Author: John Kaufmann

This blog is very fortunate to have readers with considerable expertise on issues of concern who are willing to take the time to share their views.

I am very grateful to Lew Benton for the following text:

John,

The Times Union’s August 7 article about development proposal in County Agricultural District No. 2 – and referenced in your recent Blog entry – raises more questions than it answers.

The story reports on a proposal to bring public water to serve a proposed large lot residential subdivision off Goode Street in the Town of Ballston. The proposed subdivision is in Ag. 2, near or adjacent to the Knight Orchard, a long established working farm. In fact the Knight Orchard has been part of Ag. District 2 since its original creation in 1974 and is one of the County’s best managed farm operations.

As a staff member of he Saratoga County Planning Board I was involved in establishing all five of Saratoga County’s original agricultural districts and subsequently, beginning in 1995, served as the administrator of the state Agricultural Districts Program in the Dept. of Ag. and Markets.

A little history.

Shortly after the Agricultural Districts Law was enacted by the state legislature in 1971, the staff of the Saratoga County Board, Corporative Extension and local commercial farm operations began a multi-year effort to map the remaining agricultural base. We promoted the concept of agricultural districting as a county shaping device, as a means of preserving and protecting viable ag lands and the agricultural economy and for the open space, habitat, clean air and water shed benefits farm lands and associated wood lots provide.

In 1972 the County Board of Supervisors approved our plan for Ag. District No. 1 (mostly in the Town of Northumberland) and in early 1973 the NYS Commissioner of Agriculture and Markets certified it. It was one of the first districts in New York State. Today it exists as 59,000 acre uninterrupted farm landscape in Northumberland, Monroe, Saratoga , Stillwater and a small property in northeast corner of Wilton. It hosts 152 farms and 36,000 farmed acres.

The Ballston District, District 2, was established in 1974. Today it has 160 farms on 52,000 plus acres.

Over time the County Planning Board would work to create five districts which captured the significant share of all remaining viable, active farm lands. We failed – interestingly enough -only in the Town of Halfmoon. But that’s another story.

Subsequently the original five districts were consolidated into the two we have today. It should be noted that districts must undergo a eight-year review process that essentially mimics the creation process and requires action by the Board of Supervisors and the NYS Dept. of Agriculture and Markets. So there is a very significant investment in all this and actions which compromise the districts should be taken seriously.

The districts also played (play) an important role in channeling development into the service corridor where major water and sewer systems were put in place. In fact, the County Sewer District No. 1, originally established as a water pollution abatement strategy, is flanked on its east and west by existing ag. districts. All of this was designed to guide growth when the County land use plan was prepared and adopted in 1978.

In many cases the agricultural district boundaries were made coterminous with rural zoning districts as more and more towns came to adopt their first zoning regulations.

Perhaps the biggest threat to these districts – other than an unstable agricultural economy and school taxes – is conflicting land use and the expansion of public water and sewer systems.

That is why lands in agricultural districts and their farm operations have certain protections. The Agricultural Districts Law protects from restrictive zoning, nuisance law suites and allows for sound agricultural practices. It created a system of property assessment based on the agricultural production value of the farm land, not on its development potential and it gave the commissioner of ag. and markets the authority to limit the introduction of compromising infrastructure.

Thoughts and Questions

Sec. 239-n of the General Municipal Law requires County Planning Board review of any proposed subdivision within 500 feet of a farm operation in a state certified agricultural district. So it would be very interesting to know (1) if the Town referred the proposal to the County Planning Board, and (2) what did the county recommend.

It is the County Planning Board’s role to identify development impacts on farm operations and suggest means of mitigation. The law requires the preparation and filing of an Agricultural Data Statement with all review agencies. Did the town and county planning boards receive such a statement and how did it influence their respective reviews?

The story references the town attorney saying that the subdivision was consistent with the zoning ordinance and was thus permitted even though existing policy did not allow for public water hookups. I assume that the subdivision was approved showing individual wells, not public water. A different water supply would require an amended subdivision plan, state Health Dept. review, etc. None of this is referenced in the story.

