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WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. -- The Westchester Government welcomed local municipality governments and school districts to learn about how cooperating with the county may help cities and towns save money and lower taxes at a County Center expo Tuesday.
Joseph Simoncini, the fleet director of automotive operations for Westchester, ran two Department of Public Works tables. The first table featured information about Westchester Educational Safety Training (WEST), which shares the countys research on new vehicles and automotive parts.
Everyone has some new snake oil. We dont test it because we dont really have the resources to do that," he said. "We make the manufacturers tell us about them and read studies. Right now the hot new item is police cars.
Ford Crown Victoria police cars are being discontinued, so many municipalities need to find an alternative. In addition to recommending the Caprice Chevrolet police patrol as a replacement, WEST writes the specs for cars and automotive parts on the county bidding system that many municipalities use and holds expos to explain new technology. The most recent such event at Playland attracted more than 50 municipalities from three states.
The Department of Public Works has also spent the past decade cutting its carbon footprint down by 35 percent, which earned the department an award from the National Association of Counties. Simoncini said the department is prepared to help other localities retrofit older vehicles with more environmentally friendly features mandated by the Clean Air Act.
The Department of Public Works and 15 other programs attracted municipal leaders, including Michael Blau, the Tarrytown Village administrator.
Its good to see what the county has to offer, said Blau. Last year we received one of these packets, which had a lot of sharing opportunities we didnt know about.
Blau said Tarrytown has enrolled in a program where the countys Taxi and Limousine Commission processes licenses for professional drivers.
Its going to free up one of our police sergeants. Hes responsible for detectives and for the taxis, Blau said of shifting the licensing responsibilities to the county, which will go into effect in 60 days. We werent generating much money from it. We charged $75 for a three-year license.
Tarrytown hopes continuing to rely on the county for hazardous material cleanups, professional drivers licensing and exploring new sharing programs will alleviate pressure on the village as it tries to keep its budget within the 2 percent property tax increase cap passed this summer.
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