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As the region’s economy slows, a windfall of surprisingly high tax receipts over the past several years should give county leaders plenty of flexibility to avoid sticking property owners with higher tax bills—if officials and citizens focus attention on drawing down the large, available cash reserves.

A survey of financial data from 22 counties in and around our region demonstrates that many of them, including Columbia and Dutchess, have built up enough of a financial cushion to offset a sharp decline in sales tax receipts and cover higher operating costs for at least the next few years without imposing higher levies.

As detailed in the Budget Scorecard Database, Columbia County has the most leeway of six counties in the mid-Hudson Valley with which to fill budget gaps in 2008 and beyond. Greene and Dutchess counties also have sizable excess “fund balances,” while Ulster, Putnam and especially Rensselaer have much smaller surplus reserves as a portion of their sales tax receipts.

The specific dollar amounts freely available to a given county are hard to derive from the data, obtained from the Office of the State Comptroller (OSC) for the 2007 calendar year, without a case-by-case analysis.

In Dutchess County, as an example, $25 million of its $81 million stated surplus in 2007 was reserved for capital projects that are still in the bidding or building stages, according to County Comptroller Diane Jablonski. But at least $33 million of the total is both “undesignated” and “unreserved,” and could be drawn on to offset budget shortfalls in lieu of raising property taxes or other levies at the discretion of the county’s legislature and executive. An additional $17 million of the $81 million total has already been reserved to offset future general expenses and Medicaid claims, Ms. Jablonski added.

To take the case of Dutchess County a step further, assume that retail sales activity– and corresponding tax receipts– drop from their record 2007 level by 10% this year. In Dutchess, among the counties most dependent on sales taxes to fund their operations, budget revenues would decline by about $12 million. Rather than rely on a property tax increase or other offsetting revenues, the county could draw on its $33 million free fund balance, and possibly other surplus accounts, and cover the lower level of sales tax receipts for nearly three years, all else being equal.

In Columbia County, which relies much more than Dutchess on property taxes to fund its budget, a 10% decline in sales taxes would reduce county revenues by only $2 million, compared to its free fund balance of over $20 million. With a ten-year coverage ratio, Columbia boasts one of the most over-funded balance sheets among all 22 counties in our sample. (See Tables 2, 3 and 4 in our on-line Budget Scorecard Database for a full ranking of sales and property tax coverage.)

Evaluating a county’s ability to withstand budget shortfalls also entails an analysis of its debt levels and capacity to borrow in order to supplement its funding. Again, Columbia has the most room to borrow among the six mid-Hudson counties, with Dutchess and Greene counties in reasonably sound shape to increase debt levels. Putnam, Rensselaer and, especially, Ulster already have debt levels per capita substantially above the average of our 22-county sample, though they are well below the legal limit for municipal borrowing.

Drawing on the unreserved fund balances could cause concern among municipal bond rating agencies, which may raise borrowing costs for a county if its overall financial health appears significantly weakened by the draw-down. County leaders need to weigh the possible impact on their credit rating against providing substantial property tax relief for their citizens as the boom years of plentiful revenues come to a close.

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Now in its fourth year of a public review led by the Pine Plains Town Planning Board, the Durst development remains a long way from approval, but recent statements from the developer, town officials and citizen leaders opposing the plan suggest that a much smaller, more compact subdivision could be up for final consideration by early next year.

At a town planning board meeting on June 4, new consultants representing the Durst family– multi-billionaire owners of several prominent Manhattan skyscrapers—offered to redesign the “golf-oriented” subdivision by substantially reducing the number of homes and conserving various ecological and visual features of the 2,200-acre site straddling the Taconic State Parkway just below the Columbia County line.

Critics of the initial proposal, which would likely inflict severe damage on the town’s taxpayers, school system and rural character, voiced cautious optimism.

“It’s a big step forward from where we’ve been,” said John Lyons, attorney for Pine Plains United, a citizens group which has spear-headed opposition to the original 1,000-unit plan. “The next step will be to see whether they walk the walk. If they do, there can’t help but be significant positive changes to the original plan.”

The Dursts decided to scale back their ambitions, suggested Pine Plains United Co-Chairman Jim Mara, under pressure from widespread opposition voiced at a series of public hearings on the development over the past two years.

“They had to come up with a new plan because they got hammered: hammered by the public, hammered by Pine Plains United, hammered by experts from Scenic Hudson and the Dutchess County Planning Department,” Mr. Mara said.

