The Capital Post

With a 26.4% Schodack property tax in mind, what did the Town Board do that would affect our taxes?

I could find nothing that addressed the issue specifically or had the goal of reducing or limiting spending increases.

There were several resolutions that increased spending, most notably the three that authorized town personnel to attend training and technical conferences. These totaled $2,462.00 plus appropriate lodging, food, and expenses. I don’t know if these were absolutely necessary but it seems they are excessive in a time of austerity. The Town Board also authorized three staff accountants for a total yearly expense of $133,160 plus benefits, plus lifetime retirement benefits. There will now be two full time accountants and one part time accountant. Are they all necessary and what will they do? To me it seems excessive for the size of our budget. I also think that, once they are on staff, they could provide analytical and budgeting services to the various planning committees that the town has authorized, such as the library and long term planning committees.

The first was that the Schodack Town Board did not pass (it was pulled), the resolution to approve a mass assembly permit for Herbert’s at Birch Hill to host the SUNY Albany Parkfest festival. I agree with the Town Board’s action. Not one person spoke in favor of it and about a dozen spoke against it. It seems that Birch Hill’s applications were not complete and were filed late. It also appears that in the past the large general attendance functions at Birch Hill have gotten out of hand. Birch Hill is on a dead end narrow road and is on 60 acres. While they can handle targeted gatherings of 3 – 4,000 people, a large general admission gathering of 8,000 or more is beyond the ability of their facility to handle.

The second was that all planning board and zoning board of appeals members must complete a minimum of four hours of training each year. Although they are not strongly held, my feelings are that this will “professionalize” these boards and will make them less community based and community responsive. Training, by definition, implies a certain way of looking at things, not necessarily better for the Schodack community. I imagine there will also be expenses involved that the town will have to pay for and the newly professionalized board members in the future will demand compensation for their services.

At the March 22, 2007 Schodack Town Board meeting the board passed by a vote of 3 to 1 a dog leash law. The law basically states that if a dog is not on your property it must be on a leash.

My thoughts on the law are this. Seven years ago I was against a leash law, believing that such a law would change the character of Schodack, but have since come to the conclusion the character has already changed. The character had been rural where occasional free running dogs were part of the fabric similar to other wild animals, some occasionally dangerous. The mind set was different in that a dog was seen as protection and companionship in a more remote rural setting and roads were viewed as a way to get from one place to another rather than a place that is the activity itself, as in walking and jogging. As Schodack became a bedroom community a leash law was inevitable.

The leash law doesn’t directly raise taxes but does show why as population grows taxes go up. In the past people would complain and put up with an occasional bothersome dog, knowing that the town officials would not help, hence no expense to the taxpayers. Now with an enforceable law the town will be have to enforce it. That means more dog control enforcement expenses, more police, more dog wardens, and more court cases. That is more town spending and more taxes. At the meeting one resident raised the issue of the need for a town dog park now that dogs can no longer freely run and get exercise. A town dog park would be expensive and need more tax revenue but clearly demonstrates how population growth demands more services. . Also heard was that the town roads are narrow and dangerous to walk on. Watch for a trend developing for more pedestrian friendly roads with walkable shoulders, sidewalks, and hiking trails. They all require spending and more taxes.

In the new Schodack leash law was also a provision to prohibit dogs from barking. Barking dogs are a separate issue and have absolutely nothing to do with a leash law and should have been considered, not in the leash law, but in some type of greater noise ordinance.

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Dear Congressman,

There has been reported some discussion in Congress about the possibility of the federal government bailing out homeowners in mortgage trouble because they are not longer able to make their payments once their variable rate mortgages increased.

Please do nothing to help them. Let the market work its course. To help them is a slap in the face of all taxpayers that are prudent with their finances and an egregious expense to them.

If you do anything, hold accountable those that loaned money to borrowers clearly unable to repay the loans, and the financial institutions and their executive and legislative overseers that allowed trickery and predatory practices into the mortgage business.

