The fiscal condition of two southeastern St. Lawrence County townships is rated as “susceptible to fiscal stress” under a monitoring program by the state comptroller.

Clare and Clifton are in the category of “susceptible to stress,” a “caution” ranking that indicates some potential difficulty in finances.

Two other categories indicate a higher potential for trouble, “significant stress” and “moderate stress.” No municipalities in the county have been placed in those. There are three cities, five townships, and four counties, including our neighbor to the east, Franklin County, in the significant and moderate stress categories.

Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli’s monitoring system uses indicators in five financial categories: year-end fund balance, operating deficits, cash position, use of short-term debt, and trends in “fixed” costs; and eight of what they call environmental indicators: population change, population age factors, poverty rates, property values, the employment base, state and federal aid and changes to them, legal tax limits, and sales tax receipts.

Today’s report covers over 1,000 of New York's counties, towns and villages.

Municipalities not included in today’s report are either under review or, such as St. Lawrence County and the towns of Hermon and Rossie, have not yet reported relevant data to the comptroller.