Idiots

The former Empire State's Schumer, Gillibrand

One Piece At A Time:

Our morally and intellectually superior two-headed monster, Chuck and Kirsten, should have known that voting on Marxist ideological grounds for bills that you haven't actually read has consequences.

Idiots, indeed.

Too much money, not enough dope

 h/t Iowahawk

Voters could eliminate property taxes today..

...in North Dakota.  Finger Lakes citizens who believe "you don't own your home, you rent it from the teachers' union" will want to take note.

In an election here on Tuesday, residents of North Dakota will consider a measure that reaches far beyond any of that — one that abolishes the property tax entirely.

“I would like to be able to know that my home, no matter what happens to my income or my life, is not going to be taken away from me because I can’t pay a tax,” said Susan Beehler, one in a group of North Dakotans who have pressed for an amendment to the state’s Constitution to end the property tax. They argue that the tax is unpredictable, inconsistent, counter to the concept of property ownership and needless in a state that, thanks in part to wildly successful oil drilling, finds itself in the rare circumstance of carrying budget reserves.

“When,” Ms. Beehler asked, “did we come to believe that government should get rich and we should get poor?”

Who could be opposed to such an expansion of liberty and freedom?  Why, the usual beneficiaries of the status quo:

AARP of North Dakota
AFSCME Council 59
AGC of North Dakota
American Council of Engineering Companies North Dakota (ACEC/ND)
Badlands Board of REALTORS
Basin Electric Power Cooperative
Bismarck Mandan Development Association
Bismarck-Mandan Board of REALTORS
Bismarck-Mandan Chamber of Commerce
Bismarck-Mandan Home Builders Association
Burke Divide Electric Cooperative
Burleigh County Township Association
Capital Electric Cooperative Inc.
Cass County Electric Cooperative
Cavalier Electric Cooperative
Central Power Electric Cooperative
Credit Union Association of the Dakotas
Dakota Valley Electric Cooperativ
Dickinson Area Builders Association
Fargo Citywide PTA
Fargo Moorhead Area Association of REALTORS
FMWF Chamber of Commerce
Forx Builders Association
Fraternal Order of Police
Grand Forks Area Association of REALTORS
Grand Forks Chamber of Commerce
Grand Forks County Employees Association
Great River Energy
Greater Fargo Moorhead Economic Development Corporation
Home Builders Association of Fargo/Moorhead
Independent Community Banks of North Dakota
Jamestown Board of REALTORS
Jamestown Chamber of Commerce
KEM Electric Cooperative
Lignite Energy Council
McKenzie Electric Cooperative
Minnkota Power Cooperative, Inc.
Minot Association of Builders
Minot Board of REALTORS
Minot Chamber of Commerce
Mor-Gran-Sou Electric Cooperative, Inc
MPCG PTA
ND Assoc. of Oil & Gas Producing Counties
ND Water Resource Districts
ND Water User Association
NoDak Electic Cooperative
North Central Electric Cooperative
North Dakota AFL-CIO
North Dakota Association of Builders
North Dakota Association of Career & Technical Education
North Dakota Association of Counties
North Dakota Association of REALTORS
North Dakota Bankers Association
North Dakota Beer Distributors Association
North Dakota Beer Distributors Association
North Dakota Chamber of Commerce
North Dakota Corn Growers
North Dakota Education Association
North Dakota Emergency Medical Services Association
North Dakota Farmers Union
North Dakota Grain Growers
North Dakota Grocers Association
North Dakota League of Cities
North Dakota Long Term Care Association
North Dakota Motor Carriers Association
North Dakota Petroleum Council
North Dakota Petroleum Marketers Association
North Dakota PTA
North Dakota Public Employees Association
North Dakota Recreation & Park Association
North Dakota Retailers
North Dakota Rural Electric Cooperatives
North Dakota Rural Telephone Cooperatives
North Dakota Rural Water Systems Associations
North Dakota School Boards Association
North Dakota Senior Service Providers
North Dakota Soybean Association
North Dakota Stockmen’s Association
North Dakota Township Officers
North Dakota Utility Shareholders
Northern Plains Electric Cooperative
Professional Firefighters of North Dakota
Roughrider Electric Cooperative
Slope Electric Cooperative
Tobacco Free North Dakota
Valley City Chamber of Commerce
Verendrye Electric Cooperative
Wahpeton Breckenridge Area Board of Realtors
Wahpeton Breckenridge Chamber of Commerce
Ward County Farmers Union
Williston Area Builders Association
Williston Board of Realtors
Williston Chamber of Commerce, frozen tundra division.