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I have to correct myself. I have been using 19.9% as the tax increase from 2006 to 2007. This is wrong. The actual rate increase is 26.3%. Here are the Town of Schodack tax rates per $1000 assessed value for the last 10 years.

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This is written in the context of the 26.3% January 2007 Schodack Town property tax increase. Clearly the magnitude of the tax increase and the real pain it causes residents has not yet sunk in.

On the agenda was a defensive discussion of the purchase of the new Schodack Town hall, which still mislead the true purchase cost. The supervisor claims $1.4 million as the cost, but neglects to add the $384,000 spent on renovations and the monthly rent spent since the old town hall was vacated. She also plays down the significant increase in operating costs. There was a public hearing on proposed changes in the water district for Clearview – Van Hoesen Road – Maple Crest residents. After all was said and done it seems that the Van Hoesen Road folk are happy with their water and that to help Maple Crest the water does not need to be routed down Van Hoesen Road. Not doing so would prevent a large expense to the Van Hoesen Road residents.

There were additional cost overruns at the new Schodack Town garage. It seems that neglected to be put in during design and construction was a 240 volt electric line to power the kitchen stove. $825.00 will now have to be spent to do so. No one was held accountable for this oversight. On a larger note there is still question about the viability of the garage floor which is concrete with radiant heat piping embedded. Councilman Stinner raised the question of whether the sealant on the floor is sufficient to protect the concrete from the corrosive effects of the salt and water that the trucks bring in. He pointed out the heavy epoxy sealant that the firehouse uses on their floor. To retroactively install this heavier sealant now would add considerable more expense than if it had been done during the initial construction. Again no one was held accountable. However as these design defects in the town garage and other areas such as water district planning become apparent, one may start questioning the judgement of the project engineer that the town hired. I’m still not convinced that the cracks discovered in the concrete floor will not cause us problems in the future, after the current town board no longer governs.

The town board also approved the retention of an outside CPA firm to assist the town on complex accounting issues. It seems that with the retirement of the Town Comptroller we will be losing institutional memory and need the services of an employee of the CPA firm to help us remember. I guess maybe the transition from the old comptroller to the new comptroller could have been better handled and perhaps the records could have been kept better.

The town board also approved for eligible employees the application of unused sick time toward additional retirement benefits. Huh? I thought that sick time was to be used in case the employee was sick and was not be misused. Although the supervisor stated that this would cost $1,500.00 per year, I am unsure what the long term costs actually will be. Keep in mind that the Town employees already have much better retirement benefits and working conditions than most private sector employees. What did we get from the union in exchange for this new benefit?

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Since the 26.3% January 2007 Town of Schodack property tax increase I have begun attending Schodack town board meetings to determine why. I have concluded that the Schodack town board practices excessive fact spin, uses half-truths, and generally misleads the public and the press. Several examples from the March 8, 2007 Schodack town board meeting.

1. The supervisor cites $1.4 million as the purchase price of the new town hall. She does not include the $384,000 that was spent to refurbish the building before occupancy. The actual price is closer to $1.8 million, which should have been the price used to compare alternatives. Add to this the rent spent on the new building when we could have stayed in the old town hall until the purchase was concluded and you get the true cost of new occupancy.

2. The March 8, 2007 agenda was not posted on the Schodack town web site. However, on the agenda was a question and answer session on the purchase of the Town Hall. A resident, who at the previous meeting had asked many questions about the purchase that the supervisor was unable to answer, was not present. Possibly he did not know about this agenda item. Present were, however, three other residents that strongly spoke in favor of the purchase. Interesting was that they left shortly after and did not stay for any other part of the meeting. Might they have been invited to attend to gain favorable press coverage?

