County Tax Rate Planned to move up 4.5% Partially to Fund the Med Center

WPCNR COUNTY CLARION-LEDGER. From Westchester County Department of Communications. November 16, 2005: County Executive Andy Spano yesterday released his proposed spending plan for 2006, which includes an increase in the county tax levy of 4.5 percent – below the 4.8 percent rate of inflation –  to support the Westchester Medical Center, to enhance public safety and to restore funding that was cut from various non-profit agencies in harder fiscal times.


            The 4.5 percent tax levy increase will generate $21.6 million in revenue. Of this, 3  percent (or $14.4 million) will go the medical center for operating expenses, utilities, lab services, security, transportation and ground maintenance. The remaining 1.5 percent ($7.2 million) will go toward public safety, services for children with disabilities and to a new federal-state mandate (costing $3 million) that the county take over from local jurisdictions certain costs associated with voting.  


  


The budget also holds the line on bus fares and adds personnel in emergency services, corrections, probation and child welfare programs.


 “This budget reaffirms our commitment to provide services to protect the health and safety of the people of Westchester while continuing to institute strong fiscal controls in our management practices and policies,” Spano said in his budget message.


The gross $1.54 billion budget is an increase of 3.9 percent, or $57 million, from 2005. The tax levy increase – the amount collected in county property taxes –  is less than half of this. Due to Westchester’s economic growth, increases in sales tax and mortgage tax revenue have helped offset the increased costs.


The effect of Spano’s proposal will ultimately vary from community to community, due to a state


formula that address the way local governments assess property and different trends in market values.


County taxes represent less than  20 percent of a homeowner’s total property tax bill, with the remainder levied by local schools and municipalities, as well as special districts (water, sewer, etc.).


Spano said he was pleased to report that his and other county executives’ lobbying efforts about the costs of another state mandate –  Medicaid – had finally paid off. The cost of this health program for the poor


is projected to rise just 3.5 percent next year – as opposed to 8  percent from 2004 to 2005.  And because of a one-time change in state accounting practices, the county will actually be paying less in 2006  ($188.5 million) than the $200 million net that was budgeted in 2005.


But other new and old state and federal mandates will affect the budget. As is required by federal and state law, the county Board of Elections is allocated $3 million  to take over from local jurisdictions the job of purchasing, maintaining and storing 1,300 voting machines as well as the training and compensation of inspectors. And the cost to counties of state-mandated programs to provide services to children with disabilities continues to soar, up 15 percent.


In addition, the county has chosen to continue funding important public safety programs that were previously funded with state or federal grants which have expired. 


“For the past eight years, this administration has been prudent and judicious,” Spano said. “Just last week, Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s rating agencies once again affirmed the county’s fiscal stability with a rating of AAA. We are very aware of the school, local and county tax burden our residents pay. That’s why we have streamlined government, made staffing cuts and share a portion of county sales tax with our municipalities  and schools to help offset their local property taxes. At the same time, we have always kept to the philosophy that government is best when it provides those services to protect and enhance the quality of life of each and every resident.”


            Spano’s budget now goes to the Board of Legislators, which has until Dec. 27 to adopt a final spending plan.


            Here are some other highlights of the budget proposal:



  • Funding for day care to guarantee no waiting, and a reduction in parental co-payments (to 20 percent, from 25 percent) so that more families can take advantage of the program.

  • Various non-profit agencies – from day care to the arts to libraries to those that fight domestic violence – will be restored to 2002 funding levels. These groups had been cut 20 percent since 2003 due to budget pressures.

·        The Department of Correction has additional funding due to the growing prisoner population.



  • Positions have been added to the Emergency Services Department to continue to ensure that Westchester

will be ready to handle a response to a man-made or natural disaster. Staff will also be added to the


Probation Department to continue intensive supervision of sex offenders, domestic violence offenders and drunk drivers, and to deal with gang intervention programs.



  • There will be an increase in child welfare positions in the Department of Social Services to change the standard for measuring work from a caseload to a workload system. These new positions will have no effect on the department’s tax levy, which, in fact, has decreased for the first time in history by over $17 million.

