Only in Long Beach can a $107,000 fund balance (surplus) be considered a "fiscal crisis!"

Read the above carefully. The independent auditor reports that at the end of the budget year, there was a $107,000 remaining as a fund balance, otherwise known as a surplus, but the current administration calls it a "crisis" and the media completely eats it up! Yes, the rainy day funds from previous was spent; it was spent to offset tax increases on the already overtaxed homeowners in LB. The Republican Coalition used the "rainy day" fund for the rainy day called the "Great Recession." If the current economic collapse is not a rainy day one has to ask, how excatly does this inept administartion define a rainy day?

Here is the bottom line that is undisputed. At the end of the day, when all the books were closed and the budhet lines were checked and double checked by auditors, there was a $107,000 balance, that is a surplus. In a perfect world, at the end of the day, expenses should balance out with revenues- you should have a $0 balance- that is a perfectly balanced budget. LB had a $107,000 surplus! This shell game the administration is playinng is extremely dangerous, it hurts the repuatation of the city and it scares taxpayers. And the media's feeding into the frenzy is irresponsible.

The facts are the facts. Ask yourself, was there a fund balance at the end of the day or not? Yes there was! I'll take that in these tough economic times.

Lets get one thing straight, does the city have fiscal problems, absolutely- it exists at every level of government. My point is that this administration is blowing the situation completely out of proportion, exaggerating the situation, hurting our real estate values and our ability to borrow money. Its a shell game. It is the clubhouse demcorats attempt to lay the groundwork for a huge tax increase so they can hire more of their family and friends and implement their big government agenda at the local level.

After reading the past few articles on our fiscal death spiral I come to one conclusion. The same old Long Beach politics. It is pathetic that all of our past and current City Councils both republican and democrat can't get passed bashing each other, trying to make the other look bad in order to make themselves look Better. All the residents of Long Beach will judge the current administration on how well they serve on the City Council and the decisions they make on our behalf. So please everyone just stop the bashing try to be open minded and let's see what this NEW City Council can do for us.

Mr. Hennessy....the independent audit...hired by republicans...showed massive mis management of funds....lied to the residents...lied to Moodys....its criminal. Stop with your BS. If taxes have to be raised...its because of your cronies who set the stage. simple. In have nothing but respect for you and the work you have done. Stop defending those who did wrong...criminally wrong...just because they are your party. Let the Feds conduct their investigation and let the Dems try to fix LB...you guys certainly didnt.

Special agents from the US Attorneys' Office visited a number of City employees' homes this morning asking questions about corruption. This is starting to get very big.

Jimmy..Other municipalities like Rockville Centre , Garden City, Lynbrook, have all weathered the same storms yet their bond ratings are triple A plus. The fact is that you and your party pissed away millions and lied to Moody's about it. And along the way you wrecked the pd, fd, and the recreation dept. The Feds are coming.

its indictment day in Long Beach!

One's indicted this afternoon. There will be more.

Since when is a $100,000 end of the year fund balance a financial crisis?

Something does not ad up at all. Aren't we living in a recession? Shouldn't we be happy we have any money left at the end of the year? This is far better than communities around us. What am I missing here?

-confused or duped by the media and political spin

The thing that sticks with me- Long Beach has the honor of being one of 17 municipalities out of 10,000 to get such a huge downgrade by Moodys. Secondly- the auditor spoke about a "bond note" that the city had used- and stated that is something he has only seen twice and the ones who do it have seroius problems. Ladtly and most important- Jim Hennessey the poster child for the old administration is actually trying to defend his old buddies running the city into the ground.
I can only hope that the residents read his blogs and please, please remember them when they come out next year and try to make you think they did a good job.

TWO-FACE BANCHICK!!

Last night a woman went to the city council meeting. She said her name was Ruth Bernstein, but someone said that wasn't her her name-her real name is Ruth Banchick. She obviously a supporter of the new democrat council. She was calling on an FBI investigation of the previous council for mismanaging the city. Its funny though, where is she today? Where has she been since Fagan was arrested for stealing unemployment benefits? Why isn't she calling in the FBI to investigate this criminal? She is curiously very quiet! Funny, I also heard her son Aaron was one of the first people hired by the city manager as well! (What happened to friend and family she fought again- I guess her family is exempt). She is indicative of the two faced hypocrisy that this new administration stands for, and she and the rest of the clubhouse should be screaming bloody murder against how Fagan ripped off our taxpayer money. The Banchicks are an example of all that is wrong in America today!

