The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Officials call governor’s budget pitch unacceptable
Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s revised proposed 2017-18 budget landed on the desks of local municipal officials with a resounding thud.
Malloy’s budget proposal — Malloy 2.0 as it’s called — was intended to move the General Assembly toward a decision on the proposed budget. It called for deep cuts to the majority of municipalities while increasing aid to the state’s major cities. But to many officials, including Cromwell Mayor Enzo Faienza, Malloy’s proposal appears designed to punish the very units of government that have practiced the financial restraint lacking at the state level.
Faienza said Malloy’s proposal, which was unveiled Monday, “puts all the burden on the very people who have been practicing good financial management: the cities and towns,” Faienza said.
Cromwell Town Manager Anthony J. Salvatore was equally emphatic in his assessment of the proposal.
“The governor’s second budget proposal go-around is unacceptable,” he said.
His colleague, East Hampton Town Manager Michael Maniscalco, said the governor’s proposal “would cut state aid to East Hampton by over 50 percent.”
In light of a projected reduction on that scale, Maniscalco said, “it is abundantly clear that Connecticut needs to reassess what it does. Changes need to be made across the board to both operating costs and taxing/revenue costs,” Maniscalco said. “Without change, the state, towns and residents will continue to suffer.”
Even as the legislature continues to debate various proposals, “The majority of the municipalities have already put their budgets to bed,” Salvatore said.
The proposal “does not bode well for most municipalities,” with significant cuts to Educational Cost Sharing and the elimination of Payment in Lieu of Taxes, the Pequot Fund and the Municipal Revenue Sharing grant for most towns, Salvatore said. The proposal maintains the municipal contribution to the Teachers’ Retirement System.
“Cromwell did not remain unscathed with these cuts,” Salvatore said.
Cromwell’s ECS would be reduced from $1.87 million in this fiscal year to $1.05 million if Malloy’s proposal was adopted, Salvatore said. Funding for ECS would drop from $1 million by $389,254, he said.
Overall, the proposed reductions in grants to the town would fall by $495,318, Salvatore said.
The proposal for the town to take on a portion of the teacher’s retirement fund would require a payout of $1.42 million, the manager said.
Were those proposals to be enacted, that would “equate to $2.44 million over what the taxpayers approved at referendum” on May 2, Salvatore said.
However, more than once during an interview in his office, Salvatore stressed, “these are projections” developed in discussion with Director of Finance Marianne Sylvester, and based on the governor’s proposal.
“Nothing has been passed. There have been no votes. This is just a proposal,” he said.
Portland First Selectwoman Susan S. Bransfield was more restrained in her comments because, she said, “I doubt that this proposal will be the final budget.” That being said, “I did make contact with our state representatives to say that this proposal was not acceptable,” Bransfield said.
“Were the governor’s proposal to be adopted, it would result in additional cuts that would be very difficult for our community,” Bransfield said.
What she does hope the proposal, which she described as “a template,” can do is act as a goal to members of both the House and Senate in Hartford “to sit down with the governor and work together to fashion a budget that can sustain all 169 of the state’s cities and towns,” Bransfield said.
“In the meantime, we in the town of Portland will continue doing our best to follow our charter,” she said.
In the end, both Faienza and Salvatore remain frustrated at the seemingly endless series of missed opportunities for the state to deal with the budget problem.
“I said right from the beginning back in January they should have started work on the budget then and focused on nothing else but the budget,” Salvatore said.
For his part, Faienza said, “What they have got to do is the Republicans and the Democrats have work with one another to put together a reasonable budget that the governor can sign, and one that doesn’t put all the burden on the cities and towns.”