(MOUNT VERNON, N.Y. / The Journal) — The heated debate on the municipal finances of the City of Mount Vernon continues to hit new highs, as well as new lows too. Mayor Shawyn Patterson-Howard presented legislation publicly that she and her office worked on together with Mount Vernon's representatives in Albany, New York State Senator Jamaal T. Bailey (36th Senate district) and State Assemblymember J. Gary Pretlow (89th Assembly district), about the fiscal crisis that the city government faces. Mount Vernon has consistently had a hard time creating and managing recent budgets as three mayors in almost four years (former Mayor Richard Thomas, former Acting Mayor Andre Wallace, and incumbent Patterson-Howard) have clashed with current City Comptroller Deborah Reynolds, who is not seeking re-election for her post in the June 22 Democratic Party primary elections. They have said that Reynolds does not provide enough financial information and documentation that the City can use to draft budgets and have also cited Reynolds' failure to pay the City's outstanding bills — including those that spurred the most recent rationing of fuel by City emergency services vehicles for the fire, police, and public works departments — or her inability to transfer more than $29 million in school taxes over three years, which forced the Mount Vernon City School District (MVCSD) to sue the City and to start collecting school taxes on their own.
The bill authored by Mayor Patterson-Howard, Sen. Bailey, and Assem. Pretlow, calls for a "Fiscal Stability Board" which would take over some of the duties of and be an advisor to the elected office of City Comptroller — as well as the power to issue and sell bonds — for at least almost 30 years, until the year 2051, unless a specific control period is needed to happen. If the control period is called for and happens, the appointed members of the proposed board would have subpoena powers for investigations and almost all of the City Comptroller's job on municipal financial oversight would be taken over by the board. The proposed board would have jurisdiction over the finances of the City government, including the Mount Vernon Public Housing Authority and City of Mount Vernon Industrial Development Agency as well as the MVCSD. The proposed board would be a Class C local public-benefit authority of New York State (similar to the District's nine trustees on the Board of Education) operating under Article X, Section 5 of the New York State Constitution, which requires that all public-benefit authorities of the State be created by special acts of the State Legislature (both the Senate and the Assembly).
Mayor Patterson-Howard appeared on a public livestreamed Zoom meeting of the City Council on Wednesday, June 2 along with Sen. Bailey, Assem. Pretlow, and State Senator Alessandra Biaggi (34th Senate district) — who represents the ultimate northern portion of the City, around Fleetwood and the North Side around Pennington Elementary School and Mount Vernon High School — to champion the proposed legislation to the City Council. Sen. Bailey and Assem. Pretlow had said the legislation would have needed the Council's support to be introduced into the State Legislature and that would have needed to be expedited with the Legislature's end of the 2021 session on Thursday, June 10.
According to Jonathan Bandler of lohud.com / The Journal News, the Council, which consists of five at-large members, was split on the decision. One councilmember, Lisa Copeland (who is a candidate for the Westchester County Board of Legislators District 13 Democratic primary) did not show up to the meeting and did not respond to requests for comment from Bandler. Two councilmembers, Council President Marcus Griffith (who is a candidate for Comptroller in the Democratic primary) and Councilmember Delia Farquharson (who is running for re-election in the Democratic primary) dismissed the idea of a State board authority to be handling local finances for the City and denounced the proposed legislation. Griffith said, "It is not as bad as it needs to be in order for us to go to this severely drastic approach, [...] We elected a bad apple. We are about to not elect this bad apple. We can get out of our own way." Farquharson agreed and said, "Under no circumstances, none whatsoever should we turn over the finances of the city for 30 years to a financial control body that will be elected by strangers who don't know or understand our condition. [...] Once the control is taken from city representatives, so goes the power to control the outcome." Councilmember Derrick Thompson was supportive, while Councilmember Janice Duarte (who is also running for re-election in the primary, but did attend the public hearing) was less so of a supporter.
MVCSD Superintendent of Schools Dr. Kenneth R. Hamilton and the Trustees of the District's Board of Education released a statement on Saturday, June 5 which blasted Mayor Patterson-Howard as well as Sen. Pretlow and Assem. Bailey for some major allegations regarding the proposed board. The District said that it was not informed of this proposal nor included in negotiations as the legislation was being written and also criticizes that its own operations would have to be overseen by the potential board by pointing out that the MVCSD has seen a complete turnaround for both finances and student success rates under Hamilton's tenure. The District says if the fiscal stability board were approved by Albany, it would unilaterally be in control of many things, including:
how and how much the MVCSD receives in aid from the State Education Department
how the MVCSD's annual budget is created and how much it can be
approval of goods and/or services contracts by the MVCSD
approval of MVCSD collective bargaining agreements and labor contracts (especially with the Mount Vernon Federation of Teachers, the official union representing District teachers, teaching assistants, school librarians, security personnel, school psychologists, social workers, etc.)
Now, the bill has an uncertain future. As a majority of the Mount Vernon City Council could not support the legislation on the proposed board, the bill was not officially introduced and voted on before the end of the 2021 legislative session (the time lawmakers spend in Albany introducing, debating, and voting on legislation). State Senators and Assemblymembers are spending the summer and fall working on constituent services as well as their other responsibilities in their home districts, with some Senate or Assembly committees continuing to meet. It is unclear if the bill will be introduced in the 2022 legislative session, which starts in January. Like the United States Congress, any bill introduced in a Legislature stays in that Legislature and each two-year Legislature has two sessions of one year each. The 2021 legislative session of the New York State Legislature was its 245th legislative session (part of the 123rd Legislature) since becoming a state in 1776, when it ratified its first state constitution.
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