Forecasting how many homes will eventually rise on the bucolic site of the former Carvel estate is complicated by efforts in Pine Plains to adopt a complex zoning ordinance now under consideration by the five elected members of the town board. The final zoning ordinance will be instrumental in determining how many homes can be approved by the town’s planning board and what concessions Durst will have to make towards preserving the area’s rural character, ecological resources and fiscal stability.

Pine Plains Town Supervisor Gregg Pulver, who said his town board has “every intention of approving a final ordinance, with plenty of opportunity for public input, by October,” has suggested 500 homes as a desirable target.

“We’ve never given the developers any indication,” said Pulver, “that we would support anything more than the proposed zoning ordinance would allow, around 500 units, which comes to a roughly four-acre density out there… We’d want to combine that with 50-55% open space, but true open space, not lawns and gardens, that would be open to public access.”

Pine Plains United’s Mara asserts that 500 homes is too many and that the zoning ordinance, as originally submitted to the Town Board after lengthy public review, would allow far fewer.

A total number of 200-300 units in Pine Plains and the adjacent town of Milan “is probably a number we would be open to, depending on how the subdivision is laid out on the site and how it addresses sensitive environmental features and the many other concerns voiced by the public,” said Mr. Mara.

Beyond the housing density and the environmental protections, Supervisor Pulver is wary of what could happen to the property if Durst, after winning approval for a specific project, changes his game plan or sells the property to a mass-market home builder keen to maximize short-term profit.

“My concern,” the supervisor said, “is that they start building the project and then they realize that the golf facilities are not going to attract the buyers they anticipate, and they try to come back for more lots than we’ve approved… There are going to be some intense negotiations to guarantee that what they say they’re going to build is what they end up building.”

The coming months are certain to see a slew of public hearings and debate on the specifics of the town’s final zoning ordinance and on the details of the Dursts’ revised subdivision plan.

As to whether we can expect Durst and company to be breaking ground next spring on a 300 unit subdivision that all sides can accept, Pine Plains United’s attorney Lyons concluded, “I don’t think things are advanced yet to the point where you can say anything so specific.”

The county’s Industrial Development Agency (IDA), in its April vote to reject the Widewaters Group’s request for substantial tax relief, cited various deficiencies in the developer’s application, including the lack of signed leases with specific retail chains and scant evidence that the tax benefits would be passed on to those retailers in the form of lower rents. But the IDA board members, appointed to boost the county’s economy by granting tax incentives and other subsidies, failed to make use of the most basic financial tool that any businessman or government official would be expected to rely on: a “cost-benefit analysis” to quantify the dollar amount of requested tax relief and to analyze the financial benefits that the developer claims his shopping center will produce.

With the IDA offering to reconsider subsidies for Widewaters once leases are signed, and with the developer and the Wal-Mart Corporation likely to seek other tax incentives for the project, it seems timely to offer our own analysis as guidance for officials evaluating public subsidies, for residents who could benefit from thoughtful incentive programs and for local business owners who could suffer unfair competition if the incentives are not carefully crafted.

Estimating the cost of Widewaters’ requested tax relief is fairly straightforward, despite the lack of sufficient data in the developer’s filings with the IDA. Based on our research and discussions with Widewaters, the proposed tax savings—a combination reduced property taxes, elimination of the county mortgage recording tax and a waiver on sales tax for construction materials used in the build-out—would amount to around $3 million over five years.

The county and the Hudson Central School District would each shoulder about $1 million of the subsidies, while the Town of Greenport would give up tax revenues of about $750,000.

Estimating the fiscal benefits of the giant retail project is more difficult, but they are unlikely to be anywhere near as large as the developer has suggested. In filings with the IDA, Widewaters claims the completed shopping complex will generate $185 million of additional sales each year. Excluding the Wal-Mart superstore, which was not part of the IDA application as Wal-Mart itself will construct and own the building, the sales estimated by Widewaters for the center come to $130 million.

The evidence from big-box retail developments in rural areas, however, indicates that 85-90% of sales at the center will cannibalize business from existing retailers now operating in and around the county. In other words, net new sales would account for only $20 million, excluding Wal-Mart, yielding the county and its municipalities no more than $800,000 in additional annual sales tax proceeds, compared to the $3 million in tax subsidies requested over five years.

