The Power of Inept Leadership and Aapathetic Electorate. (Albany, Murray: contractors, taxes)
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Totally agree. Is Murray up for re-election this year? (Not that shed lose or anything...)
Oh yeah, will be a landslide. She's running against a long time cranky citizen (I don't mean that in a bad way as I am one too) with no political recognition and lame backing. It also doesn't help that every ToH employee is a republican committee member and they and their families will vote republican which gives Kate a 5000+ vote lead each time before it even starts. Then add the taxpayer funded signage blitz and the town employees tearing down the opponents signs on every night shift and you have the recipe for 100+ years of success. The dems are barely even trying. Unless you get a Haber type (like Gary Port) last year with money or friends with money and then they make a small dent in the numbers but still never enough to overcome the machine.
But who are the people who keep on voting Murray into office? Are they by and large bedroom commuters to Manhattan? Are they merchants and professionals with offices in Queens? Physicians in LIJ or Winthrop?
I believe that if Wang had greased a few GOP palms, hired Armand D'amato for a no show job etc, the lighthouse project would have been greenlit.
Do not just blame Kate Murray, but the entire nassau county GOP. If they wanted the project to go thru, it would have.
Good point, Republicans in the County Legislature (which Mangano was a part of btw) stalled the Project for quite some time. They eventually agreed to push it forward, but much of the damage was already done at that point, and they did nothing to try and advance it.
Grease the palms of the local GOP and better payup to the Democratic machine and their crews. Let's face it, the parties in the two counties reflect the thinking of their constituents.
What are the self interests of the average Long Islander and if those don't align with the elected officials why aren't voters taking to the streets?
The increases in taxes under Suozzi were not double, and the vast majority of the increase was his first year in office when he had no choice. Do you remember the absolute mess we were in at the end of Gullotta's reign? That was why NIFA was put in place to begin with. Suozzi had to raise taxes his first year in office (hell, he even ran on doing so), and they were raised by 19% that first year. It was either that or have the finances taken over by the state, there was no choice. After that, the county taxes remained steady for 6 of his last 7 years in office, raising it once by 3.9%.
Maybe not double, but I'd like to see a county tax bill that only went up 23% during the Suozzi reign. What you'll find is more like 50%-75% for the avg owner in the median price range. I know the wacky assessment system might have something to do with that. Suozzi also nickel-and-dimed residents in other ways, including the home energy tax. Plus he had plans on more successive 3.9% tax increases for 2010, 2011.. 2012? Let's not forget how much borrowing Suozzi did during what was a booming economy here. With all that revenue coming in, he couldve cut taxes. Mangano, OTOH, has not raised taxes - even amid plunging revenues and during the worst recession of our lifetimes, plus having to deal with the unsustainable union contracts Suozzi left us with.
Let's be real: Nassau needs a fiscal conservative in there. Mangano is the guy for that. If you're going for an unreliable tax-and-spender type, Suozzi is your guy. I can't think of any reason to vote for Suozzi. Unless of course I was a die-hard Democrat.
Maybe not double, but I'd like to see a county tax bill that only went up 23% during the Suozzi reign. What you'll find is more like 50%-75% for the avg owner in the median price range. I know the wacky assessment system might have something to do with that. Suozzi also nickel-and-dimed residents in other ways, including the home energy tax, plus he had plans on more successive 3.9% tax increases for 2010, 2011, 2012? Let's not forget how much borrowing Suozzi did during what was a booming economy here. With all that revenue coming in, he couldve cut taxes. Mangano, OTOH, has not raised taxes - even amid plunging revenues and during the worst recession of our lifetimes, plus having to deal with the unsustainable union contracts Suozzi left us with.
Let's be real: Nassau needs a fiscal conservative in there. Mangano is the guy for that. If you're going for an unreliable tax-and-spender type, Suozzi is your guy. I can't think of any reason to vote for Suozzi. Unless of course I was a die-hard Democrat.
It as 23% for your average homeowner, some did go up a little less, some higher, but it came out to 23% as a hole. 19% his first year in office as a result of cleaning up the Gullotta mess and 3.9% his 7th year in office. Yes, he i plan a 3.9% increase over a few year period in part due to the crash in the economy which drove down sales tax revenue. Instead of an increase of roughly $50 or so per homeowner instead Mangano chose a path of borrowing an absurd amount of $$$ which will cost us far more when we need to pay that back.