 The "we got ours" club, frozen tundra division.

Update:  North Dakotans have voted to keep their chains.

Nozzolio: force NY taxpayers to subsidize Virginia millionaire

AES Cayuga

The combination of an anemic Upstate economy, fanatic environmental regulations, and the abundance of cheap, clean natural gas being produced in neighboring states has resulted in hard times for the AES coal powered generator on Cayuga Lake.  In fact, AES had made the difficult business decision to enter bankruptcy, and has shut down operations at its AES Cayuga plant.  The facility's landmark steam plume has disappeared from Cayuga's shoreline, except for for brief periods this winter when the plant, which has no heating system, had to be operated to prevent freezing. 

As we've previously reported,  financial difficulties at AES have sent shock waves through local governments in the Town of Lansing, Tompkins County, and the Lansing Central School, all of whom have feasted on the millions in property tax revenues paid every year by AES.  An economist might point out that all those millions actually came from Finger Lakes residents, who pay the highest electric rates in the continental US.

Tax addicted local governments, terrified that they might loose some of their historic ability to coerce gold plated pay and benefit packages from struggling peasants, however, can rest easy this morning.  "Republican" State Senator Mike Nozzolio has decided to use the power of government to force taxpayers to buy AES' otherwise unsaleable product.

This proposed legislation, titled S.6842, recommends the establishment of a power purchase agreement with the New York State Power Authority. The legislation would ensure that the AES Cayuga plant reopens and remains operational for a minimum of three years.

Power produced under Nozzolio's little experiment in serfdom will be doled out, not to Finger Lakes homeowners, but to politically connected fats cats.

Under the legislation, energy purchased from the AES Cayuga plant would be directed to supplement the state's ReCharge NY program. The ReCharge NY program allocates low-cost power to New York State employers.

Harker

And while local taxing entities are thrilled that their cash cow will be spared, let's not forget Victoria D. Harker, CEO of AES and the real beneficiary of Nozzolio's generosity with your money.   Despite the recent problems with her coal burning operation, and unlike many of her Upstate ratepayers, Vicki will still be able to afford dinners out.  Forbes reports Ms. Harker's total compensation from AES in 2010 was $2,661,548.00, with an additional $142,578.00 provided in director's fees from Darden Restaurants.



Updates:  

The well compensated Ms. Harken's actual title is "Chief Financial Officer and President of Global Business Services."   Vicki is reported to be planning to be out the door this summer.

For the truth about New York' s feudal "ReCharge NY" program, see One of Nine.

Happily, some clarity from DiNapoli

New York State's top financial officer, Tom DiNapoli, got involved in politics in 1972, when he was elected to the Mineola Board of Education at age 18.  While he's as much a standard issue New York liberal Democrat as the next guy, we can assume that Tom likes his job and doesn't want to be held responsible for the Empire State's bankruptcy, or a potential Federal takeover leading the the dissolution of what was once the world's beacon of freedom and opportunity.  So it's no surprise that Tom might actually look into some of our rulers' more wasteful spending.

More tax breaks does not equal more jobs.

That's according to State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli's latest report on New York's industrial development agencies (IDAs).

In his fifth report on IDAs [PDF], DiNapoli says the number of jobs created by the local economic development engines dropped by 22,000 from the year before.

DiNapoli also cites a $483 million gap in what IDAs gave out in tax breaks and how much they took in via payments-in-lieu-of-taxes (PILOTs).

