Town of Evans is having financial collapse

[jennifer7]

The Town of Evans is having a financial collapse, 1st Depew, Now the Town of Evans

http://buffalonews.com/2016/12/01/to...ial-collapse/?

[4248]

The obvious problem with such issues is there's no accountability. There's no feeling of consequence for those in elected or appointed office/positions.

If they can just ignore it or lie and get away with it - no problem. The article site "misappropriation of funds" - MILLIONS ! Yet not one word of legal actions.

Politicians and Political Parties are never held responsible for their actions or long term consequences.

[WSFirst]

I think bankruptcy would be the best option, in my opinion, see if the taxpayers can get away from a lot of the problems. In 2016, salary totals were $4,961,488 but that is down from last year's complete total of $5 million plus benefits per http://seethroughny.net/payrolls/towns Pensions were $1.3 in 2015, right now $1.4. If I am current employee thinking about retirement and can, retire immediately, you don't know if the cash will be available.

Insurance, salaries, and other costs will continue to increase and not to mention, people are living longer and that pension total will only continue to grow. I don't know how Evans can get out of this mess, the loan to me is a band-aid solution on ripped off leg. This link suggest the health cost is hurting the budget (http://www.observertoday.com/news/lo...dget-in-evans/)

I've looked at a lot of fiscal reports including Open Book New York, osc.state.ny.us, I didn't think Evans was going to be the first one but I did see that one coming. How far off is Akron and Gowanda? According to that link (timesunion), Evans was under moderate stress at 62.5%

http://blog.timesunion.com/capitol/a...l-stress-list/

[jennifer7]

Look at Evans Centers brand take home New Fire Chief SUV loaded with all the toys, How many of these are in the Town of Evans ?
www.facebook.com/Wny1075/videos/895588370542579/ The color black for Fire Chief ? should be Red,Yellow, or White
scroll down to the pictures it has custom cabinets

5 Fire Co's with 7 fire stations for the Town of Evans and how much waste is there and 5 or 6 times the duplication

Lake Erie Beach
North Evans
Highland
Evans Center has 2 stations
Angola has 2 stations

[gorja]

The article stated that the outside auditing firm Drescher and Malecki refused to offer a formal opinion of the town's finances in 2014 and 2015. I thought that was the responsibility of an outsider looking at the books to call a spade a spade.

[jennifer7]

According to Erie County every thing's going to be ok, Just need to keep increasing revenue every year to be able pay for the skyrocketing expenses of providing the basic services, (mostly salary's & benefits, ( yearly raises, Medical insurance, longevity pay, weeks of of sick & vacation time, Pension, pension spiking, increase pay roll to replace retiring workers with new workers ) which will mean raising property taxes every year 20% or more. The yearly 3% to 10% property tax increaese's won't cover it anymore and this problem is coming to Cheektowaga, Hamburg, Lancaster soon,

[jennifer7]

According to Erie County every thing's going to be ok, Just need to keep increasing revenue every year to be able pay for the skyrocketing expenses of providing the basic services, (mostly salary's & benefits, ( yearly raises, Medical insurance, longevity pay, weeks of of sick & vacation time, Pension, pension spiking, increase pay roll to replace retiring workers with new workers ) which will mean raising property taxes every year 20% or more. The yearly 3% to 10% property tax increaese's won't cover it anymore and this problem is coming to Cheektowaga, Hamburg, Lancaster soon,

I forgot to add the Cashout bonus when you retire, you get a nice $150,000 or $200,000+ check for all the unused vacation/sick time in whole 30, 35 year career
Only in WNY, Their's no other place or governmnent that does that anywhere.

I hear Cheektowaga's got 50 police officers retiring soon and then you need to add & pay for 50 new officers to the pay roll and pay benefits with shrinking taxbase

[Dan Roman]

I forgot to add the Cashout bonus when you retire, you get a nice $150,000 or $200,000+ check for all the unused vacation/sick time in whole 30, 35 year career
Only in WNY, Their's no other place or governmnent that does that anywhere.

