Village, Town at Intersection:

When Hudson Falls resident Brenda Ross said it was a pleasure to pay taxes on her property in South Carolina, her community's collective jaw dropped.

"Things are different there," Ross said during a public hearing discussing a merger of the Kingsbury and Hudson Falls court systems. "Taxes on six acres of land is $253 annually. I pay $6,000 in Hudson Falls. The reason is, South Carolina has one layer of government -- the county."

And while village residents largely rejected merging court services, all agreed taxes are too high and something must be done about it.

Some are proposing Hudson Falls dissolve into Kingsbury; some are suggesting Kingsbury dissolve into Hudson Falls to make a city; and some are taking a middle ground, proposing an increase in shared services.

The state Comptroller's Office has reported that, among the state's 932 towns, 554 villages, 62 cities and 57 counties, growth in outstanding debt is exceeding growth in revenue.

Between 1995 and 2005, outstanding debt increased 94 percent for local governments, while revenues grew 54 percent. Village debt statewide rose $800 million, to almost $1.7 million, from 1995 to 2005.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 03:22 PM | Permalink

CORNWALL ASKS TOWN ATTORNEY TO STUDY MERGER OF THE TOWN AND VILLAGE POLICE DEPARTMENTS:

It was studied in the mid-1980s.

It was discussed again in the mid-1990s. And six years ago, a team of international experts suggested that the Town of Cornwall and the Village of Cornwall-on-Hudson merge their police departments.

No action was taken then or since, but the question of the dual departments persists.

Town Councilman Randy Clark was the latest to raise the issue.

"I have no idea why we have two police departments," Clark said recently.

Clark said he's not advocating a merger; he's just never been able to get a satisfactory answer as to why it should or shouldn't be done.

At Monday's Town Board meeting, Clark asked Town Attorney Stephen Gaba to look into the pros and cons of such a change and report back to the board. No specific deadline was given for Gaba's report.

The two departments already share dispatching services run out of the town department's headquarters.
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Town Supervisor Richard Randazzo said there's no point in forcing the issue as long as village Mayor Edward Moulton is opposed to changing the status quo. Moulton said studies have shown that combining the departments will have "no real advantage to village taxpayers." He said village residents like having the immediate response that's assured by a village-based police department.
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Six years ago, a panel of international experts brought in by the Glynwood Center — a Cold Spring-based think tank — suggested that the communities might be better served by one department. Nothing more was done at the time, but Bob DeWit, president of the Greater Cornwall Chamber of Commerce, thinks it's still an idea worth looking into, since it came from people with "no preconceived notions" about the town and village.

Questions that seem to come up whenever a merger is discussed are: Who would be in charge of the department? Would both municipal boards have a say? Or would it have to be a town-run department, as Randazzo suggested the other night?

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 09:37 PM | Permalink

VILLAGE COURTS FADING AWAY:

The writing in the paper is now the writing on the wall for village officials in Cato.

The village will dissolve its court and take care of justice through the towns in April. While the court has been cost effective up to this point, Mayor Carl Lincoln believes the move will save money in coming years.

A series of articles in the New York Times last September exposed inadequacies in many of the state's 1,300 town and village justice courts. It touched off an increase in scrutiny and movement toward reform Lincoln feels the village won't be able to afford.

“Right now we're just about breaking even,” he said.

The state Office of Court Administration is pushing for major upgrades to justice courts that would be difficult for the village to accommodate without funding. The court, held twice a month in the village's meeting room, doesn't even support a clerk.

Though no mandates exist, a recent state Unified Court System report includes strong recommendations for justice courts to provide uniformed security officers, adequate space to separate litigants and court personnel and magnetometers.

“It's an ideal time to opt out,” Lincoln said.

But not everywhere: VILLAGE OF MONROE PROCEEDS WITH PLAN TO SEPARATE COURTS:

Looks like the Village of Monroe is going to have its own justice court for the first time in 23 years. The village is moving forward with plans to yank its ticket-and-petty-crime business from the Town of Monroe and re-establish the court it abandoned in 1984, when it merged with the town’s. The split could come as early as June 1.