That breaks down, the report finds, to a $2,659 cost per job - up 9 percent from the year before.

"Taxpayers are not getting enough bang for their buck when it comes to IDAs," DiNapoli said in a statement.

Tom may be on to something, if Seneca County's IDA is any indication.  Rather than bringing the county a Toyota assembly plant or an Apple Computer research facility, the IDA seems to just be making work for itself.

The owner and operator of a proposed new McDonald’s Restaurant at 2500 Mound Road will likely receive financial assistance from the Seneca County Industrial Development Agency.

James Coriale, president of Jascor Inc., the owner-operator of the existing McDonald’s on Mound Road, has received town approval to demolish the existing building and construct a new restaurant on the same site.

It appears that struggling Finger Lakes taxpayers are once again being forced to subsidize a profitable business that, absent the generosity of the Seneca County IDA, most likely could have updated its facility without taxpayer cash.  Beneficiary James Coriale, a successful businessman, actually owns six McDonalds' restaurants.

"We look forward to a welcoming everyone to our grand re-opening later this year," said Coriale. Jim Coriale owns six McDonald’s Restaurants, with locations in Penn Yan and Ovid, in addition to McDonald's in Walmart locations in Camillus, Horseheads, & Watkins Glen.

We enjoy Mr. Coriale's restaurants and we congratulate him on building a successful business in one of the most anti-business climates in the US.  We just don't have any extra cash to invest right now, and it seems Tom DiNapoli may be starting to figure that out.

Happy Tax Day

..from Sunny, and all of us at South of 5 and 20.

Our tax plan

Just in time for election season, Bob explains South of 5 and 20's tax reform proposal.

Obama's "tax cut"

Professor Jacobson explains why Taxin' Barry is suddenly wanting to give you a "tax cut."

I’ve been beating the drums since before the 2008 election that Obama’s plans for revamping how FICA money is paid and used — the most recent being the “payroll tax holiday" — should have liberals screaming.

Obama almost singlehandedly is taking a sacrosanct flow of FICA money and turning it into just another “tax” to be played with a political circumstances dictate.  In this case, the political circumstance is a second year of diminished FICA payments as part of a class warfare strategy to get Obama reelected.

FICA, however, is not an ordinary tax, it is the funding mechanism for Democrat’s most cherished program.  Politicizing the flow of FICA contributions moving into the pipeline makes it that much easier to politicize the flow of benefits exiting the pipeline.

Moronic Republican leaders are once again jumping into the Democrats' trap with both feet.  The only thing voters who get their news from the mainstream media are hearing is "those evil Republicans won't let Obama give you free money:"

Obama to Publicly Pressure House Republicans to Pass Payroll Tax Cut

Union shill thinks your money belongs to the state

Ron Deutsch hobnobbing with the rich at Mohonk

Sentient New Yorkers should agree with Bill Nojay that Andy Cuomos' three-men-in-a-room "tax cut" or "tax code reform" is actually the biggest tax increase in New York in forty years.  Lonely Conservative expects her "middle class tax" cut to amount to less that a buck a week, and links to a quote from union-funded political operative Ron Deutsch:

“The average taxpayer will get a night out at the movies, courtesy of the state Legislature, without popcorn, I suppose,” said Ron Deutsch, of New Yorkers for Fiscal Fairness, a liberal tax policy watchdog group in Albany.

Bold added.  We need to remind Deutsch, paid servant of New York's powerful public employee unions, that said night out will not be "courtesy of the state legislature."  That's our money, confiscated at gunpoint by our state government, operating as bag man for those three men in that room.

Ever been to the Mohonk Mountain House?  Neither have we.

Trumansburg school cleans house

Trumansburg Central School

After abusing district taxpayers by overtaxing their homes and businesses, two high level administrators in the Finger Lakes' Trumansburg Central School are heading for the exits amid rumors of possible criminal charges.

Trumansburg Central School District will lose two administrators -- one to retirement and one to termination.

