Amsterdam’s Common Council rejected a nearly 10-percent increase in water rates and tabled a measure to have retirees pay some of their health insurance costs on Tuesday, effectively sending three months of budget discussions down the drain.
The council heard from several people during public comment, most of them retirees who said the city’s goal to collect from them will hurt.
City resident Carol Stearns asked the council to reconsider collecting money for health insurance. She and her husband are among roughly 150 retired employees who pay nothing for full coverage.
Stearns said her husband retired as a police officer years ago with the knowledge health insurance was covered. When they learned about the city’s goal to charge for health insurance, she said, they added up their income and realized they were eligible for Food Stamps.
The plan to collect 10 percent of health insurance costs from the retirees was expected to generate roughly $200,000 in savings for the city.
The city’s $25.68 million budget plan called for a 4.38-percent increase in property taxes, counting on an extra $436,216 in revenue the city would have collected from water users both inside and outside the city.
More than 140 people attended a public hearing on the spending plan Monday and several decried the city’s plans to increase the rate for water by 9.61 percent.
Residents in 2004 voted during a referendum to cap taxes and water rates at 3 percent. The city had planned to create a local law to over-ride the cap.
Prior to voting on that local law, Fourth Ward Alderman William Wills said he was moved by the words he heard at Monday’s public hearing.
The city’s law calls for changes to the tentative budget to be set by June 1.
Categories: Schenectady County