Did the Town Planning Board require the approved plan to reference the ag. district and alert potential buyers that they might be exposed to standard agricultural practices including noise, odors, etc. that they would be hard pressed to complain about?

And what did the Town Planning Board have to say about all this during its review and did it consider any recommendations the County Planning Board may have made?

The backstory to the TU’s piece leans on the politics involved in all this and potential conflicts.

Of course we all know that political intrigue has surrounded many controversial land use issues in Saratoga County and the same actors seem to always pop up.

Exit 14, the more recent attempt by the City’s previous administration to secretly provide water to a Wilton subdivision backed by the political class are two of the more well known and particularly troubling. This is not to suggest that is the case in Ballston but it sure is interesting.

Below I include a summary of the Ag. Districts Law for your readers who may still be awake.

Lew

AGRICULTURAL DISTRICTS LAW: A CURRENT SUMMARY

Since 1971, the Agricultural Districts Law, Article 25AA of the Agriculture and Markets Law (AML), has reflected the cornerstone of State and county level efforts to preserve, protect and encourage the development and improvement of agricultural land for the production of food, fiber and other agricultural products.

As of January 1, 2016, there are 210 State certified agricultural districts created in 53 of New York’s 62 counties. These districts capture about 8.8 million acres of land, including over 6. 3 million farmed acres on 25,632 farms. By any measure, the Agricultural Districts Program is a significant and substantial farmland protection tool.

The New York State Constitution directs the Legislature to provide for the protection of agricultural lands. The Agricultural Districts Law fulfills this constitutional mandate, in part, by providing a locally initiated mechanism for the protection and enhancement of farm lands as both a viable segment of the local and State economies, and as an economic and environmental resource of major importance.

Several benefits accrue to farm operations conducted within certified agricultural districts. Chief among these are:

The obligation of State agencies, as a matter of policy, to encourage the maintenance of viable farming in agricultural districts;

Limitations on the exercise of eminent domain and other public acquisitions, and the advance of public funds for certain construction activities;

Limitations on the siting of solid waste management facilities on land dedicated to agricultural production;

Limitations on the power to impose benefit assessments, special ad valorem levies, or other rates or fees in certain improvement districts or benefit areas;

Requirements that direct local governments to realize the intent of the Agricultural Districts Law and to avoid unreasonable restrictions in the regulation of farm operations when exercising their powers to enact and administer comprehensive plans, local laws, ordinances, rules and/or regulations; and

Requirements that applications for certain planning and zoning actions impacting a designated farm operation within an agricultural district, or on lands within five hundred feet of such farm operation within an agricultural district, include an agricultural data statement designed to allow the review agency to evaluate any possible impacts of the proposed action on farm operations.

The Agricultural Districts Law establishes a land classification system used to assign agricultural assessment values to qualified properties both within and outside district boundaries, creates a process for the review of agricultural practices, discourages private nuisance lawsuits arising from agricultural practices determined to be sound, provides for advisory opinions as to whether particular land uses are agricultural in nature,and requires disclosure to prospective grantees of real property that the property is in an agricultural district.

The Agricultural Districts Law also defines the procedure for district creation and review.

There have been a number of extremely damaging stories in the press regarding Saratoga County Republicans.  From experience I assume that some very unhappy Republicans have been pointing the TU to some very unpleasant material.

In this first story we learn that under the new leadership of Saratoga County Republican Chairman Steve Bulger, the Grand Old Party spent more in the last six months then in the previous six years.  Mr. Bulger, who worked for Congressman Chris Gibson, replaced John Herrick as chair.

The TU reports, “During the first half of the year, Bulger’s spending was largely for consultants, including $10,000 to a convicted felon who is a videographer, $24,000 to a state GOP political director and another $12,000 to Better Results, a fundraising operation run out of a Loudonville home. He also contributed $10,000 to the state GOP so members could take part in President Trump‘s inauguration.”

