City Council

November 15, 2010 CITY OF SARATOGA SPRINGS City Council Meeting Agenda 12:00 2011 Comprehensive Budget Workshop 12:00 PM CALL TO ORDER ROLL CALL SALUTE TO FLAG PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD / 15 MINUTES PRESENTATION(S) None EXECUTIVE SESSION None CONSENT AGENDA None MAYOR’S DEPARTMENT Nothing at this time ACCOUNTS DEPARTMENT Nothing at this time FINANCE DEPARTMENT Nothing at this time PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT Nothing at this time PUBLIC SAFETY Nothing at this time SUPERVISORS Nothing at this time ADJOURN City Council Meeting 11/15/10 November 15, 2010 CITY OF SARATOGA SPRINGS City Council Meeting City Council Room PRESENT: Scott Johnson, Mayor Ken Ivins, Commissioner of Finance John Franck, Commissioner of Accounts Anthony Scirocco, Commissioner of DPW Richard Wirth, Commissioner of DPS STAFF PRESENT: Shauna Sutton, Deputy Mayor Kate Jarosh, Deputy Commissioner, Finance Sharon Kellner-Chille, Deputy Commissioner, Accounts Tim Cogan, Deputy Commissioner, DPW Frank Dudla, Deputy Commissioner, DPS Joe Scala, City Attorney RECORDING OF PROCEEDING The proceedings of this meeting were taped for the benefit of the secretary. Because the minutes are not a verbatim record of the proceedings, the minutes are not a word-for-word transcript. Mayor Johnson announced the Council will speak first to advise how they see things regarding the proposed 2011 comprehensive budget. After the Council speaks, the floor will be opened for public comment. The Council will have the option to address questions from the public if they wish. Commissioner Ivins stated the sales tax figure has been updated. The final number for September will change slightly; however, it is up over last year and the year before. Sales tax will come in around $8.7 million for 2010. He is working with Council members to try to pinpoint a true projection of where we will finish for the year; he is hoping to have that for tomorrow’s Council meeting. He is hearing the community say the property tax increase being proposed is too large. Commissioner Franck stated this is his 5th budget year and this is the most difficult budget. He too has heard from people that they are upset about the 8.4% tax increase. He can’t support that increase; it is just too high. He hopes there will be a significant savings to knock that number down. He feels the Council should wait until the last possible minute to vote on the budget to be sure they have all the figures in. He looked closely at the dispatcher situation and sat with the supervisors at the County level; spoke with people on the street, and the Police Department. He does not believe it is a good idea to do away with the City dispatchers at this time. During his conversations with Marilyn Rivers and Assistant Chief Mike Biss, they both made strong arguments not to do this. This will probably happen someday, but it has to be planned out properly. If this was going to happen, he wished it would have happened last year when the dispatchers would have had a job with the County. It is his understanding that that will not happen now. He is concerned from a risk and safety standpoint, potential increase in lawsuits, and potential increase in insurance. He is open to listen to everyone’s opinion on the dispatcher situation. His department is coming to an endpoint of what they can cut. Also, there is a potential increase in County taxes if dispatched was to be moved to the County. Commissioner Scirocco stated the requests his department made this year are legitimate. Since 2008, he had 60 employees leave DPW and hired back 13 for a difference of 47 employees. He wishes risk and safety would do a study of DPW. They provide just as good of safety service in the City as the Police Page 2 of 6 City Council Meeting 11/15/10 Department. Every time there are budget cuts it is always DPW that gets cut. Eventually there won’t be anyone out there plowing the streets. They are reviewing the budget and trying to make cuts in addition to what Commissioner Ivins already cut. He is open to the public sitting with him and he would even take them in his vehicle to show them what DPW does. The City isn’t getting any smaller but the work force is. They gave back $1 million dollars to the City. The recreation fields are owned by the school district; people are already paying taxes on that, so they should step up to the plat and do something. He is not ready to support having the dispatchers go to the County. He is not ready for the Sheriff’s Department to take control of the Police Department. The taxpayers pay taxes to have a police department in the City. He is willing to work with the Council to mitigate the dispatcher situation. Commissioner Wirth stated the dispatchers perform an essential service; safety and security for all the citizens of the City. They are the link between the Fire and Police Departments. The dispatchers must identify the type of call, and location before dispatching individuals. The Finance Department has removed all funding for dispatchers from the 2011 comprehensive budget. During the early stages of the last budget, there were several meetings with the Sheriff’s Department. The Sheriff stated they cannot provide the same service the City provides. This idea should be abandoned. He is not against this type of a transition, but it has to be done over time. He is not supporting this. The potential savings of defunding the dispatchers is unknown. What do they do with the equipment purchased last year at a value of over $100,000? If the dispatch is transferred to the County, there will be an increase in response time. There will not be a person to establish a command post during a power outage, or a missing person situation. A police captain position is also in the budget to be defunded. The captain is required to work with each shift; oversee the traffic safety unit, sits on the Zone 5 Police Academy Board, oversees training classes, etc. The Department of Public Safety is expected to finish 2010 under budget. They are in the position to potentially reduce the 2011 budget request by up to $350,000 to $400,000 if the dispatcher unit and police captain are