Syracuse Mayor Stephanie Miner has released her budget for the upcoming fiscal year, and it once again holds the line on property taxes and water and sewer rates.
Miner says the $674 million spending plan is the result of continued difficult fiscal decisions that don’t require more sacrifice from residents of the 23rd poorest city in the nation.
"Before I go to the poorest people in the community and ask them to pay increased rates, I want to make sure we can do something with that money that is effectively going to improve the quality of their life. And until we have a real partnership with the state and federal government on infrastructure, for example, at this point in time, it doesn't make sense to ask people of our community to pay increased water rates."
Miner says the city did save taxpayers $2.1 million from reduced pension liability costs. She says that’s a result of making a then-controversial decision not to participate in the governor’s so-called pension smoothing program of a few years back. The mayor’s budget also dips less into reserves…and Common Council Finance Committee Chair Kathleen Joy says that seems like good news.
"There's a $9 million hit to our reserves. Last year, it was $20 million. So, that's encouraging that we have less of a budget deficit, I guess."
Joy says they just received the budget, but she knows what they’re likely to look at.
Joy says they’ll also examine personnel and payroll for each department, especially police and fire. in fact, councilors will meet with fire department leaders Thursday as the first budget hearings get underway. The budget needs to be in place by July 1st.
