Posted on 08/16/2004 7:33:44 AM PDT by The Mayor
| New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com |
| Albany's budgetary fairy tales
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno succeeded primarily in delaying hard, unavoidable choices when their members approved - unread and unexplained - bills that authorized $101.3 billion in spending. Then, the bunch collected the paychecks that have been withheld since they failed to meet the April 1 budget deadline and dumped the mess in Gov. Pataki's lap. Pataki is threatening vetoes, accusing Silver and Bruno of larding on spending and refusing to cut costs. By his lights, the Legislature's fiscal plan is likely out of balance and will boost already considerable deficits in coming years. He's probably right, but the governor's posture as the guarantor of fiscal probity is laughable. He failed to lead Silver and Bruno to the fiscal restraint that New York desperately needs, and he has presided over spending that has surged far faster than the rate of inflation. Over the past four budgets, state outlays grew at an average annual rate of 7.5%, from $73.3 billion to $95.5 billion. Pataki would boost that an additional 4.5%, while the Legislature has gone all the way to approving a 6.1% hike. With inflation running at 2.5%, no wonder the state faces huge budget gaps and New Yorkers bear the nation's highest tax burden. Pataki's vetoes, if and when they come, will only nip at such profligacy. Cutting $50 million here and $50 million there will not cure Albany's addiction to lavish outlays on programs such as Medicaid and politically beneficial luxuries such as top-drawer pensions for public workers. They will do nothing, in other words, to bring New York taxing and spending into line with real-life economics. For the moment, pending Pataki's veto decisions, the Legislature's midnight-express action has given New York City and other localities a sense of where they stand. For the city, the solons approved Mayor Bloomberg's plan for $400 property tax rebates, allocated $300 million for the schools, passed a critical bond financing scheme and agreed to assume local costs for one Medicaid program. But at the same time, they grabbed $233 million from your pockets by extending the sales tax on purchases of clothing costing $110 or less. All this, depressingly, is par for the course, but 2004 is a different year. The courts will soon tell Pataki, Silver and Bruno how many more billions of dollars they must devote to the city's schools. The bill will be enormous, but the three officials have made no plans for paying it. Which is why the so-called budget is as fantastic as "The Lord of the Rings," and why Pataki's proposal was not much better. Drama queens Negotiations between City Hall and the police and firefighters unions have become heated. Union leaders are hinting at wildcat strikes during the Republican convention and hurling "we know where you live" taunts at the mayor and his staff. It all makes for lousy negotiations and good theater, most of which is being staged by labor bosses for the benefit of the only audience that counts for them. They've got to appear tough for their members or they're out of their cushy jobs. Mayor Bloomberg is trying to get cops and firefighters to follow the pattern set by his pact with District Council 37, the largest municipal labor union. Those workers will get a $1,000 signing bonus, 5% raises over three years and bigger increases tied to gains in productivity. Patrolmen's Benevolent Association chief Patrick Lynch and Uniformed Firefighters Association head Stephen Cassidy call those numbers insulting. What they rarely say is that Bloomberg has given the cops and firefighters the opportunity for raises of as much as 9.18% and offered a half-dozen ways to get the money. Each entails productivity savings that would make pay hikes of that magnitude affordable for a city whose budget is held together by safety pins. The PBA has helpfully posted Bloomberg's offers on its Web site (www.nycpba.org), but Lynch and Cassidy haven't countered with their own proposals. They'd rather rail against Bloomberg, go to arbitration and blame the arbitrator if they lose. In other words, they're generating a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing. You can e-mail the Daily News editors at voicers@edit.nydailynews.com. Please include your full name, address and phone number. The Daily News reserves the right to edit letters. The shorter the letter, the better the chance it will be used. |
Medicaid costs paid for by taxpayers in this state are abominable. Property taxes fund what is essentially a socialized medical program for those who do not work.
Medical care for the unemployed and others is better than the insurance that most working people can afford.
| Upstate bears bigger tax burden, study finds Albany -- Business Council's institute says Medicaid, large local government work force cost taxpayers |
| By ERIN DUGGAN, Capitol bureau First published: Tuesday, August 17, 2004 |
| Upstate New Yorkers pay higher than average taxes -- sometimes several times more than residents of other states -- because of Medicaid, state mandates and unusually large local government payrolls, according to a study released Monday. The Public Policy Institute of New York State, the research arm of the Business Council, found upstate New Yorkers pay up to $6 billion a year for a variety of extra taxes, from property tax to sales tax. That's due in part to a $4 billion annual cost for 93,500 more local government employees than the national per capita average would warrant.
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"Local officials are under a great deal of political pressure to hire people and create jobs, in part because of the decline of the economy of upstate New York," said David Shaffer, president of the Public Policy Institute.
The institute looked at data from 2000 and 2001, using census figures and numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The report did not offer a breakdown of what fields could be overstaffed but did find repetition in government jobs.
"It's very unusual in a large state to have the degree of overlap we have," Shaffer said.
The larger payrolls mean higher property taxes.
The national property tax average per capita is $806. Statewide in New York, property tax averages $1,382, and upstate that figure dips to $1,261.
But New York state, where the average Manhattan apartment sells for $1 million, is also home to some above-average real estate costs, which drive up property taxes. The difference in housing prices between New York and an "average" state was not addressed in the eight-page report.
The study also addressed local Medicaid spending, long held to blame for soaring county property taxes. New York has the most expensive Medicaid program in the country and services 3.7 million New Yorkers. Estimates for next year's Medicaid costs have gone above $40 billion for the Empire State, and none of the major reforms proposed by Gov. George Pataki have been adopted.
Local government officials have been pushing state lawmakers to take back the responsibility for funding the medical program for the poor. The state will take over one program, Family Health Plus, but no agreement was reached this legislative session on a variety of other Medicaid-related issues.
The report recommends making cuts to the program but not giving it back to the state. Local lawmakers strongly disagreed because the state mandates coverage but leaves it to the counties to implement and fund the bulk of the program.
"The state certainly could find defects in the program if they tried, but they have not," said Albany County Executive Michael Breslin. "If the state took it over, they would have more incentive to address the inefficiencies. Everyone knows that there are long-term illnesses that are not being managed properly, because they don't have the incentive to do so."
In Saratoga County, for example, Medicaid costs the county $27 million a year, more than 80 percent of the $32 million collected in property taxes each year. Its social services department also employs more than 100 people, in large part to do work mandated by the state.
"Almost all the counties are left doing only mandated services," said County Administrator David Wickerham. "Once they finish mandated services, there are no funds to do anything else."
Comparing New York's government work force to other states' is not a true indicator of its effectiveness, Wickerham continued, because many jobs done by state workers in other states are done -- and paid for -- at the local level in New York.
Cutting mandates also is difficult because they encompass many popular programs in a range of areas from the environment to health, noted Assemblyman Ron Canestrari, D-Cohoes. "One person's mandate is another person's great program," he said.
Duplication of local services is something state lawmakers have tried to address, said Canestrari, but they have had little success.
When approached to consider consolidation, local governments were hesitant.
"We ran into a lot of resistance," Canestrari said. "What it comes down to is, people want local control. And there's a cost to that."
You are exactly right.
As you know I lost my job almost a year ago,
Mrs mayor got us covered with insurance,
we all have new glasses, dental work, and
medical care.
I could never afford to pay for this type of insurance.
Thanks for posting that, I heard it on the radio this morning and was going to find it tonight.
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