The full story is well worth reading as it documents both the sudden profligacy of this traditionally thrifty local party but includes some embarrassing defenses of this new, “invigorated” party.

http://m.timesunion.com/7dayarchive/article/Saratoga-County-GOP-spending-more-than-ever-11490076.php?cmpid=email-mobile

In a follow up article, more details about the “felon” along with the generous payments to others is explored.

http://m.timesunion.com/allnews/article/Saratoga-County-GOP-pays-felon-10-000-11437283.php?cmpid=email-mobile

The last story involves the usual suspects of politicians, political party people, and developers.  This involves a state suit against the town of Ballston for violating the restrictions on residential water hook-ups in agriculture districts.  I find the story particularly interesting because the Saratoga County Farm Bureau has come out against what the town is doing.  Farm Bureaus are notoriously conservative and supporters of the Republican establishment.  This is not surprising because farmers are in general pretty conservative.  In this case, they understand the threat that development can have to their survival.  In the meantime, the story notes a web of connections between the developers, elected officials, and the GOP that often involves the spouses of the players.  This is a really juicy story.

http://www.timesunion.com/local/article/Proposed-Ballston-land-deal-seen-having-wide-11737020.php

 

 

Jane Weihe, my wife, was on the panel at the Thursday night event at the Library sponsored by the Young Democrats on the proposed Saratoga Springs charter.  Following the meeting she met Rick Landry, Meg Kelly’s mayoral campaign manager.  She introduced herself as “the blogger’s wife” and inquired as to when I might expect to get a response to my request for an interview with Ms. Kelly. Mr. Landry replied something to the effect that his inbox was very full of emails. She told him there were two emails there asking for a meeting and encouraged him to reply.

 

 

The Saratoga County Young Democrats are sponsoring a panel discussion on the pros and cons of the proposed Saratoga Springs charter change.

 The event will take place on Thursday August 3, at 7PM in the Dutcher Community Room of the Saratoga Springs Public Library.

Panelists are Charter Review Commission chair Bob Turner, Charter Commission member and Democratic Committee member BK Keramati, Mayor Joanne Yepsen, former Democratic chair and SUCCESS member Jane Weihe, SUCCESS member Richard Sellers, and  former Deputy Commissioner of Accounts Michele Boxley.

 

The event is free and open to the public.

 

I reached out to Republican candidate for Mayor, Mark Baker.  On an earlier occasion he had given me his cell phone.  He told me he would be happy to sit for an interview and we agreed to set up a date later this week.

I am still hoping that his opponent, Meg Kelly, will respond to my request for an interview.

 

In a hand out entitled “Saratoga Springs Charter Review Commission 2017 Proposed City Charter Fiscal Impact Summary” the Commission claims “The Deputy Commissioners’ positions would be eliminated in the proposed Charter….The largest amount of fiscal savings comes about because of this change.”

In a July 10^th blog  I challenged the assumption that these positions could easily be eliminated and their work assumed by the proposed City Manager who would possibly have an assistant. In that post I stated “The Charter Commission did not even bother to interview any past or present Deputies.”

On July 11, Bob Turner, Commission chair, replied “The Charter Review Commission spoke privately with several Deputy Commissioners…about their role.” He repeated this claim in the Saratogian on July 16. In a Reader’s View Turner wrote “We [the Commission] interviewed…former deputy commissioners…”

The Commission has repeatedly referenced interviews with past and present Council members, Mayors, and Directors and even secret interviews with City Hall employees, but I was pretty sure there had never been a reference to the Commission interviewing Deputies either publicly or in secret prior to Bob’s comment on July 11.

Sure enough at the June 26 meeting when the Commission formerly voted to adopt their charter draft , Commission member Matt Jones stated, “We (the commission) didn’t interview any Deputies.” Turner responds: “I interviewed two.” No one else responded.

Later Matt Jones states again “We as a Commission have not sat down and asked what is it that you (the Deputies) do all day long and can your functions be replaced, all five of you, by a city manager.”