I hear Cheektowaga's got 50 police officers retiring soon and then you need to add & pay for 50 new officers to the pay roll and pay benefits with shrinking taxbase

Don't be a drama queen, that's half the police force. There are not 50 retiring soon, unless you consider the soon time period to be 10 years. You are correct on the payout issue, but it's not only in western NY. Pensions should be based on straight earnings and not on the highest 3 years of that are inflated with overtime. Officers should be forced to take vacation time , it's generously given to let them take time off from a very stressful job, not to horde it for lucrative payouts

[jennifer7]

QUOTE=Dan Roman;1683314]Don't be a drama queen, that's half the police force. There are not 50 retiring soon, unless you consider the soon time period to be 10 years. You are correct on the payout issue, but it's not only in western NY. Pensions should be based on straight earnings and not on the highest 3 years of that are inflated with overtime. Officers should be forced to take vacation time , it's generously given to let them take time off from a very stressful job, not to horde it for lucrative payouts[/QUOTE]

I heard with in 5 years

Just about everywhere else and during the national recession when Town's and City's were having deficit's. The City's and Town's told their employee's and union's you either take a pay cut, use your vacation time when we tell you to and make concessions or their's going to be layoffs, and If you don't like it. their's the door

I know a very high Cheektowaga town official, She said Cheektowaga has hugh deficit's coming and her colleagues said they'll deal with it when it happens.

[WSFirst]

Why doesn't Evans file for bankruptcy or Erie County recommend bankruptcy?

There are so many benefits to filing bankruptcy instead of a loan. Baffles me.

[jennifer7]

Because all the union contracts would become void,

[WSFirst]

Because all the union contracts would become void,

Exactly! I would renegotiate the pension payouts as well.

1. File Bankruptcy, hope the judge agrees to the bankruptcy
2. Negotiate new pension payouts, 50-75% of the current payout
3. Sell off existing equipment
4. Outsource the police, Erie County or State Police, should be done anyways for a town of 16k
5. Lay off all police
6. Pay cuts for all elected officials
7. Contract the landscaping of the town parks
8. Have the county take over as much as possible

[gorja]

In 2016, Evans was one of the most highest taxed communities in Erie County.

Can't even imagine how they'll compare after this tax increase

http://www2.erie.gov/ecrpts/sites/ww...Comparison.pdf

[WSFirst]

In 2016, Evans was one of the most highest taxed communities in Erie County.

Can't even imagine how they'll compare after this tax increase

http://www2.erie.gov/ecrpts/sites/ww...Comparison.pdf

Nice find.

Why should the taxpayers be held responsible for irresponsible promises by politicians and under-funding by both the local employers and employees in these plans which have unrealistic investment return assumptions in relation to both the upfront funding and the promised defined benefits? This is going to explode shortly all over the country because none of these plans are sustainable. One serious stock market crash, followed by a real estate crash, and all the pension dominoes come tumbling down. Normalizing the interest rates would bring everyone crashing down in New York. As badly underwater as these public pensions may be now, today will probably turn out to be the good old days. The current and former public service workers are going to get nailed. If they can't figure this out now then it’s on them. They need to have a back-up plan; go open an IRA or 401k of your own device. If you trust people who lie to you constantly, you get what you deserve. When the dominoes begin to fall and the pension plan is going to get a 60% haircut, I would love to see the veins in their neck pop out, turn beet-red, and yell at the politicians, "BUT WE HAVE A CONTRACT!!!"

[WNYresident]

Why doesn't Evans file for bankruptcy or Erie County recommend bankruptcy?

There are so many benefits to filing bankruptcy instead of a loan. Baffles me.

Baffles me to. Now if the issues are being created because of sewer upgrades, natural disasters and/or material cost the issue isn't truly self inflicted. If the issues are being caused because of labor contracts/bad negotiations you need to nip it in the bud now. The holds true for all our local towns. You simply can't give a small group of people a monopoly on services in a small geographical areas. Specially if the contracts allow for never ending cost increases like for health insurance or guarantees that are not realistic. Property owners don't need to be on the hook for a group's bad investment decisions when it comes to pension funds. There just simply is no reason to allow that to continue. If we need to get a state convention started what the hell are we waiting for? Life it too short to allow this to continue.

There just isn't a reason to be put into this situation in the first place.

It's about time us property owners tell people like Andrew Cuomo he can start shoving his ideas up his butt. IE: NYS is a sanctuary for anyone from any other country. What is wrong with him including the local groups like the www.ecdems.com that support his nonsense. His first idea before telling the USA that NYS is a sanctuary anything is to get our spending under control at all levels of government.