Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Kingston & Saugerties Schools are failing. Please Complain!
We are really on the decks of the Titanic in NY State and in particular, the Kingston & Saugerties School Districts. The violins are playing, the teacher's union continues to demand and get raises, pensions, all expense-paid benefits....WHILE graduation rates continue to fall (minus 4% in Kingston and minus 3% in Saugerties) and our young adults and college graduates continue to be unemployed and continue to leave Ulster County and NY State. We are in the midst of a disaster, while our school officials continue painting a rosy picture and continue with policies which are harming both students and taxpayers. What are we taxpayers and students to do? Raise your voices, complain every day. Make phone calls to Cahill, Lopez, school principals, school board members, every day. This will work, if enough people complain to the people in power both locally and at the state level. Please complain!
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Cuomo's Pension Reform is also unsustainable. Why? We need 401-k.
Cuomo's Pension Reform is also unsustainable. Why? Because it continues out of date "guaranteed defined payment, old-style pensions" which cities and school districts cannot predict and keep up with. The only way Cuomo's new pension reform is sustainable is the drastic reduction of the number of current and future government workers and teachers. The unions are way out of touch. If the unions were smart, they would be pushing for a 401(k)-type option, where the value of a pension is tied to the performance of financial markets and the investment decisions of the workers, rather than keep taxpayers on the hook for a guaranteed, defined payout. With Cuomo's plan, the number of state, city, town, teacher workers must necessarily be reduced dramatically. As an alternative to Cuomo's Tier 6, let's propose a Tier 6a which introduces a defined contribution, sustainable, affordable 401-k pension, like we have in private industry.
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
Saugerties Schools Alert - Abolish Guaranteed Pensions & Step Increases
Although all of NY State's school districts are feeling a lot of financial pain now due to state laws which favor teacher's unions heavily over taxpayers. It appears that the Saugerties School District is feeling the most pain of any district in the Hudson Valley. I urge Saugerties residents to do more than just complain at school board meetings. Saugerties residents have to contact your NY State representatives (Cahill, Lopez, etc.) and Gov.Cuomo's office and demand the end of the Tri-borough Amendment, which allows teacher union contracts with automatic pay step increases to stay in place after they are expired and to replace costly defined payment pensions with teacher contribution 401k pensions like the rest of us have in private industry.
Friday, June 3, 2011
NY State is giving union contractors favoritism - Costs are going up!
According to The Torch (http://www.nytorch.com/ June 2, 2011) blog, there is continued union favoritism on individual contract bidding. This may be how Gov. Cuomo is getting Silver's wing of the Assembly to agree to the Property Tax Cap. If this is true, NYS residents are gaining on the Property Tax Cap, but losing with the "required" union contracts and "prevailing wage and rules". In addition, Gov.Cuomo does not take live questions from taxpayers on Talk radio. We taxpayers cannot ask him about this union favoritism. He is insulated from public interaction. If anyone knows of any venue where taxpayers can interact with Governor Cuomo, please reply here.
Saturday, May 14, 2011
Retain Young Adults - Remove Union Control of our NY State Economy
The Governor could be showing better leadership on our No.1 Priority -- The retention of our young adults by removing union control of our economy. A recent Marist Poll of NY State young adults shows that over 30 per cent of our young adults plan on leaving NY State soon due to the lack of jobs. NY State is last or close to last in Economic freedom. To me ethics reform should come after a battle royal on elimination of the Tri-borough Amendment, 2% tax cap, making NY State a right to work state like New Hampshire, moving school board voting to November, and others. Let's face it, our young people will continue to leave our state until the above reforms are enacted.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Vote NO on School Budgets and Stop Forcing our Children Out of State
This is a sincere message to the parents of our Ulster County School districts. Our Ulster County high school and college graduates are leaving NY State in droves. Where are they going? They are going to Right-to-Work states where unions and laws that favor unions do not control the school districts. Where are examples of Right-to-Work states? South Carolina, North Carolina, Florida, Texas and about 23 others including soon to be a Right-to-Work state - New Hampshire. Large numbers of new jobs will never come back to NY State until we become a Right-to-Work state. What should we do to send a clear message to Albany that we know how to stop our children from leaving NY State for Right-to-Work states? Vote NO on every school budget until Albany gets the message! If you vote yes, you are continuing the Sham which forces our children to leave the state.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Support Our Young Adults ------ Golden Hill (Private Ownership)
Keeping Golden Hill in Public Hands (owned by Ulster County) is a disaster for our Young Adults. Since it is well-known that Ulster County's subsidy will have to grow every year into the future, our young adults will be burdened with ever-increasing tax bills. The result will be that our young adults will continue to leave Ulster County. Look around. Why are there so few young adults settling here? High taxes. Please do not do anything that prevents our young adults from settling in Ulster County. In this age of tight money, Ulster County has to choose between a Young Adult Economy or ever increasing taxes.
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