A story that's consumed the local media here, and been covered by Lou Dobbs, The NY Times, and the Wall Street Journal...Unfortunately, the Medicaid waste of this state (by far, the most taxed, and hence, most business unfriendly, state in the union) is not cited.

Still...it's refreshing to see the private sector citizens of this region finally take a stand....


February 16, 2005 Wednesday
Late Edition - Final

SECTION: Section B; Column 3; Metropolitan Desk; Pg. 1

LENGTH: 1143 words

HEADLINE: Cuts, Then More Cuts, in the Buffalo Area Budget

BYLINE: By DAVID STABA

DATELINE: BUFFALO, Feb. 15

BODY:


Facing its worst crisis after years of budget maneuvers and close calls, the Erie County Legislature decided to wipe out thousands of jobs and eliminate services it had long struggled to preserve, rather than raise the sales tax.

A day after slashing $40 million from an overdue spending plan, the Legislature chose on Tuesday to cut at least another $55 million, out of a budget of nearly $900 million. Legislators are scheduled to meet on Thursday to work out the details and try to pass a budget, more than two months past the Dec. 7 deadline.

The county executive, Joel A. Giambra, described the decision to cut deeper as ''a disaster'' for the county and its 940,000 residents, who for years have seen services erode as officials struggled to come up with the money to pay for them in a region that has never recovered from an exodus of industrial jobs in the 1970's and 80's. The county includes Buffalo, the state's second-largest city, with a population of almost 300,000.

But legislators decided to cut after an outpouring of antitax sentiment by county residents, who complained about patronage and other waste and balked at another increase in the sales tax.

''The Legislature's failure to enact a revenue to maintain vital county services inflicts serious injury on this community,'' said Mr. Giambra, a Republican, in a statement hours after the vote. Mr. Giambra had pushed for the sales tax increase but had found himself increasingly marginalized in the discussions. He did not even attend Tuesday's legislative session.

Mr. Giambra added: ''As county executive, I will work closely with the sheriff, the district attorney and with our public health and public safety staff to try to maintain basic safety services. But make no mistake. This is a disaster for county residents.''

If so, it was a disaster long in the making. The legislative session followed months of heated discussions and competing plans, escalating tension and political brinksmanship to try to close a shortfall that defied the customary budget gimmicks. County parks have been closed for two weeks to save money. The failure to find revenue means that funds for every county department, from public safety to social services, as well as for the Buffalo Zoo and many cultural organizations, will either be cut deeply or eliminated. The lawmakers even said they will lay off every member of their own staffs, except for the Legislature's clerk.

In a sign of frustration, county employees, including the sheriff, comptroller, district attorney and clerk, are suing the county, saying the cuts could prevent them from carrying out their legally mandated duties.

Mr. Giambra, an outspoken critic of Albany, has steadfastly blamed rising Medicaid costs for the fiscal crisis. Officials estimated that about 80 percent of the county's annual spending went to such mandated expenses as Medicaid, Medicare and employee pensions.

Mr. Giambra pushed to raise revenues by increasing the local sales tax rate by 0.75 percent, to 9 cents on every dollar.

But only six members of the 15-member Legislature voted for the increase, less than a week after nine had supported the measure.

''This is a sad day,'' said George A. Holt, a Buffalo Democrat who is chairman of the Legislature and who was one of the legislators to change his vote. ''There were so many people who didn't want the tax -- we heard that loud and clear. We're going to show people what happens when you don't provide the resources necessary to pay for the services they've had in the past.''

Legislators said they would try to come up with the savings by cutting back in virtually every county service. Mr. Holt said at least 1,400 to 1,700 layoffs from a work force of 9,000 county workers would be required to eliminate the deficit, adding that a ripple effect among companies who contract to provide services could push the total number of jobs lost closer to 3,000. That would spike an unemployment rate that already stood at 5.9 percent in December; the statewide figure is 5.2 percent.

''When you're looking for work in Erie County, it's not easy to find,'' Mr. Holt said.

Last week, Patrick Gallivan, the Erie County sheriff, presented legislators with a plan to cut $4.2 million more from his budget. In December, he already accepted a $7.2 million reduction from 2004.

''We'll still have the ability to respond to emergencies and run the jail,'' Sheriff Gallivan said. ''But it will impact our ability to get to calls in an expedient manner and road safety in general.''

The sheriff said he would eliminate crime-prevention efforts like antidrug programs in schools and be forced to cut back on narcotics investigations and traffic enforcement. He said the county's crime laboratory has been closed in anticipation of further cuts since last week, which left his department unable to process evidence in a rape over the weekend.

''If some of these services are not properly restored, it will lead to chaos,'' the sheriff said.

In November, Mr. Giambra announced that the county faced a $108 million deficit, offering legislators two stark choices -- raise the sales tax by one percentage point, or close the gap with a package of cuts designed by his administration.