re-instated. Mayor Johnson stated since the budget was proposed, the focus has been how to provide essential services and balance it with a tax rate and tax increase. He concurs with Commissioner Ivins that many people in the community are saying 8.5% increase is too high; however, people are not coming forward with a way to reduce expenses or a way to increase revenues to offset expenses. He hopes he is speaking for the Council when he says they will not have a default budget this year. The increase of health insurance being passed on to employers and the impact of collective bargaining agreements in terms of the overall cost to the City is being faced by all communities across the country. That is why he went forward with the proposal to go to one health carrier for all; but that has not come to fruition and is being disputed by the unions. That was a significant cost reduction measure the City would have realized each year going forward. We can arrive at a solution but requires cooperation between labor and management. Part of what he is doing is reaching out to the union members and asking for them to do what is right and accept the change. It will have an impact on next year’s budget and avoid some of the less desirable cuts. We are also talking about deficits due to VLT money. They will pursue this again based upon power shifts in Albany. There is no support on the dispatch issue based on the Council’s comments so far. There are many unresolved issues such as safety to the community that prevent us from including this in the 2011 budget. An analysis by the Safety Committee raised several concerns that the Council doesn’t have answers for. One item that wasn’t noted in the budget was the proceeds from the Lillian’s lot. He believes that figure has to go back into the budget - $750,000. Either the present buyer will come through or it will be sold to a new buyer. Based upon recent discussions he has had with the present buyer, the sale will tax place in the next year. He also believes the amounts that DPW and DPW will be spending are too high. The savings for both departments combined may be as much as $1 million dollars. Something that has to be discussed is the increase sales tax; although he is not a proponent of it. If we were to raise the sales tax .5%, the projections are an additional $3 million dollars each year that we would be receiving. We don’t believe the County would take any of that additional money right now. Commissioner Ivins stated we have been fighting the VLT money issue for years by patching with one time money. We lost 10% of our revenue a couple years ago and haven’t totally addressed it and brought in that revenue. The employee costs keep going and retirement went up this year. The question is where do we cut. He could leave dispatchers in place and cut more police officers. Firemen can’t be cut as we Page 3 of 6 City Council Meeting 11/15/10 accepted the federal monies. Cutting the dispatchers would be a net savings of $500,000. He would like to take the 8.5% tax increase down to 5%. Hopefully the east and west side field maintenance being taken back by the school district will show a savings. He is still reluctant to put the sale of the Lillian’s lot in the budget. We could have some money go into the unappropriated / unreserved fund balance this year but we won’t know until April. According to the experts we should have a balance in that account of $4 - $6 million dollars. Communities around us are having tax rates considerably lower than ours. He is not willing to budget a sales tax rate increase into next year’s budget. We should seriously look at what it would take to move dispatchers to the County as it is a considerable long term savings. He would like to see the Council come up with $1.1 million dollars to bring the tax increase down below 5%. Commissioner Franck asked if any money for the school district fields was put in the budget for 2011. Commissioner Ivins stated they put $50,000 in the budget for next year. Commissioner Franck confirmed that we are keeping the same personnel and not making any cuts. Mayor Johnson stated Commissioner Ivins made a cut on the 3000 line by $70,000. Commissioner Franck stated that hasn’t changed from the comprehensive budget so we are still $50,000 in the hole. Mayor Johnson stated that is correct. Commissioner Franck stated this may cost the residents more as the school district can’t do it as efficiently as the City and we will pay it in a higher school tax. The biggest budget he has had with the last 3 budgets is the bogus revenue being put in the budget. He begged not to put the VLT money in, he begged not to put the parking revenue in, and he is in agreement with Commissioner Ivins on the parking lot because it is not recurring revenue. If the whole county raised their sales tax then it would be comfortable to go ahead with that sales tax but he would still probably disagree. He is not sure the increase in sales tax is going to get through the assembly. If it did get through, it wouldn’t be until June or July so we would only realize a half year of the increase. He would be shocked if the County gave it all to us. He talked to 4 or 5 supervisors and none have said they are going to raise the sales tax at the County level. He would take an extremely conservative amount for budgeting. He would like to do a budget where they don’t have to come back and do a mid-year adjustment. Commissioner Wirth thanked all who had positive attitude for his dispatchers. He believes the mayor has had serious talks with the buyer of the Lillian’s lot and it should be put back in the budget. They should have discussions before the end of the month on the sales tax issues. Commissioner Scirocco stated there is only 2 ways to generate revenue – property tax and sales tax. He is not opposed to looking into a .5%. He feels eventually everyone is going to come up to that point or exceed it. If this budget does go through, they are operating below the 2006 budget. His department took a look at everyone’s budget. His department and the Mayor’s Department are the only ones that are back to the 2005 – 2006 level. He wouldn’t be opposed to the sales tax increase if it would