Adam Bradley’s Promise to White Plains

Posted on March 30, 2009 by John Bailey

WPCNR FOR THE RECORD. March 30, 2009: Assemblyman Adam T. Bradley declared his candidacy for Mayor Monday and delivered a 15-minute address touching on the reasons why he was running. He said he felt it was a critical time for the city, and wanted to give back to the city he grew up in. The Assemblyman said the city needed transparency that has been lacking the last 11 years under the Delfino Administration, and Bradley vowed stronger fiscal management, and an effort to work with the school district on property tax solutions. Here is the text of Assemblyman Bradley’s Campaign Kickoff Speech:

Adam Bradley, his wife, Fumiko, daughter Fiona, foreground, and Cerena, campaigning for her father’s Assembly Seat.

I want to thank Rita (Malmud), Sandy (Galef), Peter (Sullivan) and Andy (Spano), and all of the elected officials and citizens who are here today.

Today I stand at City Hall to declare my candidacy for Mayor of the City of White Plains.

As a father of two young children, I understand what a great place W.P. can be to raise a family. I was born and raised in W.P. My parents who came here in 1950, immediately became active in the community, and still live here. I graduated from law school here in the City, and my wife Fumiko and I have two young children Fiona and Celena who are going or will be going to W.P. Schools. (More)

I want to thank Rita (Malmud), Sandy (Galef), Peter (Sullivan) and Andy (Spano), and all of the elected officials and citizens who are here today.

Today I stand at City Hall to declare my candidacy for Mayor of the City of White Plains.

As a father of two young children, I understand what a great place W.P. can be to raise a family. I was born and raised in W.P. My parents who came here in 1950, immediately became active in the community, and still live here. I graduated from law school here in the City, and my wife Fumiko and I have two young children Fiona and Celena who are going or will be going to W.P. Schools.

It has been an honor to serve my constituents in and out of White Plains in the State Assembly. However, today the opportunity to lead the City I know and love, during such difficult times is a rare opportunity for a public servant to give back to the City which has provided so much for me and my family.

The reason people love living in White Plains is because of our neighborhoods, our schools, the proximity to NYC, as well as its own great shopping areas, restaurants, movie theaters. We must acknowledge and embrace the vibrancy of our downtown.
But also acknowledge that our residents want good schools, parks, open space, and the last thing they want is to spend more time in traffic, and then pay excessive parking fees and fines.
People are worried about property taxes – especially seniors on fixed incomes who don’t want to get taxed out of their homes and families, like mine who are trying to save for college and get ahead in a tough economy. And with the redevelopment that occurred in our downtown there is no reason property tax payers should continue to be paying more and more.

My background has led me to be where I am today;

First and foremost, I’ve made a career out of fighting for kids – first as an attorney who fought to protect abused children, then as a State Legislator who authored laws to crack down on child sexual predators, and protect child witnesses in criminal proceedings and fought to ensure no child has to go without health care.
In the Legislature, I’ve fought to preserve and protect open space and our environment authoring laws like the
- Community Preservation Act – to help open space protection
- Laws to protect endangered species
- Introduced The Environmental Access to Justice Act to give citizens the right to challenge environmental determinations and the Environmental sustainability Education Act, which promotes an educational curriculum for school children in environmental sustainability.
In the Legislature, I’ve been an effective advocate for W.P. schools, W.P. hospital, and other community organizations that improve our quality of life.
- I authored the Parent Teacher Communication Act – to help parents and teachers communicate with each other over the internet.

2) This election is about property taxes and fiscal management.

This City must have a professional Budget Director working year round on the complicated fiscal issues facing the City.

** We together will make stabilizing property taxes and restoring sound fiscal management our top priority**

We don’t need additional tax hikes and continuous fee increases; we need better planning and certainly, better negotiations with developers when new projects are approved.
It’s time to reject the old choice between higher taxes or fewer services – fiscal reform and restructuring will be the answer to holding the line on taxes.
Despite the development of downtown, property taxes keep going up.
A lack of sound fiscal planning has left W.P. in worse shape during this economic crisis – with worse to come if we don’t fix it soon. When the economy was going well our city was using one shots to balance its budget. Our prior Mayors, Mayor Schulman and Delvechio both whom are here, never balanced our city budget by one shot revenues and always left the cities fiscal condition healthy even during economic downturns.
In the Legislature, I have been a steady voice for fiscal reform and responsibility.

