Ansonia Mayor David Cassetti told the city’s tax board Monday that residents have been overtaxed for more than a decade.
So he proposed a $62.4 million 2015 – 2016 budget that would decrease property taxes by nearly 3 percent.
The spending plan calls for an increase of about $1 million to spending citywide, more than offset by using $2 million of the city’s general fund to be counted as income.
If approved as-is, the budget would deliver a tax decrease of 1.05 mills, or 2.72 percent — to residents.
That means for a house assessed at $200,000, property taxes would decrease $210, from $7,722 to $7,512.
Article continues after summary of Cassetti’s proposal.
Cassetti 2015 – 2015 Budget Proposal
The Board of Apportionment and Taxation will now review Cassetti’s proposal. Per the charter, the tax board must deliver recommended changes to the spending plan by March 10.
BOAT has scheduled a public hearing on the budget proposal for Feb. 18 at 6 p.m.
Mayor’s Recommendation
This year marks the first city budget in which Cassetti was required to begin the process with a recommended spending plan to the tax board.
In years past, the mayor was pretty much a bystander in the budget process, with responsibility for passing a spending plan resting with the Board of Apportionment and Taxation.
But Cassetti and Republicans proposed several charter changes approved by voters last November that give Aldermen final say over the budget.
“I’ve always believed that the city’s chief executive officer should embrace accountability, not run from it. Yet since the city’s incorporation Ansonia’s mayor has been given no formal role in the budget process, exiled to the sidelines during one of the most crucial times of the year,” Cassetti said. “It was a great system for avoiding responsibility, but no way to lead a city.”
The mayor said he tried his best to balance tax relief with maintaining city services in putting the budget proposal together.
Schools?
But Cassetti also said that his proposal rests on “a series of assumptions and information that’s not yet available.”
For example, the city doesn’t know how exactly how much money the state will pump into its coffers to subsidize the school system.
The school board in December requested a $30,799,138 budget for 2015 – 2016, representing an increase of $1,901,931, or 6.58 percent, over its current budget of $28,897,207.
Cassetti trimmed that request by $746,043, and proposed giving the school district a $1,155,888, or 4 percent, year-over-year increase.
The city’s school budget is subsidized to the tune of about $16 million yearly by the state’s “education cost sharing” grant, but the city’s Comptroller, William Nimons, who also serves as the Board of Education’s president, said the number should be even higher, because of Ansonia’s poverty levels.
“The state of Connecticut’s been shortchanging the City of Ansonia by the tune of anywhere from $5.8 million to $7 million a year,” Nimons said.
Tax board VIce Chairman John Izzo pointed out the school board’s budget request was a lot more than the mayor proposed.
“How much state funding will offset that?” Izzo asked.
“We’re hoping that there’s going to be a little bit more coming from the state, but where the budgets are going now with the state, we may be lucky to keep level where we are,” Nimons said.
He said the main driver in the schools budget was rising costs for special education, an annual refrain from school officials.
Nimons said that special education costs amount to 32 percent of the school board’s budget request.
“It’s out of control,” Nimons said. “It’s not sustainable where we’re going right now.”
Overtaxed?
While total spending in the budget would rise more than $1 million under Cassetti’s plan, taxes would be reduced because the mayor is proposing counting $2 million of the city’s general fund as income.
Democrats criticized the move last year, but Cassetti said the fund had been set at a a “shockingly high” 17 percent of the overall city budget for years.
The level should have been 8 to 10 percent, he said.
Cassetti charged that residents had been overtaxed for more than a decade, saying it was “downright unconscionable” in a distressed community like Ansonia.
Cassetti said he wants to transfer funds from the “overstuffed” reserve to invest in infrastructure, pensions, liabilities, and debt costs.
“In essence, we are putting the reserve fund on a physician-approved crash diet,” Cassetti said, which will allow the city to lower its tax rate at the same time.
The city’s grand list of taxable property also grew by about $6 million.
Article continues after video.
Question Marks
Though the city’s charter calls for the mayor, as part of his budget proposal, to submit a five-year capital investment plan to the tax board, Cassetti did not give BOAT such a plan Monday.
“It will be ready for the election in November,” Nimons said. “So some of the items that weren’t going to make this budget will be put into the second half of next year, 2016.”
Nimons and Dan King, the chairman of the tax board, said the city will finance the lease-purchase of a new fire engine for the Eagle Hose Hook & Ladder Company in this year’s budget.
Cost estimates for the fire engine run between $500,000 and $600,000. Nimons said the city will have an exact figure after putting the project out to bid.
Nimons seemed less sure about whether the city will pony up for a new ambulance requested by Ansonia Rescue Medical Services.
“We’re in dire straits,” ARMS Chief Jared Heon said during Monday’s meeting. “We need it.”
“No comment,” Nimons replied.
The tax board will meet to discuss the budget Feb. 11, Feb. 18 after the public hearing, Feb. 23, Feb. 25., and March 4. Those meetings will begin at 6 p.m.
A regular monthly meeting scheduled for March 2 will begin at 7 p.m., with a tentative vote on their recommendations scheduled for March 9 at 6 p.m.
From there the budget proposal goes to the Board of Aldermen, who have until April 14 to hold a public hearing of their own on the budget, and an April 30 deadline to adopt a spending plan for 2015 – 2016.
