by | Apr 9, 2019 5:36 am | Comments (19)
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100 College: Bright spot on grand list. Below: Acting Assessor Pullen.
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New Haven’s taxable grand list is worth around $6.6 billion. It’s tax-exempt grand list is worth around $8.2 billion. And the gap between the two is growing.
by | Apr 9, 2019 5:36 am | Comments (28)
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Hours-long Ward 7 Election Day line.
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More poll workers and better machine maintenance.
Democratic Registrar of Voters Shannel Evans argued that those two proposed improvements are key to better run elections in the fiscal year to come, and that they are worth a 34 percent boost to her department’s budget.
by | Apr 3, 2019 7:49 am | Comments (6)
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Jones and Gormany.
Elicker.
Mayor Toni Harp’s budget roadshow pulled into Goatville’s mActivity center Tuesday night to face a crowd of East Rockers curious about the state of the city’s finances and what the future might hold.
Continue reading ‘Budget Road Show (Down) Lands In Goatville’
by | Mar 14, 2019 11:49 am | Comments (3)
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Acting City Budget Director Michael Gormany and City Controller Daryl Jones field questions.
How will the school system close a potential $30 million deficit this coming fiscal year?
Not with the help of a bailout from the city or the state, according to city financial staff and the mayor’s proposed budget.
Continue reading ‘No Quick Fix Seen For Looming Schools Deficit’
by | Mar 12, 2019 7:48 am | Comments (4)
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Acting City Budget Director Michael Gormany and Finance Committee Vice-Chair Adam Marchand at Monday night’s budget workshop.
The city plans to borrow money every two years, rather than every single year, to pay for cop cars, tree trimming, computer upgrades, and other long-term capital improvement projects.
According to the city’s finance staff, that every-other-year borrowing model could save the city hundreds of thousands of dollars and hundreds of staff work hours every biennium.
by | Mar 1, 2019 6:05 pm | Comments (16)
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Acting City Budget Director Michael Gormany at Thursday’s budget presser.
The city’s net taxable grand list shrank by $15 million, or .23 percent, despite the city’s current building boom.
That grand list detail emerged in the mayor’s proposed $556.6 million new fiscal year operating budget, which was published in full on Friday afternoon.
by | Feb 28, 2019 4:01 pm | Comments (18)
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Mayor Harp with department heads at Thursday’s budget presser.
No tax increase. A marginal bump, not a new $30 million, for the Board of Ed. Bigger pension investments.
And a 1.75 percent overall increase in spending, to be covered by debt savings and a host of small new sources of revenue.
Those are a few of the highlights from the mayor’s proposed $556.6 million operating budget for the next fiscal year.
by | Feb 15, 2019 8:58 am | Comments (21)
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Chief Campbell with recruits at the academy.
Cut cop pensions and increase their salaries.
Add more disincentives to leave the department.
Shake down suburban departments when they do poach city officers.
Maybe lower the minimum age to become a police officer? Or maybe not.
by | Feb 12, 2019 9:03 am | Comments (28)
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Asst. Police Chief Otoniel Reyes, Chief Anthony Campbell, Payroll/Benefit Auditor Alissa Ebbson, and Asst. Chief Luis Casanova (far right) face the alders.
With a mixture of resignation, frustration, and cautionary instruction, alders unanimously signed off on spending over $3 million reserved for debt service on shoring up the police and fire overtime budgets instead.
Continue reading ‘Alders Sign Off On $3M Debt-To-OT Budget Transfer’
by | Feb 11, 2019 3:55 pm | Comments (8)
Halfway through the fiscal year, city spending is down in just about every department and in just about every budget line item in comparison to this time last year.
The notable exceptions: Pension payments. Self-insurance. Worker’s compensation. And police overtime, which continues to balloon as officers leave the force.
by | Feb 4, 2019 2:02 pm | Comments (11)
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LCI’s Jeff Moreno at neglected government-owned Rosette Street lot.
Thomas Breen photo
Controller Daryl Jones at brainstorming session.
Nobody likes vacant lots. But publish an online map identifying city-owned lots, and maybe more residents will come forward to buy, build, and return them to tax rolls.
That and other land management recommendations arose during a conversation with city staff about boosting revenue and cutting costs.
by | Jan 25, 2019 8:38 am | Comments (8)
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Controller Jones (right) and budget chief Gormany deliver good news.
Mohit Agrawal saw something strange as he flipped through the latest city monthly financial report.