  • In an effort to combat Medicaid fraud, the 2006 budget provides funding to investigate the providers to uncover abuse, fraud and waste. The county recently signed a memorandum of agreement with the state Health Department and Medicaid’s Inspector General to begin a review of the provider payments through IBM’s  Verify New York’s investigative software system. When fraud is found, the county will receive a percentage of the settlement. 

·        County utilities costs are projected to be up more than $2.2 million – to $17.4 million. This represents heating of buildings for the county and the medical center operations.


·        The cost of the county’s health benefits to employees is projected to increase by $15 million, to $90.9 million. This, despite cost-control measures the county negotiated into its labor contracts last year.


·        State- and federal-mandated programs to educate and transport young children with disabilities will continue to rise. The projection for 2006 is that this will cost Westchester $132.4 million, compared to $125.9 million in 2005. Once state aid is taken into consideration, the cost to county taxpayers in 2006 will be $58.7 million – more than a $7 million increase from 2005.



  • The replacement of 44 old county vehicles with hybrids to reduce gas costs and protect the environment.

·        Various county revenues are up. Sales tax revenues are up by about $20 million, state aid for transportation up $10 million, and mortgage tax up $7 million. 


 

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An Evening With Clarence Darrow is a Brief for the Ages.

 


 


WPCNR On the Aisle. Review by John F. Bailey. November 16, 2005: The White Plains Performing Arts Center lived up to its mission statement last night with the World Premiere of All Too Human, a tour de force of  perhaps America’s greatest lawyer, dead solid perfectly written and  cleverly performed by another great lawyer, Henry Miller. Mr. Miller is  the personal injury attorney of choice of not only the White Plains, but  the American legal community, who maintains his offices a block away from the theater at 99 Court Street.





All Too Human is a unicorn of a serious play: it makes you think, hang on every line,  mucks into the  raw conflict of mankind’s motivations and conditions, and sends you out into the night uplifted with (of all things), a new found respect for the possibilities of the legal profession.


 


Mr. Miller achieves this by  exploring the motivations and the causes of perhaps America’s real Perry Mason – Clarence Darrow a man who was a legend of American law in his own lifetime.


 


All Too Human is self-produced by Henry Miller, the White Plains attorney, senior partner of Clark, Gagliardi & Miller at 99 Court Street.   There is a tendency on the part of critics to come down harshly on these “vanity plays.” Executing an “evening-with” play is no easy task: you’re limited to the intrigue of your original material; you have to organize the material carefully, and your personality has to transfix and become the character to the audience.


 


Mr. Miller is glorious guilty on all three counts as charged: from his first appearance on the bare bones set (easy chair, lecturn, defense table, and courtroom balustrade against blue curtained backdrop — Mr. Miller has got to deliver it all) wearing a rumpled gray suit, white shirt and red suspenders, Mr. Miller, graying as Darrow,  greets you as a guest in his apartment and proceeds to regale you with tales of his life and famous cases. All that’s missing is a glass of bourbon for each member of the audience.


 


Set in the 1930s when Darrow was at the end of his life, the audience spends an evening with Darrow in his Chicago apartment listening to the old litigator reflect, ruminate and give the young legal bucks “inside baseball” and his observations of the legal profession.


 


  The opening night audience of White Plains litigators, (we suspect  they did not know what to expect), were seduced against their collective wills  by Miller’s natural script and his own ability to create Darrow-like magic. He won them over with charm, folksiness, some inside legal jokes, and played the cynical crowd with the skill of the great Darrow himself.


 


Miller’s script has an easy flow to it with no awkward “objections.” It is funny,  moving and motivating. He brings the issues of Darrow’s famous labor cases, (a champion against the robber barons),  his defense of Loeb and Leopold ( one of the first arguments against capital punishment), the Scopes Monkey Trial (the irony of  the evolution trial that as “Darrow” says has to be stopped, and the issues are still with us today), not to mention those old standbys of playwrights through time:  the mystery of life and the purpose of law.


 


The play entertains, educates and elevates the practice of law, but more than that, promotes the “practice of ideas.”