Widewaters believes that 85-90% of the center’s revenues, including Wal-Mart’s, will be new sales, implying that the retailers will generate some $160 million in new spending and purchases that shoppers now make in other nearby counties. Such a large addition to Columbia’s total sales tax base of $500 million seems a stretch, and it would require every household in the county to find an additional $6,500 per year to spend at the Widewaters plaza,

The developer’s claim that its tenants will “create” over 950 full-time jobs is also inconsistent with retail industry trends. The vast majority of new jobs in regions like Columbia with low unemployment rates are typically filled by workers from existing businesses.

“That was the issue that bothered me most,” said County Board of Supervisors Chairman Art Baer, who opposed granting the Widewaters tax package. “If they had a national hardware store chain as a tenant, they may be replacing the job of a guy who is making $16 an hour plus benefits at a local hardware store with a job paying $10 an hour with no benefits at the big chain store. Then he can’t afford to live where he’s living and the local store loses the sales.”

Complementing the cost-benefit comparison of tax incentives– the $3 million subsidy vs. $800,000 in new annual county sales tax proceeds—is the analysis of other potential costs and benefits of such huge project. As Widewaters’ representatives have stressed, the completed plaza, even after incentives, will generate substantially more property tax revenues than the now vacant site on Fairview Avenue. However, numerous studies have concluded that the costs of providing basic police, fire, and highway services to a big-box center like Widewaters’ far outstrip the additional tax revenues the shopping plazas typically generate.

In our testimony last year to the Greenport Town Planning Board—which approved Widewaters’ development without retaining any experts to analyze its fiscal impacts—we concluded that the costs of meeting the center’s needs would exceed additional town tax revenues by some $350,000, or 20% of the town’s 2007 property tax levy.

The county IDA has signaled a willingness to reconsider tax breaks for Widewaters as leasing activity progresses. Wal-Mart and Widewaters are both likely to apply for property tax abatements under a separate state program that encourages counties, towns and school districts to subsidize commercial expansion. Before reviewing any of these applications, officials authorized to fund the incentives with taxpayer money would be wise to bone up on the basics of cost-benefit analysis.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the Planning Board:

The Durst Organization has produced for you a labyrinth of numbers in its 1,500-page Environmental Impact Statement, all of which paint a glowing portrait of an environmentally sensitive, financially beneficial windfall for our rural communities.

I would like to focus your attention on ten simple, common-sense numbers which, when studied along with supporting data I will submit later, should help to convince you that the Carvel Development will not look anything like the upscale golfing resort proposed and that it could well become a financial disaster for the town, its property owners, its local businesses and the Pine Plains Central School District.

The first set of numbers concerns the claim made by Durst and his team that they have identified a market for 1,000 homes to be sold to affluent, avid golfers and resort lovers, mostly from the New York metropolitan area.

THIRTY-THREE PERCENT: The decline in the numbers of Americans who played golf at least twice a month from 2000 to 2005. In other words, overall demand for golfing and golf-oriented communities has plummeted by one-third.

THREE THOUSAND TWO HUNDRED: The number of new homes surrounding golf facilities, including the Durst application, that are currently proposed for construction within 40 miles of Pine Plains. In other words, even if there were growing demand for golf resorts, every home Durst puts on the market will likely be competing with two other very similar units only a short drive away.

SIXTY-TWO DEGREES FARENHEIT: The average high temperature, from November to March, for the six golf communities that Durst and his partner, Landmark Land, identify in their impact statement as “comparables” for Carvel. The average high temperature in winter at the other 11 resorts that Landmark is managing, but which were not included in the filings, is 68 degrees. The average high winter temperature for Pine Plains: 37 degrees. If there are truly comparable developments for what Durst is proposing, we have not seen them.

EIGHT-HUNDRED-THOUSAND DOLLARS: The median home price Durst is seeking for his 1,000 units and the basis of his calculations for property tax revenues contributed to the town and school district by the Carvel Development. The 2007 median home price in Dutchess County was $330,000, 60% less.

ZERO: The number of development projects outside of New York City that the Durst Organization has completed. Zero is also the number of golf communities that Landmark Land has designed and built out to completion.

Faced with collapsing demand, exploding supply, no comparable projects and no proven track record, how can anyone expect that Durst will deliver an upscale golf community in a climate like ours with homes priced at two-to-three times the going rate?

