POUGHKEEPSIE – The Budget and Finance Committee of the Dutchess County Legislature has started the ball rolling on a memorializing resolution asking the state to pay for mandates.
Dutchess lawmakers noted that 70 percent of the county’s annual budget is comprised of unfunded mandates.
Republican Legislator Angela Flesland told her colleagues during Thursday’s committee session that it is unfair to continue to force localities to foot the bill.
“Obviously everyone agrees that welfare protection and the other things listed here are critical to the safety of our residents, but that being said, we need some help from New York State and it’s only going to happen when Albany stands up to this issue of unfunded mandates”, Flesland said. “It’s not fair to counties that they continue to push them on us.”
The full Dutchess County Legislature is expected to adopt the memorializing resolution to send to Albany at its next meeting.