Murray resident believes water districts have been overcharged

Editor:

The national political landscape is changing and Town of Murray taxpayers have taken notice. Our town hall is full for meetings and it’s the place to be on the 2nd Tuesday of every month at 7 p.m.

People are participating. And for good reason.

The 2014 NYS Comptroller audit revealed significant problems with capital project activity and use of certain debt proceeds. In other words, the loans that were supposed to pay for your water lines were used for other purposes.

The report went on that the town does not create proper financial statements and cannot evaluate its true financial condition or effectively monitor the Town of Murray’s financial operations.

As a result, the town has broken its agreements on the water districts and violated Local Finance Law. But in the Town of Murray its business as usual. According to our Supervisor, “We regret that the State does not like the way we choose to do business in Murray. It works for us.”

Now it’s apparent that the town has been overtaxing its water district residents for years. The special district tax on your bill is for the principal and interest on the loan to pay for the water line infrastructure, nothing else.

According to the 2016 Town Budget you have been over taxed $63,142.00 and over the past 4 years it appears to be $286,000.00. How far back do you want to look? It also appears that the money is no longer in the funds. Where’d it go?

Taxpayers deserve answers. The board must look into this more in depth and I hope our town supervisor will step up to the plate and be cooperative and transparent. I have requested an explanation at the April Town meeting. Come to the meeting.

Joe Sidonio
Town of Murray