If the development will not be what they claim, what might it actually look like instead? If the last 60 years of history in the Hudson Valley is any guide, these 1,000 lots, if approved, will attract middle-class families moving in from cities and suburban areas in order to find more affordable housing, quieter communities and better public schools for their children.

Unless the history of our region is about to change drastically, here then are two key numbers to highlight the impact our new neighbors could have.

ONE-POINT-THREE-FIVE: That is how many students enrolled in the nearby Arlington school district for every new house built there during the mid-1990s when the area experienced a housing boom, spurred by in-migration. It is a number that many other school administrators have described as conservative, and it is also supported by data from other fast-growing school districts in the mid-Hudson Valley. If the same enrollment ratio holds for Carvel, it will equate to 1,350 new students attending the Pine Plains public schools, or nearly double the 1,400 students enrolled in the district last year.

ONE-THOUSAND-NINE-HUNDRED DOLLARS: The average increase in school taxes for each home in the district necessary to cover the annual deficit created by adding those 1,350 students.

I understand the community’s concern that recent declines in school enrollment may continue. There is plenty of opportunity for growth that will boost enrollment. The question is how much you want, how quickly and at what cost. Doubling the student body with one subdivision over a five- or ten-year period hardly seems an attractive solution.

One last set of numbers, which shows who stands to win if this development is approved and who, along with the taxpayers, will likely be the big losers.

EIGHTY MILLION DOLLARS: The estimated profit that Douglas Durst stands to make if he were to sell the 1,000 approved lots at Carvel before putting a single shovel in the ground. You can’t blame him if he concludes his resort plan is not viable and decides to sell out the unfinished building lots, but you needn’t feel any sympathy for him either.

ONE-HUNDRED-AND-FIFTY-THOUSAND SQUARE FEET: A rough guess of how much retail space will be needed to meet the local shopping needs of the 2,500 or so new residents at Carvel. “Good for our local businesses,” you might say. But, again if history is a decent guide, most of this new space will not be developed in the middle of town but in strip centers along Route 199. These retail centers typically attract national and regional chains like Hannaford’s, CVS, Applebee’s, and Ace Hardware with their strategy of under-pricing local merchants in order to drive them out of the market for good. Such a rapid increase in new homes located so far from the central hamlet will likely to put an end to Duell’s Hardware, Pine Plains Pharmacy, Peck’s Market and other business stalwarts of the town.

TWO HUNDRED: The total number new homes built in the ten towns of Northern Dutchess County in a strong year for housing. The Carvel proposal, in other words, will flood the market with a five-year supply of building lots that will dramatically reduce the selling prices of existing homes and raw land for miles around. If that’s not a confiscation of private property rights from all of us who own property in the area, I don’t know what is.

So, members of the Planning Board, these are ten numbers that suggest there could be severely negative financial impacts from the Carvel Development as currently proposed. I cannot ask you to accept my numbers as the only, or even the best, estimate of what the future will bring. But I urge you to accept them as a realistic and carefully researched financial scenario of what could indeed happen here. And if you do accept the possibility of a financial outcome very different from what Durst predicts in his filings, then you must take steps to ensure that the town is not left holding the bag if his estimates prove to be wildly optimistic.

You can and should request that Mr. Durst put his money where his mouth is by posting a bond large enough to mitigate the financial impacts on the town and the school district should his resort community in fact turn out to be just another sprawling subdivision of new families whose demands for public services will far exceed their property tax payments.

You can and should insist that if he is going to take such huge profits out of your town, he does not do so at the expense of the town’s property owners and businesses. Restrict the number of lots and houses he can sell in a given year. Make him pay for new fire trucks, highway equipment and school buildings should the need arise. Make him provide affordable housing for qualified town residents. Make him help revitalize local businesses in the hamlet. In short, make him mitigate the potentially dire impacts of his development so that whatever you approve on the Carvel property is consistent with the goals set out in your town’s Comprehensive Plan.

No one can ask you to stop development in the town, only to anticipate and mitigate potential problems so that the worst case scenario does not become a reality.

Sincerely,

James Sheldon
Gallatin, NY

One of the mass mailings invites us as “dear neighbors” to “meet the Durst family,” and in this and future postings we hope to get to know the Dursts, not their soothing, sepia-toned portraits gracing the brochures, but their capabilities, their character and their business strategy.

