100 years ago in The Record

Thursday, Nov. 21, 1918. Despite raising the salaries of many city employees, Mayor Cornelius F. Burns promises that Troy’s 1919 budget “will show an increase so small as to be scarcely appreciable to the individual taxpayer.” The budget is submitted to the common council tonight. The Record reports that it’s “the first under the law which contemplates a pay-as-you-go policy and for which preparations have been in progress for several years past.” Approval authorizes the city to collect taxes beginning January 1. “You will agree with me that never in its history was the city confronted with the extraordinary and unusual conditions which faced us in making up this year’s estimate,” the mayor writes in his cover letter. “The high cost of living and materials, together with the fact that the salaries paid in the police, fire schools and other departments do not correspond to those paid in other municipalities, have compelled us to make substantial increases in all our departments.” Police and firemen in particular have been lobbying for long- overdue pay hikes. Under the new budget, patrolmen will get a $200 raise and will make $1,250 in 1919. Across the departments, salaries will go up by between $200 and $300 a year. “We have taken care to see that the smaller paid officials received their proportionate share and in no in- stance have any of the department heads received any increase,” the mayor notes, “To do this and not create an unnecessary burden on the taxpayers has indeed been a problem.”

Raises amount for nearly all the spending increases in the budget, which add up to $150,000. However, cuts in other departments and the elimination of some positions allow the mayor to claim that the net increase over last year is only $33,356. Better still, water rates will not be increased, which is “a matter of much gratification” for the mayor.

The budget is referred to the finance committee, which schedules a hearing for December 5. Some bickering breaks out when Alderman George T. McCune (R-14th Ward) suggests summoning the department heads to answer questions at the hearing. Republicans have long wanted department heads to explain (or try to justify) specific budget items.

Alderman William H. Casey (D-1st Ward) says “it would be useless to summon the heads of the departments, as they had nothing to do with the estimate.” He suggests questioning the members of the board of estimate and apportionment, but council president Albert J. Watson insists that the aldermen have no power to summon any department heads. McCune complains that in the absence of a manual, aldermen “did not know what they could really do.”