WPCNR CITY HALL CIRCUIT. By John F. Bailey. January 14, 2009. UPDATED 5 P.M. E.S.T. UPDATED 7:15 P.M. E.S.T.: Paul Wood, City Executive Officer, reported to WPCNR today White Plains sales in the recently completed Holiday season were down 11%.
White Plains collected $11,886,191 in sales taxes in October, November and December, down 11% from the WPCNR forecast, had overall sales kept pace with 2007 indicating total 2nd quarter sales were down 12%.
In the “holiday quarter,” October, November, December of 2007, the city received $11,841,285 in sales tax. This year’s handle is about $45,000 more despite a 1/4% increase in sales tax this year. That the city sales tax collections kept pace with last year indicate that the 1/4% sales tax offset the decline year to year of 12% in overall sales.
WPCNR estimated earlier this year that if sales maintained the 2007 pace, 2-1/4% of sales the city would have received $14 Million in sales tax last quarter. In the first quarter of this fiscal year, July-August-September, the city economy generated $12, 476,731 in sales tax, up 14.3%.
In the holiday quarter of 2008, Wood said the sales tax is up 0.4%.
Mr. Wood said the city was still on target to make budget ($45.4 Million in anticipated sales tax collection in fiscal 08-09, but he was “not optimistic.”
“This shows glaringly the effect of the loss of the additional 1/4% the Mayor had requested last year,” Mr. Wood said. Wood referenced Mayor Joseph Delfino’s request of the Common Council in fall of 2007 to raise sales taxes 1/2% last fall, only to be rebuffed by the Common Council and Assemblyman Adam Bradley, who instead ended up asking the state legislature for 1/4%. “Had we gotten that 1/4% (sales tax), we’d be in good shape,” Wood said.
Susan Habel Commissioner of Planning said the 1/4% that did not happen would have covered the $2 Million decline in mortgage tax and declines in licenses and building permits the city is suffering due to a dead stop of new construction in the city. To date there are six city-approved site plans by WPCNR count: 55 Bank Street, The Venue, two condominium projects on Maple Avenue, Kensington Assisted Living Project, North Street Community, and the 1133 Westchester Avenue hotel and office buildings approved that are on hold.
Wood said the Mayor is going back to city departments to make more cuts in their budgets. He could not at this time predict what the city deficit might be. Last year the city generated $11.2 Million in the third quarter and $10.7 Million in the fourth quarter in a different economic environment at the old sales tax rate.
If the present rate of purchasing in the city sustains itselt the city should just make its sales tax handle:
1st Quarter: $12,476,731
2nd Quarter, $11,886,191
3rd Quarter, 11.2 Million (Last Year)
4th Quarter, $10.7 Million (Last Year)
Total Sales Tax: $46,262,922
(if collections in Quarter 3 & 4 Match 2007-2008 pace.)
Back to Budgets
Wood said the Mayor has no choice but to go back to all city departments and ask for more budget cuts to curb spending now.”I can’t wait until March, because then it’s too late, the money will all have been spent,” Wood said.
Wood said he was asking departments to do more reviews now. He ruled out early retirement offers and held out the possibility of full-time employees being fired.
Previously the Mayor had ordered 10% cuts in Department spending. About 21part-time employees to date have been targeted to be let go. 6 Department of Public Works employees used in March and April to get fields ready have been fired and 4 employees from the Ebersole Rink. The White Plains Public Library is considering firing 11 more part-time employees, and cutting out Sunday hours to meet a $400,000 budget cutting target.
The Library Board meets this evening to discuss options at the library in a meeting at 7 P.M.
No Documentation Yet
To date, despite repeated requests by WPCNR, city hall has not issued a detailing of the cuts in all departments and how the cuts are shared by each department in actual dollars, and how they are made up. Heat has been turned down at city hall. Some employees have been reported bringing electric heaters from home to keep warm in the municipal building.
Meanwhile, on the other side of town, the School District in the midyear of its budget year, by contrast has not taken any budget cutting moves on the current budget now being spent.
Hotel Sales Tax Killed by Republicans in Senate: Back Story
In another effort to generate more revenue for the city, last year the city attempted to get Albany to pass a Hotel Tax for White Plains. This failed too, as WPCNR alluded to in the first edition of this story
WPCNR reported that Mr. Bradley had declined to offer the Hotel Sales Tax, also requested by the Mayor. WPCNR was contacted by Adam Bradley’s office which revealed the actual sequence of how the hotel sales tax met its end in Albany.
Jay Peltz, an attorney with Adam Bradley’s office advised WPCNR that Assemblyman Bradley had offered the hotel tax bill in the Assembly and had gotten it passed by the Assembly. Mr. Bradley, according to Mr. Peltz, got State Senator Suzi Oppenheimer to carry the Assembly Bill to the senate, only to have it blocked by Republican Senators in the State Senate.
According to Peltz, the Republicans did not want Ms. Oppenheimer to have any bills to her credit, because Republican Liz Feld was challenging for Ms. Oppenheimer’s seat. Peltz said Assemblyman Bradley contacted the Mayor’s office and advised them that the Senate Republicans were blocking the Hotel Tax Bill and because they did not want Ms. Oppenheimer to be able to point to any bills to her credit. Peltz said Mr. Bradley urged the Mayor’s office to get the City Albany lobbyists to work on the Republicans in the city interest on the hotel tax bill. Apparently the effort, if any, by the city lobbyists failed.