Our first link, Dear Mr. Durst, is a letter we wrote to the company’s CEO in 2005 asking him to explain why “a man of your environmental vision, tremendous wealth and civic generosity” would stake his reputation on a development whose likely legacy will be to “turn our rural way of life into the next front line of suburban sprawl.” The letter remains unanswered, as do the questions it raised, leaving us little choice but to assume that this man with a personal fortune estimated at over $2 billion simply wants to pocket another $100 million or more at our expense.

There is another member of the Durst “family,” one who has been omitted from any mention in the brochures: Durst’s primary planning, construction and marketing partner, the Landmark Land Company, which we profile in a summary of our own research, based on publicly available sources. Landmark, the reincarnation of a bankrupt savings & loan, appears to have plenty of experience in real estate speculation but virtually none in developing from scratch a project of this scale in a snow-belt region.

Also included in the Landmark report is a brief outline of the U.S. golfing industry, which raises further questions about Mr. Durst’s ability, or his intention, to market the Carvel development as an upscale, second-home golfing resort.

We end this installment of our “Durst Watch” with a letter from the Dutchess County Department of Planning and Development which takes the Durst team to task for the “disturbing incongruity” between the environmentally sensitive wonderland described in their public filings and the destructive, sprawling behemoth they are asking for approval to build. “Clearly,” the county’s letter states, “many portions of what is being proposed is not green development, but ‘greenwash.’”

Our first piece on the costs of growth, a 2005 column entitled Once Upon A Time…, raises the central questions that residents of Pine Plains and neighboring towns must grapple with in order to make informed decisions on the Durst proposal. The next coulmn, Lessons From Our Neighbors , draws on our own extensive research into the nearby Dutchess County school district of Arlington, which provides a compelling precedent for estimating the size of the school tax burden the Durst developers will likely leave behind as their most lasting financial legacy. A Small Number refutes the assumptions in the Durst team’s own analsyis of the project’s impact on school taxes. Finally, Battle of the Experts tries to cut through the contentious data dueling and underscore the irrefutable fact that “judging from development patterns in every other town in the Hudson valley, the costs of providing education and other public services are likely to be much, much greater than the additional tax revenues received.”

The dual perils of declining sales taxes, which comprise 30-50% of a county’s tax revenues, and a large backlog of urgent capital projects will likely put a growing burden on property taxpayers, especially in more heavily indebted counties that cannot borrow much money to fill the fiscal gap.

This is the most worrisome conclusion from our latest survey of 22 counties in and around the Hudson Valley, which draws on 2006 budget data compiled by the Office of the State Comptroller. Detailed comparisons of per capita levels of taxation, spending and indebtedness for all the sampled counties are available in our Budget Scorecard Database .

The region’s vibrant economy over the past several years has produced an unexpected windfall for county budget managers who rely on sales taxes and, in many cases, a levy on new mortgages to supplement property taxes as their primary source of revenues. Meanwhile, county officials have often been reluctant to spend tax dollars under a long-range plan for upgrading their aging infrastructure, preferring instead to wait until capital improvements become unavoidable. The combination of booming revenues and stingy spending have left many counties with large cash reserves, which can help to finance long-neglected investments in infrastructure projects.

The OSC data suggests there may be particular pressure to raise property taxes in three counties– Rensselaer, Broome and Livingston– where spending on capital improvements has been well below average for several years and debt levels, adjusted for cash reserves, are relatively high. Conversely, Greene, Delaware, Schoharie and Washington counties owed relatively little money, net of reserves, through 2006 and appear to have invested consistently in their public infrastructure.

In Columbia County, where taxes per resident are among the highest in the region, rapid growth in property taxes and debt over the past few years have created a sizable reserve fund. The fund, which amounted to over $26 million at the end of 2007, according to County Treasurer Kenneth Wilber, is nearly enough to cover the $30 million in capital improvements expected over the next three years, including a major expansion of the county’s courthouse and construction of a new headquarters for its Social Services department. Columbia’s below average indebtedness, even after a recent$7.5 million bond issue, gives the county some leeway to borrow additional funds if sales taxes and other revenues drop more drastically than anticipated.

Art Baer, the newly appointed Chairman of the Columbia County Board of Supervisors, hopes that the county’s large reserve fund and solid balance sheet will allow him to take a more considered approach to major spending decisions.

“I want to take a longer view of our capital requirements,” Mr. Baer said. “We have a number of large projects that we’re trying to prioritize and figure out how to fund them without resorting exclusively to property taxes.”

