With the type of drama that is often involved in the selection of a new pope (candidates unknown and lots of secrecy but in this case no white smoke), the Board of Directors of the Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corporation (WROTBC) has selected Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown as its new President and Chief Executive Officer. Assuming contract negotiations are worked out, the decision ends one of the most protracted public job searches in the region's history.
It turns out that City Hall is nix on six (terms). The Mayor is trading in his control of city government with its 3,300 employees and $631 million budget for a relatively small public agency with about 550 employees and 2024 operating expenses of about $37.5 million. Instead of dealing with the myriad of constituencies competing for his attention and city funds Brown will only need to deal with customers whose biggest decision may be whether to bet on a horse race or play the slot machines.
You might ask, why leave all that power? It's simple:
- Way less stress
- Way more salary (The advertised salary range is $280,000 to $320,000)
Plus the Mayor via the City Charter is able to hand off the office to his friend, South District Councilmember and current Council President, Chris Scanlon. In Brown's successful write-in re-election effort in 2021 Scanlon moved heaven and earth to return him to office for a fifth term.
Whatever date is selected for the handoff of the keys to City Hall, rumored to be in early October, Scanlon will walk into an impending financial crisis like no other that the city has ever faced. At a minimum the city government will need to come up with at least $46 million in new revenues for the next fiscal year starting July 1, 2025. Because of the way in which revenues were overestimated and certain expenses underestimated the problems will become evident over the next several months, affecting the current budget too. Because of the holes that will occur in the current budget it is probable that the city administration will use additional remaining federal pandemic funds to fill the gaps, making next year's problems even worse.
As a loyal ally of Brown since he joined the Council in 2012 Scanlon repeatedly voted in favor of past budgets that set the stage for the impending disaster. That problem will affect him right into next June, which happens to be when the Democratic primary for mayor will occur. The recent changes in the budget preparation schedule approved by the Common Council move up several key dates in the process, leaving Scanlon having to maneuver around a variety of treacherous milestones along the way.
It is likely that the city will have to come up with $55-60 million dollars in new revenues or spending cuts to balance the 2025-2026 budget. The state Legislature already turned down a Brown administration request for a hotel occupancy tax and the Council rejected increases in parking rates. Every ten million dollars increase in property taxes would need a nearly six percent increase in the property tax levy. Multiply that times five or six – ouch!
In the face of such issues the Niagara County representative to the OTB Board, Elliott Winter, gave an interesting interview. Winter talked about what a tremendous job Brown had done as mayor over the past 19 years. Then Channel 2's Nate Benson asked the million 60-million-dollar question: what about the budget hole that Brown is leaving for the next mayor? About 10 seconds of silence was followed by, "I have no other comments."
In his new role Brown also has some issues to deal with. The Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corporation has been racked by investigations and scandals of all sorts in recent years. In no particular order those issues include excessive pay and benefits for the agency's executives; questionable marketing issues concerning the use of luxury box football and hockey tickets; and favoritism in selecting services and contractors. All of the current betting parlors have been losing money for many years, essentially leaving those locations as make-work projects for people who are favored with employment. All of these issues cost the member counties and cities of the Corporation real money every year. Will President Brown dig into the needed reforms?
And then there is the Buffalo politics side of the mayor taking a new job. Scanlon will obviously run for election next year. Will he inherit the business community support that assisted Mayor Brown all these years, even as the city is collapsing financially? State Senator Sean Ryan is a potential candidate next year. Expect at least one Black candidate to enter the race, possibly including the newest city Councilmembers, Zeneta Everhart and Leah Halton-Pope. Candidates other than Scanlon should be expected to explain their proposed solutions to the city's financial crisis.
As of last July Scanlon had $126,000 in his campaign treasury. Ryan reported $276,000. Brown's number was $193,000. Will Brown try to shift some of that money to Scanlon's campaign?
It's always good to have more money in your campaign account than your opponent but that factor doesn't always win an election. The city's impending crisis will be peaking next spring just as the mayoral campaign heats up. The question of how the public might support certain solutions proposed by the candidates to resolve the city's financial problems going forward could become a dominant and potentially determining factor in the primary election.
One final point. As previously reported in this blog, the Buffalo Fiscal Stability Authority has a major role it can play in dealing with the city's impending financial crisis. At the moment the Authority has done nothing except watch and offer some budget analysis. The Authority's Board is hamstrung by the fact that there are four vacancies (appointments of the governor), and one of the current five members is the mayor, who certainly won't want the Authority stepping into the picture. The Authority is scheduled to meet on September 23. What happens then? Stay tuned.
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