I've been following the Daily Freeman coverage of the issue of Safety Net billing and am quite surprised by the lack of balance with the majority of coverage reporting only the points of view of the City of Kingston, the Town of Ulster, and Ulster County officials. What about the rest of Ulster County? Ulster County is large and very diverse, comprised of largely rural areas that might have vastly different points of view. The Safety Net issue is of great concern to the citizens which I represent as the Town of Rochester Supervisor. This line item has been the largest area of expenditure growth in our Town Budget due to the dismal economic conditions we are all struggling to endure. Last year the Town of Rochester paid Ulster County over $77,000 in Safety Net charges, having budgeted $88,500. More importantly, we also successfully challenged over $42,000 in erroneous charges. The budget would have been busted without due diligence.

Mayor Sottile and his Comptroller should have been as diligent. Ignorance of the lists of charges from the county is no excuse. While it is true Ulster County Social Services should have been more accurate in assigning Safety Net responsibility to municipalities, paying a bill with taxpayer money without confirmation is fiscally irresponsible. The use of Real Property records to determine billing should have been normal procedure since inception of the program instead of utilizing zip codes. A little more effort from both county and municipal officials and this fiasco would be nonexistent. The public has been misinformed of the facts involving the Safety Net billing situation. Safety Net is available to individuals for up to 60 months and to families with children after their 60 months of Family Assistance have expired. Towns pay Safety Net charges for their residents even if they move to the City of Kingston as charges are based on point of origin. Many of the Safety Net charges my town pays have addresses outside of the town, yet the Town is responsible as the application for Safety Net began with that person's last residence. For example, a Town of Rochester resident who loses their job, applies and is approved for assistance, and subsequently moves to Kingston has their local share of assistance paid by the Town of Rochester. Our Town does not even receive the minimal benefits of the money multiplier effect because the dollars our taxpayers contribute to the program are not spent at our local businesses. Those monies are most likely spent in the City of Kingston or the Town of Ulster.

I am not in favor of having the Safety Net charges be absorbed by Ulster County. County residents should not have to subsidize other areas' participants as part of their county tax bills as is being proposed. The argument that Safety Net charges should be absorbed by the county due to lack of affordable housing outside of Kingston is a smokescreen. People in the Safety Net program congregate in urban areas because shopping and services are more readily available. Mass transportation and walking distance shopping and services are not readily available in rural areas. County Legislator David Donaldson and Kingston Mayor Sottile have expounded considerably on the claim that lack of affordable housing elsewhere draws Safety Net recipients to Kingston. They do not, however, differentiate whether the need is for low income rentals or starter homes for first time buyers. Both are classified as "affordable housing" yet there is a large difference between the needs and demographics of those two categories. Much of the information being shoveled around comes from an informal study of Kingston Housing Authority applicants conducted in 2004 which didn't go so far as to differentiate Safety Net Participants from the general population of 480 applicants (Daily Freeman 5/2/2004). Last month [the Daily Freeman] reported both Kevin O'Connor, executive director of Rural Ulster Preservation Co., and Dennis Doyle, Ulster County Planning Director, stated that studies conducted in the past did not point to the changing of the Safety net program as a strategy for creating more affordable housing. In addition a study in 2004 showed that only 4 of the 21 municipalities in Ulster County would save money if the county took over funding of the Safety Net Program.

Work should be concentrated on ensuring that billing for the Safety Net program is accurate, so that each municipality pays its fair share instead of trying to move fiscal responsibility elsewhere. Let us move forward and productively input our time and energy into the creation of sustainable employment opportunities and affordable home ownership throughout our county so that the Safety Net program becomes a nonissue.