A mixed metaphor is appropriate for Mayor Gina-Louise Sciarra’s budget proposal and much of what has been the financial behavior of the city government of Northampton over the last many years: If you slowly increase the heat, the goose that laid the golden egg won’t even know he’s being cooked.
This city government does not seem to recognize a relationship between its continually raising property taxes and citywide fees, and its impact on increasing commercial and residential rents in the city. As landlords feel the continuous upward pressure of their costs as imposed by the city, this increasing cost structure gets passed on to renters.
The impact is that rising rents make Northampton unaffordable both for businesses and residential renters. The empty storefronts downtown should make this obvious to the mayor and City Council. The latest example is that the prospective buyer for Ted’s Boot Shop was reported in this paper to withdraw the offer to keep this anchor business open due to the high rent.
I wonder if Easthampton will be getting a nice new shoe store.
City residents on fixed incomes are most at the mercy of the city’s profligacy.
And yet, the mayor offers a budget replete with new agenda programs such as the Climate Action Project Administration, which will only contribute to further bloating the costs that are killing the livability of the city. I’m sure that Northampton’s actions on the climate will be more than enough to offset the building of new coal plants in India and China.
And then there is the 200% increase in water and sewer rates that will be imposed on all city residents and businesses because of the departure of Coca-Cola. I would like more clarity on whether the 25% reduction in water and sewer use by Coca-Cola’s departure does not decrease overhead to the city.
The mayor also bemoans the high cost of overtime by our Police Department, which is reported to be short 21% of needed officers. It appears this was not anticipated by the City Council’s poorly thought out decision to defund the police by 20% just a few years ago in response to the pressure exerted by a few people on a public Zoom call.
Perhaps the mayor and City Council should rethink how their free-spending behaviors are turning the once vibrant downtown Northampton into a ghost town. I remember how mayor David Musante turned a tired old mill town into the thriving city we now take for granted. Our current city government needs to stop killing Northampton.
Jay Fleitman lives in Northampton.