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Supes won’t receive raises this year
By John Mason
Hudson-Catskill Newspapers
COLUMBIA COUNTY — A proposed law giving all county supervisors 14 percent raises in 2009 bit the dust Wednesday.
In withdrawing the law from consideration at the full Board of Supervisors meeting, Chairman Art Baer, R-Hillsdale, said it was a cost-saving move in reaction to two recent pieces of information, the denial of federal aid to reimburse the county for expenses incurred during the December ice storm, and the news that fourth-quarter sales tax receipts are down $1 million from a year ago.
The local law also includes raises for all county appointed officials, which Baer said the board will honor. These are traditionally based on the cost-of-living increases paid to the county’s unionized employees.
The law will be reintroduced at the February board meeting, with the raises for the supervisors removed.
As it was, it would have raised each supervisor’s pay from $14,000 to $16,000, except for the chairman’s, which would have risen to $40,000 from $35,000; and the deputy chairs and majority and minority leaders’, which would have gone from $17,000 to $19,500.
On Jan. 12, the county received a copy of a letter from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to Gov. David A. Paterson informing him that the state’s request for major disaster declaration, which would have meant $26 million in aid for damages due to the Dec. 11 ice storm, was denied.
“This has a $2.2 million impact on the county,” Baer said. The state is appealing the decision. “We’re talking about economic stimulus packages for upstate New York, and we can’t even get emergency disaster relief.”
He said he had been optimistic, based on what FEMA representatives had told him and on the fact that Massachusetts’ application had been approved two weeks earlier.
The next bit of bad news was the drop in sales tax revenue by $1 million from fourth-quarter 2007-2008 to fourth-quarter 2008-2009, making it the second-lowest quarter in five years.
“That’s concerning to me,” Baer said. “We projected it would be down 10 percent in 2009, but the fourth quarter was down 13 percent.”
If that trend continued, it would be a 3-percent drop, or $1 million, for the year, he said.
The board also continued until next month a proposed local law establishing a second alternate conflict defender. Baer said he’d like more input from the Legal Committee.
In other actions, the board:
n Appointed Planning and Economic Development Director Ken Flood and Office for the Aging Director Kary Jablonka to the county Workforce Investment Board.
n Clarified that Howard Henward had been appointed to the county Planning Board, representing Hillsdale, Copake and Ancram, from 2009 to 2011. In a previous resolution, his first name was incorrect.
n Appointed John Florio Jr. to the Planning Board, representing Stockport and Greenport, through 2011.
n Agreed to request the state Legislature to allow it to extend the county’s authority to impose an additional 1 percent sales and compensatory use tax through 2011. The tax law authorizes a county tax of 3 percent; this raises it to 4 percent.
n Agreed to ask the state Legislature to allow the county to impose on deed transfers an additional $1 tax for each $500 of value in property sales, with the first $150,000 of a single-family residence exempt.
COLUMBIA COUNTY — A proposed law giving all county supervisors 14 percent raises in 2009 bit the dust Wednesday.
In withdrawing the law from consideration at the full Board of Supervisors meeting, Chairman Art Baer, R-Hillsdale, said it was a cost-saving move in reaction to two recent pieces of information, the denial of federal aid to reimburse the county for expenses incurred during the December ice storm, and the news that fourth-quarter sales tax receipts are down $1 million from a year ago.
The local law also includes raises for all county appointed officials, which Baer said the board will honor. These are traditionally based on the cost-of-living increases paid to the county’s unionized employees.
The law will be reintroduced at the February board meeting, with the raises for the supervisors removed.
As it was, it would have raised each supervisor’s pay from $14,000 to $16,000, except for the chairman’s, which would have risen to $40,000 from $35,000; and the deputy chairs and majority and minority leaders’, which would have gone from $17,000 to $19,500.
On Jan. 12, the county received a copy of a letter from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to Gov. David A. Paterson informing him that the state’s request for major disaster declaration, which would have meant $26 million in aid for damages due to the Dec. 11 ice storm, was denied.
“This has a $2.2 million impact on the county,” Baer said. The state is appealing the decision. “We’re talking about economic stimulus packages for upstate New York, and we can’t even get emergency disaster relief.”
He said he had been optimistic, based on what FEMA representatives had told him and on the fact that Massachusetts’ application had been approved two weeks earlier.
The next bit of bad news was the drop in sales tax revenue by $1 million from fourth-quarter 2007-2008 to fourth-quarter 2008-2009, making it the second-lowest quarter in five years.
“That’s concerning to me,” Baer said. “We projected it would be down 10 percent in 2009, but the fourth quarter was down 13 percent.”
If that trend continued, it would be a 3-percent drop, or $1 million, for the year, he said.
The board also continued until next month a proposed local law establishing a second alternate conflict defender. Baer said he’d like more input from the Legal Committee.
In other actions, the board:
n Appointed Planning and Economic Development Director Ken Flood and Office for the Aging Director Kary Jablonka to the county Workforce Investment Board.
n Clarified that Howard Henward had been appointed to the county Planning Board, representing Hillsdale, Copake and Ancram, from 2009 to 2011. In a previous resolution, his first name was incorrect.
n Appointed John Florio Jr. to the Planning Board, representing Stockport and Greenport, through 2011.
n Agreed to request the state Legislature to allow it to extend the county’s authority to impose an additional 1 percent sales and compensatory use tax through 2011. The tax law authorizes a county tax of 3 percent; this raises it to 4 percent.
n Agreed to ask the state Legislature to allow the county to impose on deed transfers an additional $1 tax for each $500 of value in property sales, with the first $150,000 of a single-family residence exempt.
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