City and school spending over the last five years has increased over $60 million. Spending has never been greater than $24 million over other similar time periods in the last 20 years.
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City and school spending over the last five years has increased over $60 million. Spending has never been greater than $24 million over other similar time periods in the last 20 years.
This spending does not include the millions of new tax dollars that will be required to bail out the school system for overspending $15 million in the salary budget for the last two years. A special state commission will decide that in the coming months. A supplemental tax increase could be part of the solution by the end of the summer.
The School Committee has been a total failure and will not take any accountability for this overspending, ignoring it like it does not exist and refusing to cut spending to balance the budget. Now along with the teacher’s union they are using the same old tactic of threatening to cut kids’ programs such as school sports to blackmail city officials into pouring millions more into the annual school budget.
On the city side, employee salary and benefits are increasing at an unsustainable rate. City debt will soon eclipse $1.3 billion. Warwick's credit rating will be slashed very soon, requiring millions more in borrowing costs, and the city will be $200 million over its borrowing limit with no room for future borrowing.
We heard at the budget hearing that it will cost taxpayers approximately $13.5 million a year for at least the next 20 years just to pay off the construction debt on the two new high schools. That is the equivalent to a 1½ maximum tax increase. It does not include any new taxes for continued city and school annual operational costs. This will result in hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars in cumulative new property taxes in the next three years for every homeowner and small business in the city.
A maximum tax increase produces approximately $9 million in additional revenue each year. Warwick has been on an unsustainable spending spree, averaging over $12 million a year in spending over the last five years. All this spending does not factor in the tens of millions of federal COVID dollars that the city and schools have also used to pay for operational expenses that now will need to be paid by increased property taxes.
Many will not be able to afford these tax increases, especially seniors on a fixed income. They will be forced to move out of the city, and the Warwick School Committee, most of the City Council and the Warwick teachers union don’t care.
Robert Cushman is a former Warwick city councilman and School Committee chairman.
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Straightnnarrow
Thank you Mr Cushman. City Hall continues to spend, spend, spend and the taxpayer will be on the hook with no relief in sight. The Federal, State & local governments are all on the same path to insolvency and they all need a DOGE exposure. A majority of the City Departments could and should be privatized. Will that solution be looked at by City Hall? Of course not, it is much better that we drive people from their homes and businesses, so tha City workers can remain on the "job" sucking at the taxpayer breast.
Friday, May 30 Report this
Straightnnarrow
Remember during the Wuhan virus calamity, our caring, doting Governor Raimondo separated "essential' workers from "non-essential workers" and decreed that all "non-essential" workers must stay at home without pay. Naturally, all State employees were deemed "essential" and none were laid off. We got her message: the private life is dead and only the PARTY will live.
Friday, May 30 Report this