3. At the March 8, 2007 meeting was a public hearing on water system improvements to the Maple Crest development. Maple Crest has had water problems since its inception and for many years the town board has sought ways to fix them. A not distant water district, Clearview Heights, has abundant water. The latest proposed fix was to run a pipeline from Cearview down Van Hoesen Road then somewhere up Waterworks Road to tie in to Maple Crest at Meadow Lane. Along the way they were to tie in to a water district to the west which currently gets its water from Castleton. Sound good except that this plan would not have fixed Maple Crest’s water problems. It seems that the section farthest from Meadow Lane would still have had low pressure. At the previous meeting this was pointed out to the engineer. At the March 8 meeting during the public hearing he tangentially pointed out that there was an alternate plan to route water directly from Clearview to Maple Crest, eliminating the need to go up Van Hoesen Road. The Van Hoesen Road folk spoke that they had good well water and some had it regularly tested and felt that they didn’t need public water. The supervisor explained that the Van Hoesen Road area was targeted by the Rensselaer County as an area with bad water. Many residents then questioned this, explaining that they had never been contacted by anyone from the County and wondered how that conclusion was reached. Was there some other motive for this convoluted, possibly unnecessary, water plan?

4. Open government requires public input to the maximum extent possible. There are two ways to obtain public approval for capital outlays. One is to have a public vote. The town board explains the needs and the costs and then the public votes to approve or disapprove. The other is for the town board to approve the project subject to a permissive referendum. A permissive referendum is where after the board approves the project the public has 30 days to gather petitions to force a public vote. 30 days is not much time and much of the public is not aware of town board actions until much later. The town board have opted to purchase the Schodack town hall by resolution, subject to permissive referendum, and and the agenda was a resolution to approve, but pulled before the vote, the changes to the Clearview – Van Hoesen – Maple Crest water district by resolution, subject to permissive referendum. This is plain wrong and should be stopped.

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Recently there was a letter in the Independent criticizing Schodack’s new cell phone policy. The writer raised some excellent issues that had not occurred to me. His main point was that the Schodack Town Board turned a requested $440 to reimburse an employee for a damaged personal phone into a yearly recurring multi-thousand dollar expense.

The town will now buy and supply cell phones to all the employees that are deemed to require cell phones while on duty. This would include police, highway department supervisors, building inspectors, etc. I imagine the total number would be at least 10 that at $40.00 per month would equal a minimum of $4,800 per year, probably much more. In addition the employees are prohibited from using the town issued phones for personal calls. Additional time will be required in the controller’s office to review each bill to assure no private calls were placed. This will also mean that employees with town issued cell phones would actually be carrying two – the town issued one and their personal one and they would have to make sure they use the correct one. Police officers in addition will have to carry, or keep available in their cruiser, their police radio.

As the Independent writer summarizes, a better, more efficient, and less costly policy would be for the town to reimburse town employees for business use of their personal phone either for calls made or by a monthly cell phone allowance. This is another example of how the Schodack Town Board is wasting tax payers money and has still not reined in excessive spending given the 19.9% tax increase last year.

Spend $510.00 for highway signs to commemorate Maple Hill High School soccer championship. They should stop this nonsense and if they wanted to honor the soccer team, or the wrestling team, which also was suggested, a resolution of commendation would be appropriate. This is how they honor boy scouts that make Eagle Scout rank. It costs the taxpayers nothing.

Spend $3000.00 for title search on a development road that was supposedly deeded to Schodack several years ago but no one recalls the details. This was during the tenure of attorney Langlois as the planning board attorney dating it to the early part of this decade. The attorney, the planning board members and the director of planning (I believe now retired) should be called to account for this derelication of job duty. There is more to this, as the road which serves 8 houses is not up to town standards and there is not enough money in road’s escrow fund to make it so. The town should have nothing to do with this road until the developer pays all the expenses to bring it up to town standards and pays all expenses to properly deed the road to the town.

Spend $70 per month ($840 every year) for internet access at the Schodack transfer station. (This was actually on the 02/08/07 resolution list, but tonight the transfer station manager was there to explain his need for internet access).

I haven't looked too closely at the last two budgets to know precisely why taxes have gone up. I suspect it is mostly because of bad fiscal planning and management. We had three major capital projects - police station, town garage, town hall - all with capital expenses and cost overruns. It also appears that town also doesn't control small expenses as well as in the past, as evidenced by the steep climb in payroll and benefits. Some catch up from the early parts of the decade may also be in play.