Then came comments from Pat Kane posted on this blog claiming he too had interviewed Deputies. Specifically he claimed he “personally interviewed 7 people who served as Deputies in our commission form of government. 3  who have served in 2017 and 4 who have served in the last 3 years.”

His description of the information he says he gathered in his interviews is particularly troubling. We are asked to believe that these Deputies were comfortable enough with Mr. Kane to meet with him privately and confess that they had no qualification for their jobs. He also claims that “5 of the 7 …stated they had had a personal relationship with the person who appointed them prior to the appointment.”  I think  the term “personal relationship” is a particularly loaded one and was an unfortunate phrase for him to use.

So Pat Kane allegedly gained the confidence of all these Deputies, extracted damaging personal information from them and then posted it on a blog. His claim that people made these extremely damaging statements to him in secret interviews for which there is no validation and then posting them on this blog site is not worthy of him and frankly, I don’t find his claims credible.

There is no record of either Mr. Kane’s or Mr. Turner’s interviews nor any evidence that any of the information they supposedly gathered was ever communicated to the Commission as a whole.

In spite of the lack of evidence all but two members of the Commission have supported the narrative that the Deputies (now referred to as “political” Deputies by Commission members) are expendable and easily replaced by one or maybe two people.

It seems clear that the Commission should not be confident at all that they have a firm understanding of the work the Deputies do. Yet they have hung their promise of economic savings on the assumption that the unexplored work of the Deputies is easily reassigned. A miscalculation about this could have serious financial repercussions for a new government as Matt Jones has warned.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have mixed feelings about the ongoing controversy over building a Code Blue shelter next to Shelters of Saratoga on Walworth Street.  I think that the prohibitions that were part of the Planning Board’s approval should minimize the impact of the facility on the neighborhood.

Unfortunately, my experience with the ZBA is that they have shown an extraordinary ineptitude in crafting their approvals to protect neighbors.   These projects also seem to have a power to creep beyond their original promises.

It is hard to believe given the requirement that it only be used for nights that drop below thirty-two degrees that the occupants will be hanging out in the neighborhood during the day.

Here is the story from the Saratogian.

http://www.saratogian.com/general-news/20170718/residents-suing-city-over-code-blue-location

 

I have waited  three weeks before attempting again to arrange an interview with Meg Kelly, the Democratic candidate for Mayor.  During this time Ms. Kelly has filed her nominating petitions with the Board of Elections.  Ms. Kelly has also held a fundraiser recently.

 I received a reply to my original request for an interview from her campaign manager, Rick Landry. He advised me that I was not to use her city email address when contacting her.  I assumed by this that I should make future requests through him since he offered no alternative email address for her.  So I sent my most recent request for an interview with Ms. Kelly to him.  After not hearing from him for several days, I wrote again.  I have not heard from him.

 If any of the readers of this blog should encounter Ms. Kelly or Mr. Landry, would you ask them to contact me?

 

 

 

Note:

I received a post from Pat Kane on July 14^th in which he addressed issues associated with the Charter Commission’s plans to eliminate the deputy positions.  The full text of his post appears below and I have also posted it as part of the original thread it was directed to.

I found Mr. Kane’s comments quite disturbing.  As part of responding to him, I sent the comments to someone who has a keen knowledge of government processes in general and Saratoga Springs processes in particular.  I think sufficiently highly of this person that I would venture he/she would put this blog out of business were he/she ever to decide to blog on politics.  Here is the text of the response.

JK

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Observers Comments

Full disclosure, while I’m not totally supportive of the charter commission’s recommendations, (and I am extremely disappointed in the way this was handled by the mayor, and subsequently by Mr. Turner and Mr. Kane) I’m 100% in favor of ending the commission form of government in our city.   There is a reason, perhaps an almost Darwinian reason, that this form of government went from existing with some regularity in the early-mid twentieth century, to being almost non-existent today.  I believe we are only one of three municipalities in the state that still have this form.  It increases inefficiency, duplicates services and operations, and leaves the staff and deputies subject to the whims of elected officials, some of whom are shockingly un-invested in the day-to-day operations of City Hall.