Mayor John Karl III started talking about a separation before taking office, then pushed ahead last year when he learned the town had shortchanged the village at least $200,000 in fine revenue over several years. The town claims it accidentally withheld the funds because of a computer error.

Karl met last week with District Attorney Frank Phillips and Monroe police Chief Dominic Giudice to discuss resurrecting the village court. He said Friday he’ll put roughly $75,000 in the next budget – which takes effect June 1 – for judges, clerks, computers and office supplies.

The state is supposed to reimburse the village for whatever funds the town improperly kept. Exactly how much that totals remains in dispute.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 01:58 PM | Permalink

FIREFIGHTERS CLAIM DISSOLUTION OF JC WOULD RISK LIVES:

A retired firefighter warned about the potential dire consequences of eliminating Johnson City's paid fire department Tuesday night as village trustees accepted a petition to dissolve the village into the Town of Union.

The village attorney will now review the petition and determine if it's valid, a process that could take a month. If the petition is deemed authentic, the trustees then will form a committee to create a dissolution plan that the public would vote on in an election.

The meeting, moved from the smaller municipal meeting room to the Village Justice Building, was heavily attended by Johnson City's paid firefighters, their relatives and retired firefighters who are concerned that dissolution would mean eliminating a paid fire department in the village, along with other services.

Bosh. The town can establish a fire district with paid firefighters and there would be little if any change in the delivery of services. It's understandable that these folks are concerned about their jobs, but that doesn't justify melodramatic scare tactics.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 05:50 PM | Permalink

COMMUNITY TO STUDY MERGING TOWN, VILLAGE:

Should the village of Allegany dissolve and merge with the town of Allegany?

That question, which has been asked and informally reviewed for a number of years, will now get a formal study by local officials, citizens and a consultant.

Village officials recently announced plans to formally review the matter after receiving a $52,200 state grant to conduct a study.

The total cost for the entire project is $58,000 and the village and town will provide the local share of the remaining costs. Once the study is completed, the issue would be voted on by village residents.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 10:50 PM | Permalink

HERKIMER CO. TOWNS TALK CONSOLIDATION:

Herkimer County and its municipalities are taking the first steps to what could become a 20- to 30-year process of consolidation.

Initial plans discussed this week involve looking into creating an economic development committee, purchasing supplies in bulk through the county and collectively buying chlorine for the multiple water-treatment plants in the county.

"We want it to start small then continue growing," Frankfort Mayor Frank Moracco said. "We don't want to overwhelm ourselves."

Consolidation would help officials deal with the difficulties of providing services to residents without increasing taxes, Moracco said.

"We're all in the same predicament," he said.

The economic development committee would be similar to the Herkimer County Chamber of Commerce and could include members from the chamber, county and municipalities. The committee would market the county as a unified entity because any business that moves into the county will help everyone, Moracco said.

"I think it's important that we're all on the same page," he said.

Cutting personnel and combining in areas such as highway departments, departments of public works, light and power, garbage services and fire and police departments could free up huge amounts of money for the municipalities, Herkimer County Legislator Vincent Bono said.

Another meeting might take place within a month, Bono said.

"The county's willing to help out anyway it can," he said.

During a meeting Tuesday at the Ilion Municipal Hall to discuss consolidation, Bono brought up the idea that maybe the villages should eventually merge into their towns. The villages could still unofficially go by their old names, Bono said.

"Everybody talks about it," he said, "but when it comes down to it, people are scared to lose their identities."

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 08:26 PM | Permalink

MEDINA COURT ABOLISHED:

After an emotional public hearing, the Medina Village Board voted to abolish its Village Court.

More than 50 residents turned out for the hearing to voice their stance for or against the idea of eliminating the court and combining services with the recently consolidated Shelby/Ridgeway Town Court.

But in the end the majority of the board voted to consolidate, citing the move as a way to decrease village expenditures and take a small step toward minimizing government.
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Many residents in attendance lauded the board’s decision, with opinions ranging from a first move toward more widespread consolidation in local government to a much needed tax-saving measure. Orleans County District Attorney Joseph Cardone gave his backing.