Regarding the Town Hall, what strikes me is how totally inefficient its layout is and how wasteful of space and energy it is. It makes no sense to have a three story building with an elevator for the amount of employees working there. It seems that everyone is now compartmentalized with less daily interaction unless work time is wasted for that interaction. Regardless of what Supervisor Secor says, I have to believe that a new Town Hall could have been built for less than what we paid for this one and with a more efficient layout, designed to our needs. This new town hall must be considerably more costly to operate than the old one.

In the short run residential development should help the tax base and keep town taxes low (as opposed to school taxes) as the increased property value goes quickly on the tax rolls but there is a long lag before the increased demand for more services. Commercial development is similar and regardless of the tax breaks given (unless 100%), there is an immediate increase in local tax base but to long term detriment. The lowest property taxes are in rural areas with neither residential nor commercial development.

Regarding water and sewer development, although the water and sewer districts are supposed to pay for them, there is now an attitude that these developments benefit the town as a whole and their costs are now creeping into the general town expenses.

The merits of tax breaks to lure commercial development have huge macro and regional implications and I am against them, but they have appeal to policy makers because of their short term political impact.

President Bush's recent proposal to tax employer paid health premiums while allowing a deduction for the payment on personal taxes has some merit and should not be quickly dismissed. My reason to not dismiss it is that it is an opening to break the connection between employment and health insurance. Quite simply health insurance should in no way be tied to employment. I understand that for most low income uninsured people, the 15% tax break would not afford them the means to buy insurance and that private, competitively priced insurance is not readily available. However, employer based health insurance has major problems that are just wrong.

7. An individual either cannot buy health insurance or cannot buy at the premium price that even the smallest employer can buy. This may be a state issue but I believe that any insurance company selling health insurance must offer that plan at the same price to all residents without regard to their employment status.

9. An employee over age 65, in good standing, if working in a company with less than 20, must have Medicare the prime insurer, but if over 20, then the employer’s insurance is prime.

The president’s plan has a lot of flaws and will do little to help the uninsured but the problems with employer based health insurance are many and need to be address. The president is probably also lying about his true intentions. Personally I favor a Medicare type system for all.

I recently paid my January 2007 Town of Schodack property tax bill. What a shocker! The Schodack Town tax rate went up 26.3% from the 2006 bill. From 8.686982 to 10.979670 per $1000 assessed valuation. I thought this must be a fluke but I checked back over the last couple years and saw that the 2002 bill the rate was 6.347611. Wow, in five years the Schodack Town tax rate went up 72.9%. Who can afford this? How did this happen?

I attended a few Schodack Town Board meetings to see if I could find out what went wrong. I haven’t reviewed the budget so can only go by what I saw. It seems that Schodack has gone on a capital spending binge. We have a new police station, a new town garage, and a new town hall. While all three may have been needed it seems that we have bought the top of the line.

The town garage is state of the art and widely admired and envied by the other towns, with visitors coming from far and wide to view it. The cost overruns were excessive, almost double, from the initial budget, with additional spending still being requested. At the last meeting a request was made for several thousand dollars for an intercom system that was left out of the original spec and a change order costing several thousand dollars on a plumbing system.

The new town hall is totally too large and too inefficiently laid out. There are three floors with a small lobby on each and an elevator connecting them. The employees must spend lots of time moving between the floors and interdepartmental coverage is now more difficult. The building also has lots of dead space corners, all of which require heating and lighting. I have to believe we could have razed the old town hall and built a new one story replacement, efficiently designed for our needs, for considerably less than the cost present town hall. Recurring operating costs would have been significantly less. Perhaps it even could have been linked to the police station, which is on neighboring land owned by the Town, as was originally envisaged. Maybe we should not finalize the purchase of the current town hall, as it is a lease to buy arrangement. Perhaps we would be better even if we did take the loss.

I also noted at the town board meeting that the tax increases are not a great concern to the board members. As a previous board member said, and I paraphrase “If you can’t afford the taxes perhaps you shouldn’t live in Schodack".