{"id":3344,"date":"2010-12-06T08:45:17","date_gmt":"2010-12-06T13:45:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/?p=3344"},"modified":"2010-12-06T12:49:29","modified_gmt":"2010-12-06T17:49:29","slug":"its-time-for-straight-talk-on-unfunded-state-mandates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/2010\/12\/06\/its-time-for-straight-talk-on-unfunded-state-mandates\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s time for straight talk on unfunded state mandates"},"content":{"rendered":"

Earlier today, I posted a link to the Adirondack Daily Enterprise’s<\/a> report on Franklin County’s decision to boost property taxes by more than 20%.<\/p>\n

Board Chairman Guy “Tim” Smith (D-Fort Covington) laid the blame directly on the state’s unfunded mandates.<\/p>\n

“We did the best we could, and I know the taxpayers aren’t going to be pleased,” Smith said.<\/p>\n

Bluntly, I’m not sure I buy it anymore.\u00a0 The “unfunded mandate” argument is too easy, too convenient.<\/p>\n

So here’s what I want from county leaders, not just in Malone but in Elizabethtown and all the other county seats around the region.<\/p>\n

I want our local politicians to itemize specifically what the services are that the state is mandating, which they think should be cut in order to save the county money.<\/p>\n

Which medical services should go?\u00a0 Which housing aid?\u00a0 Which\u00a0 mental health programs?\u00a0 And how much are each of these programs costing property tax payers?<\/p>\n

Smith suggests that he could have reduced the tax increase to single digits. \u00a0 How exactly?\u00a0 If given full freedom, what would Franklin County have eliminated?<\/p>\n

School districts should do the same with their unfunded mandates.\u00a0 Tell us which ones are wasteful, or simply no longer affordable.<\/p>\n

The reason I want this clarity is that county leaders have shown little appetite for cutting even those programs which they do have freedom to downsize.<\/p>\n

Essex County flirted with an across-the-board cut of 10% to all its contracting agencies, but is now backtracking.<\/p>\n

A plan to privatize the Elizabethtown nursing home has also been shelved, even though there are no state restrictions limiting the board of supervisors’ flexibility.<\/p>\n

I’m not suggesting that mandates aren’t an issue.\u00a0 They are, by all accounts, a real concern.\u00a0 But they’ve also become a fig leaf.<\/p>\n

In future, when our local leaders cite them as a reason for breathtakingly large tax increases, we need details and specifics.<\/p>\n

If nothing else, this will give us a clearer sense of some of the changes and reforms needed in Albany.\u00a0\u00a0 We’re not going to get rid of all unfunded mandates.<\/p>\n

But if we can identify three or four big, costly (and possibly wasteful) programs, it might make a difference.<\/p>\n

I’d love to hear back in the comment section from some of our supervisors, legislators, and school board members around the region.<\/p>\n

What are some of the mandates that you think should go?\u00a0 Specifically, which ones are big enough line items that cutting them would help us shrink those swelling budgets?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Earlier today, I posted a link to the Adirondack Daily Enterprise’s report on Franklin County’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[22,10,20],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3344"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3344"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3344\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3345,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3344\/revisions\/3345"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}