New Haven Independent

Cities Unite To Bypass Rell On Stimulus

by Thomas MacMillan | January 26, 2009 8:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Leaders from New Haven, Stamford, and Bridgeport are working to get directly some of that Obama economic recovery money.

Five New Haven alders got together with four members of the city councils of Stamford and Bridgeport on Sunday afternoon in New Haven City Hall. It was the latest meeting of Connecticut Elected Local Leaders Organized (CELLO), an organization formed eight months ago to bring together the leadership of several of Connecticut’s larger cities.

The group, which also includes Hartford and Waterbury, is designed to allow Connecticut cities to join forces and advocate for their common interests at the state and federal levels.

All three cities represented at Sunday’s meeting are dealing with budget shortfalls. With a new administration in the White House and an $825 billion stimulus package on the way, CELLO sees an opportunity to pull in dollars straight from D.C.

However, the feds’ current plan is to route the Connecticut money to Gov. M. Jodi Rell, who would then distribute it to local communities. Traditionally cities have felt that the state favors suburbs over cities in making decisions.

The city leaders who comprise CELLO are banding together to lobby Connecticut’s U.S. Congressional delegation to route stimulus funding directly to municipalities, rather than to the state, where they fear that the money won’t be spent in a way that most benefits Connecticut’s bigger cities.

Directing the Stimulus

Sunday’s meeting began with elected leaders from New Haven, Bridgeport, and Stamford comparing their budget woes. Carl Goldfield (pictured), president of New Haven’s Board of Aldermen, started things off, saying that although things look bad this year, New Haven will balance it’s budget “by hook or by crook.” Next year, however, Goldfield continued, the city is looking at a “significant deficit.”

“The whole thing’s fluid,” Goldfield said. “It depends on what we get from the state.”

Goldfield estimated that union concessions might shore up $10 million in the budget, but that even then “service reductions of one sort or another” loom.

Tom McCarthy (at right in photo), president of the Bridgeport City Council, and David Martin (at left in photo), president of the Stamford Board of Representatives (and possible Stamford mayoral candidate), said that their towns are in similar situations.

“Somebody’s got to give us some money… to trust us with some money,” said Goldfield. He said that the funding that comes from the state is often “so directed” that it doesn’t allow the cities to put the money where it’s really needed.

“The governor’s priorities are not about protecting major cities,” Martin said.

CELLO members complained that state funding is often spent on roads and infrastructure, which does little to address the needs of bigger cities.

“We’re on the front lines of so many of the problems people are dealing with,” McCarthy said, saying that in the current recession people will be drawing more on city services and less so on state services.

McCarthy said that after talking with U.S. Chris Murphy, he feared that the initial federal stimulus money was already headed for state governments. “That ship has already sailed.”

New Haven Alderman Sergio Rodriguez pointed out that some federal revenue streams come directly to cities. He mentioned block grants and funding for the COPS program. Rodriguez said that CELLO’s lobbying efforts could include the expansion of these streams.

The meeting ended with plans to draft a letter to the Congressional delegation and to organize a meeting between CELLO and Connecticut’s federal senators and members of congress.

“We’re so efficient,” said McCarthy, snapping his fingers at the end of the short meeting.

“Now if we can get anything done!” Rodriguez responded with a laugh.

Hello, CELLO

After the meeting, Rodriguez recounted the history of CELLO. Rodriguez said that he and Goldfield had helped to start the group about eight months ago, inspired by the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities, a New Haven-based organization of Connecticut mayors.

Rodriguez explained that CELLO initially focused on the state level. Then came the election of President Barack Obama, who, Rodriguez said, shows “more desire to connect with cities directly.”

Rodriguez said that CELLO has plans to take a trip to Hartford on Wednesday February 4, to meet with state leaders and talk about its agenda. Specifically, he mentioned that the group would like to discuss the possibility of a “local option tax,” the ability for municipalities to levy special local taxes — service taxes, hotel taxes, or sales tax — of “maybe half a percent” that would create additional revenue streams for cities.

“It’s very exciting,” Rodriguez said of CELLO. “It’s like a real movement taking hold.”

The state government “tries to pit cities against each other,” McCarthy said. “We’re cutting through all that stuff.”

Connecticut has a “suburban-run legislature” McCarthy said. “It’s sometimes in their interest to have us fighting for the small piece of pie they’re going to give us.” He said that CELLO represents an opportunity to stop fighting over the crumbs and start asking for more pie.

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Comments

Posted by: City Hall Watch | January 26, 2009 9:46 AM

Sometimes I feel like I'm living in an alternative universe. Can somebody please beam up CELLO members into 2009?

CELLO, lead by New Haven will never accomplish anything unless it quits whining about being treated unfairly. The major cities get more state money than anybody. These cities get 2.5 times per kid what suburban towns get; New Haven has reaped more schools contruction money than anybody in the whole state; it has gotten huge chunks of the transportation bonding and dollars for train stations, parking garages, Gateway; PILOT dollars was and continues to be nothing but a direct dependency payment to the large cities. Small towns don't get much PILOT if any.