“The numbers look pretty good,” the budget watchdog said. “Am I reading this right?”
by | Jan 15, 2019 1:31 pm | Comments (6)
Allan Appel photo
The Crown Street parking garage.
The state will fund nearly $11 million in urgent repairs for three downtown parking garages, but only if the city agrees not to sell those garages for a decade.
by | Jan 15, 2019 8:55 am | Comments (4)
Thomas Breen photo
Housing Code Inspector Rick Mazzadra on old-school Hill inspection.
City GIS guy Alfredo Herrera pitches alders Monday night on new-school plan.
A code inspector notices a leaky roof, or a contractor working without a permit. Instead of reaching for a pen and a pad of paper, she uses a tablet and internet-assisted camera to document the problem — which then shows up on a map shared with otherproblem-solvers.
City officials laid out that tech-assisted utopia as they convinced alders to advance two Information Technology contracts.
by | Jan 7, 2019 8:29 am | Comments (5)
Thomas Breen photos
Retrieving salt at DPW headquarters during a snowstorm last year.
The city will likely spend $5 million less than anticipated on a rebuild of the Department of Public Works (DPW) headquarters, even though the projected cost of the project is now $5 million more than originally budgeted.
That’s thanks to $10 million in state bond money for a demolition and construction project.
by | Dec 11, 2018 8:33 am | Comments (2)
CDC Photo
Thomas Breen photo
Health Department’s Pamela DeZutter testifies Monday night.
The city’s Health Department plans to contract with a Middletown-based nurse temp agency to make up for a rash of unexpected vacancies and illnesses among city nurses — right at flu-shot crunch time.
by | Dec 4, 2018 1:13 pm | Comments (5)
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BOA President Tyisha Walker-Myers, CERF Trustee Cathy Graves, and city Controller Daryl Jones at the first meeting of the Pension Task Force at City Hall.
The two city pensions are each currently funded at around 40 percent, leaving roughly $700 million in unfunded liabilities.
A new task force consisting of alders, city staff, and pension fund trustees aims to try to figure out how that happened, as well as how to get those funding levels up.
by | Nov 30, 2018 9:05 am | Comments (23)
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Police Chief Anthony Campbell: OT budget “unrealistic” from start.
In its latest financial report, the city projects that police overtime will top $8 million by the end of the fiscal year — nearly double what the officials had initially budgeted.
by | Nov 28, 2018 2:25 pm | Comments (28)
Markeshia Ricks Photo
Mayor Harp at the Newhallville Community Management Team meeting.
In a twist on her current budget roadshow, a Harp administration official asked neighbors for ideas about how to address the city’s fiscal challenges.
A hand went right up, and a suggestion followed: Stop budgeting state money the city doesn’t have and isn’t going to get.
by | Nov 21, 2018 8:48 am | Comments (20)
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Mayor Toni Harp at Tuesday night’s Downtown-Wooster Square community management team meeting.
The city has a revenue problem.
And if New Haven residents don’t want to bear that burden through higher property taxes, then they need to lobby the state legislature for increased tax-exempt-property reimbursements, fair education funding, a slice of the state’s sales tax receipts, and other state-enabled means for cities to raise more money.
Continue reading ‘Harp: State Must Let City Raise More Revenue’
by | Nov 12, 2018 1:32 pm | Comments (3)
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The Yalesville Fife and Drum Corps march down Chapel Street during October’s Columbus Day Parade.
The city’s Columbus Day Parade ended in the black this year, and paid the city back for the thousands of dollars worth of police overtime that it incurred.
by | Nov 1, 2018 7:57 am | Comments (14)
Markeshia Ricks Photo
Mayor Harp.
The mayor has informed three dozen government managers that they must each take three unpaid days off over the next eight months to help alleviate the city’s fiscal stress.
by | Oct 30, 2018 7:48 am | Comments (4)
Last year’s books are finally closed. And the city did indeed end its last fiscal year with an $11 million deficit.
Continue reading ‘New Report: City Ended Fiscal Year $11.09M In The Red’
by | Oct 26, 2018 8:32 am | Comments (19)
Thomas Breen Photos
Jones (at left): Hire fund manager. Agrawal: Don’t.
A new city government working group is considering investing a small sum in the stock market in hopes of eventually earning back at least a hundred million dollars that it owes to its public employees.
by | Oct 3, 2018 1:50 pm | Comments (11)
The city is projecting an $11.6 million surplus at the end of the current fiscal year thanks to an August bond refunding that pushes increased debt payments decades into the future.