This article appeared in todays Journal News. Highlights the need for the town to continue to tighten up on spending. Reduced sales tax revenue, mortgage tax revenue are hurting all governments. In addition - we have had a number of snow or ice clearing days during weekends in recent weeks (including today). Our highway crews get double time for work on Sundays and holidays... We are not going to cut snow removal services---this is an essential service. As soon as the police advise public works of slippery road conditions we send out the crews to start sanding/clearing the roads.
Westchester cities see revenue slump
By Keith Eddings
The Journal News • January 18, 2009
WHITE PLAINS - Local sales tax collections dropped as much as 4 percent in Yonkers, Mount Vernon and New Rochelle in September, October and November - the run-up to the holiday shopping season that is as critical to city halls as it is to Main Streets - while collections in White Plains were flat, despite a recent quarter-cent increase in that city's sales tax, state figures show.
Adding to the local budget woes, mortgage recording tax collections also dropped as home prices plunged along with the number of sales, which also depressed real estate transfer fees for the localities that collect them.
Deepening the local budget woes, building fees also dropped as projects were shelved.
But the declining sales tax collections are hurting the most and reaching the furthest, affecting every school district and municipality in Westchester County. None of the districts, towns or villages levy their own sales taxes, as do the big four cities, but the county provides them with a cut of the 3 percent sales tax it collects in their jurisdictions.
The county's fourth-quarter sales-tax revenues were down $9.8 million to $108.4 million, a decline that will ripple through school districts and local governments as they begin getting their piece of the disbursement from the county on Feb. 2. The sales tax checks from the county will total $23.3 million for the quarter, down $2.1 million, or 8 percent, from the year before, said Donna Greene, a spokeswoman for County Executive Andrew Spano.
The sales tax revenues make up only a modest portion of most school district budgets, but the revenue is far more critical for local governments. The revenue provides about a third of White Plains' $161 million annual budget - making it the city most dependent on sales taxes in the state - so it has the most to lose.
The city in July increased the local portion of the sales tax a quarter-point, to 2.25 percent, which allowed sales-tax collections in September, October and November to hold steady at $11.9 million. Without the increase, collections would have dropped about $1.3 million, city Finance Commissioner Gina Harwood said.
Mayor Joseph Delfino began battening down the hatches last month, directing department heads to cut their spending this year as much as 7 percent, which could save $11.3 million. About 40 part-time workers have lost their jobs, the Youth Bureau is closing an hour early, thermostats in city buildings have been turned down 2 degrees, the library cut staffing and book purchases, and the Common Council is expected to delay or cancel the purchase of $1 million worth of new vehicles.
"It may sound trite or seem of little significance, but I ask all employees to be more aware in general of energy savings by shutting off lights and appliances in rooms that are not being used," Delfino wrote in a memo to department heads, illustrating how deep he is digging.
In Yonkers, sales taxes slumped $600,000 in the three-month period, to $14.7 million, which, along with even steeper drops in mortgage and real estate transfer taxes, caused Mayor Phil Amicone to dump 150 workers from the city payroll. Most were brought back after unions made concessions, such as working days without pay and giving up raises.
Mayoral aide David Simpson said Amicone is hopeful about 2009 but is bracing for the worst.
"It had been a fluid situation, but it's coming in at an increasingly disconcerting trend," Simpson said of city revenues. "That's the problem with the way the economy is moving right now. It's hard to put a number up on the wall, throw a dart and hit it."
Sales taxes provide $61 million of Yonkers' $892 million budget, which also funds city schools.
In New Rochelle, preliminary numbers from the state show sales taxes dropped 15.3 percent during the three-month period, to $5.3 million, although Mayor Noam Bramson said the drop is not so dire because a major taxpayer, whom he would not identify, has not yet reported its collections for the period. The City Council adopted its budget for the new year in December, when it had a close-up view of the looming recession that cities which adopted budgets earlier did not.
Sales tax projections were trimmed $100,000 in the new budget, but Bramson said that may not have been enough. Among other things, a hiring freeze has been put in place and the purchase of $500,000 worth of new vehicles has been canceled.
Mount Vernon, the poorest of the big cities, may be weathering the storm best. Sales tax collections held steady at $4.3 million over the three-month period.
