Campaign 2009 Issues — And Where I Stand

NASSAU COUNTY'S FISCAL CRISIS

The Problem

Once again in 2009, Nassau County finds itself in a fiscal crisis. The County has a budget deficit of approximately $130 million. County Executive Suozzi has proposed large-scale layoffs of police officers and other important County workers, the closing County offices on some business days and the elimination of nearly every County-run park.

The County is attempting to shed itself of basic governmental responsibilities, while, at the same time, it raises your taxes yet again. Once more, Nassau taxpayers pay more to their County government, only to receive fewer services in return:

It seems never to be enough. We are already saddled with the highest property and sales taxes in the country. While the recession has contributed to the magnitude of the crisis, it is not the driving cause. Despite eight years of claims to the contrary, the Suozzi Administration has failed to address the causes underlying the County's budget woes: labor costs and excessive patronage, too much borrowing and a broken property tax assessment system. Meanwhile, our sister suburban counties, Suffolk and Westchester, dealing with the same recession, do not face yawning deficits and imminent, drastic cuts to basic services.

Scannell's Failure to Lead and Decisive Votes for Tax Increase

Legislator Joe Scannell has rubber-stamped every tax and fee increase the Suozzi Administration has asked for over the last eight years. In the last several months alone, Scannell has voted to raise property taxes by nearly four percent and to impose a sales tax on all home heating fuels, including firewood. These Suozzi-sponsored taxes each passed by a single vote. Had Scannell cast his vote with taxpayers instead of the Administration, he would have killed these new, unfair, counterproductive levies.

Toward Better Solutions

The first principle of solving the County's fiscal problems is simple: no further tax increases. In fact, the Legislature should formulate an alternative spending plan that eliminates, at the very least, the new home heating fuel sales tax.

Next, the Legislature must insist on a series of public budget hearings that go through each County department and function to determine areas for cuts and savings. In particular, the Legislature must focus on the personnel costs in each department. We need to shine a bright light on the management structure and patronage appointments in those agencies that are being told to curtail or end their core missions of providing basic government services.

Given the position in which the County finds itself, we will have to consider some emergency measures, such as the temporary closing of County offices during business hours, as well as reductions in spending on unaffordable social programs.

Importantly, the Legislature cannot continue to act as a rubber stamp for every executive branch proposal. While a new majority coalition in the Legislature should not oppose the County Executive merely to oppose him, it is key, especially in these difficult times, that the body function as a proper check on the executive in order to balance and curtail some the Administration's most onerous, excessive and unwise proposals, especially those that involve more taxes and fees while decimating services.

THE FIRST PRECINT

For nearly his entire decade in office, Legislator Scannell has promised to deliver a new facility for the Nassau County Police Department's First Precinct to the people of the Fifth Legislative District. But after spending nearly a million dollars "studying" sites for the new precinct, District resident still have no idea when and where the County will re-locate the First Precinct, and, apparently, neither does Mr. Scannell. Despite his vague promises of relocation to a part of the shopping center on Grand Avenue adjacent to Baldwin High School, no one has seen an actual plan.

It is essential that the community understand whether there is a real plan to place the precinct on Grand Avenue. How would such a placement affect the school and the traffic in that busy area? How much commercial tax revenue would we permanently forego by locating the precinct in a shopping center? How much will the relocation cost? How much is the County spending on yet another relocation study?

Moreover, the community has a right to know what role, if any, Mr. Scannell played in last year's the transfer of the precinct's commanding officer. Did Scannell seek to have the commander fired or removed and, if so, why?

In short, Mr. Scannell needs to explain himself on the First Precinct. There is no doubt that the officers of the precinct need a new home. There is no reason why it should take a decade of "study" before the County can even put a shovel in the ground on a key project such as this one.

REASSEMENT AND PROPERTY TAX CHALLENGES

Nassau County's property tax assessment system has been an embarrassment. It has produced far too many incorrect valuations and it has contributed mightily to the County's fiscal instability.

In recent years, thousands of county residents have challenged their annual reassessment, and many have won refunds. Over 80% of all of the property tax challenges in New York State come from Nassau County.

For its part, the County has lost many of the assessment challenges, forcing it to return millions of dollars in tax revenue it should not have collected in the first place. These tens of millions in refunds have wrecked havoc on the County's budget. Worst of all, the County continues to borrow money to pay the refunds, despite repeated promises by the Suozzi Administration to end whatever everyone acknowledges as a fiscally ruinous and irresponsible practice.

The County Legislature has an important role to play in fixing the system. The County now has a new Assessor, a person who, for the first time, is an appointed, rather than elected, official. It is up to the Legislature, the body approved that Mr. Suozzi's Assessor nominee, to regularly and publicly oversee his work. The Legislature must demand that the Assessor conduct his work professionally and objectively and should look to work with him to correct past problems and to reduce the number of challenges.

The Legislature most also insist that the County end the practice of borrowing to pay back property tax challenges. The Legislature should lead the way in implementing the budgetary and legal reforms that will stop the practice and bar its use in the future.

MAKING THE COMMUNITY PART OF THE SOLUTION

In these difficult times, it is essential that political leaders think creatively about effective ways to serve our communities. While we must work to ensure that government performs its basic services, and does them well, there are some things that government simply cannot do well or efficiently. We also have to look to "do more with less" and we must become less reliant on a big government looking out for every community need.

In the Fifth District, there are numerous civic and service organizations that stand ready to fill voids left by government cutbacks or failures. We must work to mobilize these organizations and enhance their profiles in the community.

For example, in Baldwin and South Hempstead, civic groups might work with the County and Sanitary District No. 2 to keep the Grand Avenue shopping corridor clean.

In Rockville Centre and Freeport, service groups such as the Lions Club and Knights of Columbus might partner with the County and village officials to provide volunteers to make possible some social services that the County would otherwise have to eliminate.

With some assistance and direction from political leaders, our communities can help themselves and help make it possible for local government to "do more with less."