I have several issues with Mr. Kane’s response and perspective on this.

1) I would love to know how Mr. Kane and the charter commission (CC) picked which deputies to interview.  Doesn’t appear to be any rhyme or reason to it, which to me, makes it a sloppy bit of research.  By his own telling, Mr. Kane says that they interviewed only 3 who served in 2017, which begs the question: why did you only interview 3 out of 5 (60%) of the deputies currently in the city’s employ? I find that odd. Other people should too.

2) While I understand that concerns abound regarding “patronage” jobs, it is not at all unusual for mayors, city council members, state assemblypersons, state senators, governors, etc., to put people in top positions that they are familiar with.  Given the level of complexity and sensitivity of the jobs, and the fact that voters put a particular elected official in that spot largely based on his or her policy beliefs, it makes sense to have an elected official employ a like-minded person – a person who is capable and comfortable executing that vision.  Mr. Kane (and others) routinely conflate the idea of jobs that are politically appointed (e.g., deputies) with “patronage” jobs – which in the political world, have a certain “not what you know, it’s who you know/gravy train” connotation to it.  It feels like he is trying to make the idea of an appointed job a dirty or insidious thing; it is not.

It should also be noted that a city manager and asst. city manager would also be appointed, and would not be totally void of politics.  You wouldn’t necessarily want the arbitrary results of civil service examination picking your top operations person for you.

3) Mr. Kane’s January 2018 forecast on deputy tenure sounds arithmetically right to me, but it couldn’t be clearer that he is picking a yardstick which distorts the data in his favor.

So, in January 2018, the longest deputy will have served for 2 and ½ years, and he goes on to cite the other would-be tenures to come to an average of “about 1 year per deputy.”  When he cherry-picks the timeline like that, he is actively choosing to massage the statistics in his favor.  Shauna Sutton served for 6 years; Joe Ogden for 2.5 years; Lynn Bachner for almost 5 years; Tim Cogan for many years; and Eileen Finneran is completing her her tenth year having served as a deputy under Mayor Keehn, Commissioner Kim and Commissioner Mathiesen.  That average of deputy experience is considerably more than “1 year.”   He then proceeds to directly and disingenuously compare this “average” of 1 year with the idea that the incoming city manager and assistant city manager would have 15-20 total years of general experience and he seems to suggest that this manufactured juxtaposition should make the choice a no-brainer.  Mr. Kane is only considering “deputy” experience to build his 1 year “average”; Mr. Kane then allows himself to consider all of one’s work experience when considering the 15-20 years the prospective managers would have. My understanding is that Joe Ogden who served as Mayor Yepsen’s deputy for 2.5 years, served something in the range of 10 years of public finance and state government experience coming into that job. All of the deputies currently serving in City Hall have had other jobs, for many years.  It’s absolutely ridiculous for him create this 1 year versus 15 years comparison that is not only wildly misleading, but false.

Also, he seems to be casting the “deputies come and go” reality as the disease and not the symptom, when it is really the other way around.  The city election cycle is two years, and people plan for that reality accordingly.  The deputies, the highest ranking non-elected officials in city government, are also paid about half of what the city’s top grossing employees make.  The deputies often leave because the mayor and the City Council  lack the requisite political courage to say: “the deputies are high-level managers; they work many hours; they put up with a lot; they are there in our stead; they need to make more.”