“Clearly the direction of the justice court system is consolidation,” he said.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 10:45 PM | Permalink

SOUTHEAST ASKS BREWSTER TO CONSIDER CONSOLIDATION:

The town has reached out to the village of Brewster with a proposal to consolidate its government services, a move that would help bring the otherwise disconnected communities together.

A letter was sent to Brewster Mayor John Degnan on Dec. 14 asking him to consider a plan to form a joint residents' committee that would examine the feasibility of such a merger. Degnan has yet to respond, Southeast Supervisor John Dunford said.
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The offer follows the creation of a state initiative that provides grant money to local governments seeking consolidation and/or shared services. Former Gov. George Pataki and the state Legislature created the Shared Municipal Services Incentive (SMSI) program in 2005 and set aside $2.75 million in the state budget for cooperative efforts. This year, in a statewide effort to reduce the local property tax burden, the program has been expanded to provide $25 million in funding.

Municipalities must apply to the state Department of State for awards in several categories, including $200,000 per municipality for costs associated with the consolidation of two or more governments. Awards have already been announced for 2006-07, officials said.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 10:50 PM | Permalink

BALDSWINSVILLE MAYOR URGES MERGER WITH TOWNS:

We're told it takes but one person to start a movement. Is that one person Dan O'Hara, the mayor of Baldwinsville?

We'll see.

This young politician - he's 46 - has proposed consolidation of his community of 1,249 people with the two towns that surround it on the north and south, Lysander and Van Buren. Today, that would mean about 33,200 people.

This could take years, but the mayor thinks it can work and "now's the time to do it."

A week from today, he'll ask the Baldwinsville Village Board to pass a resolution joining with Syracuse University to study merging the three governments into one. If the Lysander and Van Buren town boards do the same, Dan thinks a consolidation plan could be ready for voters a year from today.

Consolidation has been talked about for years around here with little motion. Dan's the first one to grab hold of the elephant and try to push it uphill.

He tells me he decided to give this issue a run about two months ago as Baldwinsville moved toward building a municipal budget with the loss of a village clerk and possible retirement of the head of public works- Dan O'Hara- at the end of the year. He says he thought about whether the two towns and the village "really need three public works commissioners."

The answer: Probably not.

That was when Dan pulled a string and got an appointment with Nancy Cantor, SU chancellor and fellow forward-thinker. She agreed to help and arranged another meet, this one with Mitch Wallerstein, dean of the Maxwell School.

Bottom line: They meet again in two weeks. Dan says he hopes a timetable for moving ahead with his plan, with the help of SU staff - including polling guru Jeff Stonecash - can be arranged. This could lead to a questionnaire to be circulated among voters in Baldwinsville, Van Buren and Lysander.

Dan wants to bring voters along with him as the plan matures. He feels efforts in the past haven't done this. Maybe that's why they failed.

"They never engaged the public before," he explains. "I think people want to be part of change. We need to engage people in this process. If not, it's going nowhere. Good judgment comes out of bad judgment."

The Seneca River divides Baldwinsville into two unequal halves: The south side belongs to the town of Van Buren, the north to Lysander. Dan O'Hara says the two towns form a sandwich, with the village in the center, the filler. This makes a perfect place, tucked into the corner with Oswego and Cayuga counties, for Onondaga's first consolidation.

Some work is already done. While Baldwinsville has its own police department, Lysander and Van Buren are covered by other agencies. Baldwinsville doesn't have an assessor; that's covered by the two towns.

Dan believes reasonable people would not choose the type of government we have today "if we sat down and thought about it." He's willing to give up being mayor if need be. He has spoken to the supervisors of Van Buren and Lysander: Barry Bullis and Mary Crego are on board, at least to study the idea.

"No one's thrown me in the river yet," he says with a smile, adding quickly, "I think we have a friend in Albany now," a reference to the new governor, Eliot Spitzer.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 08:46 PM | Permalink

CONSOLIDATION GAINS FANS SLOWLY:

By the year 2008, construction could begin on a massive public works barn that would house equipment owned by Washington County and the towns of Kingsbury and Fort Ann, said Willy Grimmke, superintendent of public works for Washington County.

