Report: Albany 2015 City Budget Drained Reserves

Shahinfar's 2015 year-end analysis expands on the findings of S&P Global Ratings, the Wall Street ratings firm that earlier this month dropped the city's bond rating amid concerns about vanishing reserves and a heavy reliance on unpredictable state bailouts. Shahinfar said the news isn't surprising but underscores Albany's long-standing argument that the state has an obligation to more fairly compensate the capital city for the state's vast tax-exempt landholdings. Albany last year failed to collect any of the $2 million in revenue budgeted from the new red-light camera program, which wasn't fully online until earlier this year, and a $5 million planned sale of 363 acres in Coeymans to the state never happened. [...] Sheehan last fall said the sale price would drop to $3.6 million, and it could fall further pending an appraisal by the state Department of Environmental Conservation. Because Sheehan did not budget the sale again this year, any money from it will be a bonus in the 2016 budget, Shahinfar said. [...] the firefighters union and some residents aggressively fought Sheehan's plan, leading to a deal in which the union agreed to reduce the number of firefighters who can take vacation at one time in exchange for keeping the ladder company open.