4) He appears to lack an understanding about city operations regarding this idea that 2 people can do the work of 5.   That simply will not happen.  Again, Mr. Kane is totally confusing the structure of government as codified in a charter with the goods and services the public requires that government to produce. The best example of this is the deputy commissioner of finance.  The deputy commissioner of finance not only serves as the traditional deputy for that department, but that job also – and more importantly – serves as the city’s budget director.  Even if the deputy job went away, you would have to hire a budget director as that job is far too big to be absorbed by the finance director, a unionized job which is already akin to being the city comptroller.  Honestly, it would appear to a non-city employee that that job is the hardest deputy job.  The deputy mayor job would be/should be eliminated in the face of a city manager, but the work currently being done by these individuals will have to get done by someone else. And a city manager and assistant city manager, reporting to the mayor/City Council and to a very active, very involved public, will not be able to absorb all those functions. Mr. Kane’s comparison here does not hold water.

5) Mr. Kane also seems to be confusing the notion of what it costs the city to employ someone with their compensation package. Deputies make about $72k and a family plan for health insurance costs about $23k per year is my read of info from the city is about right. That’s $95k in compensation If you’re taking the family health insurance option.  The additional $15k in expenses that the city incurs (retirement/social security contributions) are not considered compensation.  Again, Mr. Kane tries to make it look as if the “16k per year of experience” is the better bargain, because he counts all of the city manager’s job experience when crafting that number, and he then he turns around and tells us that the deputies are costing us “110k per year of experience” as he conveniently leaves out any other job experience, counting only the deputy job experience.  If that isn’t being disingenuous I don’t know what is.

6) Mr. Kane’s comment about the 3-4 high level, experienced employees in each department is true, but he is wildly mistaken if he is banking on those employees absorbing deputy functions. Those employees are largely – if not exclusively – unionized and they are not supposed to be working more than 40 hours per week or outside their job title.  Even if the charter changes, the collective bargaining landscape will not.

I think charter change is a generally good idea, but it has been executed so poorly from beginning to end that it’s really hard to get behind this particular iteration.

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Pat Kane’s Original Comment

Patrick Kane commented on Deputies: Challenging Charter Commission’s Prejudices “This week Finance Commissioner Madigan announced the appointment of a new deputy, Michael Sharp.  This is one of the five …” I too served on the charter commission this year. I personally interviewed 7 people who served as deputies in our commission form of government. 3 who have served in 2017 and 4 who have served in the last 3 years. Every single person would speak on the condition that their name would be left out. All current deputies or former deputies were perfectly clear in their professional opinion that The Commission Form of Government does not serve the City of Saratoga Springs in a professional manner. The most common terms used was ” constant fighting and bickering among commissioners and departments”. 6 of the 7 felt that they brought little or no professionally specific skills to the job. 5 of the 7 also stated that they had a personal relationship with the person who appointed them prior to the appointment. In January of 2018. Deputies Tenure The longest serving deputy will have 2 1/2 years experience. Finance deputy will have 5 months service, public safety will be brand new to the job, Public works will have 1 1/2 years, and the deputy mayor will be brand new. That average is about 1 year per deputy. Currently deputies have a 110,000.00 compensation package or 550,000.00 for 5 (110K per year of experience) Professionally trained and experienced Professional City Manager and Assistant City Manager The combined experience with two professional management positions will likely be 15-20 years. Their salary package for both will be an estimated 330,000.00 ( 16K per year of experience) So is 550,000.00 for 5 people with and average tenure of 1 year of on the job training, equal to 2 people with 15-20 years of professional training and experience at 330,000.00 ? The show will go on. Lets not forget that there are 400 full time employees that have been serving the public year after year regardless who is in office or who that commissioner appoints as deputy to work in their department. Additionally, there are 3-4 senior level employees ( non-deputies) in each department that have served in their departments longer than 15 years in their role. With a two year transition period, the needs of the city will be reviewed and a professionally crafted plan will be in place for a seamless transition on January 1, 2020.

Love, Sex and Jealousy: A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Monday, July 17 at 7:00 PM Saratoga Springs Public Library (Dutcher Community Room) 48 Henry Street, Saratoga Springs FREE! Before the season begins be sure to brush up your Shakespeare at this special discussion led by Saratoga Shakespeare Company Artistic Director and Skidmore Professor Lary Opitz .