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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTB-11/04/2010ELIZABETH A. NEVILLE TOWN CLERK REGISTRAR OF VITAL STATISTICS MARRIAGE OFFICER RECORDS MANAGEMENT OFFICER FREEDOM OF INFORMATION OFFICER Town Hall, 53095 Main Road PO Box 1179 Southold, NY 11971 Fax (631) 765-6145 Telephone: (631) 765 - 1800 southoldtown.northfork, net OFFICE OF THE TOWN CLERK SOUTHOLD TOWN BOARD BUDGET HEARINGS MINUTES November 4, 2010 4:00 PM A Budget Hearings of the Southold Town Board was held Thursday, November 4, 2010 at the Meeting Hall, 53095 Main Road, Southold, NY. Supervisor Russell opened the meeting at 4:00 PM with the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. I. Call to Order 4:00 PM Meeting called to order on November 4, 2010 at Heeting Hall, 53095 Route 25, $outhold, NY. Pledge to the Flag Supervisor Russell SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Please rise and join with me in the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you. What I am going to do is let everybody know that this is a hearing for what is a tentative budget. The Town Board has no intent on adopting the budget this evening. We have two hearings, one at 4:00 and one at 7:00, if you know anything about this Town Board, you know that we take public comment very seriously and will not make a decision tonight because we do want to factor in what people have to say with regard to the budget that is proposed. Is there anything legally that needs to be read at this point? TOWN CLERK NEVILLE: Yes, the notice of hearing. The legal notice. II. Public Hearings Set PH for 2011 Budget History: 11/04/10 Town Board ADJOURNED RESULT: ADJOURNED [UNANIMOUS] MOVER: Louisa P. Evans, Justice SECONDER: Albert Krupski Jr., Councilman AYES: Next: 11/04/10 Next: 11/4/2010 7:00 PM Ruland, Orlando, Talbot, Krupski Jr., Evans, Russell Councilman Christopher M. Talbot November 4, 2010 Page 2 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes COUNCILMAN TALBOT: NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that the Preliminary Budget and Preliminary Capital Budget of the Town of Southold, Suffolk County, New York for the fiscal year beginning on January 1,2011 has been prepared and approved by the Southold Town Board and filed in the Office of the Town Clerk at the Southold Town Hall, 53095 Main Road, Southold, New York, where they are available for inspection and where copies may be obtained by any interested person during business hours. FURTHER NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN, that the Town Board of the Town of Southold will meet and review said Preliminary Budget and Preliminary Capital Budget and hold a public hearing thereon at the Southold Town Hall, 53095 Main Road, Southold, New York, in said Town at 4:00 p.m. and at 7:00 p.m., on Thursday, November 4, 2010, and at such hearing any persons may be heard in favor of or against the 2011 Preliminary Budget and 2011 Preliminary Capital Budget as compiled, or for or against any item or items therein contained. FURTHER NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that pursuant to Section 108 of the Town Law, the following are proposed yearly salaries of members of the Town Board, the Town Clerk and the Superintendent of Highways: SCHEDULE OF SALARIES OF ELECTED OFFICIALS (Article 8 of Town Law) Officer Supervisor Members of the Town Board (4) @ Town Justice and Member of the Town Board, Fishers Island Town Justices (2) ~ Town Clerk Superintendent of Highways Tax Receiver Assessors (3) ~ Trustees (5) ~ Salary $ 90,472 $ 31,270 $ 49,048 $ 66,682 $ 93,886 $ 99,691 $ 36,061 $ 68,862 $ 16,103 SUMMARY OF TOWN BUDGET 2011 PRELIMINARY Appropriations Less: Less: and Amount to Provisions Estimated Unexpended be for Other Raised by Code Fund Uses Revenues Balance Tax A General $ 27,230,116 $ 3,960,663 $1,535,000 $21,734,453 B General-Outside Village 2,119,124 1,094,760 241,000 783,364 DB Highway Fund 5,185,250 373,319 228,000 4,583,931 CD Community Development 130,000 130,000 CS Risk Retention Fund 506,000 506,000 H3 Community Preservation Fund 5,095,000 2,895,000 2,200,000 MS Employees Health Plan 4,066,632 3,687,632 379,000 November 4, 2010 Page 3 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes [Total-Town $ 44,332,122I $12,647,374 [ $ 4,583,000 I $27,101,748 I DB1 Orient Road Improvement Dist $ 3,815 $ $ 850 $ 2,965 SF East-West Fire Protection Dist 714,563 500 1,500 712,563 SM Fishers Island Ferry District 3,182,000 2,400,000 132,000 650,000 SR Solid Waste Management Dist 3,842,996 1,858,750 107,000 1,877,246 SS1 Southold Wastewater District 177,385 177,385 SS2 Fishers Island Sewer District 34,800 30,100 4,700 F.I. Waste Management Dist 607,660 51,000 40,000 516,660 Orient Mosquito District 80,000 80,000 Subtotal-Special Districts $ 8,643,219 $ 4,340,350 $ 463,435 $ 3,839,434 Orient-East Marion Park District $ 34,250 $ 34,250 Southold Park District 315,000 315,000 Cutch.-New Suffolk Pk Dist. 142,083 12,083 130,000 Mattituck Park District 566,860 28,500 106,000 432,360 Subtotal-Park Districts $ 1,058,193 $ 28,500 $ 118,083 $ 911,610 Fishers Island Fire District $ 359,700 $ 3,300 $ 356,400 Orient Fire District East Marion Fire District 557,952 42,111 20,000 495,841 Southold Fire District 1,768,300 21,856 1,746,444 Cutchogue Fire District 1,205,540 2,000 125,000 1,078,540 Mattituck Fire District 1,784,503 1,784,503 Subtotal-Fire Districts $ 5,675,994 $69,267 $145,000 $ 5,461,727 L Total-Ail Districts L $ 15,377,406 i $4,438,117J $ 726,518 [$10,212,771 J Grand Totals This Page 59,709,528I $17,085,491 I $5,309,518 ] $37,314,519 ] We also have notice that it was posted on the Town Clerk's bulletin board on the 25th of October and that it was posted in the Suffblk Times on the 28th of October and other correspondence. And the town website. And that is it. Supervisor Russell SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Okay, would anybody like to come up and address the Town Board on the current budget? Supt of Highways Peter Harris PETER HARRIS, SUPERiNTENDENT OF HIGHWAYS: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Peter Harris, Superintendent of Highways Southold