Mr. Giambra, a longtime Democrat who served as Buffalo's comptroller before switching parties and winning the county executive's seat as a Republican in 1999, came up with a tough spending plan, which he called the ''red'' budget, but said he did not want it to pass. Critics said the plan, which called for closing all county libraries and eliminating both road patrols by sheriffs and plowing by the Public Works Department in an area notorious for big snowstorms, was a ploy designed to force legislators to insist on the tax increase and eliminate the need for substantive cuts.

The plan had the opposite effect, causing an outpouring of protest from tax-weary citizens who flooded radio talk shows and besieged their legislators with calls, letters and e-mail messages. The Legislature tentatively approved the sales tax hike and accompanying ''green'' budget in December, but an early January amendment calling for new spending and protecting scores of patronage jobs led Al DeBenedetti, a Democratic legislator from Buffalo, to withdraw his support, making him the only member of his party to oppose Mr. Giambra.

''I've had thousands of calls to my office, as we all have, with a common theme -- cut the pork, cut the patronage -- and we did that yesterday,'' said Timothy M. Wroblewski, a Democrat, who voted for the tax increase. ''We further reduced excessive spending. But I don't think the sheriff's road patrol is excessive spending. Or that the district attorney's office is excessive spending. Or that having school nurses in city schools, or the libraries or parks that thousands of people use are excessive spending.''



URL: http://www.nytimes.com

GRAPHIC: Photos: Andy Amato led a protest on Sunday over the closing of Chestnut Ridge Park. (Photo by Dan Cappellazzo for The New York Times)(pg. B1)
Dave Gavadin gave his daughter Jessica, 6, a ride on a sled during a protest of a park closing near Buffalo. (Photo by Dan Cappellazzo for The New York Times)(pg. B5)

Very interesting!

Thanks for the post Hawk!

*buys Hawk a new shovel*

And a giant FUCK YOU to Erie County for this

My wedding reception was planned at one of their parks and now we have to find a new location for it. Live 2700 miles away too, this should be fun. We have no fucking idea what we're going to do now. Wheeee!

Amazing that the taxpayers overwhelmingly want the sales tax increase but the county decides not to listen. Assholes. Funny how "representatives" rarely actually act upon the desires of their constituents. They've mismanaged that county for years and the only possible fix they can consider is to just slash the holy shit out of everything. Wonderful.

Admit it, it was my lamb picture in the "Lure Back Eric" thread, wasn't it?

And sorry about the wedding reception:( You can have it at my house if you want. I've got a nice backyard, and I'll BBQ for everyone.

Buffalo is a hell hole, and it's because of the politicians that it is so. It's been mismanaged, and allowed to degrade for decades now. Buffalo has made absolutely no attempt to transform its industrial complex from blue collar to white collar (like Rochester for example), it taxes it's people out the ass, and has done nothing to promote the city. It doesn't promote tourism, it doesn't promote business, it promotes nothing. And that is why it always will be a shithole.

Then why don't the people elect new leaders that will reflect their will? I'm of the opinion that you can only blame politicians so much, since the people have the power to vote them out if they're not doing their jobs. I'm not familiar with the area as I'm on the other side of the continent, but if it's true like you say that this has been happening for decades, then I have to place at least some of the blame on the residents there.

Actually...according to a scientific poll by WGRZ-TV today...65% of county residents opposed the sales tax increase...which is the whole point...

even though this has been an exciting movement...i'm afraid it won't move further until the state reforms medicaid....which is a significant barier since the unions and drug companies are on teh same side...a formadable opposition...but eventually its going to come to a head...people here just can't afford it anymore.

Well, if people don't like living conditions there they should get the hell out of Dodge. Plenty of other less fucked up places to live in the country. Obviously the cost of living is too high for the living wages in the community, and that's probably due to lack of competetive industries and high paying employment. That probably does come down as a fault of the government. People do have to realize though that without taxes the standard of living in the community will go way down, as will the opportunity for growth in the business sector. No one wants to live in a bankrupt city with no public park accessablility, limited emergency services ect. These are things taxes pay for.

Elect people to represent the people of Buffalo? HA! Not too familiar with the Buffalo political machine are we?

And people don't like the living conditions in Buffalo, and they are getting the hell out of dodge. Again, this is one of the aspects of the economic problem facing Buffalo. The blue collar work base has all but dissappeared, and replacing it has been by and large, lower class, uneducated people. The tax base in Erie county has dissappeared because of the exodus from Buffalo, both from the people and the loss of businesses. Also, the cost of living in Buffalo is about as low as it gets in America. It's a bit higher in some Erie country burbs, but cost of living is hella cheap in upstate New York, even cheaper in Buffalo.

And anyhow, taxes in Nashville were dirt cheap, it's a landlocked city, and its exploding. I wonder why Nashville is expanding so rapidly, and why Buffalo has crashed and will continue to do so?