LI fire districts hold public budget hearings

BY LAURA ALBANESE | laura.albanese@newsday.com

October 17, 2007

Fire districts across the Island opened up their yearly budgets to public scrutiny for the first time last night to mixed results - with some districts attracting dozens of participants and others attracting none.

More than 40 people attended the hourlong public budget meeting in Gordon Heights, a district that boasts the highest fire tax on Long Island, said Gina Previte, a Medford resident who pays $2,519 annually.

In the past, Previte said, budget information wasn't always readily available. She said the public hearing was a small step in the right direction for a community that "can't afford to stay , but can't afford to leave."

"Everyone here is feeling very burdened," Previte said, and a number of them, like Rosalie Hanson, also of Medford, planned to use their allotted time to air out grievances.

In Massapequa and Wantagh, it was another story. There, the meetings, which consisted of detailed PowerPoint presentations on yearly expenditures, lasted 15 minutes with nearly no comments. Six people attended the meeting at Wantagh, whose district covers 11.5 square miles and has a budget of more than $6 million. No non-fire personnel attended the meeting in Massapequa.

Though the turnout was small, transparency was the ultimate goal, said Wantagh Fire Commissioner Craig Craft.

"We're out there protecting our residents, and certainly our residents are entitled to see how their money is being spent," he said.

Districts were required to publicize the hearings' date on all town and fire Web sites and on signs in front of town halls and firehouses, the result of a new state law that requires increased transparency on how districts spend their money.

The meetings, which were set to occur on the same night at all of Long Island's 867 districts [CORRECTION: There are 179 fire districts and departments on Long Island. The number was incorrect in a story yesterday. PG. A19 NS 10/18/07], will improve the districts' relationships with local communities, said William N. Young, counsel for the Association of Fire Districts of the State of New York, a group that supported the legislation to have the hearings.

"The public will see that what we do is in their best interests ... and that [the money] all goes back into the community," Young said.

Still, he conceded, there would be growing pains.

"This is definitely a work in progress," he said, adding that the idea took some getting used to for much of Long Island's mostly volunteer force.

"People were like, 'How come? We're volunteers. Why do we have to do this?'" Young said. But after a series of meetings explaining the changes, many had changed their minds, he said.

"While they're not universally embracing this transparency, the majority [are]," Young said. And as districts acclimate to the change, their abilities to "handle these types of hearings will only improve as we go along," he said.