Town. Just have two questions, one pertaining to the operating budget for the highway department, under machinery. When I originally had submitted my budget we had discussion, it is a budget review, I had originally November 4, 2010 Page 4 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes asked for a sum of $50,000 for, in the heavy duty equipment line item. During the course of conversations, there were conversations that $30,000 was going to be a possible, a doable number; reduced to $30,000 and I see in my operating budget for 2011 it is 0 and I am just perplexed and out of all the things that I, there were things that had been omitted and the only thing that I am asking that the Board please reinstate that $30,000 into the equipment line item on the machinery. Second thing is I read today's local paper and I read a letter to the editor that has been sent to the Supervisor pertaining to increases in salary and I think there is a lot of people out there in this town that don't realize the amount of hours that certain elected officials put in with no monetary return and some people may say I am up here blowing my horn but I, as a full time elected official that works weekends, holidays, snowstorms, hurricanes, whatever, 24/7, that is a part of the job. However, I am there. And to me the percentage salary increase is nothing, if you want to take and equate that into the total number of hours that I have spent many nights going back to the office, ran home had dinner and went back and worked until 10:00, 11:00 at night doing paperwork and stuff. My choice. However, I feel as though I have given plenty to this town so that a 4% raise like all these blue collar workers are going to receive because they ended up, they gave up a raise last year and they did it for a reason. They gave it up so they could save people's jobs. Well, I haven't had a raise in a few years and I don't feel as though, that I am not deserving of it. Of course, if you read the paper last week, you have got somebody in Mattituck that doesn't think I deserve it. But I am not that person's special, every time you need something call three four times a week because she has another issue. Everybody in Southold Town deserves to get served, not just one person. But I am just here today and some people may say it is self-serving or selfish but I don't feel it is selfish because I feel I give this town their money's worth. And with that, I just hope that you don't scrap my raise that had been put in the original budget. Thank you. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: Mr. Hams, what is your salary to this date? I know it is on public record, I just don't know it off the top of my head. MR. HARRIS: What is it up there now? I don't know, $95? JUSTICE EVANS: Well, we only have the one with the raise in it, with the raise it would be $99,600. MR. HARRIS: $95 thousand and change. The raise is $3,000 and something. Four percent, whatever the 4 % worked out to of that raise. And like I said, I am a full time person, I am not par~ time employee, I am a full time. And like I said, weekends, holidays, 24 hour around the clock. When we have snow storms, I am there. I am not sitting from an easy chair in front of the television. I am out on the road or I am in the office. I am there. Driving snow plows when we are shorthanded of help. So with that being said, I know there are a lot of people that say elected people make too much money but in my opinion, I think I deserve the raise. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Thanks, Pete. Would anyone else like to come up and address the Town Board? Benja Schwartz, Cutchogue BENJA SCHWARTZ: Well, maybe I will be back at the 7:00. I was unaware that that was also November 4, 2010 Page 5 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes public hearing on the budget. My name is Benja Schwartz. I usually can figure out what is going on around here but I don't know, somehow I got the message that the budget heating was 4:00 and 7:00 was the regular Town Board meeting. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: We noticed it as two public heatings on the budget. One at 4:00 and one at 7:00. At the conclusion of the 7:00 budget heating, the regular meeting will take place. Theoretically 7:30, depending on the comments and the outpourings for the public hearing. MR. SCHWARTZ: Oh, well. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: Historically sometimes the budget meeting goes as quick as this, so we have a 7:00 public meeting on the budget and we have to wait until 7:30 and sit here until they open the next meeting. So instead we did them both at 7:00 so if there is a budget meeting as short as this one, we can get tight to the public hearing. MR. SCHWARTZ: I am sorry I missed the meeting two weeks and two days ago. Another short meeting, Town Board meeting. Lasted less than an hour. That doesn't mean you shouldn't be paid more. It was reported in the Suffolk Times that Supervisor Russell stated that, I don't want to misquote the Suffolk Times. Mr. Russell said that prior boards had established a policy of increasing elected officials salary by the same amount of the CSEA employee's salaries. Does everybody agree with that? COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: I don't know year he is referring to. It has been a while. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: That was the policy that was established by Councilman William Edwards when he was a Town Board member. It was also supported by Councilman Ross when he was a member of the Board. I believe at the time the goal was to take the politics out of the process but I remember Albert Krupski, Councilman Albert Krupski also myself at the time, suggesting that that was probably a case of, it is policy that will probably promptly be ignored like most around here, and that they should be revisited from time to time. Salaries themselves, as a collective approach. But yes, there was Town Board policy that was passed, I could tell you who the nominating .... MR. SCHWARTZ: Well, according to the Suffolk Times and they are not always right, it was reported that you presented that as the reason that your proposed budget includes a pay raise. