Steve Greenfield's Letter to the Editor 12/30/09: Why We Should Renovate Now

This statement is from me as an individual and does not speak for an elected body or any other individuals who belong to it.

This week I have come under attack as sloppy, superficial and under the influence of subjective political ideology in the execution of my due diligence. These attacks are mounted by people who have had no exposure to the degree and depth of my due diligence processes, no awareness of the length and amount of time invested or the experience and expertise of successful, non-ideological professionals in the topics under investigation in my public service or private advocacy. While opinions on matters of ideology range widely and compete in the marketplace of democracy, facts are facts, and math is math. Two plus two equaling five can be somebody's ideology, but someone who finds that it equals four cannot be accused of personal ideology or exposure to only biased influences. To wit: Building new gets much less state aid than renovating and requires buying property. Therefore, renovation is cheaper.

Selling the New Paltz Middle School and its property to finance building new does not change the outcome. The property has no commercial value because it is zoned residential. Selling it to the town and village for a combined municipal center does nothing either, and likely makes it even more costly, since that purchase would be made with tax dollars from the same taxpayers and would not be useful as a municipal center without substantial renovations, again charged to the same taxpayers. If we did not sell to the town and village for the maximum possible price, we'd be undercutting the interests of school taxpayers, many of whom do not reside in New Paltz.

Not renovating at all is more expensive than renovating and will jeopardize our educational standards. The middle school is in terrible condition. It has been absorbing high maintenance costs for two decades now. Renovations come from the capital budget and 60% of those costs are reimbursed to us by Albany. Maintenance costs come out of the operating budget and are not aidable one cent, and since they are in the operating budget, are subject to the state cuts that have been announced. As that's the same budget from which teachers are paid and class sizes maintained, declining to renovate and leaving all the known repair costs in the operating budget results in zero state aid and substantial risk that necessary repairs on matters that affect health and safety will force substantial teacher layoffs and increased class size, serious tax increases or all of the above. The uncertainty of state aid to operating budgets means the best way to save money is to put as much maintenance as possible into a capital budget. When you add in today's historic low interest rates and low contractor bids, we can save much more.

Crossroads, if constructed, will add a substantial amount of students to the district, far in excess of tax revenues generated. That means much higher taxes, and by the average New Paltz demographics for occupancies of the configuration proposed for Crossroads, probably not less than 3% just from that project, likely more. And that's only if the extra population doesn't put us over the tipping point of maximum occupancy for our buildings, which would force new construction throughout the district that would easily surpass $100 million. I don't make this up -- it comes from figures in the developers' impact statements, which I read carefully. Stoneleigh Woods listed its annual negative impact on school taxes as $500,000 per year, every year. That's nearly 2% on your taxes, just from the one project. Should these projects be built, the tax implications are devastating and it isn't because the School Board wildly wastes your money. That's fact. I own a house and pay taxes here, too. So do almost all my friends. That's why I spend so much time researching the tax implications of everything that reaches my desk.

There will always be people who disagree with me, but one thing I know with certainty is it's not because I don't do sufficient due diligence or because my math comes out wrong. Two plus two always equals four. I have put at least 1000 hours over two years doing due diligence on these matters, all of it on a strictly volunteer basis. I have listened to people who disagree with me very carefully throughout that process, calculator in hand. All of the above information is factual and I stand behind it 100%. It is why I think we should renovate now.

Steve Greenfield
New Paltz