Literately Speaking - Beyond Schenectady

SCHENECTADY CITIZENS FIGHT FOR GOV. BY THE PEOPLE

If you live in or around Schenectady, N.Y., you can’t help but know that citizen activists are combing the city to collect signatures for a referendum to be voted on at the next election. The referendum asks the citizens to decide whether the City Council should have the authority to raise salaries at any time.

The purpose of this referendum is to have a public vote on a decision that was made in a closed door vote by the City Council. The council voted to overturn an existing law, which protects the public from unscrupulous politicians who have in the past voted themselves huge salaries during their term in office. The law that the council negated required all raises to be effective in the next term. The idea had been: if the mayor has done a good job during the existing term, then the public isn’t likely to begrudge him the raise and will re-elect him.

The change in the law came moments before a 46% salary increase was given to Mayor Brian Stratton. This amounts to a $28,000 increase in one shot and is equivalent to the median income of the city taxpayers.

The purpose of the referendum has been skewed by opponents claiming its sole purpose is to stop the raise, and they purport that the mayor deserves a raise. Anyone who reads beyond the headlines knows that the method by which the raise was given is the issue and not the raise itself. Opponents seem to believe the end justifies the means – the equivalent of allowing Enron executives to decide whether they did anything wrong when they screwed thousands of people out of their life savings.

The truth about those vocally opposing the petition is they are ‘suckies’ waiting for an opportunity at the public trough; backing the mayor with appearances of support with fallacious logic in hopes they will be remembered when comes that unproductive patronage job picking the pockets of taxpayers who work long and hard at real jobs.

TO THE MAYORS CASE

The Schenectady Mayor is the lowest paid when compared to those in nearby cities. Brian Stratton brings a professional appearance and some political influence to the office because of his father, Sam Stratton.

Brian Stratton has found ways to save money. He has combined some jobs, arranged for tax delinquent houses to be sold in a package to a company that does the collection and foreclosure work - and that means assuming the holding costs as well - and he has gotten rid of a losing parking garage.

Schenectady’s credit rating has been improved and debt has been significantly reduced.

These things all sound good, but…

THE MAYOR’S SMOKE AND MIRRORS

Brian Stratton knew the pay when he ran for the job. Reasonably, if he can produce quality results during this term, there would be no argument over a raise for next term. But Stratton and the Council lied to the taxpayers and included no raise in the budget. Afterwards, they held a private meeting to arrange for the mayor’s huge raise.

A long-term city employee earning $28,000 was fired to obtain the money for Stratton’s raise.

The mayor’s office, which paid $60,000 when Stratton was elected, has been reduced by sourcing the work to new employees. The cost of these employees, not counting benefits, is approximately $70,000, bringing the current cost of the mayor’s office to $130,000, which exceeds salaries from other cities used as comparables to the cost.

Stratton has been praised by his groupies for balancing the budget and reducing the deficit, as if he did this by some wonder of the educated mind. What he did was what any idiot could and would do; raise taxes.

And it wasn’t just any tax increase, but a cruel and cold double-digit increase on the poorest people in the city, while offering the biggest tax relief to the wealthiest.

There are only 26000 households in Schenectady, and 56% of them are tenants; of those, 50% are in the government’s very low-income bracket.
Twenty percent of the cities residents are below poverty. The per capita income in the city is $17,000. The city has 30,200 housing units according to the census. It was to the devastation of poorest people that Stratton placed a flat fee garbage tax on all property; double the amount on two family homes ($260), and triple on three ($390). This caused hardship on the poorest renters and homeowners as well as fixed income retirees. The mayor said this was “more fair” because two family houses often have large amounts of garbage set out to the curb. The fallacy of this is that some two family houses have one or two containers on the curb while single family houses may have anywhere from one to five containers – especially in the wealthier neighborhoods with the largest houses; huge amounts of trash piled on the curb is not the norm for two family houses. So, where is the flat rate more fair? It is not! Stratton put the city in the black with the most hideous, unfair, tax increase on the residents struggling the most just to put food on the table. The wealthy homeowners are grateful.

The injustice does not end there. The city still collects the cost of trash collection in the regular property taxes and supplements that with the garbage fee – supposedly. But if you don’t pay the garbage fee, the city won’t collect; in fact, they will fine you for putting the trash out for them. The problem – the criminal act of the mayor and council – is that these homeowners have paid for the majority of the trash pick-up with their property tax and now the city has taken their money and not delivered the service they charged the homeowner for. Stealing money from the people, isn’t that nice.

Frequently cited as an accomplishment of Stratton’s is the new businesses and jobs coming to downtown. Well, that’s another fallacy. Most of the new business he is credited for was seed planted before he became mayor; now that they are in bloom, he is taking credit. It is to his credit that he supports the improvements, but so did the last guy, Mayor Al, who had as little to do with it as Stratton does.

The business is mostly bars, paid for with the public’s money extorted through an oppressive sales tax and given away by Metroplex (an authority allowed to tax the crap out of the public and give the money away to business, and the business can then charge for the service that they took the people’s money to provide). No private investor would put his money into these places. The jobs, frequently referred to as good paying, are the usual bar jobs and do not pay the rent, and most certainly won’t pay the taxes or the mayor’s raise.

So, there is some doubt as to whether the mayor has acted in a manner really deserving of a raise, but most will agree that the office is underpaid. The important thing is for the public to not be confused by the rhetoric of the Stratton fan club. Particularly bad and misleading were the ones who got themselves published in the local news; Anthony P. De Luccia – who came up with the best political yip-yap about the ‘language in the records to warrant rewriting the law to conform to what has already been established”, which I don’t believe was an original thought by him, but was put on him by a professional political double-talker with the promise of one of those patronage jobs; Bob Mantello – who thinks the economic accomplishment mentioned above warrant a salary far in excess of the $88,000 per year “legally implemented by the City Council”, which goes to show you those patronage jobs aren’t going to be filled by the sharpest tacks in the box. You would think Bob would have included the “esquire” after his name, knowing so much about legal and all. There were quite a few more of these people – whose names, for the most part, all seemed to end with vowels – and they all sounded about as ridiculous, trying to impress their way to a free paycheck.

But let us remember, the issue is about a law that prevents a mayor and council member from obtaining a raise during their term. Even if this administration could be trusted with that power, the ones that will follow can not. That is why the law was made, and that is why the taxpayers need to vote this change down in November.

You can follow the action at: http://www.schenectadyny.info/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b=cc

posted by Smith @ 8:03 PM