City Council Passes Budget With Modest Tax Increase

The City Council Monday night by a 15-4 vote passed a city budget that calls for a tax increase of $53 for the average homeowner and $135 for a business. This budget represents a third straight tax increase, albeit modest, for Mayor Bill Finch as he seeks a third four-year term next year. The council will set the mil rate in June for the budget year starting July 1.

Finch issued this statement following the vote:

“Thank you to the City Council, especially the Budget and Appropriations Committee and its committee co-chairs, for their tireless efforts during this legislative process.This budget continues to make our city stronger while doing right by taxpayers. We’re continuing to make our city safer and more secure through investments in public safety. We’re serving as a leader nationally by making sure all of our employees can make ends meet through raising our minimum wage to $10.10 starting this year. And we’re giving our public schools the funds they need to effectively prepare our kids for college and 21st century jobs through an increase in funds for public education. That’s the kind of progress the Park City needs to ensure our city remains a place where our kids and grandkids will want to live, work, and raise a family. As the father of two kids currently growing up in Bridgeport, I can say in good conscience that through this budget, we’re helping our city grow stronger by the day.”

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19 comments

    1. So if I am understanding the math–if Mr. Tiago is getting a $95,000 salary, it is going to take approximately 1,800 city taxpayers to pay for him. Is that about the salary he is making?

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  1. I look forward to learning what expenses were reduced or eliminated to make the city more efficient. What unnecessary positions or departments were eliminated? How much did the city council reduce its stipend by?

    The mayor forgot part of his speech; “and a chicken in every pot”.

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    1. How about smoking pot and raising chickens? If one chicken were allowed to be raised in Bridgeport it would be more economic development than we’ve seen in six and a half years.

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  2. What the Mayor really said.

    “Thank you to the City Council, especially the Budget and Appropriations Committee and its committee co-chairs Sue Brannelly AKA the Tax Lady and Shelton Mike for their tireless efforts during this legislative process. This budget continues to help pay for Bass Pro’s lease agreement with MCI, that’s if they come at all. We’re continuing to make our city safer and more secure through investments in motorized bicycles for the police department. We’re serving as a leader nationally by making sure all our employees can make ends meet through raising our minimum wage to $10.10 starting this year. (Did I just say that?) And we’re shorting our public schools the funds they need to effectively prepare our kids for anything but those 21st-century jobs. Again by decreasing the funds this year to the tune of 3.2 Million dollars for public education. That’s the kind of progress the Park City needs to ensure our city remains a place where our kids and grandkids will never want to live or work in this city, where their taxes will exceed their mortgage payments on a grand scale. As the father of two kids currently growing up in Bridgeport, and soon to be relocated to a Charter School, I can say in good conscience, through this budget we’re helping my friends and supporters grow stronger by the day.”

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    1. The Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society at the University of California at Berkeley has ranked Bridgeport 10th on its list of cities contending with a flood of “underwater” mortgages.

      Forty-two percent of mortgages held for homes in the state’s largest city are underwater.

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  3. I will guess Swain in place of Lyons, but would love to know! What a nightmare. Of course Tiago got a job, Manny got a driveway in Stratford, our cops got new bicycles (you can’t make this stuff up!) and then there is the whole Rev. Treasurer Moales issue. How can this be legal? And SHAME on this council. These people have taught me to never vote for a Democrat again on any level and I am a registered D.

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    1. Not Swain. She is on the budget committee. She was one of the folks who did the work to pare it down.

      The four were: Torres, Lyons, Salter and DeJesus. Halstead was not there but if he had attended I imagine he would have been another NO, but would not have changed the outcome.

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  4. Coming back … very serious blockages have caused my technical adviser to spend over six hours since last Thursday. BLOCKED from getting to this site to read or to post. More later. Where there is a will there is a way, or so it seems. A tip of the hat to those who have seen me in person these last few days and asked if things are okay! Time will tell.

