The town board has filed Local Law No. 2 of the year 2012.
This local law will override the tax levy limit established in General Municipal Law $3-c. The current limit for all local municipalities has a cap of 2%. You can view the local law by clicking here.
According to board members the removal of the 2% tax levy cap has to be done to protect the tax payers. This years town of Alexandria budget went over the 2% cap, along with 7 other towns in the North Country. Our town board as well as the others thought they were within the cap. Alexandria was within the cap until the board was hit with an unexpected workers compensation payment in the amount of $22,392. Click here to read more on this story.
Some fear that municipal governing boards will become careless, reckless and frivolous with the tax payers money if the cap is removed......
I do not have the energy or the Ambition to discuss this next agenda item. I will say this, it is sad that a few of the board members did not do their homework before speaking at the 7.11.12 meeting. You really should know who you are purchasing from before you go looking for an alternate supplier.
One final note, NY State Local Government Management Guide Seeking Competition in Procurement is a good resource for those on the board that might be a little fuzzy on procurement guidelines. You can read the PDF version by clicking here.
I found this excerpt to be extremely interesting.
Generally, local governments and school districts are required to have a code of ethics that sets forth standards of conduct reasonably expected of its officers and employees.27 Although a code of ethics is an entity-wide document, it may be beneficial to include standards for procurement activities in your code. Procurement is a function where the public and private sectors meet to conduct business. Public procurement officials needto have a clear understanding of what business practices are permissible and what ones are not. It is also important that all local government and school district officers and employees maintain high ethical standards of conduct and avoid situations where there is even the appearance of impropriety.
