As they approach the finish line in adopting a 2011 budget—with a deadline set for this Friday, November 19—members of the Southampton Town Board’s Republican-Conservative majority are keeping their cards close to the vest, holding off on introducing anticipated last-minute changes to Town Supervisor Anna Throne-Holst’s $82.1 million preliminary spending plan.
If approved on Friday, Ms. Throne-Holst’s proposed budget would include a 2.4-percent increase in taxes—a fiscal move that Ms. Throne-Holst has stressed is designed to amass $1.85 million to pay off the town’s deficits in its beaches and waste management funds. Her plan would increase overall spending by about $2.3 million over the amended 2010 budget.
Republican Town Board members Nancy Graboski and Chris Nuzzi, and Conservative Town Councilman Jim Malone did not return numerous calls seeking comment this week on any potential amendments. Ryan Horn, a town spokesman, confirmed that they were working on amendments this week, but said they opted to decline sharing them with the public, noting that the changes are evolving “minute by minute.”
“What they told me is they don’t have anything right now to chat about, with what the proposed amendments are going to be,” he said.
Ms. Throne-Holst said she has heard from at least one Town Board member, Democrat Bridget Fleming, that Mr. Nuzzi, Mr. Malone and Ms. Graboski may amend the budget to restore the General Services Department, also known as the Business Management Department. The supervisor wants to dismantle that department as part of her budget.
But when reached on Tuesday, Ms. Fleming said that she never told Ms. Throne-Holst such a thing. “Anna must have made a mistake,” she said.
The department in question is headed up by Town Management Services Administrator Richard Blowes, who is slated to retire at the end of the year under a New York State early retirement incentive. He will continue to serve as the executive director of the Southampton Housing Authority. Mr. Blowes, whose position was eliminated from the supervisor’s preliminary budget, said he signed a contract with the organization on Monday.
“That was my big reorganization,” Ms. Throne-Holst said of the General Services Department. She added that not one Town Board member has contacted her about a potential amendment to the department.
When approached at Town Hall on Tuesday, Ms. Graboski walked away from a reporter, declining to comment on any potential budget amendments before stating that she was heading into a meeting. She declined to discuss any potential changes to the General Services Department, stating: “We’re looking at a bunch of things at this point in time.”
Ms. Throne-Holst said she hoped her colleagues wouldn’t wait until the last minute to introduce changes. During Friday’s work session, the supervisor tried to set a rough deadline for amendments, explaining that the town comptroller’s office needs time to determine the financial impact on the spending plan.
The supervisor tried to get her fellow board members to informally agree to setting an earlier deadline, but Mr. Nuzzi countered that while sooner might be better, Town Board members technically have until Thursday to submit their resolutions to the town clerk’s office for Friday’s meeting.
The strained atmosphere at Town Hall was on display on Tuesday afternoon, just days before the budget was to be adopted. There was a clear lack of communication between the supervisor’s and Town Board’s offices, which are just a short walk from one another on the second floor. Those in Ms. Throne-Holst’s office said they have no idea what the board’s majority was drafting, and Town Comptroller Tamara Wright said she also has not been notified of any pending changes, save for minor budget line adjustments. She said that, as of Tuesday afternoon, she has helped draft between 25 and 30 resolutions related to adjustments suggested following discussions with department heads and based on comments from the public. Ms. Wright said she has not been consulted on any large changes, such as department restructuring or suggested layoffs.
But the comptroller said that based on comments during last Friday’s work session, particularly ones made by Mr. Malone, the board’s majority apparently plans to unveil significant amendments on Friday, including those that would reduce or eliminate any increase in town taxes.
“Oh, I think there are going to be some major adjustments, yes,” Ms. Wright said. “I sense that they really want to bring tax relief, and the only way to bring tax relief is to reduce spending.
“To keep the levy flat, they would have to find over $750,000 of spending cuts, or find new revenue sources,” she continued. “And then if they were going to reduce taxes, they would have to go even deeper.”
Southampton Town’s park reserve fees and Planned Development District funds were the subject of a review last week by the town’s auditors, and preliminary indications are that even more money than originally thought has been misplaced.
Auditors with Nawrocki Smith, LLP, offered the preliminary findings of their work at a Town Board work session and recommended that money in some PDD accounts be redirected to different reserves to more appropriately fit their dedicated use. They said out of the 19 PDD projects within the town, four involve the actual collection of funds. Two of the four involve cash funds that were combined with money in park reserve accounts and should be separated, the auditors said.
They also addressed accounting errors in park reserve fees, a topic that Ms. Wright addressed before the board about two weeks ago, when she announced that nearly $1.5 million in park fees were wrongly placed in an account called “Planning Board fees” within the Land Management Enterprise Fund. The number has since grown after further analysis and now stands at about $1.9 million, according to the town auditors.
An official report from the auditors is expected to be released within the next week or two.
Confusing legislation could be the excuse that Southampton Town uses not to have to shell out $140,000 to fund its education and government channel, Sea-TV, town officials said this week.
The issue was raised more than a month ago when Mr. Blowes said that resolutions and town law dictate that the municipality owes money to a SEA-TV reserve account.
But this week Ms. Throne-Holst said she does not believe the channel is owed the money because the legislation is unclear. The $140,000 figure is dictated by two things: a 2005 town law that governs the distribution of channel revenues, and resolutions enacted prior to 2005 that attempt to allocate money to a reserve account for the channel.
What’s in question with the law is exactly how much funding SEA-TV should have been receiving from the town since 2005, and how much should have been placed in the reserve account, according to the supervisor.
The issue was scrutinized by Town Attorney Michael Sordi shortly after it was first raised. Mr. Sordi said that, in his legal opinion, the law and resolutions were too ambiguous to make a determination. He recommended that the Town Board amend it.
In both instances, Mr. Sordi recommended that the board amend the legislation and either clarify its language or rescind the resolutions. Ms. Throne-Holst said she plans to introduce a notice for a public hearing on Friday to eventually amend the town law.
Rohma Abbas on Nov 17, 2010