In that intermunicipal dream scenario, the cooperatively owned structure would eliminate the need for four separate smaller buildings, each of which is currently falling into a state of disrepair.

Four older structures could be sold, putting them back on the tax rolls. Utility costs could be slashed and employee overhead could be cut by eliminating positions through attrition.

Again, that would be an ideal situation.

Municipalities throughout the region are continually discussing similar consolidation projects. But many may never evolve from paperwork to bricks and mortar. Other communities will take years to make the transition.

State Sen. Elizabeth Little, R-Queensbury, who chairs the state Senate's committee on local government, is passionate about consolidation -- where it works.

But she said the obstacles stacked against pushing these projects to completion are as numerous as the layers of New York municipal government.

"It's a slow process," Little said.

Washington County has been talking with Kingsbury and Fort Ann about merging garages for at least a year.

"It's one of those things that is important to do and important to look at, but it's not along the line of the crisis of the day," Grimmke said.

Often, when Little meets with town and village officials, they have a knee-jerk reaction against change.

"It's human nature," Little said.

Last year, she met with officials from the town and village of Fort Edward. The municipalities share office space, so Little assumed she was starting off with one foot in the door.

But when she started making suggestions, they balked.

Then, after she won them over, "they wanted money for a study," Little said. "I said no. The people involved need to look at it."
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"Sometimes I get discouraged, but then I talk to someone else, and they say maybe we could do this or that," Little said.

To make life easier for municipalities investigating consolidation, her office is working on creating an online clearinghouse. The online database would contain agreements that have succeeded and failed, and it would be searchable by local officials.

In a Senate report on intermunicipal agreements, Little's office has already made some headway. Staff members have compiled success stories, including mergers between the town and village of Lake George, as well as the Cambridge and Greenwich police departments.

"I always mention that one. It is one of my favorites," Little said.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 03:05 PM | Permalink

SHERRILL MAY GROW WITH VERNON'S HELP:

The Town of Vernon and the City of Sherrill are considering three petitions for annexation into the city. An annexation will move the city line further into the town. "The town isn't changed at all," said City of Sherrill Manager Bob Comis. "Sherrill just gets bigger." The largest tract of land up for annexation is a 166-acre plot east of and parallel to Betsinger Road. According to Town of Vernon Supervisor Myron Thurston, whose family owns the land, a purchase offer has been made on it. "It's a request that's being made so that the property is accessible to city water and sewer," Thurston said. "The only way that can happen is to be annexed into the City of Sherrill." The property is owned by Thurston's father and his three brothers. The 166 acres of undeveloped farmland is expected to be developed into residential properties. ... For the annexations to occur both the town and the city have to approve them.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 04:50 PM | Permalink

AUDIT: LOCAL GOVERNMENTS IN TROUBLE:

Many local governments in New York, pounded by rising expenses and slow growth, are in financial trouble, according to an audit by the state comptroller issued Wednesday.

Debt has doubled in the last 10 years, property taxes are soaring and people and jobs are leaving many cities, according to a report from state Comptroller Alan Hevesi

"Local government across the state continue to operate amid a barrage of fiscal pressures that show no sign of diminishing in the near future," according to the report.

Ominously, the fiscal conditions of the counties, cities, towns and villages "persists despite many positive developments in the past year," the report says. Those include a state capping of local Medicaid costs, increases in revenue-sharing aid from the state, big increases in state aid to local schools and a strong economy downstate and in the Hudson Valley, coupled with low inflation.

"The report is just more evidence of the imbalance between local fiscal capacity and the cost of providing essential municipal services," Peter Baynes of the state Conference of Mayors said.
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He cited two in particular: the binding-arbitration statute that leaves it up to a state-appointed panel to decide on contracts with police and fire unions; and the Wicks Law, which requires local and state government to let four separate contracts for public-works jobs. That's a mandate critics say adds billions to the cost of public-construction projects in the state every year.

