Fiscal officer defends, explains city budget
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By M.J. STAFFORD
mstafford@observertoday.com
Dunkirk Fiscal Affairs Officer Ellen Luczkowiak defended Mayor Kate Wdowiasz's 2027 budget proposal Monday.
Luczkowiak told a Common Council Finance Committee meeting Monday that City Comptroller Tracy Smith-Dengler put a lot of work into streamlining the spending plan, which comes with a proposed 11% property tax increase.
"People need to understand -- on this budget, Tracy went through and saw a lot of issues in how it was laid out. She did a complete revision," Luczkowiak said.
Smith-Dengler consolidated departmental information, mainly the Department of Public Works'. "In the (previous) budget, it was all over the place," Luczkowiak said. "You had to go page by page and figure out what the real budget was."
Luczkowiak said copies of the proposal are available at City Hall; she can also email them.
Comptroller Smith-Dengler was excused from the Finance Committee meeting Monday. Smith-Dengler was reportedly on a vacation that was planned before she took her job with the city in July.
Luczkowiak said the comptroller will be back on Thursday. "Once she gave me her consolidated numbers, I had to go in and balance the budget, which was not an easy task," Luczkowiak said.
"I know council will review it. I know the Office of the State Comptroller will review it. Obviously there will be possible changes and revisions," she added.
Councilman-at-large Nick Weiser, the Finance Committee chairman, asked how much room Dunkirk has left until it bumps up against a state Constitution limit on taxation. "Very little," Luczkowiak replied.
"The mayor kept everything in this budget as requested by specific departments," the fiscal affairs officer claimed, adding that "both police and fire had a need for overtime, and those figures are pretty big."
Police overtime rises to $220,000 in the 2027 proposed budget, up from $184,000 in the final, adjusted 2026 budget. The $250,000 of overtime for the fire department is the same in both budgets.
Councilwoman Natalie Luczkowiak wondered how the budget could call for such a tax hike when the Common Council has not been asked to override the state tax cap for 2027. "It's a proposed budget," Ellen Luczkowiak emphasized.
Council will review the budget on the next three Tuesday mornings, starting with DPW at 9 a.m. today, Oct. 20.
Weiser said he hopes council has "a clear idea of what we want to do on the budget by mid-November."
"I don’t want anyone to think our problems are as easy as raising taxes," Natalie Luczkowiak said. "We need to look at the budget."
Weiser also brought up a Smith-Dengler proposal to send tax bills earlier than April, to help the city's early 2027 cash flow. Weiser evidently favors a voluntary scheme, where past due dates on the bills will be the same but people will be strongly encouraged to send them in as early as possible.
Weiser asked Clerk/Treasurer Amy Dobek how long it would take to issue tax bills immediately after the Dec. 15 deadline for council to pass a budget. She said it would take a couple weeks.
Weiser hoped that "giving the people the option of paying earlier could alleviate the cash flow concerns" mentioned in recent Finance Committee meetings.
Monday's Finance Committee meeting ended in its typical fashion, with resident Chris Pinkoski firing questions at city officials. Pinkoski queried if the budget addresses the city's deficit.
Ellen Luczkowiak hesitated, calling Smith-Dengler "the lead on that" -- but then acknowledged that the budget does not have anything "extra" in it to address the deficit.
Pinkoski called the sewer budget "unrealistic" and not fully funded.
"You can say that, but the fact of the matter is, we will be doing a deep dive on sewer" during the council's budget review process, Fiscal Affairs Officer Luczkowiak replied.