At least we're not Amherst

[biker]

I get a little down in the mouth from time to time about the prospects for our city.

But every once in a while, something comes along to let me know things aren't so bad.

Sometimes it's good things happening right here. Like city residents voting to get rid of the obstructionist at-large members or electing the experienced guy as comptroller.

Sometimes it's when worse stuff is happening in the other burgs. You know, God's country.

Like listening to the radio this morning. It just made me glad that:

At least we're not Amherst

[biker]

I listened to the interview with that guy Kindel. I don't know anything about Amherst politics. I've stayed away from the Amherst threads.

But is that what you guys call government?

At least our thugs were more colorful.

This guy just insinuates things, using scary financial terms.

As a financial guy, this guy's full of BS. Consider a couple of his points:

"We're getting hit with late fees cause this guy wants to sign checks." How the heck is this new guy responsible for late bills. He's only been in office a month and a half. Sounds like this was a problem before he took over.

"We almost had the electricity turned off. We're ninety days behind." See my previous comment.

"The phone company almost cut our service off because we were so late in our payments." How would this guy Kindel know that. I thought he was a Councilman. I didn't know he worked in the Town's accounts payable department. Oh yeah, see my first comment.


And I was left with the feeling:

At least we're not Amherst.

[biker]

The City is full of ethnic groups that are often at each other's throats.

The Blacks don't like the Poles. The Italians don't like the Hispanics. The Irish don't like anybody else.

But we've learned to get along, to a certain extent. And if things start getting irritating, we can always say to each other:

At least we're not Amherst.

[Linda_D]

Actually, biker, there seems to be some problems with the town paying its bills because the new supervisor apparently wants to personally verify the "authenticity" of each and every bill and then determine if there's enough money in the account to pay it before he signs each individual AP check. Since Mohan is an engineer and not an accountant, I don't know if this process is very effective. Obviously, Mohan doesn't believe in delegating.

This is from DVOAKLEY:

I attended the work session. The first item of business was a presentation by the town's financial adviser. Amherst has a Aaa Moody's rating. This is as high as any town in WNY. It means a lot when they go in the market to sell bonds for various town projects.
Councilman Kindel then opened the vender payment subject. The Highway Dept owes for rock salt (77,000) they have bill of 197,000 but the 77 is past due. the vender has threatened to shut off delivery. Shelly said "So what", we have rock salt on hand. Not so said Bob Anderson, the stockpile is depleted. Bottom line, we need to get the bill paid asap. The Senior Center has received a shut off notice from the NYT for nonpayment. Food venders have not been paid since 1/11(payments are supposed to be made weekly), 30 part time teachers have not been paid. bulk postage bill is past due.
Waste management is due 277,000. That's representative of bills not paid. There are more.
Satish insists that he will not authorize payment of any bill til he is satisfied the bill is authentic, due and payable. Bills have already been screened by dept heads and the comptroller's office. I admire his insistance on checking every bill, but I'm afraid he is going about it the wrong way. First thing you do is pay the bills and pay them on time. That is paramount if the town wants to maintain a stable credit rating. The town was put on warning by the rock salt supplier that it wants a definitive payment schedule that the town will adhere to. The supervisor is personally going over every payment. Not the most efficient use of his time. He might think of having an independent audit of the bills(which I think is too redundent) or if he wishes, he could review the vouchers after he has paid the bills. But he must see the bills are paid timely.
He got hammered by Kindel and Ward.

Paying vendors

[biker]

I read your link Linda and it reminded me of another thing from the interview.

John Zack asked Kindel whether it's true that the Town ran a $20 million deficit last year. "That's a lie. We always have a balanced budget." said Kindel.

Very deft debating technique Kindel used. He gave a response, but not to the question asked. And because most people's eyes glaze over at financial matters (Zack's are permanently glazed), he got away with it.

A budget is a plan. For most governmental entities, it is usually a requirement that it be balanced.

Actual results, on the other hand, may or may not have revenues equalling expenditures.

As the posts in your link showed, the discussion was about the actual results for the year just ended.

I didn't hear this morning whether this is or is not a deficit from last year. And the difference between fiscal and calendar year ends may be confusing things. But I'd find a gap of $20million pretty hard to believe.

[steven]

Originally posted by biker
Like city residents voting to get rid of the obstructionist at-large members or electing the experienced guy as comptroller.

I gotta admit I was proud of the comptroller election

[atotaltotalfan2001]

Originally posted by biker
I read your link Linda and it reminded me of another thing from the interview.

John Zack asked Kindel whether it's true that the Town ran a $20 million deficit last year. "That's a lie. We always have a balanced budget." said Kindel.

Very deft debating technique Kindel used. He gave a response, but not to the question asked. And because most people's eyes glaze over at financial matters (Zack's are permanently glazed), he got away with it.

A budget is a plan. For most governmental entities, it is usually a requirement that it be balanced.

Actual results, on the other hand, may or may not have revenues equalling expenditures.

As the posts in your link showed, the discussion was about the actual results for the year just ended.

I didn't hear this morning whether this is or is not a deficit from last year. And the difference between fiscal and calendar year ends may be confusing things. But I'd find a gap of $20million pretty hard to believe.

I've always felt the Amherst Town Board made the Buffalo Common Council look sane!

I think we'll be seeing some really unusual things in the coming years in Amherst. The new supervisor is totally unschooled in politics/governance. I don't care. It's good to get a fresh look into the system. Whatever you do, don't rely on what you read in the Amherst treads, for the most part, for accurate information. It's not there. Trust me. I've done my best to check.....