help the City. Commissioner Franck stated sales tax was a bit higher a few years back. We were over 7% a couple years back and then got out of it. Mayor Johnson stated the $3 million dollar projection is based upon an increase of .5% sales tax increase. PUBLIC COMENT Al Callucci of 9 Lexington Road stated a great percentage of our sales tax is taken in during the peak season. He is a supporter of an increase in sales tax. He has been an advocate for a fair budget and fiscal control. He has been tracking the quarterly reports as they are real numbers. Public Works reduced Page 4 of 6 City Council Meeting 11/15/10 their amount of spending in the second quarter. In the 3rd quarter Public Works was 65% of budget. That was a 20% of spending of the budget in the peak 3 seasons of the year. He can’t understand why there would be less spending in the 3rd quarter than the first 2 quarters of the year. It appears, according to the trend, DPW would be 10% under their projected budget for this year. Public Safety is going to run about the same. To not take that money and apply to next year’s budget and put it in reserve is not fair to the tax payers and employees of the City. He doesn’t understand how we can be looking at anything other than 2 or 3%. A public/private partnership for parking would generate revenue. Commissioner Ivins stated part of the equation of not knowing where we are going to end the year is due to comp time. A number of employees wait until the end of the year to cash out comp time. Mr. Callucci stated comp time only applies to DPS. DPW is take it or leave it. Commissioner Ivins stated City Hall has comp time as well. Peter Martin of 101 Bryan Street stated Commissioner Scirocco identified additional savings but didn’t say how much. In terms of making this a meaningful process, he would ask that the reports of the additional savings be made available to the public on the web site as soon as possible. He asked the Council if there are any additions that can be made to the unappropriated/unreserved funds to allow them sit in that fund. This fund has an impact on our bonding rate. We need to build back up those funds. A comment was made that we are trying to patch for the loss of the VLT funds. A majority of the funds that were received from VLTS was used to build up the reserve fund. In regards to the increase of sales tax; if we increased it in the City only, our merchants will be affected and will hurt our downtown. It would be imprudent to budget for any of those sales tax revenues in the 2011 budget. Kyle York of 59 Railroad Place stated he agrees that the property tax is too large. He stated 81% of our money is going to union benefits. People understand a sense of urgency and let us see the dispatch savings realized. With increased capacity of technology, the dispatch plan allows for better communication. He can’t believe our officers on patrol wouldn’t be able to speak in real time. He also believes personal responsibility keeps us all safe – see something, say something. In April we had the plan to go to one health carrier. How do we get to the point where the 81% dictates we will not get the savings? May the unions reach back here for that big 81%? In regards to the parking lot, he knows there is a realistic alternative for the Lillian’s parking lot. The money can be made real as one time money and it does belong back in the budget. Nancy Goldberg of 66 Sarazen Street stated it is fine to sit in the City between West Avenue and Lake Avenue. She is speaking for the people who live east of the Northway. It takes 9 – 20 minutes to get out there. The dispatchers know the City and work quickly. She thanked all who supported keeping the dispatchers here. In addition, we have a consolidated school district and we are not saving any money. John Krause of 227 Grand Avenue urged the Council to keep pressing on the single health carrier. He asked if anyone validated if the retirement payment is correct or if the payments can be stretched out. He is concerned that we don’t know if we are getting the right amount of sales tax from the state. He believes there will be unspent money at the end of the year. You have to find a way to find out the amount well before April of the following year. Robert Strauss of 40 Thoroughbred Drive stated there is a New York law prohibiting people from using cell phones while driving. That law is not being enforced in this City. It would generate income through the fines. Mark Lawton of 209 Nelson Avenue stated he has never seen such inadequate information for the public. We are in for a major restructuring in this economy. The mayor did a good job trying to consolidate the health carriers in the City. You have to think about what Saratoga Springs is suppose to be at the end of a balanced budget. The budget process in the Charter is not broken, it just isn’t being implemented. He can’t offer any cuts because he doesn’t have any information. Page 5 of 6 City Council Meeting 11/15/10 CALL TO ORDER Mayor Johnson called the meeting to order at 2:07 p.m. PUBLIC COMENT Mayor Johnson opened the public comment period at 2:08 p.m. Mayor Johnson said the public comment period is limited to a total of 15 minutes and individuals are limited to two minutes each according to the rules approved in February of 2004 by the City Council. No one spoke. Mayor Johnson closed the public comment period at 2:09 p.m. CONSENT AGENDA None MAYOR’S DEPARTMENT Mayor Johnson announced he has nothing on his agenda at this time. ACCOUNTS DEPARTMENT Commissioner Franck announced he has nothing on his agenda at this time. FINANCE DEPARTMENT Commissioner Ivins announced he has nothing on his agenda at this time. PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT Commissioner Scirocco announced he has nothing on his agenda at this time. PUBLIC SAFETY DEPARTMENT Commissioner Wirth announced he has nothing on his agenda at this time. ADJOURNMENT Mayor Johnson moved and Commissioner Ivins seconded to adjourn the meeting. Ayes – All There being no further business, Mayor Johnson adjourned the meeting at 2:10 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Lisa Ribis Clerk Approved: 12/7/10 Vote: 5 - 0 Page 6 of 6