(Brenton’s Version)
The original budget the county executive handed to county council: JES Presents – Making Sense of Erie County Residents’ Dollars and Cents
Brenton’s Version (aka Brenton’s Spin): County Executive Davis Announces 2025 Budget Vetoes
A few takeaways–
He says that his economic development department is not a duplication of effort, despite the fact that there are a number of organizations in Erie County that are committed to economic development.
He says that the Human Resource Commission IS a duplication of effort, because Erie County residents can travel to Pittsburgh or Harrisburg, but he offers no solutions for transportation to Pittsburgh or Harrisburg. Not only that, but he gave the library collaboratory rooms to Gannon in the lease. People attempting to make Zoom calls instead of traveling will have no quiet space in which to do so.
He claims he doesn’t want to raise taxes. He raised them by 10.6% last year, and it didn’t seem to both him then. It seems like he’s running a re-election campaign instead of the county.
He insists he needs $2.5 million for an EMS authority to protect our “friends and neighbors.” $1.5 million in ARPA funds were given to Gannon for Project NepTWNE. There is no plan for this $2.5 million. It seems that some “friends and neighbors” are more important than others. A budget is a plan for spending. Seeing the budget for 2025 and how he can hand such a large chunk of money to Gannon, can anyone be confident in his planning skills for EMS?
He sees no issue in taking money from the reserve that was committed to the Erie County Community College. If he were allowed to do that (which he isn’t), it would force the taxpayers to then support ECCC if the fund is depleted.
He disagrees with council’s cutting the communications officer’s position because it’s become too political. During the snow emergency–when people need information–there were no updates to the county website. In fact, it hasn’t been updated since before the election.
One of the contentions of our lawsuit is that the country executive breeched his fiduciary duty to the taxpayers of Erie County. I guess you can say that he’s consistent.
Here’s a list of meetings for Thursday, December 5 Erie County PA:
3:30 Board of Elections Meeting
4:00 Erie County Council Finance and Personnel meeting
This meeting is for items on the agenda for the regular council meeting 12/10/24
5:00 Erie County Council Special Meeting on the budget (to consider overriding the vetoes)
Please attend if you can, or offer input to council: Stay Engaged.
“Now we got problems and I don’t think we can solve them.”
~Taylor Swift
Keep Our Library Public! 