The next Mayor has to put taxpayers first: when he negotiates with developers.

He must negotiate better deals
He must pay more attention to parking and transportation.
He must make better use of technology
He must protect open space our special and diverse neighborhoods, and our unique quality of life.
He must provide leadership that listens

The next Mayor must ensure that there is transparency in our city government and welcome those that seek information and monitor our city actions, watchdogs should be welcomed, and not criticized.

3)In these tough economic times, we need new energy to meet our challenges.

The redevelopment of downtown wasn’t as well planned as it could have been. Now, it’ll take new energy to secure better deals for taxpayers.
As we’re seeing all across the country, the same-old policies won’t do anymore. We need change now.

The fight to hold the line on property taxes demands an energetic reform-minded approach.

I will bring a laser-like focus on protecting the taxpayer.
I have always been a reformer, who first ran for elective office against the leadership of the Assembly. I will be a reform-minded innovative Mayor.
I have been willing to fight entrenched interests and the status quo. An example is my leadership very early on in the fight against for profit HMO’s taking advantage of our system of public health. In fact, I authored the first major HMO Reform legislation in 2006.

The time has come for new thinking and new approaches. These are very difficult times. We must re-evaluate our strategies and we must protect taxpayers who are struggling in this very difficult economy. I promise to provide that new type of leadership.

I will fight to protect our quality of life:

Improve parking downtown; ensure our city is pedestrian friendly.
Expand parks and open space, and ensure children have safe places to play.
I will work with White Plains schools to help provide the resources to make sure that our schools continue to offer a world class education for our children.
I will fight to create affordable housing for seniors, as well as for police, fire fighters, and teachers so that those who hold our community together can afford to live here.
And one last time – I will fight to strengthen our fiscal condition, so that we can truly do something about our over increasing property taxes.

Once again, I want to thank all of the elected officials, friends, and most importantly the residents of White Plains, who are here today.

I look forward to representing you and all the people of this very special City.

Adam Bradley

BOE Saves Taxpayer $62 on Final Cut. Budget up .74% Taxes Up 2.4% on $185.8M Bud

Posted on March 30, 2009 by John Bailey

WPCNR SCHOOL DAYS. By John F. Bailey. March 30, 2009: The Board of Education approved a $185.8 Million budget to send to district voters May 19 Monday evening, cutting the budget from $185,9, based on a restoration of $2 Million in education aid from the state, restored over the weekend by Governor David Paterson, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate leader Malcolm Smith in their budget compromise agreement. The .74% increase in the budget results in a 2.4% property tax increase resulting in a school tax of $8,000 on the $700,000 average White Plains home.

Forty persons attended the official adoption of the White Plains City School District Budget for 2009-10 Monday evening.

This means if you own a home in the $650,000-$700,000 price range, you will see your property tax go up in July from $7,618 to $7,990, (pushing on $8,000 ) an increase of $372, (within $8 of the WPCNR/White Plains Week television program estimated two weeks ago). Combined with the White Plainsian’s average $700,000 home county tax of $2,400 and the city tax, projected at $2,800 for that $700,000 home if the city budget is the same as this year’s ($161.7M), the average Mr. and Mrs. White Plains homeowner of that $700,000 home will pay $13,200 in taxes next year. If the city runs a budget more than $161.7 Million depending on the deficit the city runs (projected at $9 Million to $11 Million), the tax for that $700,000 southend home would hit $14,000 from all three taxing authorities: the schools, the county and the city.

If the city budget drops revenues as much as $11 Million as previously projected by the city, that city tax will go up to $3,500 on the same home pushing the total property tax up to about $14,000.

Another Stealth Tax Raise included in the Three Men in a Room Budget.

WPCNR was told today by the Office of Real Property Services that another cut in the key STAR Exemptions is included in the Paterson-Silver-Smith state budget agreed upon over the weekend. The STAR Exemptions, despite what Fred Seiler said this evening, are being cut again by 11%, not 18% as was originally in Governor Patterson’s budget, but still hiking the White Plainsian’s property tax to help fund their own state aid.