As a side note how do you feel about Venditto?? Johnny boy raised taxes in the TOB FAR more than Suozzi did in Nassau County, and Venditto did not have to deal with Gullotta or the sales tax revenues drop as a result of the crash.
It as 23% for your average homeowner, some did go up a little less, some higher, but it came out to 23% as a hole. 19% his first year in office as a result of cleaning up the Gullotta mess and 3.9% his 7th year in office. Yes, he i plan a 3.9% increase over a few year period in part due to the crash in the economy which drove down sales tax revenue. Instead of an increase of roughly $50 or so per homeowner instead Mangano chose a path of borrowing an absurd amount of $$$ which will cost us far more when we need to pay that back.
As a side note how do you feel about Venditto?? Johnny boy raised taxes in the TOB FAR more than Suozzi did in Nassau County, and Venditto did not have to deal with Gullotta or the sales tax revenues drop as a result of the crash.
TOB and NC are sort of apples and oranges. Don't think that the crash in the economy didn't affect TOB. Nassau/NYS/TOB all work together. So if the county and state is in financial trouble, that will reverberate through all municipalities.
TOB does not have the tax revenue growth (mainly gas and sales taxes) that NC enjoys, among other revenue streams that grow faster than the CPI. TOB has to rely on property taxes as their main revenue source.
Not only that, TOB to me seems right-sized for LI. A lot of the expenses are infrastructure, and of course the growing pension issues. However, you won't find the extraordinary salaries on their payroll like Nassau has. At least I couldn't find it. If there is wasteful spending going on, I'd like to see it in the budget. I'm not making excuses for Venditto. Perhaps he has raised taxes a bit too much. But the bottom line is Nassau and TOB are two different animals, and this discussion is about Nassau.
TOB and NC are sort of apples and oranges. Don't think that the crash in the economy didn't affect TOB. Nassau/NYS/TOB all work together. So if the county and state is in financial trouble, that will reverberate through all municipalities.
TOB does not have the tax revenue growth (mainly gas and sales taxes) that NC enjoys, among other revenue streams that grow faster than the CPI. TOB has to rely on property taxes as their main revenue source.
Not only that, TOB to me seems right-sized for LI. A lot of the expenses are infrastructure, and of course the growing pension issues. However, you won't find the extraordinary salaries on their payroll like Nassau has. At least I couldn't find it. If there is wasteful spending going on, I'd like to see it in the budget. I'm not making excuses for Venditto. Perhaps he has raised taxes a bit too much. But the bottom line is Nassau and TOB are two different animals, and this discussion is about Nassau.
I'd like to hear some reasons to vote for Suozzi.
I know we were discussing Nassau, I just find it ironic that those who jump and scream about Suozzi raising taxes (the vast majority of which was his first year in office as a result of the Gullotta mess) are absolutely silent when it comes to Venditto who raised taxes considerably more than Suozzi.
Under Suozzi, we got out of an absolute mess with the county finances during a time the county was about to be taken over by the state. Everything certainly wasn't perfect, and not every decision that was mae was correct, but we got out of a horrific situation with the county finances. No one likes to see higher taxes, but sometimes it is needed. The refusal to ever do so is what led us to the Gullota meltdown and we are heading down that very same road now. Compare the changes in the county bond ratings under Suozzi to under Mangano. Compare the borrowing under Suozzi to now (and yes is it did exist under Suozzi as well, but the differences were astronomical. Compare the Lighthouse Project plan, which was pushed heavily by Suozzi while Mangano played a role in stalling it in the Legislature before it passed and Murray eventually killed it, compared to the Referendum plan.
Grease the palms of the local GOP and better payup to the Democratic machine and their crews. Let's face it, the parties in the two counties reflect the thinking of their constituents.
What are the self interests of the average Long Islander and if those don't align with the elected officials why aren't voters taking to the streets?
Why always just choose to down LI'ers? You know darn well you can replace "Long Islanders" with "Americans" and that would be a true sentence. It's a national problem, not just local to LI. In reality, the only country out there that's really good for voting in favor of their own interests (the middle class) is Norway and guess what party they vote most: socialist, God forbid!
The answer: Things haven't gotten bad enough for the sheeple to wake up. We still have our junk food to eat relatively cheap and our reality TV to watch. Things need to get worse.
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