Jimmy.. The City of Long Beach is self insured. That 8 million was there for that reason,
To pay out insurance claims. You and cronie Scofield blew the money now the Feds are on the way

Well if the city gets some money from the hotel....maybe they can go to lunch there!

The Hotel owes over $457K to the City of LB. A deadbeat of
Major proporations at the worst possible time.

Jimmy Hennessy - were you sworn in as "Jimmy" as in "I, Jimmy Carter do solemnly swear..."? My first re-election campaign advise, start using James. You sound like a dopey kid that doesn't know math and might lose millions of dollars should you ever get elected. Oh wait, you guys already did that. Secondly, get rid of that "Mr. Happy Guy" picture. Your harsh criticisms make you look two-faced. Third, keep a low profile. As in, don't chime in to patch so many years before running again. You are already coming across like the village idiot on some listener call in show. The truth here folks is that LB has been run by incompetents and crooks for most of it's life. We still elect people who have absolutely no business running a city. We elect firemen and lifeguards and people who failed in finance and politics elsewhere. We even have a school board that are spendthrifts, arrogant, and one doesn't even have a high school diploma. What do we expect the outcome to be? And Jimmy, the link to article on msn.com - really?. We have only a 100k in surplus and we used to have millions. We're not as bad off as Elkhart, Indiana. You win. Everybody dance now

Carol, my information is correct as per a personal visit to city hall tuesday at 3:00. Your saying they paid half thier debt within the last 36 hours ? Possible, but not likley. What is your source of information and when is it current as of ? You failed to say when and how much was alledegly paid. I doubt it.

The Allegrea is still in arrears on its taxes. Just looked them up. But so are 1,800 other Long Beach property owners. Some for ten years....

Iaocoom, thanks for that information. Do you have a current outstanding figure ? Then we will know if Carol is correct, or talking out of her third point of contact.

I think this city needs to abandon the City Council and go with a mayoral system. Enough is enough.

This financial crisis in LB made today's Wall Street Journal - here are some excerpts:

Long Beach: Small City, Big Fiscal Mess

“They systemically over-estimated revenues and under-budgeted expenses,” said Long Beach’s new city manager, Jack Schnirman, a Harvard-educated management consultant and former press aide to U.S. Sen. John Kerry.

To pay its bills, the city in December bailed itself out with a jolt of short-term borrowing, a signal to bond raters that Long Beach’s problems went far deeper than they had realized.

A few days later, Moody’s Investors Service downgraded Long Beach’s $48.3 million general obligation debt to its lowest investment grade, citing the city’s declining mortgage-tax revenues and soaring spending. Long Beach’s rating suffered one of the steepest plunges in the public-finance sphere.

“The position had gotten far worse than we had expected,” said a Moody’s analyst.

Schnirman said he’s going up against a “culture of spending and a lack of accountability.”

I hope Dotty doesn't raise prices for those delicious sweet potato fries

As predicted, the "independent" minded city manager Jack Shnirman hired long time Democrat Clubhouse member, committeeman and operative to work in the city. He has been hired in the Community Development office as a "community liaison." The Community Development office has historically be run with one person only. This hire adds another list to the family and friends broken promise of this "new" administration and it violates a "hiring freeze" that was announced on Tuesday (and enacted by the city council ) with the fiscal emergency resolution. Again, how can there be a "fiscal crisis" and yet the "new" democrats keep hiring there friends??

Mr. Hennessy, how would you suggest people interpret your posts? You have said in several posts since the election that you hope the new administration and city manager succeed. But then you bash them at every turn while their administration is in its infancy, before they have done much more than try to assess what they have inherited. Many recognize that your singular political view and unwavering party loyalty pushes you to defend the previous administration and to cast doubt on your political rivals currently in office. But…if this is even possible for you…take off your political glasses for a moment and think not as a local party leader, but as an average tax paying citizen of this city. What the citizens of this city want and need is good and efficient government. We want to know that our hard earned dollars that we pay in taxes are being spent wisely and effectively by our elected officials. Like those of us that have to balance our checkbook each month, we want our government to live within their means. Some of us don’t care what party a politician comes from. We put the well-being of the city above a political party. What is your top priority? Rather than working to get your candidates into office at any cost, can you refocus that energy to fixing our city’s problems? Is your party the only path to fixing our problems? Can you put the well-being of the city and its residents above your party?