A potential battle is brewing between Chemung County and the City of Elmira over a shared services agreement, and the city has an unlikely ally — the county legislature.
For the past 10 years, the county has provided employees to staff the city’s departments of public works and buildings and grounds.
The agreement, implemented in 2015, was designed to offset a shift in sales tax revenue distribution. The county originally split sales tax revenue with the city 50/50 but changed that formula so the county kept 66% of the money and the city got 34%.
Now County Executive Christopher Moss said he wants to terminate or amend the shared services agreement.
Moss would like to see a new agreement that would require the city to pay the county for labor costs, phased in over a four-year period, while the county would continue to cover fringe benefits.
“When the City of Elmira is in the financial position to offer substantially higher wages for comparable positions, it has become increasingly clear that the county should not be financially subsidizing the city’s workforce at the expense of county employees and services,” he said.
“While it’s important for all municipalities throughout the county, to include the City of Elmira, to experience fiscal stability, they must learn to operate within their financial constraints, just as every other municipality throughout the county has done,” Moss added.
County lawmakers back City of Elmira
In response to a letter Moss sent to the county legislature in June, notifying them of his intent to terminate the shared services agreement, legislative leaders responded with their own letter dated Sept. 22, pointing out the city is already experiencing financial difficulty, as highlighted in a recent report from state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli.
The legislators said that severing the shared services agreement would only create additional fiscal stress.
“The legislature, the county executive’s office, and many other public and private organizations are all attempting to retain existing businesses, encourage outside investment in our community, and attract businesses and organizations to our community with the goal of retention and creation of good-paying jobs for our residents,” stated the letter signed by Chairman Mark Margeson and other legislative leaders.
“It becomes much harder for businesses and organizations to invest their dollars here when the county seat is on the verge of bankruptcy,” the letter stated.
What happens next?
Lawmakers have called a special meeting of the legislature’s highway committee for 8 p.m. Monday, Oct. 6 in the 5th floor legislative conference room at the Hazlett Building, 203 Lake St. in Elmira.
The purpose of the meeting is to consider a measure that would prohibit termination of the shared services agreement without express consent by resolution of the legislature.
The county spends about $1.5 million a year to staff the city’s public works and buildings and grounds departments, Moss said.
That involves between 30 and 40 employees combined, according to Elmira Mayor Dan Mandell, who opposes Moss’s plan and said he will be at Monday’s meeting.
Mandell said he’s open to an amended shared services agreement as long as it’s fair to city residents.
“(Moss) is trying to balance his budget on the backs of city taxpayers,” Mandell said. “Our budget is already strained. It doesn’t make any sense. You can’t take that much money away from the county seat.”
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This article originally appeared on Elmira Star-Gazette: Chemung County plan to end shared services with Elmira ‘doesn’t make any sense,’ city says
Reporting by Jeff Murray, Elmira Star-Gazette / Elmira Star-Gazette
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