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: No, what I said was, I didn't say that was a reason, I think you should re-read the article because I think they got that article tight. What I did refer to .... MR. SCHWARTZ: I just read what it said in the article. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Yes, but it didn't say I proposed the raises based on that, I said it was consistent with the policy that was passed a few years ago. But that is not the reason I proposed the raises, I proposed the raises... November 4, 2010 Page 6 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes MR. SCHWARTZ: It says the prior Board had established a policy... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: That is right... MR. SCHWARTZ: And it was the, at least the reasonable implication of the article that that was being followed in this years budget. Is that not the case? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: It is partially the case. There were other reasons but that was one of the scenarios. Was that I merely pointed out that there was Town Board policy at the time. COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: It is a tough history, you know, if you look back and I have been on, this is my fifth year on the Board and I have had one raise and it is the Supervisor's fifth year and he has had no raises. And so, even if there is a policy out there that is going to say that the Town Board is going to get this or that raises, it is always a, it always becomes a difficult issue especially in a year where we are still, for the third consecutive budget we are still working hard to not only cut, as Councilman Ruland says, the widgets out of the budget and it wasn't a good year for widgets either. And we are looking at the big picture too in every department and Mr. Harris came in today and he said, he spoke well at the work session about how in the last year he is down 7 men, in the last two years he is down a total of 10 men and these are men that haven't been replaced and so we have been taking great effort to reduce personnel and reduce overall costs and to reevaluate the way every department operates and how it functions within the town hall unit and so to, I don't know there might be a policy that the Town Board takes a raise that mirrors the union but it is not enforced, that is for sure. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: And it can't be as a practical reason. In fact, the reason I budgeted for raises was because Southold's fiscal house is in order. When we are putting budget increases out at 7,8 or 9 %, that is not the time to budget for raises for elected officials. When I proposed my original budget for the Town Board at 1.83%, I thought that would be an appropriate time to keep these salaries in pace. At least to remunerate them with a 4% increase. Now I have to tell you that of course, a lot of the public outcry has been because of the overall economy, this isn't the time to budget for raises. We are listening to that, I understand that point of view. MR. SCHWARTZ: I have some different ideas I would like to share with you, if you give me the chance. Do any of you remember the last time we had a tax reduction? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: In Southold Town? I can tell you .... MR. SCHWARTZ: The last time taxes went down? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: The last time taxes were proposed to go down was in Supervisor Horton's first term, he had proposed a 1.1% decrease in taxes because he did not include the need to fund the state's retirement pension system. Of course, that Town Board restored it and ultimately taxes were raised about 2.1%. That was the last time. MR. SCHWARTZ: We are sure hoping that you know, we won't have to wait five years for November 4, 2010 Page 7 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes that. If there is a policy that ties the elected officials salaries, including the salaries of you the Town Board members and the Town Supervisor, to the CSEA salaries, then that policy is a corrupt policy. It should not just be partially followed or not followed, it should be eliminated and vacated and if you don't understand that it is because, I can try to explain it to you but I can't make you listen. I can talk to you but I can't make you listen. But I still can't not tell you because that wouldn't be right. Do you understand why that would be a corrupt policy? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Yes, for the very reason I brought it up at the time a few years ago in that this Town Board is the negotiating body for the CSEA contracts. That is the very point I put on this table when that discussion was had about five, six years ago. We are negotiating, well, in effect that would be. MR. SCHWARTZ: Inaudible. On both sides of the table. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: In effect, that would be the scenario. That is exactly what I put on the table at the work session some five or six, oh, four or five years ago when that proposal was suggested. MR. SCHWARTZ: There is a clear pecuniary conflict of interest that the Town Board is negotiating for the tax payers and at the same time for themselves. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: That is a policy that is inherent with every budget, just so you understand. MR. SCHWARTZ: In all honesty, I don't know, you know, how we should set the salaries of the Town Board members but if I was sitting in your seats, I would be looking for a way to do it without appearing to be self-serving. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: Oh, i agree with you Benja. We should revisit that policy and take a look at that. