Cuts to budget draw calls of sabotage from incoming board, residents

At the Nov. 17 Monroe Town Board meeting, Supervisor-elect Maureen Richardson accused the Republican board members - including Supervisor Anthony Cardone - of attempting to hamstring the incoming administration with last-minute cuts to several areas of the 2026 town budget, which was approved by a three-two vote, by the Republican-majority board.

Richardson, along with fellow Democratic councilwoman Mary Bingham and newly elected councilpersons Luis Rivera and Beth Stephens, questioned the timing of the changes and speculated they were retaliatory actions against the new board.

“This is an inappropriate budget. It’s a lame duck budget,” said Richardson. “We’re going to do our best regardless to try to serve the public with what we are left with.”

Though Richardson had the support of Bingham, their two votes were not enough to overcome the majority of Cardone, Councilwoman Dorey Houle and Councilman Sal Scancarello, who voted no on most of the incoming Supervisor’s efforts to restore the budget to the Nov. 6 preliminary version.

Among Richardson’s blocked efforts were her attempt to restore $750,000 that was budgeted for police services. She said that even if the town was not continuing negotiations with the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, the elimination of the funds leaves no money for a police assessment study. During the board comment period, Houle said that money was removed because it was tied to a potential contract with the OC Sheriff, which the residents made clear they did not want the town to pursue. She added that the town was still in negotiations with the village for police services and didn’t want to add funding to the budget before getting a breakdown of the village’s proposed price of $2.1 million.

Richardson also failed to get the votes to restore stipends and salaries for certain town positions including the salary of the Secretary to the Supervisor, which was reduced by $10,000 in the current budget. Houle said that the reduction in salary reflects the level of experience of whomever may come in to replace the person currently in that role. Richardson disagreed, and said she felt reducing this and other salaries hinders the incoming board’s efforts to hire qualified replacements with comparable experience. In addition, Richardson said the new budget’s reduction in health insurance funding would leave the town vulnerable as costs in this area continue to rise. Cardone and Houle argued that the amount was sufficient based on employee trends.

Richardson sought to restore the Budget Officer stipend from zero back to $18,500. She said that while this was traditionally given to the Supervisor, it could be reappropriated for another budget or another consultant on budget matters.

Along with questioning why certain compensation was reduced or eliminated from the current budget, Richardson speculated that certain increases in salary were politically motivated. Richardson pointed to the Highway Secretary’s base salary increase by $5000 and a refuse stipend increase of $4000, raising their total compensation by 20 percent. Richardson claimed this employee received a 20 percent raise last year.

During public comments, residents expressed their concern over the changes made to the budget and the lack of input from the public and accused the town’s current Republican board members of trying to sabotage the incoming board.

Stephens, who was elected to serve a four-year term on the Town Board, addressed the outgoing members of the board, claiming they were hurting the people of Monroe and would be remembered for their last-minute changes to the budget instead of any of the work they did throughout their tenure as elected officials.

“I had hoped that there would be some opportunity to work across the aisle. You showed something different tonight. I wish there was a way that I could say, let’s do another public hearing. Let’s try and bring [the budget] back to the table,” Stephens said. “But yes, it’s due to the comptroller in three days. So, this is your legacy.”