Harckham: Concerns Remain with County Executive's Budget Proposal

(This story, including headline and photo, is by Rasheed Oluwa)

Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino described his budget proposal for 2014 as boring.

But even boring budgets can draw some and concern.

“Certainly, holding the line on taxes is a good thing that’s been a priority of the Democratic caucus and still is,” said Board of Legislators Majority Leader Peter Harckham, D-North Salem. “We’re committed to a zero percent tax increase, so that was a good thing. No layoffs, is very good thing. We’ve been greatly concerned, particularly last year at the number of layoffs. We didn’t think there needed to be layoffs last year, so the fact there are no layoffs this year is a good thing. Those are two positives.”

But Harckham, whose district includes Bedford and Mount Kisco, said members of the Democratic Caucus still have some concerns. As one example, they would like to see the amount of money, 27 percent, of parental contribution to childcare come down.

“We heard in last year’s public hearings that number was too high for parents,” Harckham said. “We’ll see in the public hearings this year. A this point it really is the people’s budget.”

Harckham also explained there were a number of cuts that were made to nonprofit organizations last year and that the Democratic Caucus wanted them restored.

“We’ll be looking with a great deal of scrutiny to make sure that they are all back in,” Harckham said. “Those are small investments that save taxpayers a lot of money on the back-end and those are the type of investments that we need to be making on the backend.”

Harckham mentioned programs for eviction and foreclosure protection as areas that the county needs to reinvest in.

“It’s so much less expensive to the taxpayers to make a small investment to keep a family in their home rather than to house them in transitional housing and all the wraparound services and costs,” Harckham said.

Harckham also listed as Astorino’s plan to amortize $26 million in pension costs as a concern and said it would be better in the long run if the county didn’t borrow. He stated the County Executive’s plan is to find savings during the year to try to avoid borrowing.

“You can’t count on that and when you pass a budget, that’s your policy document,” Harckham said. “That’s what you’re saying you’re going to do.”

But Harckham said he is pleased that there are no plans to bond for the payment of tax certioraris.

“That’s a red flag that the rating agencies look at, so I’m very glad that there was no bonding for tax certioraris,” Harckham said.

Public hearings on the budget are scheduled for Nov. 24 in Peekskill, Nov. 26 in Yonkers and Dec. 4 in White Plains. Each hearing is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m., with doors opening at 6 p.m.