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: I don't remember, I think it was a 4-2 vote, I think I didn't vote for it, I know Albert didn't and that was the suggestion at the time but all this dialogue and all this discussion were had at that time about that. But I agree with you, that any budget is inherently conflictual because this Town Board sets the salaries for Town Board members, it sets the salaries for elected officials and it also, it is every single budget that is going to be the quagmire, without a doubt. MR. SCHWARTZ: Well, part of your job is deciding on the budget but part of it is presenting the budget to the public and at the very least, I think there was an obvious error in the presentation, if it was presented that by, and the paper, they may not be perfect but they are not that dumb. Somehow they got it wrong. I am glad that we have cleared that up. Let's move on. The fund balance. Can anybody tell me what the policy is and what the current budget practice is on the fund balance, with the exception of, if I may, the Supervisor does a lot of talking on this Board and I appreciate that he has a responsibility to develop the preliminary budget but I think November 4, 2010 Page 8 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes the other five Board members up there also have a responsibility to be involved in that process as well as this process of budget review and the proposed application of the 2010 fund balance to the 2011 of revenue stream has raised some issues. Would anybody .... COUNCILMAN RULAND: I would love to. The usage of the unappropriated fund balance which is the same basically as in your school districts, any districts that have an unappropriated fund balance. It is the sum total of the funds from the various line items of the budget that at the end of the fiscal year are unexpended. That is where the money comes from. So at the end of any given year, you are going to have a sum of money that is unexpended. Good budgeting practices and the general accepted accounting practices tell you that there is a, and also there is a statutory, at least in schools, a statutory percentage of the amount that you are allowed to maintain. In municipal government such as this, that amount is important, extremely important and the stability of that amount is extremely important as you go in the financial market for the bond rating. The bond counsel, the actuaries and the actual companies that solicit and sell the bonds on the behalf of the Town of Southold look at these figures on a historical basis, in other words, it is not just this year. They look at it over a number of years and they track the stability of that fund, so that it doesn't, if it were a graph and it spiked up one year and back down the other, they look for a constant and a constant that is at a minimum threshold or above which shows financial stability of the town and its ability to repay its obligations over an extended period of time. Also, I know the Supervisor is succinctly more in tune with the policy that was adopted by the Town Board in recent years about the amount of the fund balance that will be committed to the next year's budget. Now that is the same practice that is done by every school district in any municipality that has a fund balance. A certain percentage, for lack of other words, is returned to the taxpayer in the form of revenue for the next year's budget. What it does more than anything, is stabilize the tax rate. Which is, in my opinion, very important. So that again, if you have a graph, you don't want it to be at one point one year spiked way up the next and dropped way down the next. Stability is very important and then again, that, and the Supervisor as the chief financial officer of the town can correct me if I am wrong, but that too equates back to the bond rating and the rating of the town overall and its financial condition. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: And I believe the 10 percent. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: It is, our current bond policy requires that we hold no less than 10 percent. COUNCILMAN RULAND: No less than 10 percent. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Ten percent of our operating budget, the policy was changed a few years ago. There was this historic policy that you could allocate no more than 50 percent of the fund balance into the following year's budget. That policy served its purpose. It was actually proposed by Councilman Wickham, in his first year as Supervisor Wickham. And it was a good policy. And it got us to the point where we were more stable. The problem was, that policy is outdated. The fund balance had been dropping precariously because if you keep taking half of something, then number keeps getting smaller. It got very low. This Town Board then, reestablished a new policy that would require that no less than 10 percent, the fund balance November 4, 2010 Page 9 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes reflect no less than 10 percent of our general operating expenses. That policy would require that we hold a fund balance for our operating expense, this year I believe at about $3.8 million. Our fund balance is $4.213 million. So we are about $500,000 almost $600,000 in excess of that policy. Wall Street has recognized that policy as sound, they re-ordered us with a stellar credit rating. The money that I had allocated, the 2.1, was over, above and beyond the fund balance. That was money that was earmarked for specific uses in 2010. Those bills did not come due. I re-allocated those expenditures into 2011 along with the money to pay for those expenditures. It would be irresponsible of me to hold onto that $2.1 million, grow a huge fund balance and then go after the taxpayers and ask them for another $2 million to pay for those very expenses. MR. SCHWARTZ: Well, thank you very much. That little finance and history lesson. I think everything you said is correct and fair. I could add a little bit, that in the past there was lower appropriations in the fund balance were made during the off years and years when there were elections, they tended to have higher appropriations to reduce the tax rates. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: And Tom, I have to say Tom created a policy that put an end to that and it was a good policy. But it is time to evolve our accounting practices along with the needs of the town and that is why we went to a fund policy, a balance policy that is tied to the operating expenses itself and not to a fund policy that is tied to itself, 50 percent of itself doesn't earmark that fund balance to any measurable amount, that is why we tied it specifically to our operating budget. MR. SCHWARTZ: So the current policy requires that the fund balance be maintained at over 10 percent .... