State Awards Town $500k Due to Financial Recovery Plan

East Hampton Town officials announced Wednesday that the state awarded the town $536,425 in recognition of its financial recovery plan. The money will be pumped back into the government's structure, as it is earmarked for a state-of-the-art, open-floor-plan workspace proposed for the old Town Hall building. 

The town government was restructured under Supervisor Bill Wilkinson's administration, which downsized 26 departments into 13 through retirement incentives and staff reductions, in response to the financial crisis inherited from Bill McGintee's administration in 2009.

Wilkinson said Wednesday that he aimed to right the town's finances by creating a more efficient and cost effective government. The recovery plan consisted of zero-based budgeting, "prudent deficit financing," streamlining functions, and introducing "personal accountablility and sale of surplus assets," such as the town's share of the Poxabogue Golf Center in Sagaponack, he said.

The result was $4.2 million in savings in 2010, $8 million over four years, and an 18 percent drop in the tax levy, officials said. 

"It's an unbiased, objective look at the work we did in East Hampton," Wilkinson said of the award, adding that receiving it is an example of "good governance transcending politics." He said the award should serve as "a psychic reward for employee participation in the process" over the past three-and-a-half years.

East Hampton is the only municipality in Suffolk County, and one of two on Long Island, to receive such funds. Nassau County will receive $5 million for its personnel reduction and precinct consolidation initiative in the county police department.

East Hampton will receive the half-million dollars over three years.

When the town applied for the award, it did so with the Town Hall project in mind. Charlene Kagel, the town's chief auditor, said the town received priority because the proceeds would be used toward "smart growth."

"We actually got the most we could get," Len Bernard, the budget officer, said Wednesday. The reward is based per capita.

The Department of State is issuing more than $12 million in Local Government Performance and Efficiency Program grant assistance that rewards local governments that undertook "significant and innovative actions that reduce the property tax burden confronting residents," the department said in a statement Wednesday.

"This program is an integral part of Governor Cuomo's agenda to improve efficiency and reduce costs at all levels of government," New York Secretary of State Cesar A. Perales said. "The governor is yet again applying a competitive process to stimulate creativity and innovation among decision makers, and the big winners are the taxpayers who will benefit from smart, cost savings investments in their communities' futures."

"Those efforts were not simply a snapshot in time; they continue every day," Wilkinson said.

The supervisor said he is looking forward to starting the project to restore the run-down old building with a new design concept, based on models in Europe. "This layout was rooted in the work of industrial engineers and efficiency experts," the town wrote in its application. "The town believes that creating a more conducive work environment will create greater work flow efficiencies and positively impact employee confidence levels," it said.

"It will be a real exciting project for me and the next administration to take over," Wilkinson said. He is not seeking re-election in November.

He believes an open space concept will blend well with teamwork, and will better serve the mobile workforce. He envisions a long desk with workstations that shrinks the traditional individual workspace from 200 square feet to 75.

"That project dovetails nicely with this award," Bernard said.

"The whole campus is about efficiency," Wilkinson said, adding that the "value system approach" in 2010, just recognized by the state, "should still be here in 2018."