Dear Friends and Neighbors,
The more things change, the more they are the same*
January 5, 2005 – Warren County Board of Supervisors Meeting Notes:
Mr. Haskell thanked the members of the board for the honor of being selected Temporary Chairman. He also made the following remarks:
“As we organize for 2005 . . . I would like to congratulate my fellow supervisors for their accomplishments in 2004. In my opinion, we accomplished more in 2004 than I thought a governmental board could.”
“We rid ourselves of the burden of the Trash Plant and saved our taxpayers $750,000 per year.”
[Note: The plant was finally sold in 2011. According to an account in The Post Star (October 16, 2010) the burn plant opened in 1993 and turned an initial profit in its first few years. Since then, taxpayers paid $60.1 million to cover shortfalls, according to Steve Lynch, a consultant who handles trash plant matters for the Warren-Washington Counties Industrial Development Agency.]
“We completed a Public Safety Building (County Jail), which will save $1 million a year in boarding out prisoners plus get revenue of approximately $1 million.”
[Note: The 2014 Adopted budget Corrections Division (County Jail) – revenues $360,900 on expenditures of $8.1 million. The 2015 budget – revenues at $661,000 and expenditures at $9.6 million.] Source: Warren County Administrator and Budget Officer
We started a Co-Generation Project at the Westmount Health Facility, which will save $1.3 million over a 13-year period . . .”
[Note: EnerNoc the county hired engineering firm estimated the net Cogen loss for Electricity and Gas over the first 8 years (2006-2013) was $147,487 versus if the county had stayed on the Grid. Plus there were $3.4 million of payments on top of this. EnerNoc projects over the next 8 years through 2022 the cogen will be $498,092 more expensive than going back onto the Grid, and that is only if the $1.2 million of Medicaid payments come in.]
Source: EnerNoc December 2013 report to the Board of Supervisors
“These are just a few examples of how hard this board worked to keep our county taxes in check and to make sure we were taking care of our constituents.”
[Note: Click here for a full copy of the 1/5/2005 meeting notes – http://www.warrencountyny.gov/gov/proceedings/proceedings2005.pdf]
December 2014 Warren County Board of Supervisors Update:
Warren County is moving forward with a $152 million budget in 2015 that includes savings from the Westmount Nursing home and Cogeneration plant sale before the sale has been approved or completed. The budget was passed before supervisors understood the terms of the sale for the nursing home/cogen.
I’m for selling the nursing home, but many of us continue to have serious concerns about the nursing home/cogen deal currently on the table, but it has already been put into the budget like it is a done deal.
Warren County is moving forward with a $16.1 million court expansion. I don’t buy it. We do not need to spend this much money. Please see my prior blog posting discussing the court expansion, or click here – http://www.westcottupny.com/wpcontent/uploads/2014/04/74-Warren-County-Court-Expansion-11-19-20141.pdf.
The 2015 budget includes $500,000 in casino revenues before a casino is ever approved.
This “revenue” materialized in the last budget committee meeting just prior to the full board passing the budget.
This feels like a budget gimmick. We should not count on this revenue as a means to balance the budget for 2015. If it comes in – great. We can put it in our county savings account at that time. If it doesn’t come in we will have to pull another half million dollars from the county savings account.
The Warren County airport runway expansion and other aggressive plans at the airport are going forward based on promises of “millions and millions” of dollars in new economic development that will result. Do you really believe that? I don’t.
The airport is fine just the way it is. If anything we should look at cutting the annual operating expense, $845,000 in 2013 according to the Budget Officer, and put those savings into our roads. Saratoga County runs their county airport for less than $100,000 a year of county taxpayer money.
Those who don’t believe that history repeats itself need look no further than the Warren County Board of Supervisors. Mark Westcott
* Alphonse Karr is credited with this quote.