Goldfield wants somebody to trust him and DeStefano with the money? You have to be kidding me. He voted along with the aldermen to pass a budget they knew was unbalanced and continues to be unbalanced. In fact, it gets more unbalanced every day as they continue to approve spending that is outside the budget. If it is balanced by the end of the year, as Goldfield claims, it will be by hook and crook.

Posted by: Alphonse Credenza | January 26, 2009 10:38 AM

Hoorah for City Hall Watch! On the nose again! Keep writing, please.

Posted by: robn | January 26, 2009 12:11 PM

CHW,

Please explain why PILOT (payment in lieu of taxes...chronically underfunded by the leg) is a dependency payment? If the state deems universities and hospitals for the greater public benefit (for the benefit of the whole state) and therefore non-taxable, why is it wrong for the cities housing those institutions to ask for reimbursement?

Posted by: anon | January 26, 2009 1:28 PM

The stimulus spending on the national level should not be for municipalities and states to get out of the red in their budgets caused by outdated and non-negotiable contracts or improper spending controls. National stimulus should be about creating more GDP than you put into it. Therefore, projects should be major infrastructure spending that creates jobs and expands the use of Connecticut. Light Rail. Improvements to the regional infrastructure accessibility and planning. Multi-modal road use and improving street access for underprivileged populations (youth, elderly, poor). Long-term projects (like train stations, parking garages (bikes too), school contruction) are all a part of this. Education, too, would fall into this in my view because I view spending on education as spending on human capital, ie infrastructure.

City Hall Watch - while I agree with some of your sentiment, understand that New Haven currently houses (for example) all of the homeless in the area. While there are plans to build shelters in Branford and North Haven, there aren't any. Also, if you want a surgery, you'll be coming to a New Haven hospital (well, oddly, I say this and I had surgery at a surgery center in Gilford not too long ago). But the point you make about New Haven receiving money is not valid, because those listed were REGIONAL improvements, not New Haven specific improvements.

There is a big problem in this state in conversation. Projects occurring in New Haven (Q-Bridge update, rail yard expansion) service the region and state more than they service New Haven. I guess I should be thankful that my city was ruined by a highway some 40 years ago and now there is a 6 year project to make it bigger destroying our waterfront views?

I agree with your school construction comments, though I know there exists an argument contrary.

Posted by: City Hall Watch | January 26, 2009 3:07 PM

Pilot payments started with the federal government and were labeled PILT to offset non-taxable property it owned in a community. But it is rare for a state government to reimburse local communities under its version of PILOT. In fact, there are only a handful of states that do, and none of them pay anything near what Connecticut pays to its towns and cities.

While the state legislation calls for 100% PILOT payment and it has only funded 55 - 77% depending on the year, cities have still been paid handsomely and nobody has audited the PILOT program for accuracy. Sources at Yale tell me New Haven collects more in PILOT payments on its property than it would collect as a property tax. If it were a property tax, you can take it to the bank, some very high level examiniation of the tax bill and valuation would be taking place which does not happen with PILOT claims.

Because the largest hospitals, universities and colleges are located in the larger cities, the major cities here in CT get the lion's share of PILOT. IN ADDITION TO PILOT, cities and towns also get a pro-rata share of the Pequot dollars per the same PILOT formula, according to Judith B. Greiman, President, Connecticut Conference of Independent Colleges in a 2005 op-ed.

In 2005, that added another 10% cash to PILOT payments that year, according to Greiman. If the same policy holds true today, that means when PILOT hit 77% last year, it was really 87% or something close which is getting damn close to 100%, and yet the whining continues.

The cities in general, and New Haven in particular, chronically overspend, take special funds and treat them as regular revenue and build it into their budget each year. When that fund decreases, they complain "they're cutting us." When it goes up, it's still not enough. When they got the gaming revenue, still not enough. When COPS funding came here under Clinton, it too turned into regular revenue. When Bush cut it, DeStefano was first in line to lament the slashing of our city by the federal government.

So, in short - most cities and towns in America do not get PILOT payments from their states. If you have a college, university or major hospital in your town, it's considered a good thing; something to be proud of, and one to jointly support because of the other revenue that comes to town because of the visitors who utilitize it. Here in CT, they use these facilities as a crutch, like the beggars in Slumdog to get dependency payments from the state. New Haven is now dependent on the state for this money, in fact for more than 50% of its operating costs. Millions of dollars flow to New Haven from statewide taxpayers - and still it is not enough.

With time running out this year for a balanced budget, and a larger deficit next year...you better hang on to your boxers. It will be the only thing you have left.

Posted by: robn | January 26, 2009 6:53 PM

ANON,

This is less aimed at you than the way our society measures progress, but I'd add to your comment that we should stop measuring economic health in terms of GDP. Negative things like the destruction of NOLA are considered to be positive for GDP (becuase we had to spend money to attempt to rebuild).

Posted by: Alan Felder | January 28, 2009 7:41 AM

There will be no trickle down economic for the lower class, New Haven is a Chicago style politics. You have to PAY to PLAY, (example SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION is under a PROJECT LABOR AGEEMENT) better known as a PREFERENCE LABOR AGEEMENT that exclude Blacks, and other ethnic groups.

Cities Unite To Bypass Rell On Stimulus

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