Archive for the ‘City government’ Category
New housing authority chairman
Members of the Saratoga Springs Housing Authority board elected a new chairman Thursday, and debated who has oversight over salaries and work contracts.
The seven-member Board of Directors unanimously backed third-term member Eric Weller as chairman. The former dean of the Skidmore College faculty replaces Dennis Brunelle, who Mayor Scott Johnson declined to reappoint April 1.
Weller joined board meetings through an Internet video feed from Florida over the last several months as the housing authority underwent several changes brought on by the infestation of bed bugs in parts of Stonequist Apartments.
He told the City Council in February that it has no say in the authority’s business, and the agency answers only to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Weller attended Thursday’s meeting in person, days after City Council members voted to ask the housing authority’s board to forward all salary increases it has approved since 2000. State public housing law states the SSHA sets pay scales and the City Council approves them, but members of the authority have disputed that.
The housing authority receives federal taxpayer money through HUD. It ceased bringing salary changes to the council in 2000 and stopped giving the council annual reports in 2007, just after Ed Spychalski became executive director.
The SSHA board will adopt a new budget for its 2012-2013 fiscal year at next month’s meeting, which includes revised salaries for its 13 or so employees, board members said. It wasn’t clear if the board intends to share the new salaries with the City Council before it meets again in June.
The state Comptroller’s Office began auditing the housing authority’s financial operations at the mayor’s request more than 13 weeks ago. Spychalski said Thursday that auditors recently completed interviewing employees.
Spychalski recently severed the SSHA’s annual work contract with the nonprofit Saratoga Springs Affordable Housing Group, effective Aug. 1. The SSHA received $12,000-a-year to handle the group’s maintenance, labor, advertising, trash pickup, legal advice and more.
Accounts Commissioner John Franck has filed for information on if the housing authority staff used federal resources to subsidize the housing group.
Spychalski says he and other staff members spent hundreds of hours volunteering for the group, but cannot do it anymore because they don’t have the time. He argued that he had the authority to cancel the work contract without the board’s consent. The newest member of the board, former city Finance Commissioner Kenneth Ivins, disagreed.
“We as a board have a responsibility to oversee that,” Ivins said.
Vote set on reforming government
A bid to change the city’s 97-year-old commission form of government will go to voters in November, while last call for alcohol will remain at 4 a.m.
The City Council voted 4 to 1 Tuesday to place the Saratoga Citizen group’s charter change proposal on this year’s ballot. Voters will choose if they want to replace the present form of government that operates with a mayor and four commissioners with a professional manager and five-member City Council, who would hire the manager.
Two courts upheld Saratoga Citizen petitions, and after more than two years, it was time to put the issue to the public, said Accounts Commissioner John Franck, who brought the resolution. The vote ended with huge applause in City Hall.
“It’s been a long road,” said Patrick Kane, president of Saratoga Citizen. If approved, changes to the city government would be enacted in January 2014.
Mayor Scott Johnson opposed the measure.
“This proposal as a local law to adopt a citizens-based initiative is without any kind of legal precedent,” Johnson said. “That makes me very uncomfortable.”
The mayor could still form his own commission to propose charter change that would take precedent over Saratoga Citizen’s plan, but time is running out for that. The city spent more than $50,000 in legal fees fighting the group’s petitions.
The City Council made small changes to the Saratoga Citizen’s petitions before adopting them.
In another development, Public Safety Commissioner Chris Mathiesen tabled a vote on rolling back last call for alcohol in the city to 3 a.m. from 4 a.m. Three bar owners in the city and others spoke against the plan at Tuesday’s meeting.
dyusko@timesunion.com ■ 518-454-5353 ■ @DAYusko
Building inspector resigns
Developing:
The city’s building inspector abruptly resigned Friday.
Thomas McKnight of Ballston Spa cited personal reasons for his decision to step down from the $75,000-a-year job.