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: No less than 10. MR. SCHWARTZ: No less than or over .... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: That is right. MR. SCHWARTZ: Ten percent of the operating budget which is approximately $40 million and the $4 million is approximately 10 percent, a little bit more. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Actually it would be our operating budget which would be Southold Town whole town, Southold Town part town and highway part town. The total operating budget there is about $38 million, that would require 3.8 in a fund balance and like I said, we have 4.23. MR. SCHWARTZ: So we are .... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: It excludes the, when you say .... MR. SCHWARTZ: And the reason for the fund balance is that we need a, we can't make a perfect budget so there will be times when we run out of money, need to add more money, we need some and the credit rating or the rate at which we pay interest when we borrow money will November 4, 2010 Page 10 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes depend in part on our having a significant, sufficient fund balance. Also there is the issue of insurance which I recall that this town is at least partially self-insured? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Yes. MR. SCHWARTZ: And that is in reliance on our maintaining our .... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: That is the risk retention line. That is separate from the fund balance. The general operating fund balance, the 4.2 million is a separate line item from our risk retention fund. Our total fund balance along all departments, is about $6 million and that would include the risk retention for self-insurance etc. The 4.2 is just for the general allocations, for the general operating budget. MR. SCHWARTZ: Thank you. COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: And the reason, you know you said the Supervisor speaks for everyone a lot and one of the reasons, especially with the budget, he has been working with department head. s since August and basically all year round. We have budget talks but since August really, he has spent a lot of time and effort going over every line. When the Town Board members met with the department heads last month, we really thought we could, as Mr. Orlando said, take some meat off the bone but we were happy to get a bone, there wasn't much there. So that is why he is so familiar with the numbers and the facts. MR. SCHWARTZ: And that is what we are paying you all for. MR. ORLANDO: Actually, Benja, we manage the budget every two weeks. Every two weeks we are doing something that directly affects the budget. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: i would go beyond that and say every day. Because every single one of you weighs in on issues on a daily basis. MR. SCHWARTZ: Well, I am glad that somebody is informed. I was disturbed to read in the newspaper today, in a letter from Supervisor Russell that strict policies of work force reduction through attrition and reallocation of the workforce is being followed by the town. I have not observed that that policy is that strict in my observations of this town government over the past couple of years. I don't, I am not saying that it should be strict, I am saying if we are going to practice attrition of the workforce and reallocations of the workforce, again, if I was sitting in your seats, I would want to start out by drafting an organizational chart. There is no organizational chart of Southold Town government. Southold Town government was organized a couple of hundred years ago. Things were a lot simpler and then over time it has evolved by actions of our Town Board's over the years and also by New York State law. But the overall picture is very, very fuzzy and I have been advocating for years to try and clarify that and I have proposed procedures and methods by which we could do that or you could do that. It is really up to you. Nobody else is going to do it. I would suggest to you that reallocation of the workforce could be enhanced and benefited by starting with a definition of and a clarification of the November 4, 2010 Page I 1 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes workforce. Another thing that was in that letter was a reference to my neighbor, Vincent LaRocca, as an arm chair analyst. Now I know that Vincent LaRocca's letter last week referred to Supervisor Russell as a career politician. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Re-read my letter. MR. SCHWARTZ: I am not sure that a .... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Re-read my letter. State the facts correctly. I did not call him an armchair analyst. I said despite Mr. LaRocca's armchair analysis, simplistic armchair analysis. In reference to the budget. I did not call him an armchair analyst, in fact he is a very skilled retired professional. But his simplistic armchair analysis of that budget is what I referred to. Facts matter, Benja. MR. SCHWARTZ: I stand corrected. But I found that the reference to his letter as an armchair analysis was dmneaning to him and the concluding sense of the letter that implied that you preferred to follow the advice of fiscal experts, at least implied that Mr. LaRocca was not a fiscal expert. Whether he is or not a fiscal expert, whether his analysis is done in an armchair, whether it is simple or not, my point is, he is a tax paying citizen and I believe that your letter showed disrespect, not just for him but for all of the taxpaying citizens who seek to become involved or try to become involved in our Southold Town government. That is all I have for today. