1 2 3 4 5 SUFFOLK COUNTY LEGISLATURE 6 7 8 PUBLIC HEARING 9 10 11 October 21, 2020 12 13 14 15 A Public Hearing on the 2021 Operating Budget and the Southwest 16 Sewer District Assessment Roll was held via Hybrid/Zoom 17 Videoconferencing in the Rose Y. Caracappa Legislative Auditorium 18 of the William H. Rogers Legislature Building, 725 Veterans 19 Memorial Highway, Smithtown, New York, on October 21, 2020. 20 21 Legislators In Attendance: 22 Presiding Officer Robert Calarco - District #7 23 Deputy Presiding Officer Kara Hahn - District #5 24 Legislator Anthony Piccirillo - District #8 25 Legislator Sam Gonzalez - District #9 26 Legislator Tom Cilmi - District #10 27 Legislator Steven Flotteron - District #11 28 Legislator Leslie Kennedy - District #12 29 Legislator Susan A. Berland - District #16 30 Legislator Tom Donnelly - District # 17 31 32 Also In Attendance: 33 Sarah Simpson - Counsel to the Legislature 34 Dan Dubois - Chief Deputy Clerk/Suffolk County Legislature 35 Lora Gellerstein - Chief of Staff/Presiding Officer's Office 36 Felicia Scocozza - Riverhead Community Awareness Program 37 Matt Kamper - Regional Director/Passengers United 38 Andrew Pollack - Public Advisor/Passengers United 39 Andy Quito - Passengers United 40 Ryan McGarry - Suffolk County AME 41 Gregory Noone - Thursday's Child 42 Allen Kovesdy 43 Yuki Endo 44 John Michno 45 All Other Interested Parties 46 47 Minutes Taken By: 48 Alison Mahoney - Court Stenographer 49 50 Transcript Prepared By: 51 Kim Castiglione - Legislative Secretary 52 53 54 55 56 * Index Included at End of Transcript 1 Public Hearing/2021 Operating Budget & SWSD Assessment Roll - 10/21/20 1 (*The meeting was called to order at 12:30 p.m.*) 2 3 (*The following testimony was taken by Alison Mahoney - 4 Court Stenographer & was transcribed by 5 Kim Castiglione - Legislative Secretary*) 6 7 P.O. CALARCO: 8 Okay, good afternoon, everyone. We are going to call this meeting 9 to order for the Suffolk County Legislature's Public Hearings on 12:30PM 10 the Suffolk County 2021 Operating Budget and the Southwest Sewer 11 District Assessment Roll. All right, so we are -- if we can all 12 please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance led by Legislator 13 Piccirillo. 14 15 Salutation 16 17 Okay, thank you, everyone. And before we start our Public Hearings 18 just for the record I would like to please note that originally we 19 had a public hearing that was scheduled for tomorrow, October 22nd. 12:31PM 20 That public hearing has been officially moved to November 4th, so 21 we will not be having a public hearing tomorrow on the Operating 22 Budget. 23 24 With that, we are going to go into our Public Hearings with the 25 first public hearing being the 2021 Operating Budget. I do have 26 seven -- no, yeah, I think seven speakers who signed up to speak on 27 this topic, and our first is Allen Kovesdy. Mr. Kovesdy, are you 28 there? 29 12:31PM 30 MR. KOVESDY: 31 Yes, I am. Can hear me? 32 33 P.O. CALARCO: 34 We can hear you, Allen. 35 36 MR. KOVESDAY: 37 Good morning. Did you get the packet I sent? 38 39 P.O. CALARCO: 12:32PM 40 I believe we did, but we can check with the Clerk. 41 42 MR. DUBOIS: 43 It was distributed. 44 45 P.O. CALARCO: 46 Okay, the Clerk has received the packet and is distributing it. 47 Allen, you have three minutes to speak and you can start whenever 48 you are ready. 49 12:32PM 50 MR. KOVESDY: 51 Okay, thank you very much. What I sent you was a cover letter and 52 then I sent you 70 pages of backup. The 70 pages of backup is the 53 latest vacancy report for the County of Suffolk. It shows over 54 2200 vacancies. So let me just speak briefly. I'm doing this for 55 two reasons. Number one, in reading the budget document I found 56 out that there were some areas that needed further clarification. * Index Included at End of Transcript 2 Public Hearing/2021 Operating Budget & SWSD Assessment Roll - 10/21/20 1 Number one was the revenues. I know the Revenue Code 144541, it 2 lists a multitude of revenues, Federal Aid, the CARES Act. There's 3 no explanation as to how this money is being used, how much has 4 come in, if there are any restrictions; that should be explained. 5 6 The second thing that I found with the narrative, which was a 7 rather perplexing problem, was how much money do they need to avert 8 these layoffs. Newsday says 500, but the County Executive has no 9 numbers of vacancies, just has increased turnover savings all over 12:33PM 10 the place, so there's no way of knowing. And historically a lot of 11 positions are 100% positions like in administrative areas, but 12 positions in certain departments are only 25% County funds, so a 13 500 number for half a year could be tremendous more. So what I 14 wanted to know is how much money and Federal Aid does the County 15 have to have to reverse these layoffs? I'd also like to know, or 16 it should be explained to you because you're going to be making the 17 final decision, when these layoffs or cuts are, where are they 18 coming, what services are attached to them and so forth. What you 19 got was a half a picture, all right? I put some other comments in 12:34PM 20 there about that. 21 22 The other point is the sooner this gets done the easier it is. If 23 you wait till July you have to do twice as many things as you have 24 to do in January. 25 26 The second thing -- I only have three minutes here. The crux is 27 the vacancies. The County Executive shows approximately 8800 28 positions filled. His staffing sheet, which is on page X shows 29 11,000 positions. There are over 2200 vacancies. A vast, vast 12:35PM 30 majority of these have never been filled, have been vacant for 31 years. I met with one of the Legislators and she said, "Why don't 32 you age these". So being I'm stuck at home, I aged these. I found 33 out that 352 are over five years, some of them are over 20 years, 34 93 are over ten years old, and so forth. There's hundreds of them 35 from 2016. There's no money to pay for these in the budget. The 36 Police Department has no money to pay for anything. You have close 37 to $50 million in turnover savings. 38 39 If you have to make cuts, if you have to do anything realistic, you 12:35PM 40 have to eliminate vacancies. It's your responsibility, not the 41 County Executive's, to do it. It's a very simple task and can be 42 done in one day. The computer is set up to do it. It's your 43 responsibility to do this. If you do this you have a clean 44 document. Nassau County cleaned it. I put in -- I reviewed 45 Nassau's budget. They only have 200 and change police vacancies; 46 you have 600 police vacancies. They'll never be filled. So they 47 have the two classes. 48 49 P.O. CALARCO: 12:36PM 50 Mr. Kovesdy, your time is up. Does anybody have any questions for 51 Allen? 52 53 LEG. PICCIRILLO: 54 I do. 55 56 * Index Included at End of Transcript 3 Public Hearing/2021 Operating Budget & SWSD Assessment Roll - 10/21/20 1 P.O. CALARCO: 2 Legislator Piccirillo, go ahead. 3 4 LEG. PICCIRILLO: 5 Hi, Allen. How are you? 6 7 MR. SCHNEIDER: 8 Fine. Nice meeting you, sir. 9 12:36PM 10 LEG. PICCIRILLO: 11 You, too. Could you just extrapolate a little more on what you 12 were just about to say? 13 14 MR. KOVESDY: 15 Yes. 16 17 LEG. PICCIRILLO: 18 And how it pertains to the budget. 19 12:36PM 20 MR. KOVESDY: 21 Okay. The budget on the staffing pages has something called 22 turnover savings. It's a number which reflects vacant positions, 23 positions that leave during the year, and what the County Executive 24 traditionally does, all County Executives, they use that money to 25 balance the budget. So if you go to the Police budget and you look 26 there you'll see 50, $60 million of turnover savings, which means 27 they took $60 million of staff money and subtracted it from the 28 budget. So that means $60 million worth of positions can't be 29 filled. They've done that through all the departments. 12:37PM 30 31 So what you need to do to make a realistic determination is you 32 have to subtract out the positions that can never be filled, 33 whether it's 1,000, 800, 1,500, whatever number. That will reduce 34 turnover savings, give you a complete picture of what staff you 35 need in the County and it'll also shows how much money the County 36 Executive put in due to the COVID. Right now he's mixing 2,000 37 vacancies with his cuts. 38 39 So, you know, that's the problem. For you to do a realistic job -- 12:38PM 40 I didn't have all the data to sort everything.