 


Miller on his opening night did justice to his superbly organized script, defending it well with a performance that held the audience’s attention by a combination of conversation with the audience about his foibles and feelings, and deft segues into flashbacks to deliveries of Darrow’s famous summations.  It built.  He organized the material well, and explored the nautiluses  of Darrow’s career becoming a master raconteur in the process.


 


For the person not interested in law, rest assured, the excitement of the issues of the human condition: oppression, suppression, cruelty, exploitation come vividly alive as Miller brings alive his strategies that achieved landmark judgments in American law. If you’re having trouble persuading your brainy son or daughter to attend law school, this play will turn them around.


 


Miller’s ellocution is something many professional actors (and lawyers) should study. You hear every word Miller says in this play, even when the WPPAC microphone does not work. It is a testimony to Miller’s writing that in a play of 90 minutes straight, you are held fascinated.  His delivery is on occasion stuttered with “buts,” “stutters” and a little shakiness, but this may have been clever acting technique to convey the illusion of extemporaneous conversation with the audience, and ingeniously makes you pay closer attention. He delivers slowly, with emphasis, and you hang on his every word!


 


All Too Human recalls Steve Allen’s Meeting of the Minds shows, on PBS but rather than the cameo one-dimensional stand-ups of celebrities of the past in those shows, Miller creates a real character here.


 


From his piercing brown eyed glare at the close of his Leopold and Loeb summarization as he works a judge,  to his reducing William Jennings Bryant’s creationism argument to absurdity with Darrow’s ridiculing words, the romance and flexibility of language and persuasion is on target.


 


Miller recreates Darrow’s devastating logic in his summations with gravitas, irony, and the controlled hyperbole that won landmark judgments that forged worker’s rights in this country. Miller’s own legal career is somewhat Darrowesque, winning landmark judgments in tort law in defending the disenfranchised. He has a lot of the crusader in him and it is obvious he knows his Darrow.


 


His best scene: his explanation of the incident where Darrow was tried twice on charges of  bribing two jurists in California. His delivery of the “stacked deck” defense gives plenty of thoughts to think.  


 


The play makes America’s labor history come alive and illuminates the legal issues that are still with us today. It is both history lesson, style prep course for lawyers to see how it’s done, and a down-home talking to one’s conscience. It is much like Plato’s Socratic dialogues but livelier with whimsy, drama, pathos. You may be offended by some of Darrow’s views on religion, though, but do not let that deter you from seeing this play.


 


In All Too Human, Miller’s care in building a natural scriptural symmetry from how the play opens and how he closes sends the audience out smiling. He ends the play on a high.  He received a minute standing ovation for his performance. At the end of the play, two lawyers in the audience  were talking, “Well, Henry you done us proud,” the other said to no one imparticular. Another lawyer noted,  “Well, at least we don’t have to wait for a verdict.”


 


 


This distinguished gentleman of the press has reached a verdict. I find the defendant, Henry Miller, Guilty as charged of impersonating Clarence Darrow.  He was Clarence Darrow.


 


All Too Human plays nightly the rest of this week at 8 and Sunday at 2 PM at White Plains Performing Arts Center. For information on tickets, contact 888-977-2250.

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Renovation, New School, Cert Impact Means Avg $400 Sch Tax +


WPCNR SCHOOL DAYS. By John F. Bailey. November 15, 2005: The Board of Education was presented with very early numbers on the cost of bonding for $50 Million to $65 Million in 2007,2008, 2009 to build a new Post Road School and to execute the most needed renovations to district buildings and fields (as recommended in the Building Condition Survey completed recently by KG & D architects).


 


The cost in taxes averages out to an additional $406 in school taxes per year beginning in 2008 for an owner of a $700,000 White Plains home.  


 



The Board also learned that the Business Office recommends bonding for an additional $8 Million in  tax certiorari refunds in June, 2006 to cover expected new certiorari settlements forthcoming according to information from the City of White Plains. The new $8 Million in bonding is addition to the $8 Million the school will bond for in December to cover certiorari refunds in the 2005-2006 school budget year.


 


Assistant Superintendent for Business Terrance Schruers provided work sheets to the Board and the media outlining roughly the cost of the anticipated $65 Million in bonding for the district. He was followed in his presentation by Russell Davis, the architect who outlined the procedure for the State Environmental Quality Review process required by the State Education Department. Davis presented a SEQR review process preliminary timetable, that, if followed would enable the School District to hold a referendum on a $50 Million or $65 Million bond issue in May, the time of the School Budget Vote.