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  5. Sue Brannelly is obviously an expert on “raw data” so she must be forgiven for not defining that term that is relevant to the revaluation discussion of the last few days.
    The City was scheduled for a mid-10 year revaluation as of Octboer 1, 2013.
    The City anticipated the trajectory of values in the City would not be good since October 1, 2008 and attempted to get the State legislature to postpone our date in the 2013 session. Legislature said no.
    The subject became more serious this fiscal year and the Mayor did get a pass within the past few days from the State legislature until after the next Mayoral election.
    However the City signed up for a revaluation program that included the “raw data” phase, followed by a time period when Vision Appraisal personnel listened to property owners comments (and resolution or not), followed by a possible session with Board of Assessment Appeals sessions (and resolution or not), and finally the option of taking your case to a housing court in New Britain.

    The “raw data” Sue referenced had enough detail and specificity for City leaders to hope the info never saw the light of day. (And rumors at the time indicated an order went out from on high to say all items were to be shredded. If the “data” was really “raw” perhaps they used a garbage disposal? And the public is told to call Vision? And Vision will happily tell you an agreement they signed with the City does not allow them to disclose any info, right? You’re kidding, aren’t you? Our poor City spent $280,000 to pay for 80% of the revaluation task, but the taxpaying public cannot see a SHRED of evidence it ever existed, and those parts of our small City where values went down since 2008 but have recovered somewhat are being subsidized by the lower recovering properties in “mortgage underwater” neighborhoods??
    And in 2015 we will pay for 100% of such revaluation again? You bet. You see, Sue and Bill are HOPING (Oh my gosh, they are hoping) values will rise by then, but what if they do not, or what if the total taxable Grand List continues to increase at a slower rate than Bill Finch’s ability to increase compensation across the board for those he favors?? OMG, again!! Time will tell.

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  6. Here is something for all residents to read; Bridgeport is the 10th city in the country with underwater mortgages. Imagine that. this is another top 10 we don’t need.
    The mortgage brokers came to Bridgeport and sold our residents and others on the idea everyone deserves to own their own home.I know that’s a fairy tale as do a lot of other people. Unfortunately the people who bought houses in Bridgeport at inflated prices were victims in this housing fraud. People were given mortgages they had no chance of paying on a monthly basis. They made interest payments at first and could make them but when combined with payments on the principal they could not make the payments. Right now on my street there are four house where the owners lost the houses and the bank took over.

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  7. When you review the B&A failures:
    ** to reduce the large opportunity available in vacant positions (that in past years appeared in the Proposed Budget Document but this year the words VACANT and UNFILLED were eliminated);
    ** to include regular grant funding for City Departments under revenues received as in Lighthouse/After School where $300,000 or more will arrive and be spent where?
    ** to reduce their own Stipend and Other Services accounts. By reducing each of these accounts they assist taxpayers by eliminating funds available to the administration for spending elsewhere without accountability.
    Had they done some of the above in cost cutting, plus the additional funds from the State of CT, and the budget was balanced. Then if the mil rate went up, it would only be because something else had happened to properties on the Taxable Grand List last year … or auto tax revenues were up … but a NO TAX INCREASE WAS IN THE CARDS.

    So Sherwood can make things happen when he has so many positions vacant for all or part of a year … and that happens every year … and he does not have to come back to the Council for “translations” or basic permission because the room is there. There were multiple votes taken on increasing revenues and decreasing other revenue sources and increased appropriations in some areas and decreased in other areas. Then there is the final vote that ties each of the votes together in a balanced budget, even if it is neither smart, effective nor efficient. We know the money does get spent, but here in Bridgeport we will not know the answers for 2014 until we see a FINAL, AUDITED, June 2014 monthly report sometime around January 2015. How do you like knowing that fact? And how does it feel that we have seen only one FINAL AUDITED June City report of revenues, appropriations and variances in more than 20 years? Time will tell.

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