The restoration in district school aid of $2 Million to White Plains is being partially paid for again by the White Plains taxpayer because in the final Albany budget, the STAR BASIC EXEMPTION and STAR ENHANCED EXEMPTION ( the allowance deducted off your home assessment) is being reduced another 11% lowering your exemption from $3330 to $2,964 if you’re under 65, and from $6,500 to $5,785 if you are over-65. Jeffrey Gloak of the New York State Office of Real Property Services confirmed to WPCNR Monday that the 11% cut in the STARs was the final version of the Patterson-Silver-Smith Budget. Proportionately the Over-65 taxpayer is hurt much more by this once-again, not-publicized (except by the CitizeNetReporter) cut.

The restoration of the aid was included in the present budget to reduce the tax levy from $519 per $1,000 of assessed value to $515.15 per assessed value instead of cutting the budget more than the $185.9 it was at last week.

Fred Seiler, the Assistant Superintendent for Business said that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority tax of point 33% of the district’s total salaries (.33%) looks like it is going to go through, and that was included in the approved school budget tonight, costing the district $328,510 (slight more than the salaries of two data processing executives the district hired last August).

Four persons criticized the district for adding $500,000 in a new language program, to bring foreign language to the Highlands Middle School, while laying off personnel, and not spending enough money to remove children attending the district illegally, removing a social worker from one of the schools, and four not looking harder to cut expenses.

Seiler said the district budget approved tonight is essentially the budget the district will have regardless of whether the voters approve or turn down the budget on May 20, because the $185,778,149 budget is $7,371 less than the allowed contingency budger of $193,149,841. Seiler said it was up to the board whether to cut the budget more or adopt the budget at $185.8 M after any negative vote.

Superintendent of Schools Timothy Connors, wrangling his last school budget for the district prior to his leaving the district June 30, said “I think we’re in good shape. We did not cut any of our wonderful programs. We’ve maintained class size. However, the largest problem we have is the continuing loss of assessibles. Our leaders are going to have to address that.”

Peter Bassano, Board member, up for reelection in May, thanked the community for their input and numerous e-mails because they helped, he said, the board make their decisions in an “unbelievably bizarre environment.” He warned, “Next year is going to be worse. This is the beginning of a roller coaster ride, and it’s not going to get better.”

Donna McLaughlin, President of the School Board, said the Board does listen to the people, “but we don’t always agree.”

Teacher Negotiations Go on to Fact-Finding Stage

Kerry Broderick, the President of the White Plains Teachers Association described last Thursday’s Teacher negations as “strikingly unproductive,” and reported that the next stage of mediations would proceed to Fact-Finding, the discoveries and positions of which would be made public after the mediator’s final report.

Broderick said that only half of White Plains 651 Teachers would receive automatic step raises next year because the other half are already earning the maximum salaries of the district.

Actual positions consolidated or eliminated not fully clarified.

The Superintendent of Schools Connors said two administrative positions (Athletic Director and Director of Physical Education) were combined into one. Another Administrator was kept on but would teach part-time. Twenty certified positions were eliminated, but were not disclosed; Twenty Teaching Assistants were eliminated, as well as 3 Security Positions and 4 Clerical positions.

Bradley Runs for Mayor on Fiscal Reform. Prop Tax Control. Smarter Deals.

Posted on March 30, 2009 by John Bailey

WPCNR MAIN STREET JOURNAL. March 30, 2009: Favorite son Adam Bradley announced his candidacy for Mayor of White Plains this morning on the steps of City Hall. Councilperson Rita Malmud introduced the son of William Bradley, longtime Democratic figure in White Plains as “a chip off the old block of integrity,” saying Mr. Bradley was a proven leader right for White Plains. Andrew Spano, the County Executive, said Mr. Bradley understook how governments have to work together, “he gets that,” Spano said.

Councilperson Rita Malmud, right, introduces Adam Bradley, while Assemblyperson Sandy Galef, left, former resident of White Plains, waits to speak at this morning’s Bradley kickoff announcement of his mayoral candidacy.