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Would anybody else like to comment? Marie, please. Marie Dominici, Mattituek MARIE DOMINICI: Good afternoon, I guess. Marie Dominici, Mattituck. I just want to make a personal observation, first of all, always commend people who sit on this Board because the work that goes into what you do is not known to the public necessarily, the amount of man hours that go into the final product that you deliver, whether it is a budget or anything else. But at the end of the day, the thing that concerns me greatly is, if you look around this room aside from the people sitting at the dais which is yourselves, there are i 0 people in this audience, four of which are c~mployees, two of which are media people. And I don't know the remaining people, so I am guessing there are three of us left that are really taxpayers without being employed and taxpayers of this town. So I get really disturbed by the fact that people like to stand on the sidelines and critique and make comments. If people had a real interest in what is going on in their town, they would show up for these meetings and at least listen, if they have no comments, but at least to listen. You as a taxing agency will be bastardized regardless of what the budget comes out to be, because 70 percent of our taxes or at least my taxes, are school taxes. If I had to just pay my town taxes, I could do that on unemployment and I would give you all a raise. Having said that, it just disturbs me that people will stand on the sidelines and rant about their taxes and don't show up for these meetings or at least one meeting to understand the dynamics. The only comment I will make is the way this particular budget is outlined and I have said this in the past, it is not comprehensive enough, although I do know that you have it on your website. But when I look at this and I see personal services, and I have said this before, to me personal services is getting your hair and your nails done. So when I see, you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars in that bucket, I cannot say that I agree or disagree with what is shown here. November 4, 2010 Page 12 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: Do we look that good? MS. DOM1NICI: So that is my only comment about this. I can't say that I agree or disagree with this budget. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Let me tell you, Marie, you are 100 percent correct. I actually met with you and Ray Huntington and another gentleman a few weeks ago, it is my job to take this budget and try to make it something that is more easily understood by the public. I am working on that now, in the very near future I am going to have a presentation that is going to sort of explain the budget step by step. You know, to take this and boil it down to this isn't easy. We talked about options of pie charts etc. but you are 100 percent correct, this isn't my budget, it belongs to the people of Southold Town. It is their money and they should be able to look at that budget and know what every dollar is being spent on and why. The why is sometimes more important than the how much. MS. DOMINICI: When will this budget formally be approved? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: It has to be approved by the 20th of November, by state law. We have another hearing tonight, again I do not anticipate a Board willing to vote to approve it tonight. We will probably have to meet and reconvene to discuss some of the public input, both written and here in person to come up with a revised budget. But it has to be adopted by the 20th of November. MS. DOM1NICI: Okay, so then your planned meeting to break it down is after that? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: I am hoping to do it before but with obligations, it is very difficult. And looking at the enormity of the information and trying, as we talked that day. MS. DOMINICI: Okay. Thank you for your time. COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: Thank you. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Would anybody else like to address the Town Board? COUNCILMAN RULAND: Can I say a word, Scott? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Yes, please. COUNCILMAN RULAND: It seems or maybe some people would glean from what they read in the newspaper that the budget, the preliminary budget and it is important that that be emphasized that the budget that you submit to the Town Board is the preliminary budget. This is the culmination of your meetings with the departments and your recommendations as the chief financial officer of the town to the entire Town Board, at which time, as Albert spoke to, we have and you have been present, Supervisor, at all those meetings where we met with every November 4, 2010 Page 13 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes department head and we went through their budget, sometimes line by line. Questioned and looked at the expenditures, I would say in detail, in some cases had to have the person come back because there was more detail that was needed and then and only then and even then I would say and here I will speak for myself, at our meeting on October 25th which was a morning meeting I had raised questions about salary recommendations and I said to you a number of things one of which was that I wrestled with the whole thing tremendously because I am involved. In other words, ifI vote for it, I am voting myself a pay raise and I have a hard time, I would have a hard time doing that under any, any set of circumstances. That is just me. But I also told you that I felt strongly that in your role, you had a responsibility to do what you thought was right in proposing something. Whether ultimately it is deemed right or wrong by the Town Board is somewhat out of your hands because you proposed this and you have one vote and the rest of the Town Board has five more and we could in fact agree with you on everything, we could agree with you on some things, we could agree with the department heads on everything, we could agree with some of them on nothing and that was the case on a couple and we agreed on a lot of things in between and I would say I think, I could stand corrected because we have had so many meetings that I can't quite remember but with the exception of one, I think Justice Evans was present by