Buffalo mayor Sean Ryan is defending his plan to include a 25-percent property tax increase in his proposed budget, when he releases it to the Common Council in April.
Speaking Friday, Ryan says his administration inherited a $60 million deficit when he took office in January, midway through the City of Buffalo’s fiscal year. He projects when the new budget takes effect July 1, the city will have a deficit of $109 million. He likens his administration’s situation to others racking up credit cards bills while he is now the one having to pay them off.
“In the City of Buffalo, we've been running deficits year after year. We've been engaging in magical budgets and no realism,” he said. “So this year, we're putting all the data on the table, full budget transparency. This is the mess that I've inherited.”
Ryan says filling $60 million dollars of that deficit will come through fee collections, while the city needs the property tax levy to close the remainder.
But opponents of the proposed levy include State Assembly Majority Leader and Buffalo resident Crystal Peoples-Stokes. She says an increase in property taxes could have a devastating effect on housing tenants, who would see the increase reflected in higher rents. Renters account for about 57 percent of all Buffalo households, according to five-year Census estimates.
Peoples-Stokes also suggests Ryan should not try to solve the deficit in one budget year.
“Obviously he's trying to rectify some problems of the past, but those problems of the past were not created in one year, and I don't think he should try to solve them in one year on the backs of taxpayers,” she said. “I know that he's going to get help from the state. The governor's already made it clear what she's doing, really loud and clear. There'll probably be some additional resources added from the Assembly as well. Likely, he'll get the vacant properties tax that he's looking for and the real state transfer tax that he's looking for, but to get support for me, and I think most of my constituents, on a 25% tax increase, he won't get that.”
Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz points out that for several years, the city did not raise their property taxes at all, but had they done so within the tax cap of 2.5 percent over the past ten years, they would have made up the 25 percent being talked about now.
In the meantime, can the county share more of its own sales tax revenue with the city? Poloncarz says he does not want to revisit an existing sales tax sharing agreement between the city and county.
The city already receives kind of a double payment based on the 1977 sales tax agreement. They get two bites of the apple, where every school district, town, other city and village only gets one bite at the apple,” Poloncarz said. “It would have to be completely redone through the Legislature, and with most of the Legislature now representing suburban areas, I just don't think it would make sense.”
Ryan says is administration is about transparency, and already warned businesses, elected officials, and community leaders that the city is in dire fiscal shape.
When asked about his administration, which includes four deputy mayors, Ryan defended the model.
“I ran on the platform of modernizing City Hall. I ran on the platform of putting in a competent new management structure,” he said. “Part of the reason we're in a $109 million deficit is because the city mismanaged itself. They developed a management system that didn't work. The old management system where everyone had go through one deputy mayor was a complete and utter failure. Were the streets plowed properly under that system? Were the community centers updated under that system? The answer is no.”