"It's mandates like that that makes us inherently inefficient," Baynes said.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 11:08 AM | Permalink

TOO MANY GOVERNMENTS:

Imagine a world where the City of Jamestown has a population of roughly 45,000 and stretches from Lakewood to Falconer — a world where most of the villages in Chautauqua County cease to exist and town borders have been dramatically redrawn.

A world like that is the only way for Western New York to turn the tide on economic stagnation and decline, says Ken Bond, an expert on public entities with both the New York State Bar Association and the American Bar Association.

‘‘I can tell you, New York is not a great place to do business, but we can be,’’ said Bond, the keynote speaker at a shared services seminar at the Robert H. Jackson Center on Wednesday. ‘‘We need to think this way if we’re going to bring in businesses and people, and balance ourselves out as a viable element in the world economy.’’

Consolidating municipalities is the best way to lower taxes and draw businesses and residents to Upstate New York, according to Bond — and he isn’t alone in his call for the number of local governments to be reduced.
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Chautauqua County contains 27 towns, 15 villages and two cities — each with its own elected and appointed officials, each with its own highway department, and each with its own offices, equipment and supplies. That’s a total of 44 local governments in a county with a population less than 140,000 — simply too many, according to Bond.

‘‘When you have a sparsely populated area, you don’t need a whole lot of government,’’ Bond said.

According to Hevesi’s report, the problem is the same across New York state. The state contains 932 towns, 554 villages, 62 cities and 57 counties — a total of 1,605 local governments and ‘‘a structure no one would design today.’’

The municipalities and borders of today were largely established before 1920, and in many cases much earlier — and population trends have made many villages entirely obsolete.

‘‘Today, police, water, sewer, sanitation and fire protection services are provided routinely throughout towns, and the incorporation of a village is no longer necessary for these purposes,’’ the report states. ‘‘The impetus for most recent village incorporations has not been the need for new services, but the desire of disaffected residents of a particular area to take control of land use regulation and other services from a town board.’’

The high number of local governments leads to higher overhead costs and duplicated services — and that leads to the high-tax, business-unfriendly environment New York state is famous for, according to Bond. He also noted Upstate New York’s economy has long since been declining, while the public service industry has been thriving.

Bond also said upstate residents can learn a lesson from New York City, which combined dozens of towns, villages, cities and counties into a single government entity toward the end of the 19th century.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 10:57 PM | Permalink

DUNHAM HOLLOW VILLAGE REJECTED:

Residents went to the polls Tuesday and rejected for a second time a proposal to form a village of Dunham Hollow in a fight against three mining proposals. The final tally was 224-16, though about 440 people were eligible to vote.

Voters rejected the idea of a 4.93-square-mile village in the town's northeastern sector in March, 167-119. Turnout was considered high at the time, at 63.5 percent.

Dunham Hollow is a hamlet in the mostly rural town, and the village proposal was pushed by the Dunham Hollow Civic Association.

After the defeat in the first election, village proponents claimed voting was rife with irregularities and filed a lawsuit seeking a Supreme Court review.

Acting Supreme Court Justice Christian Hummel agreed with some of the claims, threw out the first vote and ordered a second.
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Urgency for a village waned after last November's elections when a slate of town candidates opposed to mining won seats and the Town Board then enacted a new law banning mining.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 11:26 AM | Permalink

LEADERS CAUTIOUS ABOUT CONSOLIDATION:

Consolidation isn't the cure-all for what ails Greater Binghamton that some residents may be envisioning, local government leaders warned Tuesday.

Mayors and supervisors from across Broome County, who were panelists at a Greater Binghamton Chamber of Commerce-sponsored dialogue on local government issues, agreed that while shrinking government could lead to lower property taxes, that is a long-term outcome that needs to be kept in perspective.

"Consolidation doesn't attract wealth," said Binghamton Mayor Matthew T. Ryan. "It's not that simple."

Ways to lower government costs have created a long-standing debate among local leaders. While there has been some recent action, including Broome County collecting Binghamton's property taxes, many residents want more: Some would like village boundaries and services to dissolve into their surrounding towns.