Superintendent Paula Hurley will retire on Jan. 2 due to family needs. Former business manager Laura Bellis has been terminated. She has been on paid leave since September 2010, after a comptroller's audit was critical of how reserve funds were managed.

Hurley's husband Bill has already retired from his superintendent's gig at the nearby Newfield school district.  

What is this mismanagement costing struggling district taxpayers?  Paula Hurley's current salary, according to the New York State Teachers Retirement System, is $142,627.00.  

Median family income in the school district is $50,313.  As a percentage of home value, Tompkins County, NY, property taxes rank #32 out of the 3,141 counties in the US.  Time for consolidation?

Live Free

Stacy "The Other" McCain has arrived in New Hampshire to do some political reporting.  We recommend you read his stuff.  

In today's "Greetings from New Hampshire," McCain drops one sentence that should rivet the attention of all Empire State residents.

New Hampshire state legislators are paid just $100 a year, the legislature only meets part-time and there is no state income tax.

Bold added.  As New York's local governments compete to be the first to break Andy Cuomo's tax cap, read that sentence again, amigos.  

Time for a pay cut, Shelly?

Janis Kelly: "politically correct corruption"

Kelly

From the deep within Groves of Academe, the only Republican candidate for Mayor of Ithaca, NY, fires a fastball.

We must stop using public money for favored private groups. At the first Common Council meeting I attended, the council (including both J.R. Clairborne and Svante Myrick) used $50,000 in "low-income housing" funds to guarantee a loan for the State Theatre. This is wrong. A private car rental company (whose executive director, Jennifer Dotson, is on Common Council) has been redefined as "public transportation" and given reserved parking spaces all over the city, apparently at no cost. This is low-grade, politically correct corruption, and it is wrong.

Corruption, indeed.

Its about time someone exposed this scam .  Overtaxed Finger Lakes families are being forced to subsidize short-term rental cars for Ivy League swells.  Were we Ithacans (not likely! - ed), we'd support Kelly against her numerous lefty opponents.

Cash-hungry Cuomo: non-Indian casinos OK

Non-Indian, "commercial" casinos will soon join the competition for New York residents' shrinking budgets.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo says his administration is actively investigating whether to bring commercial, non-Indian casinos and related gambling to New York.

By the time the graft has been distributed, New Yorkers can expect a net loss, to be made up with higher taxes. We should have gotten into the casino business in 1950.

Tax assessment pits county vs. county

Oswego

Among New Yorkers protesting their tax assessments we now find Cayuga County's government.  Cauyga County, it turns out, bought a piece of land in Oswego County, and is now suing to get its tax asessment reduced.  

Yes, taxpayers in Cayuga County will be forced to pay taxes on land they "own" in Oswego County.  Justin Murphy explains the convoluted confiscation in the Auburn Citizen.

The building at 11 River Glen Plaza, a former grocery store which the county bought May 16, is assessed at $2 million. By 2011 tax levels, that means about $102,000 in property taxes.

In a tax certiorari petition filed July 27, the county and JHMPAC, the entity from which the county bought the building for $950,000, asked an Oswego County judge to lower the assessment to $700,000, which would yield $35,850 in 2011 taxes.

“It’s part of a process you go through with any purchase,” Cayuga County Legislature Chairman Peter Tortorici said. “The assessment came in, I think, a little high, and we’re just going through the process to see if we can get it reduced.”

Government entities generally don’t pay property taxes, but Cayuga County does have to pay in this case because the property in question is outside county borders, according to an advisory opinion issued by the state Office of Real Property Services.

So highly paid experts toiling in our county governments can't agree on what a property is worth. What confidence can we then have in our own assessments?  For instance, this million dollar lakefront mansion in Seneca County was just reassessed at $194,000.  Sound a  little low to you?

USA Today ignores state taxes

Print media on the cutting edge

In this morning's USA Today,  Dennis Cauchon reports that Texas' economy is now larger than New York's.

Texas became the USA's second-largest economy during the past decade — displacing New York and perhaps heading one day toward challenging California — in one of the biggest economic shifts in the past half-century.