phone, she participated in all the discussion so it wasn't just that we here on the mainland were making all the decisions but in fact, the entire Town Board was engaged in the discussions that had to do with the meetings with the department heads in detail and if I have said anything to this point that anybody would correct me, please do but I think that is my recollection of how it went. For me and for the others, I thought it was a very open, a very enlightening and a very important process. I don't take my role here as anything less than serious and I didn't see that anybody else did as well because we are not dealing with our money, we are dealing with someone else's money. And as the lady in the audience said, yes, probably whatever we do will be criticized but I think in the end, what we do has to be what we believe in our hearts is best for all of the people of the Town of Southold and looking at a global picture sometimes is difficult because there is turmoil on one part of the globe when there isn't on the other and our job is to try and find out where the middle ground is. And I think that the Supervisor's comment just recently about what we hear and the input, and we have received a tremendous amount of electronic communication, we ali have received some written communication either in our mailboxes here, I know I have received a couple at home, as well as phone calls and people stopping you in the post office or whatever and expressing their concerns and at the end of the day, I think we have to take all of those into consideration and do what we think is right. And I don't think that myself or as well as I know any of my colleagues, would do anything differently and for the people that either can't or don't come to a hearing like this and will see something like this on television, I think it is important for them to know that we are not just sitting here rubber stamping what the Supervisor recommends, that he put forth a document; we have worked on the document and I don't think we are done yet. I think we are close but I don't think we are quite done. Basically that is, I have a great deal of admiration for all of my colleagues because they have put their hearts all into this. It has taken a lot of time over the last 30 days and anybody who would say it doesn't is wrong. Because we have been here a number of times. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: Bill doesn't speak often but when he does, it is quality. And that is right, everything Bill said was correct. I think everyone on the Board did an honorable job November 4, 2010 Page 14 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes with the budget and we did take it very personal. As Mr. Harris said, we had $30,000 in his budget for heavy equipment and then Albert, Bill and I spoke afterwards with rest of us and we said we don't think this is right and we did take it back out to lower the budget, so we are continuously adjusting the budget. Well said. Benja Schwartz MR. SCHWARTZ: Benja Schwartz. I am very happy that you are all very happy with your own performance and actions. COUNCILMAN RULAND: Excuse me but I didn't say that I was happy with myself. I am merely saying this is what we have done. MR. SCHWARTZ: And do you think that you couldn't have done better? COUNCILMAN RULAND: I don't think that we are done yet. MR. SCHWARTZ: Well .... COUNCILMAN RULAND: I look forward to the rest of your remark. MR. SCHWARTZ: I appreciate that you all work hard and you are trying to do a good job for the taxpayers in the Town of Southold, however, I think one part, very important part of that job is for you, our Town Board, is to be critical of town government. And not just cheerleaders and bobbing heads. Not just keeping those seats warm but not just commenting on what Supervisor Russell puts forth but actually getting out there and making some changes to improve the ways things are done. For example, I give Superintendent Harris credit for coming to the meeting tonight and I appreciate that he came to the meeting, however, there is a glaring discrepancy between the way that he communicates with the public and the way that other department heads, for example the Southold Town municipal waste, transfer, recycling municipal waste center department seems to be trying to develop an effective, communicative website. The highway department has one thing, a phone number and an under construction sign. I think that is a joke. I like jokes but I don't think the government should be a joke. I am very upset by a recent action that was taken by the highway department and was rubber stamped by this Board and I und~stand that there are future actions to be taken in my neighborhood. I have only been there 45 years but with all due respect, that is longer than any body else has lived in that area and I think I am intimately familiar with the neighborhood. Now I hear there is a plan to widen the road at the dead end of East Road. Supervisor Harris has expressed his intention to do so in the spring. I believe it was on the request of one of my neighbors. The other neighbors never even got notice. They never even heard there was something, let alone an opportunity to weigh in. I don't think this is the way we should be doing things. The recent action that was undertaken by the highway department and again, I have to give credit where credit is due, I did a Freedom of Information request and I got a fairly accurate of most of the costs. Clearly not all the costs. But the main cost of that action which was to install a drain to benefit and I stand corrected by Superintendent Harris that said it wasn't just to benefit one property, it was to benefit two. Yes, there was a property next to the property that requested that drain that also might experience, might experience some benefit but in fact, that money which was spent, been spent, but this November 4, 2010 Page 15 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes relates to the budget for next year because if the policy is that the superintendent of highways can do whatever he wants with the monies that are allocated to him for road improvements including taking those money