He denied leaving due to disagreements over job inspections, and declined to comment on reports saying he lacked the necessary education for the job. The Civil Service Commission requires the city building inspector graduate with a college degree.
“It was because of personal reasons I can’t discuss,” McKnight said.
Mayor Scott Johnson appointed McKnight on a provisional basis on Oct. 31 after the position had been vacant for more than two years. Johnson fired the previous building inspector, Lauritz
Rasmussen, after the two disagreed about building code standards for the city’s 33,000-square-foot indoor recreation center. Johnson could not immediately be reached for comment Tuesday. City officials do not publicly discuss personnel matters.
A Civil Service exam for the suddenly vacant building inspector position will be held on June 2. Only those who have applied to take the exam will be eligible for the job, said Patsy Berrigan, commission secretary. There are three applicants so far, she said.
Shot himself like Plaxico
A city man faces criminal charges in a case that began when he allegedly shot himself in the leg.
Shawn Noisette, 28, told police he had been robbed at gunpoint on Waterbury Street around 2:30 a.m. Thursday, according to police Lt. John Catone. That caused police to investigate the incident.
Police determined that Noisette apparently shot himself with an unregistered .22-caliber handgun while in his house on Pearl Street while getting ready for work, Catone said. Noisette was charged with fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon, endangering the welfare of a child and falsely reporting an incident, all misdemeanors.
“The defendant claimed he’d been robbed at gunpoint, consuming enormous police and prosecution resources and terrifying a crime free, quiet neighborhood,” Saratoga County
District Attorney James A. Murphy III said.
Noisette is expected to appear in City Court on Thursday.
Vote Tuesday on 3 a.m. last call
Good morning. Saratoga Springs Public Safety Commissioner Chris Mathiesen has called for a vote Tuesday night on changing last call for alcohol across the city to 3 a.m. instead of 4 a.m. The change has generated opposition from the community’s business leaders, who have asked Mathiesen to tone down his rhetoric. The public safety commissioner has said that downtown can become dangerous and unruly during early morning hours.
Some City Council members seem unwilling to support the measure at this time because the State Liquor Authority’s board last week adopted its counsel’s opinion that the city cannot have different closing hours than that of Saratoga County. That means the county Board of Supervisors would have to change last call in all its cities, towns and villages, which it hasn’t even considered, board Chairman Thomas Wood said this morning. Here’s what I received from the SLA:
Southwest Neighborhood Association to meet Wednesday
The Southwest Neighborhood Association meets at 7 p.m. Wednesday (a change from the usual Tuesday meeting) at Saratoga Eagle, 45 Duplainville Road (entrance on Geyser Road at Grande Park).
City accounts commissioner John Franck will discuss redistricting and how it affects your votes, and the city’s recent waterfront property on Saratoga Lake, off of Crescent Avenue.
E-mail pburke7180@yahoo.com for information.
City Council 5/1/12
It looks like another monster session tomorrow night in City Hall. The last couple of City Council meetings have gone four or five hours. This one looks meaty. It starts with two pubic hearings – on last call bar hours and the effort to change the City Charter and form of government. I understand that a technicality will prevent the council from voting Tuesday on sending the Saratoga Citizen initiative to the ballot in November. Mayor Scott Johnson is expected to discuss
Complete Streets; Accounts Commissioner John Franck will reveal the settlement terms of the John Breyo property assessment case; and Public Safety Commissioner Chris Mathiesen is scheduled to speak about a potential 3 a.m. last call.
Breyo mansion settlement
Here’s an update on John Breyo receiving roughly $1 million in local property tax refunds from Saratoga Springs and the city school district in a settlement over the city’s $20 million assessment of his 61,403-square-foot mansion:
John Aspland Jr., an attorney who represented the city, told me this morning that taxpayers won’t have to fork over the money out-of-pocket because both the city and the school district had stocked away money for such a decision. “The school district and the city both put aside money when this commenced every year this was in play,” Aspland said.