But for rural communities, including the Town of Windsor, sharing among governments is commonplace, Supervisor Randy Williams said. While residents in the urban core want their governments to slash the number of employees, Williams said on the outskirts they get by with what they have by sharing resources.

"None of us have enough manpower," he said. "Consolidation and shared services -- that's how we exist on the outside."

Still, some residents in Johnson City plan in the next few weeks to circulate petitions calling for the village to dissolve as a way to get property tax relief. If village residents eventually voted to dissolve, the Town of Union would be required to provide government services. Mayor Harry Lewis has said he receives split reaction from village residents opposing and supporting dissolution. He wants a formal study of the costs before coming to a conclusion himself.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 02:32 PM | Permalink

CONSOLIDATION MOVES FORWARD:

It is a topic that has been discussed in the past, and now the Village of Albion and the towns of Albion and Gaines will take a step forward in the process of consolidation.

The village was chosen to receive a $65,700 grant to hire, in cooperation with the two towns, a consultant to research the pros and cons of sharing services or even merging the three together. The grant was one of 22 awarded by Gov. George Pataki to municipalities across the state for similar ventures.
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Trustee Michael Neidert was around for those discussions.

“I think it’s an excellent idea,” Neidert said. “We’ve been talking about consolidating for four to five years.”

Neidert said they have started already with combining assessors for the town and village of Albion, and this year brought the court system together.

While he said it was difficult to determine what a consolidation would do to the municipalities, Hadick said it was a benefit as far as saving money.

“It’s for duplication of services,” Hadick said. “Even as far as clerks go for the water bills, if we consolidate Gaines, Albion and the village, then there would be one person taking water bills.”

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 09:56 PM | Permalink

BATTLE LINES FORM ON CONSOLIDATION:

Pam McKiernan is clamoring for property tax relief.

Her family has lived in Johnson City for six years and has seen their tax bill go up about $2,000 since moving in.

McKiernan, 36, isn't sure if dissolving the village into the Town of Union is the answer, but she wants tax relief to come out of the discussion on consolidation.

"Whatever the final result is, something has to be done," she said. "Nobody wants to see people lose their jobs, but I don't want to lose my house, either."

However, critics of consolidation believe it could hurt services and jeopardize public safety if not done correctly. The Johnson City Fire Department's union distributed fliers this week asking residents to attend the village board's next meeting on Aug. 15 to let board members know "public safety is a priority," the flier says.

The union's pamphlet says that dissolving the village would mean losing village services, including fire and EMS services. It also claims response times would be longer than the current average of three minutes. Representatives from the union were not available for comment Wednesday.The push for dissolving Johnson City has gained momentum in recent months. Residents asked the board in June to take a non-binding vote to determine support for dissolution. Last month, the board decided against taking that vote, but agreed to continue discussions.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 11:02 PM | Permalink

BERNE, COUNTY MERGING ROADWORK:

in what might be the first merger of its kind in the state, the town of Berne's Highway Department would be folded into the Albany County Department of Public Works under a new proposal billed as a way to save money.

The seven town highway workers would become county employees, so none of those jobs will be lost.

Officials said the merger would eliminate the elected town highway superintendent's post, now held by Raymond Storm.

But it's expected Storm would become a supervisor in the combined office, said County Executive Michael Breslin.

"It's going to save a lot of money, and we're going to do things more efficiently," Breslin said of the proposed change.

County Public Works Commissioner Michael Franchini said his office had looked into it, and they could find no other example in the state of a town highway department merging with a county public works unit.

"At this point, unless we can find one, it's the first one in the state," he said. Officials estimated the merger would save Berne $162,670 each year, which amounts to 10 percent of the town budget.

The town wouldn't have to build new salt- and fuel-storage facilities because the county has them. The county wouldn't have to build a new field office because the town has one.

Both the county and the town have highway offices three miles apart in Berne, a town of 2,845 people.

Town plow trucks must drive over miles of county roads to reach the town streets they are responsible for cleaning. The merger would eliminate that inefficiency.

The proposed change will likely be part of the 2007 county budget proposed in October.

It will require approval by the Berne Town Board and the County Legislature.

Posted by Joel Seachrist at 04:02 PM | Permalink