for road improvements or repair and maintenance and using them for enlargement of the road and extension of our network of drains which we now have to maintain, we have got a big hole in Fleetwood Road. Well, I was down there today, I don't think it was a very hard rain today. Guess what? The single property that was phmarily benefited by that drain, the drain is working fine, the water from the road is going into the drain but lo and behold, there is still a puddle on that property. Now you were told that before that work was done, before that money was spent. And some of you even came to look at the project but I don't think you came on a rainy day, I don't think you listened to what you were told and I think in the future, we need to have a process where the plans of the town and the highway department programs and the number of people that are working for the town are made more publicly accessible. This budget was apparently printed on some kind of an old printer, I don't know, dot matrix or something, then it was rescanned in and then it was posted as an image file on the website. It was very hard to read. I don't care how savvy you are and what kind of an expensive computer screen you have, a file like that is difficult to read, let alone to understand. What does it take to make it clearer? Not very much. A little bit of knowledge. You know, there are a lot of people in town that have that knowledge and I for one have been trying to share that with town government for a long time but you know, so excuse me when I just don't believe that everything is the best that it can be. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: Well, Benja, Superintendent Harris does not run every storm drain past the Town Board to install it. That is why the people voted him in, the public voted him in, to manage the roads. Now, a major project he will talk to us but to put in a storm drain at the end of someone's property, I mean on the end of a town road, he does not .... MR. SCHWARTZ: It was not at the end of a road. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: I was talking in general. MR. SCHWARTZ: It was on the side of a road that is still closed. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: I am not talking specific sites, I am talking about in general. He doesn't come to us for every storm drain. That is why he is in charge of that, if he sees a need to put a drain in, he puts that drain in. MR. SCHWARTZ: He doesn't consult the engineer to know if the drain he is installing is going to serve the intended function and purpose? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: That issue has been covered time and time again. This is a budget hearing, can I please ask people to focus on the specifics of the 2011 budget? MR. SCHWARTZ: That has to do with the way money is spent. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Then that is a good discussion but again, the specific allocations, the November 4, 2010 Page 16 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes appropriations etc for the 2011 budget. COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: And we do have a stormwater committee and when they meet, it is a public meeting .... MR. SCHWARTZ: Well, let's talk about .... COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: You are more than welcome to join the discussion at the stormwater committee and actually, you said we rubber stamped that storm drain. I know I went down and I am sure other Board members went down to look at it because you had questioned about the location and everything and when a member of the public brings something in our day to day purview, to the Town Board's attention, the Town Board members they go and look at it, they look into it. So it wasn't rubber stamped. MR. SCHWARTZ: But what you saw was what that property owner created for you. He put on, he dug out the side of his property and created a washout problem and then showed it to you. You know, I have been looking at it for years and that was a self induced and it is still flooding there because this property is low-lying. COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: Despite our obligations .... MR. SCHWARTZ: Do you want to see the picture of what it looks like today? SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: What I am going to do is end the conversation and I am going to ask .... MR. SCHWARTZ: No, let's talk about the budget that is proposed and what is it? Half a million dollars that is allocated to the stormwater .... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: MS 4 compliance. MR. SCHWARTZ: MS 4, Municipal storm sewer system. COUNCILMAN ORLANDO: Unfunded, state mandated. MR. SCHWARTZ: There is another s somewhere. COUNCILMAN KRUPSKI: Southold. MR. SCHWARTZ: You know, I have been trying to get a hold of that priority list that the committee has been working on. I haven't done a FOIL for it yet but it would be nice if it could be posted on the, be nice if that committee would have a page on the website. SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Well, that's .... November 4, 2010 Page 17 Southold Town Board Meeting Minutes MR. SCHWARTZ: Inaudible. In connection with this budget .... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: That's .... MR. SCHWARTZ: What that half million dollars .... SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: That is exactly right. That is exactly right, you are 100 percent right and part of our requirement on MS 4 is to take what we are doing with MS 4 and putting that, that is an essential component of MS 4. We are going to do that. My budget includes I believe $30,000 for a computer consultant to come in and design our, to help us work with the website to upgrade the website at the same time, Town Clerk Betty Neville has secured grants for a GIS component to the website. That is all being done. That is exactly right. You are 100 percent right and the .... MR. SCHWARTZ: I will believe it when I see it. Thank you. Supervisor Russell SUPERVISOR RUSSELL: Okay. Would anybody else like to address the 2011 budget? response) Can I get a motion to recess? (No Southold Town Clerk