 


Superintendent of Schools Timothy Connors cautioned the television audience that these were preliminary figures and that presently the Board was thinking that the district would consider bonding for only a portion of the work recommended, from $50 Million to $65 Million, which would include a new Post Road School, priority renovations to the 7 school district buildings, and field renovations. He assured the audience that prior to making any decisions on buildings that the parents and administrators of the schools would be consulted.


 


Rough Debt Schedule Issued.


 


Schruers debt schedule reported that the school district would increase its total debt from the $35 Million in debt it presently carries to $100 Million if it were to bond for the $65 Million figure.


 


The present school tax rate is $410.45 per $1,000 of assessed valuation. This means that a $700,000 single family home (currently assessed according to the city Assessor’s Office at $18,475) in White Plains pays $7,583 in school taxes (18.475  $410.45).


 


To put this into perspective for you, the median price of the 68 single family homes on the market today in White Plains is $799,000, according to White Plains realtors, Nelson-Vrooman Associates. The least expensive single family home on the market today in the city is  $340,000, which would mean that homeowner would pay approximately $3,700 in school taxes


 


Certs Take First Bite.


 


According to Mr. Schreurs bonding schedule, the twin certiorari bonds would hit district taxpayers first at the end of 2006- 2007, increasing the tax rate $6.88 from the certioraris alone to $417.33 per $1,000.  Add to this the average $8 tax rate increase to cover the projected school budget increases in addition to the certiorari bonds, and the tax rate would move to $425.33 per $1,000. This $425.33 would increase that $700,000 priced homeowner’s  taxes due to the certiorari bonds bond  $392 to $7,975, a $392 tax increase in 06-07..


 


The $65 Million in bonds will be bonded in increments of $21.5M, $22M, and 21.5M at 5% in June 2007, June 2008, and June 2009, with the first payments coming in 2007-2008


 


How would the $65 Million bonding affect our $700,000 homeowner’s taxes?


 


In 2008, the tax rate over 2005  for the cert bonds and the $65 Million bond would increase the tax rate $10.12. Add to this the average $8 tax rate increase to cover the budget increases, and the tax rate goes up an additional $8, bringing it to $428.57 per $1,000 of assessed valuation. Provided the assessment stays the same, our $700,000 homeowner will pay a school tax of $8,036 ( an additional $452 per year in 08-09.)


 


In 2008-2009, the tax rate increase slows on paying off the $65 Million in bonds because the certiorari bonds payments decrease. Our $700,000 homeowner pays only an additional $4.76 per $1,000 of assessed valuation (less than the cost of a Starbucks Caramel Machiatto Vente Size cup of coffee) in 2009, plus the average $8 more to cover the compounding school budget, giving us a projected tax rate of $423.21 per $1,000 of assessed valuation. This figure gives our $700,000 homeowner a school tax of $7,935 a year (an increase of $392 over 2005-2006).


 


Mr. Schreurs last projection shows the school tax payer receiving more relief in the tax rate in 2009-2010, when the projected tax rate increase dips to $4.65 per $1,000 of assessed valuation. You add that $4.65 to the $410.45 and the $8 average tax rate increase for the general school budget compounding and you come up with a $423 per $1,000 of assessed valuation. Given the 18.475 assessed value and multiplying it by $423 gives you a total school tax of $7,931, or $388 more per year in school taxes by 2009-2010.


 


Assumptions.


 


Now these calculations are straight line and assume the assessment of the $700,000 home stays the same. If it is increased by the city, of course the approximate tax increase per year on the  $16 Million in Certs, and $65 Million in renovation bonds, would increase, as it would increase given more than expected increases in other school budget items. The tax rate increased $9.61 budget to budget from 2004-2005 to 2005-2006, and the School Business Office told WPCNR that an $8 average was a legitimate figure to use for this calculation of the average increase in the tax rate going forward, separate from the increase in the tax rate directly related to the paying off of the bond issues. Projections were not carried beyond 2010.


