This evening, the outgoing Ulster County Legislature Chairman made a comment that basically alluded to the fact that the Legislature had a chance to strip the county executive of some of his power, but by voting down the Legislature's budget proposals, they killed those chances.I, for one, am glad that the Legislature's budget went down. While I hate to see anyone lose their job, and some will now that the county executive's budget will be adopted, the changes that the Legislature brought actually made things worse. In fact, as if the executive's tax increase wasn't bad enough, the Legislature's budget proposals restored positions and spending, and would have increased taxes even more. There were some great suggestions made by Legislators Noonan, Cummings and Roberts, but the other side wouldn't support those suggestions.
I would have been impressed if someone stood up this evening and offered across-the-board salary cuts and spending cuts. I would have been impressed if spending went down. I would have been impressed if taxes didn't go up at all. But alas, almost all of the suggestions made tonight would have only worsened an already bad budget and raised people's taxes even more.
Thankfully, the Legislature will change hands next month. Hopefully the Republicans and Conservatives that will be in the majority party will not make the same mistakes. If they do, look for another overthrow in 2 years.
It's belt tightening time!
