The State Commission on Local Government Efficiency and Competitiveness has issued more than five dozen recommendations designed to reduce the costs of operating New York's thousands of taxing districts. The recommendations range from encouraging mergers to eliminating compensation of special district commissioners. Nassau County Comptroller Howard Weitzman, a member of the commission, has been very active in promoting the proposals to legislators, and good for him. The proposals, some of which have been pressed by governors and serious people since long before I was born, are generally a step in a better direction. There is room for reasonable compromise and discussion, but already there are people, particularly from the special districts, who are having none of it. That's a mistake. Four-dollar gas, flat-lining home values and a sinking dollar are running down the clock on business-as-usual.
We have some good district commissioners, some real specialists in their field. When people are saying that your compensation will be reduced to nothing it's hard not to take it as personal criticism. But this is mostly about a system that was outdated when Long Islanders were just switching from horses to automobiles. We can draw lines all over the maps and call them districts, but from a helicopter, Nassau County mostly looks like one big community.
We should also put things in perspective. The lines between two issues have been blurring recently. One issue is a broken system of how we pay for local government. The other issue is an inefficient system of delivering critical services. These issues intersect and dollars add up, but special district inefficiencies, while frustrating, are not the main thing forcing Aunt Blanche to move to Florida. Even if the recommendations regarding our commissioner-run districts were implemented and saved the high-end estimate of $35 million, it's just a fraction of 1 percent of what Nassau County residents pay in taxes to run our various local government units, including schools. I live in a sanitation district that was consolidated with a neighboring district in 1994, and while there were some initial savings, I assure you that the property tax problem has not been solved for the people of unincorporated New Hyde Park. In unincorporated communities, special districts typically represent 10-15 percent of the property tax bill. Consolidation, dropping the Big One, is not usually a significant long-term money-saver, but it can sometimes increase efficiency and effectiveness so that residents feel better about what they do pay, which should not be underestimated.
But these commission recommendations are very important in at least one big way. If implemented, they would remove some real and perceived obstacles to options that can creatively generate tax savings and increase efficiency. They remove a layer of excuses. They are a step forward.
I hope that Mr. Weitzman and his commission colleagues will not put all their eggs into the Albany basket. With political control of the State Senate in play, Democrats and Republicans will not be eager to aggravate people with titles and access to press release stationery. Governor Paterson has only committed his support to the 15 or so "easiest" of the commission proposals. Town boards, the legal parents of most special districts, are fully authorized to make just about every change suggested by this commission on their own authority, using the super incredible "Home Rule" powers they've had since 1964. The county can also take some of the recommended actions. Let's not let these other elected officials off the hook, especially a few who have been using district commissioners as whipping boys while obsessing over their own salary increases.
It's not all about taxes and money. Some districts, such as water districts, can make bad decisions with very definite impacts on other communities. Financial strains and threats to our quality of living won't allow us to just wait this out anymore. Critical decisions must be made regarding how we will administer public resources and provide important services to more than 1.3 million Nassau residents. This report is a reasonable starting point.
