To the Editor:

In a October 13 posting on NorthCountryNow, accompanied by the full letter to NorthCountryThisWeek in the October 10-16 edition, the St Lawrence County Democrat Committee released a letter expressing their opinions on the state of the county finances, sales taxes, tariffs , Iran war, SNAP and Medicaid. In the conclusion of the letter, it urges everyone to vote “blue”, vote Democrat.  The IRGC, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of Iran, also wants Americans to vote Democrat as well. Go figure…. The IRGC letter to the American public was a bit longer…26 pages. 

As a former SLC Legislator from 2011 to 2022, who held positions of Vice Chairman, Chairman of the Board, and Finance Chair for four years, I am well aware of the county’s finances, the earlier struggles, the hard choices and the decisions made to get our county out of the “financially distressed” category that the State Comptroller had assigned SLC. But first a little history is necessary. The Democrats took majority control of the legislature after the election of 2006. They started out 2007 with a new County Administrator  and a Fund Balance of over $22 million. A Fund Balance is basically the taxpayer’s unallocated savings account to have on hand for unexpected expenses, such as the ever present new mandates and cost shifting measures from Albany.

They, the Democrats, spent that savings account, expanded county government to where we had almost 1100 employees and took that $22 million Fund Balance to a negative $3 million dollars by the year 2014.  Under Democrat leadership, SLC was borrowing $10 million every year to cover payroll and emergency expenses and was forced to implement a hiring freeze.

Finally, you, the taxpayer, had enough and in the fall of 2014, you voted for a change and you elected financially responsible republicans , who had run their own businesses, who were financially literate, who had created private sector jobs and businesses. Immediately, we, the republicans hired a new County Administrator and gave strict instructions. First, we were not going to borrow $10 million ever again and secondly, we were going to reduce county taxes. The County Administrator, Ruth Doyle, got it done and continues to do an amazing job.

The rest is history. Republicans have reduced the county portion of your tax bill every year since 2015 with the exception of 2020 when we kept it the same as 2019 because of financially mixed messages from the state government. Today the Fund Balance is over $70 million which has allowed us to supplement state highway dollars to pave miles of additional roads, fund the construction of a new modern highway building to house and repair the equipment needed to take care of our 600 miles of road and almost 200 bridges. Numerous improvements have been made to your county facilities to improve productivity and create efficiencies, to ensure the health and safety of our excellent workforce that serves you. When my term ended in 2022, we had, through the efforts of our incredible County Attorney, Steve Button, cleaned up over 50 environmentally contaminated sites throughout the county and put them back on the tax rolls.

In summary, the Republican led majority has put SLC back into a financially stable position.  The Republicans will continue to provide for the most important needs of our county residents, regardless of their political affiliation. Those requirements are safe roads and bridges and public safety.

Vote “Red”, vote Republican.

Kevin Acres
Waddington