Saratoga Springs Accounts Commissioner John Franck declined comment. He said he would go over the details of the resolution with the City Council on Tuesday.
City could spend some reserve cash
Saratoga Springs is in the unique situation of needing to spend money, and could use it for renovations to its cramped police department, the city’s lead financial officer said.
The city has amassed an unrestricted fund balance of $6.2 million after ending 2011 with more than $2 million in unassigned funds, Finance Commissioner Michele Madigan said Tuesday.
Under city policy, the finance commissioner is required to keep unrestricted fund balances at no more than 12.5 percent of total budgeted expenditures, and make recommendations for when it exceeds that, Madigan said. Under the city’s surplus and 2012 budget, it must spend and/or create reserve funds for $1.55 million in 2012, she said.
The city realized most of its surplus budgeted funds over the last three years through higher-than-expected sales tax revenues and lower-than-expected expenditures, said Madigan, who took office in January. The finance commissioner will meet with members of the City Council in the coming weeks to determine their department needs. She said she wanted to retain a sufficient fund balance while “ensuring the integrity of our essential city services.”
“I do have some projects of my own, and one of those is an investment into the police department’s building,” Madigan said. The small space in the basement of City Hall needs renovations, she said. Madigan may also suggest creating a fund for employee retirement costs.
The city accumulated $3.5 million in non-budgeted monies in 2011, but $1.5 million was previously assigned. The more than $6 million in excess money marks a quick turnaround for a city that had its back against the ropes just a few years ago.
The city raised taxes by more than 15 percent and reduced its work force by some four dozen positions in 2010 and 2011 under Madigan’s predecessor, Kenneth Ivins. The layoffs included seven police officers and seven firefighters. Also, the city began receiving $1.5 million a year from the state in 2011 in return for hosting video lottery terminals at Saratoga Casino and Raceway.
Madigan will discuss her plans with members of the City Council on Tuesday. Mayor Scott Johnson could not be reached for comment Tuesday. An auditor must confirm the surplus figures before any money is dedicated, Madigan said. That could occur in the coming weeks, she said.
The city’s expanding reserves were recently cited by Standard & Poor’s Rating Services in its upgrade of the city’s bond rating to AA+ from AA. That could result in lower borrowing costs for the city.
Reform measure fights on
A plan to change Saratoga Springs’ commission form of government could go to voters in November, but the mayor said Thursday he wanted to review legal options first.
Accounts Commissioner John Franck on Tuesday recommended that the City Council adopt a petition carried by the group Saratoga Citizen, make a few minor changes and send it to voters in the fall. He set a public hearing on the issue for 6:45 p.m. May 1.
Saratoga Citizen has called for a manager-council style of government to replace the city’s 97-year-old commission structure. It collected 2,200 signatures of city residents who support a change. A majority vote by the City Council would send the measure to a public vote. Franck said he intends to call for the vote May 1 or May 15.
“This issue has been around for two years,” Franck said.But Mayor Scott Johnson, who has the upper hand in what goes to the ballot, said Thursday he has many questions about Franck’s plan. Under state law, if the mayor forms a charter commission, and it proposes its own reform measure, that would take precedent on the ballot over any other.
If the mayor does not form a commission, it appears as if Franck has the required three votes on the five member council to send the Saratoga Citizen forward. On Thursday, Johnson wouldn’t say if he planned to form a commission. But he said that he had asked for legal opinions from the city attorney and lawyers with the New York Conference of Mayors on Franck’s proposed process. Johnson questioned if the council could take over a group petition that was collected years ago, and make changes to dates that have passed and other things.
“I am not trying to be an obstructionist and prevent this matter from going to voters,” Johnson said. “I simply want to make sure the city is following the law since this is unchartered territory.”
Two courts have upheld the Saratoga Citizen petitions. The New York State Appellate Division recently sided with the group. If approved, changes would start in January 2014, according to Patrick Kane, president of Saratoga Citizen.