Cauchon credits the Lone Star State's exceptional growth on good luck and immigration.

"We're growing faster than everyone else, and this trend should last a good while," says economic forecaster Raymond Berryhill of Waco, Texas. His state enjoyed "good fortune and good planning" from having natural resources, immigration and successful technology businesses while avoiding the real estate bubble, he says.

Florida's share of the national economy grew more than any state except Texas as seniors took their wealth south.

We're not professional journalists or licensed economists here, but the fact that, unlike New York, neither Texas nor Florida impose a state income tax on their residents might be relevant to their recent growth.

Update!   Professor Reynolds has more on education in those same two low tax states.

Penn Yan school district to raise taxes, lay off teachers, and pay big bucks to double dipping superintendent

Penn Yan Academy, 1959

Should a Finger Lakes business attempt to raise prices while at the same time reducing services, customers would quickly take their trade elsewhere.  However, the Penn Yan Central School proposes to do just that:

If the Penn Yan School Board approves the 2011-2012 budget presented to it on March 9, the number of school staff posts will be reduced by 22.5 full time positions, class sizes will increase,  fewer courses will be offered each year, some programs and courses will be eliminated and the total property tax levy will increase by 2.88 percent.

The quoted Chronicle-Express article lays out the facts as presented by the school district.  Let's take a minute to look behind the story.  Some statistics harvested from the districts's own website and Education.com, organized for the convenience of South of 5 and 20 readers:

3 school buildings

13 administrators, including superintendent, assistant superintendents, directors, principals, assistant principals

1,770 students

10 students per full time teacher equivalent

$17,683 dollars per student, proposed budget

The US Census Bureau reports the median household income in Yates County, home to the Penn Yan school district, is  $41,577 (2009).  Household income is defined as the sum of mom's salary, dad's salary, Junior's lawn mowing money, and any other income they can bring in.  That said, what are those households paying their employee, the school superintendent?  Once again, from the district website:

On December 8, 2010, the Board of Education of the Penn Yan Central School District approved the appointment of Thomas A. Cox as Interim Superintendent of Schools.   Mr. Cox retired in 2005 as the Superintendent of Schools at Gananda Central School District.  Since that time, he has served in several interim positions in the region.  

The District’s application for temporary employment of Mr. Cox under Section 211 of Retirement and Social Security Law and §80-5.5 of Commissioner’s Regulations has been approved.  In accordance with Retirement and Social Security Law, Mr. Cox is entitled to receive a pension while so employed.  He will be compensated at a per diem salary of $495 per day for the anticipated period of employment from February 5, 2011 through June 30, 2011. (bold added)

We'll leave it to intreped readers to track down the amount of Cox's taxpayer-provided pension, but we suspect it's somewhere north of $41,577 per year.  And that's guarenteed every year for the rest of his life.  As a retiree, perhaps Cox could pitch in by volunteering his services to the district, rather than accepting $495 per day.

Have a flexible spending account?

Are you one of the millions of Americans who use a flexible spending account to pay some of your health care costs?  If so, you're among the first to understand that Obamcare is really a huge tax increase disguised as the destruction of the world's best health care system.

Drs. Pelosi, Reid, and Obama's prescription is already unleashing a clown carload of unintended consequences.  Frustrated flex plan members, no longer able to use their pre-tax savings accounts to purchase common over-the counter medications, are asking their physicians to write prescriptions for common remedies like aspirin, decongestants and antacids.  Although it's only March, enough havoc has already ensued that the Wall Street Journal has published a lengthy article on the phenomenon:

Sandy Chung is grappling with a new kind of request at her pediatrics office in Fairfax, Va.: prescriptions for aspirin and diaper-rash cream.

Patients are demanding doctors' orders for over-the-counter products because of a provision in the health-care overhaul that slipped past nearly everyone's radar. It says people who want a tax break to buy such items with what's known as flexible-spending accounts need to get a prescription first.