County leaders are in the early stages of developing a strategic plan to streamline financial operations and improve capital budgeting, Mr. Bear said, adding that “We want to produce a plan that minimizes property taxes while maintaining the level of services are residents have come to expect and deserve.”

Columbia is far from alone in its legacy of under-spending on capital improvements. Averaging OSC data on capital outlays for the five years from 2002-2006 indicates Columbia spent 36% less per resident than the average of the 22-county sample while Dutchess allocated 44% less money and Rensselaer 53% less than average on capital projects. Topping the list of apparent under-spending are the counties of Madison (78% less than average), Saratoga (70% less) and Broome (86% less). The highest capital budgets over the period came from Putnam (81% more than the average), Warren (121% more) and Delaware, which spent nearly four times the average per capita amount on infrastructure.

Rensselaer, with a relatively light tax burden, and Dutchess, where taxes per resident are about average, will both need to raise debt from 2006 levels in order to catch up with the capital spending patterns of their peers, the OSC data suggest.

The dual perils of declining sales taxes, which comprise 30-50% of a county’s tax revenues, and a large backlog of urgent capital projects will likely put a growing burden on property taxpayers, especially in more heavily indebted counties that cannot borrow much money to fill the fiscal gap.

This is the most worrisome conclusion from our latest survey of 22 counties in and around the Hudson Valley, which draws on 2006 budget data compiled by the Office of the State Comptroller. Detailed comparisons of per capita levels of taxation, spending and indebtedness for all the sampled counties are available in our Budget Scorecard Database .

The region’s vibrant economy over the past several years has produced an unexpected windfall for county budget managers who rely on sales taxes and, in many cases, a levy on new mortgages to supplement property taxes as their primary source of revenues. Meanwhile, county officials have often been reluctant to spend tax dollars under a long-range plan for upgrading their aging infrastructure, preferring instead to wait until capital improvements become unavoidable. The combination of booming revenues and stingy spending have left many counties with large cash reserves, which can help to finance long-neglected investments in infrastructure projects.

The OSC data suggests there may be particular pressure to raise property taxes in three counties– Rensselaer, Broome and Livingston– where spending on capital improvements has been well below average for several years and debt levels, adjusted for cash reserves, are relatively high. Conversely, Greene, Delaware, Schoharie and Washington counties owed relatively little money, net of reserves, through 2006 and appear to have invested consistently in their public infrastructure.

In Columbia County, where taxes per resident are among the highest in the region, rapid growth in property taxes and debt over the past few years have created a sizable reserve fund. The fund, which amounted to over $26 million at the end of 2007, according to County Treasurer Kenneth Wilber, is nearly enough to cover the $30 million in capital improvements expected over the next three years, including a major expansion of the county’s courthouse and construction of a new headquarters for its Social Services department. Columbia’s below average indebtedness, even after a recent$7.5 million bond issue, gives the county some leeway to borrow additional funds if sales taxes and other revenues drop more drastically than anticipated.

Art Baer, the newly appointed Chairman of the Columbia County Board of Supervisors, hopes that the county’s large reserve fund and solid balance sheet will allow him to take a more considered approach to major spending decisions.

“I want to take a longer view of our capital requirements,” Mr. Baer said. “We have a number of large projects that we’re trying to prioritize and figure out how to fund them without resorting exclusively to property taxes.”

County leaders are in the early stages of developing a strategic plan to streamline financial operations and improve capital budgeting, Mr. Bear said, adding that “We want to produce a plan that minimizes property taxes while maintaining the level of services are residents have come to expect and deserve.”

Columbia is far from alone in its legacy of under-spending on capital improvements. Averaging OSC data on capital outlays for the five years from 2002-2006 indicates Columbia spent 36% less per resident than the average of the 22-county sample while Dutchess allocated 44% less money and Rensselaer 53% less than average on capital projects. Topping the list of apparent under-spending are the counties of Madison (78% less than average), Saratoga (70% less) and Broome (86% less). The highest capital budgets over the period came from Putnam (81% more than the average), Warren (121% more) and Delaware, which spent nearly four times the average per capita amount on infrastructure.

Rensselaer, with a relatively light tax burden, and Dutchess, where taxes per resident are about average, will both need to raise debt from 2006 levels in order to catch up with the capital spending patterns of their peers, the OSC data suggest.