MAYVILLE - County Executive Greg Edwards read the news this weekend and, oh boy, was he dismayed.
Edwards unveiled his proposed budget for 2011 last Wednesday. The plan was then detailed in several articles in both The Post-Journal and the OBSERVER, as well as criticized in editorials.
In his Monday Morning Memo, Edwards wrote that the newspapers failed "to acknowledge even the most basic of facts." He then went on to outline how much of the $21 million deficit which the county is facing next year is a result of actions by leaders in Albany. The Monday Morning Memo is a newsletter released weekly by the county executive.
FOUR FACTORS
Medicaid will cost the county more in 2011.
However, in addition to paying more for Medicaid, the county will see less federal assistance to fund the program next year.
In 2010, the county received $5.6 million in FMAP funding. Next year, the county will receive only $1.9 million.
As a result of the year-to-year increase and drop in assistance, the county is feeling a $3.8 million increase for Medicaid.
Similarly, at the start of 2011, state pension costs will have increased by $2,584,000, community college chargebacks will have increased by $1,545,000 and a total of five programs in the Public Health Department and Department of Social Services will have increased by $1,394,000.
"Just these four costs, all dictated by Albany, will cost the taxpayers of Chautauqua County over $7,423,000 more dollars than this year," Edwards writes in his newsletter.
Edwards then points out that though the tax levy in his proposed budget is up by $4,998,000, that's still less than the mandated increases forced on the county by Albany - $2,425,000 less to be exact.
OTHER ISSUES
Albany is a cause of increase in the county's 2011 budget, but there are also other factors affecting its bottom line, according to Edwards.
"Assemblyman (Bill) Parment demanded that our sales tax rate be reduced effective Dec. 1, 2010, cutting another $3,250,000 in revenue which requires that this same amount be added to the property tax," Edwards writes in his newsletter.
He goes on to allege that Parment has caused the county to lose $53 million in sales taxes since 2006, making Chautauqua County the only county in the state to reduce its rate in a recession.
"We have received $53 million less in sales taxes, but despite this loss we have been able to reduce the property tax rates every year," Edwards writes. "We did this through cuts, efficiencies and reductions in county government. So as a result the portion of our deficit directly related to state edicts exceeded $10,673,000 but my proposed property tax increase is $4,998,000 showing a difference of over $5,675,000.00 that was not added to the property tax increase."
Health insurance and other costs drove the deficit up to $21 million, which Edwards writes as meaning that additional $14 million has been addressed not in property tax increases but by cutting the workforce, costs, programs, using savings and through increased efficiencies.
"We have cut costs, found efficiencies and absorbed all of these cuts up through this year without increasing taxes," Edwards writes.
He then went on to say that taxes paid in 2006, under his predecessor's budget, were $96 million compared to the proposed 2011 amount of $89.4 million - a difference of $6.6 million.
More than just property taxes, those numbers also include the county's sales tax, mortgage tax, DMV revenue, and occupancy tax.
"Less workers, less programs, more efficiencies, more non-tax revenue, better management of our operations has enabled us to handle Albany's excesses and our own Assemblyman's demands of lower sales taxes, but as in all things there is a limit," Edwards writes.
The county executive's Monday Morning Memo can be found online at the county's website, www.co.chautauqua.ny.us. Also online at the site are both the county executive's budget presentation as well as the full 2011 budget itself.
