The Greenburgh Town Board has been conducting internal reviews of different departments over the years. A few years ago we hired Woordard & Curran to review internal operations of the Department of Public Works. Among their recommendations: that we implement a work order system to better track work that the Department of Public Works is addressing. When was complaint made? When was problem resolved? Where are potholes located? How long does it take to repair?
Last year the Town Board followed up on the request and asked the consultant to develop a plan of action to implement this efficiency initiative. On Tuesday, November 26th Woodard & Curran will make a presentation to the Town Board and to our Technology Committee from about 7 PM to 8 PM at Town Hall. Our meetings are also televised on public access TV and streamed live on the internet.
They will recommend step by step initiatives that will enable department heads, the community and Town Board to follow up on work orders. If you have a technology background and would like to be a part of the technology committee you’re invited to the meeting. Should we eventually implement a 311 program? Customer service initiatives will be discussed at this meeting.
I will also ask the Technology Committee to review how the town currently uses social media. What can we do to improve our communications with residents? Your thoughts are welcome. What do other communities do that we don’t do?
Budget clarification: from the Town Comptroller, Roberta Romano
The proposed 2020 budget calls for a 0.00 percent tax rate increase in Town Entire with total appropriations of $34.3 million and a 0.00 percent tax rate increase in Unincorporated Greenburgh with total appropriations of $88.3 million, based on the assessed values used to calculate your April 2019 tax bills. Assessments are constantly changing due to tax certioraris and tax grievances. The assessment values used were the April 2019 tax bill amount. The assumption is the assessment will remain the same as last year’s tax bills and therefore, you will be paying the same amount of taxes as last year. The assessment roll as of September 2019 has assessments increasing by 1.81% for Town Entire and 1.42% for Town Outside. Using September 2019 assessments results in a projected tax rate decrease of 1.781% in Town Entire and 1.395% in Town Outside.
Some of the major additions to the 2020 budget, in addition to the monies set aside for a new courthouse, are the creation of a Discovery Unit to address the NYS unfunded criminal justice reform legislation, speed reduction initiatives, traffic safety mitigation, allocation of money for capital projects rather than borrowing, and special projects made possible by grant opportunities. Please note that in my previous statements I noted a zero tax levy increase. I mistakenly used the word levy instead of tax rate.
The Town Board held our first budget hearing last week. We will hold our second budget hearing on the 2020 budget on Monday, November 25th shortly after 7:30 PM. This Tuesday, at 4 PM we will start reviewing different departmental budget requests. Our work session discussions on the budget will be televised.
PAUL FEINER