A Who’s Who in Democrats attended the announcement: left to right, Councilpersons Dennis Power, Tom Roach, Benjamin Boykin, Milagros Lecouna, Chair of the Board of Elections, Reginald Lafayette, Peter Sullivan, Assemblywoman Sandy Galef, Mr. Bradley, Rita Malmus and County Executive Andrew Spano.

Peter Sullivan looks on as Mrs. Bradley, their daughter, Celena, Rita Malmud as Adam Bradley promised White Plains he would slow the rise in property taxes, work with schools, negotiate smarter deals with developers, and be more fiscally responsible with the city budget. You may see his speech at his website later today at www.bradleyforwhiteplains.org.

Board of Education Meets to Adopt Proposed 09-10 Budget Monday

Posted on March 29, 2009 by John Bailey

WPCNR SCHOOL DAYS. March 29, 2009: The Board of Education will meet Monday evening at 7:30 P.M. at Education to adopt officially the 2009-2010 School Budget, expected to be $185.9 Million, barring last minute trimming. The Superintendent of Schools Timothy Connors is expected to report the exact number of persons expected to lose their positions in order to keep the budget to a 1% increase over last year. Last week, the Superintendent advised WPCNR, he expected just 12 persons would lose their jobs in position cuts amounting to 4 Clerical positions, 20 teaching assistants, 3 Security Guards and 20 Certified Positions (defined as any position requiring state certification, such as social workers, or teachers) and 4 Administrative Positions.

The property tax increase going into tomorrow evening meeting is 3.9%The Assistant Superintendent for Business Fred Seiler confirmed two weeks ago that the new Assessment Roll is at $286.8 Million, requiring the district to generate a tax levy of $149.9 Million on a school budget of $185.9 Million. Seiler pegged the new tax rate White Plainsians will pay at $522.68 per $1,000 of assessed valuation. Two years ago, that tax rate was $474.61 per $1,000.

Seiler blamed this year’s increase on the $5 Million drop in city assessments combined with a loss of state aid of $1.5 Million next year, and the increase in the debt service for the capital project, the last installment of which will be borrowed for in 2009-10.

For reference, if you own a White Plains home priced at $700,000, with an assessed value (after the STAR BASIC EXEMPTION computation of $15, 100 — you are paying $7,618 in school taxes this year. Next year you will pay $7,892.47, unless more state aid is forthcoming. A school tax increase of $275. If your house is worth $1 Million and up, depending on your assessment you’re going over the $10,000 mark in school taxes.

As of Monday afternoon, the Superintendent said 4 Clerical positions would eliminated, 20 Teaching Assistants, 3 Security Guards, and 20 Certified Positions (which he defined as any position requiring state certification, such as social workers, or teachers), and 4 Administrators. He declined to identify the Administrators who are currently employed. He estimated that about 12 persons total would actually lose jobs.

REVENUES FINALLY UNVEILED. Note whack out of state aid, $1.6 Million and Interest on Investments ($850,000) necessitating $2.4 Million of the $3.1 Million budget increase.

Superintendent of Schools Timothy Connors said in the first public hearing on the budget two weeks ago that any aid coming from the state bailout stimulus now being dolled out in Albany will not likely be showing up in school districts until 2011-2012 and 2012-2013.

$185,912,042 Budget is $7.2 Million less than allowed Contingency Budget

Fred Seiler pointed out that by the state forumula the school district would have been allowed a Contingency Budget of $193.2 Million, noting that the budget presented tonight was 7.2 Million less than if the district had decided to raise the budget to the allowable Contingency Budget level — a level first predicted by WPCNR in the early budget process.

SPECIAL BOARD OF EDUCATION MEETING

Monday March 30, 2008

Education House

7:30 P.M.

AGENDA

I. Opening of Meeting:

Pledge of Allegiance

Oral announcements by the Board President, Board Members

II. Communications:

III. Public Participation: (The Board will entertain comments from the public on any issue, with a time limit of three minutes per person, and a maximum total of 25 minutes.)

IV. Superintendent’s Report:

V. Summary Action Items:

VI. Other Action:

1. Recommended adoption of the Proposed Budget for 2009-10.

VII. Board Discussion: