Archive for the ‘Financial Sustainability’ Category
Friday, September 3rd, 2010
Read the article here in the New Haven Independent.
Can we decrease spending and increase revenue to cover $100 Million? This is what we need to do in five years to cover a $82 Million shortfall and raise the emergency fund to 5% of our budget (another $22 million). This is not counting any drastic measures by the State to cut our PILOT or ECS (Education) funding.
Other interesting findings such as spending $1.5 Billion Dollars on Schools without checking to see if we need to build so many schools — is this why the census is so low at schools? If our census at schools do not match what we told the state, the State is going to send us a bill for the difference. I believe we have already had to pay back about $65 million in money for things which the State never approved. Where does it end???
Posted in Accountability, Budget, Financial Sustainability, Inefficiencies, Mayor, Transparency | No Comments »
Tuesday, June 15th, 2010
Check out this article in CT News Junkie on Unfunded Pension Obligations
An important piece this article does not mention is the “discount rate” or “Return on Investment” assumptions. When you assume, as New Haven does, a high and unrealistic 8-9% return every year, year after year, you only need to put in a small amount of money AND you can claim that we are “funding the pensions at 100% actuarial required amount”. The problem, is that if you assume 5% then the amount we need to put away in our CERF and P&F funds would skyrocket each year. Our funded ratio is very low AND we assume a high rate of return. I would recommend you request from our actuaries SEVERAL scenarios with the rate of return, pessimistic/ best guess/ optimistic ROI. Our current ROI is hopelessly optimistic and concealing the true problem in our city’s pension funds.
Tags: Accountability, Budget, City Of New Haven, Financial Sustainability, Pensions
Posted in Debt Obligations, Financial Sustainability | Comments Off
Tuesday, May 25th, 2010
See the New York Times Discussion.
Can New Haven fix its pension problem?
Posted in Financial Sustainability | Comments Off
Thursday, April 29th, 2010
Thank You
We had a very successful turn out last evening and even won over the people turned out by the Mayor. Lets keep up the pressure to have the Board of Aldermen send the budget back to the Mayor.
Tags: Accountability, Budget, City Of New Haven, Finance Committee, Financial Sustainability, Mayor, Meeting, NHCAN
Posted in Accountability, BOA, Budget, Financial Sustainability, Mayor, Meetings, Transparency | Comments Off
Sunday, April 11th, 2010
Tags: Budget, City Of New Haven, Financial Sustainability, NHCAN, Pensions, presentation, Salaries, video
Posted in Budget, Debt Obligations, Financial Sustainability | Comments Off
Saturday, March 13th, 2010
Read this letter from Professor David Cameron about the budget drivers and forces effecting our 2010-2011 Budget in New Haven. It is a great summary of where we are and what we need to be concerned about.
Tags: Barriers to success, Budget, City Of New Haven, Financial Sustainability, Inefficiencies, Mayor
Posted in Budget, Financial Sustainability | Comments Off
Wednesday, June 10th, 2009
Contact the Police and Fire Pension Fund Commissioners to let them know you are outraged by people trying to game the system. Tell them they cannot afford to squander the pension fund when it is underfunded by 100s of Millions of dollars!
Read this article from the New Haven Register.
Background about the story from the New Haven Independent here, here, and here.
If someone is innocent, then they should continue in their job. The possibility of false accusations is a terrible reality for any police officer. That is why we have a judicial system, of which the police are an integral part. If this person is guilty, he should be fired and not given special treatment — which is all too common in New Haven (CJ Cuticello and Billy White). Check out this outrageous practice in Long Isand.
Contact the Board and tell them we want this to stop!
RETIREMENT BOARD – POLICE AND FIRE FUND
- Bishop Theodore L. Brooks, 271 Stevenson Road, New Haven, CT 06515 203-387-3899
- Wendy Mongillo, 12 Oliver Road, New Haven, CT 06515 (203) 387-7948
- Richard Epstein, 59 McKinley Avenue, New Haven, CT 06515 Home Phone: 203-397-2299, Cell Phone: 203-982-4838, email
- John DeStefano, Jr., Ex-Officio Representative, 150 Judwin Ave, New Haven, CT 06515 203-946-7660, email
Tags: NHPD, Pensions, Urgent Action
Posted in Accountability, Financial Sustainability, NHPD, Transparency | Comments Off
Friday, May 1st, 2009
There was a hearing at the State Freedom of Information Commission today. You can read the background in the New Haven Independent and The New Haven Advocate. Here is the sanitized version of the city’s projections. The attached version is different then the one Jeffrey saw in July 2008 and the one he requested under the FOIA. Notice that the City’s projections keeps taxes completely unchanged for five years. I don’t think anyone believes that taxes will remain completely flat for five years. Things inherently cost more each year. More updates forthcoming.
Tags: Accountability, Barriers to success, FOIA, Transparency
Posted in Accountability, Budget, Debt Obligations, Financial Sustainability, Transparency | Comments Off