 


The $50 Million Bond.


 


Should the School District decide to bond for the lessor amount, $50  Million, the increase in taxes on the $700,000 home are less:  $432 in 07-08, $332 in 08-09, and $330 in 09-10.


 


 


 

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Board Raises Regents PASS Grade to 65 for 07 Local Diploma. OKS Display Policy

WPCNR SCHOOL DAYS. By John F. Bailey. November 14, 2005; Correction November 21, 2005: The Board of Education accelerated local diploma standards for Class of 2007 students at White Plains High School last night, voting 5-2 (with Peter Bassano and Rick Tompkins against) to raise the requirements for 2007 would be candidates for a WPHS high school diploma. Beginning in 2007, students would be required to pass 2 of the 5 Regents Examinations (American History, World History, English, Math, Chemistry, and Physics)  with a grade of 65 in order to graduate WPHS. This requirement will apply beginning with this year’s Junior Class (Class of 2007). It will not apply to the Class of 2006.


In future years, the Class of 2008 would continue to have to pass 2 Regents exams with a grade of 65 or better to receive a local diploma. The Class of 2009, 3 Regents Exams; the Class of 2010, 4 Exams, and the Class of 2011 would have to pass all five Regents Exams with a 65 or better, thereby assuring all students graduating with a diploma from WPHS would be graduating with Regents Diplomas.


The Board ruling places White Plains ahead of the proposed State Education Department timetable which would require all New York State Students to pass all 5 Regents Exams with a 65 to receive a Regents Diploma by 2012. Henry Cafaro, Director of Guidance has informed the board that he knows of no school districts other than White Plains which are accelerating the passing grade process ahead of the state schedule.


Members of the Board of Education went to great lengths at Monday evening’s meeting, with Peter Bassano, Donna McLaughlin, Bill Pollack and Marie Tratoros emphasizing that by demanding more of White Plains High students, the district is preparing them better for life after high school. 


Mr. Bassano wrote to correct a WPCNR error in reporting the Board Vote: I  just read the story about Monday’s meeting and wanted to correct something rather serious.  The vote approving the Holiday Display policy was unanimous.  The vote for the Regent’s passing grade was 5 to 2.   I voted against the proposed policy because I believe we do our students a disservice by handing them a diploma even though they get a 55 on three regents exams and we then do not compel them to retake the class and master the material. John, I would appreciate if you would publish a clarification on this.  This vote and the policy we adopted is one of the more important decisions we will have made this year.

Holiday Display Policy Approved, 7-0


Despite 6 of 7 parents addressing the Board urging they not pass the Holiday Display Policy, with three of the parents sharply criticising the Board’s efforts at publicizing the policy to the community, Parents spoke out on the issue during the Public Comment period, complaining bitterly that the policy would introduce religion into the public sector. The number of commentators was a record for the number of public commentators at a school board meeting since WPCNR has been covering the Board of Education (2000).


Here is the text of the new school district holiday display policy:


Displays


 


The Board of Education of the White Plains City School District is proud of the diversity of White Plains and believes that the District has the responsibility as an educational institution to foster mutual understanding and respect in our students for the many beliefs and customs stemming from the varied religious, racial, ethnic and cultural backgrounds of the members of our community.


 


With this goal in mind, the Board of Education will allow the District to acknowledge the cultural and historical aspects of religious holidays and to temporarily display secular and religious symbols in the school buildings to celebrate the diversity of the holiday seasons.


 


All holiday displays containing religious symbols must be non-proselytizing in nature and shall conform to the following requirements:


 



  • The display of religious symbols (in a display) must be part of a larger configuration in an education setting which includes secular symbols and is representative of the diversity of the holiday season;
  • The display of religious symbols must contain written statements supplied by the District explaining the symbol and its significance to cultural and historical aspects of the religious holidays presented in an unbiased and objective manner;
  • The display of religious symbols must be temporary and limited to the duration of the holiday season; and
  • The display of religious symbols must be accompanied by a written disclaimer of public sponsorship indicating that,
“This temporary display of secular and religious symbols is intended by the District to celebrate the diversity of the holiday season and should not be construed as an endorsement of any religion.”

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