The result is that Americans are visiting their doctors before making a trip to the drugstore, hoping their physician will help them out by writing the prescription. The new requirements create not only an added burden for doctors, but also new complications for retailers and pharmacies. 

"It drives up the cost of health care as opposed to reducing it," says Dr. Chung, who rejected much of a 10-item request from a mother of four that included pain relievers and children's cold medicine.

Though the new rules on over-the-counter drugs amount to a small part of the massive overhaul of the health-care system, the unintended side effects show how difficult it can be to predict how such game-changing legislation will play out in the real world.

We all need to know about this.  We're talking about aspirin today, but soon your pregnancies, heart stents and cancer treatments will  be included in the mayhem.  Read the whole thing, call you congressman, and tell your friends.

"The Cartel" in Seneca Falls Thursday

Americans for Prosperity, an organization recently attacked by Barry Obama, will present the important education documentary "The Cartel" on Thursday in Seneca Falls.  From AFP New York:

In Governor Cuomo’s State of the State Address, he declared that New York State ranks first in spending per student and yet ranks thirty-fourth overall in results.

It is not much better on a national level. American 15-year-olds rank 35th out of 57 countries in math and literacy, behind almost all industrialized nations. Yet the U.S. was the biggest spender at 7.6 percent of GDP, or $1.1 trillion in 2007.

Obviously, we are failing our children in giving them the means to excel in the new global economy. And throwing money at the problem is not the answer.

On Thursday, March 10th, 2011 at 5:30 p.m. at Seneca Falls Library, 47 Cayuga Street, Seneca Falls, NY, there will be a public screening of The Cartel, a documentary that exposes the waste and problems in the public school system. VIEW the movie trailer!

You can register for this free-ticketed event HERE!

More Finger Lakes districts looking to merge?

South Seneca Elementary

Belatedly waking up to shrinking enrollments and tapped out taxpayers, more Finger Lakes school districts are considering consolidation.  We recently noted discussion of a  Seneca County-wide consolidation.  This morning the Ithaca Journal reports another long rumored merger has moved closer to fruition:

Trumansburg Central School District officials are considering merger and resource sharing with the neighboring South Seneca Central School District.

Spurred by Gov. Andrew Cuomo's public push for consolidation of smaller school districts in New York, Trumansburg School Board President Douglas Ann Land and Superintendent Paula Hurley said at last week's school board meeting that they met with South Seneca representatives two weeks ago and began discussion of a possible merger of the districts and, in the nearer term, cooperation on joint services.

Struggling Finger Lakes families are forced to support way too many redundant school administrators.  Last week Governor Andy Cuomo, of all people, shined a light on superintendents' six figure compensation packages.  Consolidation will reduce administrative costs, starting at the top.

During the past decade, Central New York's dwindling private sector workforce has had to produce more while earning less.  Since the private sector is the ultimate source of all government revenue, its time for the public sector to get on the program.  Our government-run schools must learn to produce better results at lower cost, or get out of the way.

Cuomo questions superintendents' pay

 

Governor Andy Cuomo wants to cap New York school superintendents' pay at $175,000 (plus benefits).  Many taxpayers have been shocked to learn how much these seemingly redundant bureaucrats have been raking in.  Of course, the supes themselves are squealing like stuck pigs, pointing out that their average take is only $163,000 (plus benefits).

Rochester D&C commenter JohnQPublic has crunched the numbers and solved the mystery of how Rush-Henrietta Central School can be so generous to its superindendent in these otherwise challenging times:

Compensation per www.seethroughny.net:

- 2008....$189,189
- 2009....$213,040
- 2010....$220,102

PLUS tens of thousands more in benefits!

No wonder! Look who's on the Rush-Henrietta School Board:
- Kris Kringle
- Tooth Fairy
- Easter Bunny
- Lucky the Leprechaun (Board President)

The Board has a big pot-o-gold to give away to the lucky superintendent!

Who knew that Rush-Henrietta Schools were awash in so much extra cash?

Too see the numbers for your local district, go to SeeThroughNY.