Politics
Collins on Hardline with Hardwick, “a breath of fresh air.”
By Lee Chowaniec
Mar 30, 2008, 19:26

County Executive Chris Collins appeared on the WBEN Hardline with Hardwick Show this morning. Straight off, he declared that he was not interested in seeking any other political position, but only interested in bringing change to Erie County.

Canisius College Political Professor Kevin Hardwick asked Collins whether things are different than what he had expected.

Collins declared, “We proved the naysayers wrong. They said we couldn’t run the county like a business and we are doing just that and are finding and unearthing savings at every turn; hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

He noted that the quality and dedication of the county workers was a pleasant surprise of sorts. He commented that when he met the folks from Social Services, Mental Health and Child Protective Services he found that the dedication exhibited by that workforce was a positive surprise.

Upon further questioning by Hardwick, Collins admitted that he has a higher opinion about the county workforce, but that, with the right leadership, training and some of the six-sigma initiatives being brought in, the county workforce will respond in a positive way.

Referring to the upcoming state of the county address by Collins this Wednesday, Hardwick asked for a preview of the address. Collins answered: “We need to do better and we need to be better, but we have the basic raw materials to be a great community. We just haven’t promoted the community like we should.”

“We haven’t taken care of our infrastructure, whether it’s parks, roads, bridges or the buildings at ECC. We have the raw materials here to move into a growth mode and be a great community”.

“We just haven’t taken advantage of those raw materials. We spend too much time dwelling on negatives instead of positives. I want to bring back that sense of optimism back to the community.”

TV News Reporter Don Postles asked Collins about the merger of Kaleida and ECMC and what will it take to get the impasse broken. Collins declared that “it would take the leadership of Governor Patterson, our elected leaders in Albany and it starts by dismantling the public benefit corporation which has put the ECMC campus at a 30 percent labor cost disadvantage in comparison to the Kaleida facility.”

Collins declared that Albany does not have the political will to take on such matter, namely, dismantling the public benefit corporation. “They (Albany) continue to cave in to the public sector unions, and in doing so they are selling the Erie County taxpayers down the river.”

He further declared that they pretend that we could bring these two facilities together in an unlevel playing field type of environment and say that at ECMC where you have a 30% cost disadvantage, where 50% of that cost is from labor, and where the model is broken.

He also spoke of how the taxpayers have been ill served in having to pay for the $100 million bond that was taken out during the Giambra administration as a one shot to bail the county out of financial distress.

Scott Brown (Channel 2) asked whether the county would hold the line on taxes considering the predicted cutbacks by the state to municipalities.

Collins replied that as of now he did not see any need for a tax increase. The hundreds of thousands of cost savings being unearthed will offset any need to increase the budget. “We have identified and locked-down the fluff in discretionary spending.”

Collins also noted that with the increase in sales tax receipts from Canadian shoppers that he believed would continue, combined with the cost savings programs, the county should be in better shape than other municipalities facing budget constraints.

Collins noted the absurdity of having to pay an individual “pager pay” seventy dollars a month for the inconvenience of their being called after hours.

Control Board

Hardwick asked Collins whether he felt a “hard’ control board was needed. Collins responded it was time for the control board to go soft and become an advisory board. He declared again that he sent a letter to the control board to inform them that he longer was going to participate in the “mirror bond” fiasco!

“It is time for Mark Poloncarz and I to go to Wall Street and sell our own bonds and to get the 2007 capitol projects rolling. This has not served the taxpayer well.”

Collins declared that it didn’t bother him if the control board remained hard, as long as they gave their approval to the county to sell their own bonds. He noted that bond revenues obtained through property tax measures are more secure than those obtained through sales tax receipts.

Water Authority

Collins labeled the water authority as a non-performing asset. “It doesn’t bring value to the county and is answerable to no one.”
He cited that as the reason why patronage takes place at the authority and the reason for the resulting exorbitant salary and retirement payouts.

He would not advocate sale of the water authority but is looking at options on how to unlock value that is currently locked in at the Water Authority. The county is at a standstill until they sort through the legal issues on how to deal with a stand-alone public authority.

“Selling it outright would be a disadvantage to the rate payers,” stated Collins. He declared if something were done, it would be more in line with a long-term “concessionaire’s” process where you could build in some guarantees, such as water quality and deliverance provisions.

“It’s like leasing your building.” But you could have some conditions where if requirements weren’t met, you could step in.”

According to Collins, there are many examples across the country where roads and bridges have been privatized with concessionaire agreements.

He also believes that the water authority should serve the best interests of the community and look to make change. However, there is the fear that as they answer to no one they will file suit to maintain the status quo and then a positive process that could be completed in months could be delayed for years.

Collins declared he was saying more than he should be on the matter at this time. The Hardwick panel commended Collins for his openness and that it was indeed a “breath of fresh air.”

When then asked whether it was his goal to eliminate patronage jobs and the large severance payouts that were being given to water authority official ($233,000 recently), Collins answered that would be the case if they could dissolve the public benefit corporation authority that we have there, then many of these benefits would go away.

They would then answer to the ratepayers where today they answer to no one but themselves. “There is no supervision there.”

Other

Collins was very upbeat about bringing jobs to the area. Economic development would be enhanced through ECIDA and Municipal IDA cooperation and with State economic funding assistance.

He also expressed he is satisfied with the short term funding that has been agreed upon between the county and the control board for his six sigma training program. The media has misunderstood that the $900,000 petitioned for was over a period of time and not short term.

Postles asked Collins about his idea of cleaning up county parks with volunteers so that it would not be necessary to hire more jobs onto the county payroll and increase taxes. “Why hasn’t that been done?”

Collins answered that, “As a case in point, there are 140 workers from Mentholatum who offered to give up a Saturday and go to Chestnut Ridge Park to put up a $20,000 swing set – completely on their nickel to benefit the taxpayer.”

Collins said John Orlando of the AFSCME Union informed him that would take away work from his union members and they would file a grievance and sue the county if Collins allows it. Collins declares such stance is ridiculous and states that he's inclined to let them go ahead and sue and to let the volunteers help clean up the parks.

“My inclination is that the parks are in bad condition and need to be cleaned up, and we’re going to do it. So, if he wants to sue us, let him sue us.


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