Congressman Anthony Brindisi

Brindisi: My plan paves a way to keep city taxes from rising and it creates local trades jobs

State Assemblyman and NY-22 Congressional Candidate Anthony Brindisi, unveiled Part 1 of his Infrastructure plan for Binghamton and the Southern Tier today. Brindisi said this phase of the plan has one urgent focus before it becomes too late: keep city taxes from rising.

“Over the course of the summer, we have waited and waited for Congresswoman Tenney to lead the way to an infrastructure deal in DC, but we’re still waiting for all the results she promised during her campaign. To date, all we have seen is a radical plan that would actually raise Binghamton taxes, halt the paving of roads and the removal of blight, and decrease our chances at landing federal dollars for game-changing projects. It’s not only unfortunate it’s unacceptable,” said Brindisi. 

Brindisi’s first part of his infrastructure plan is on the heels of the recently released White House budget proposal that came earlier this summer and steamrolled the federal Department of Transportation’s budget with a whopping $16.2 billion cut. Brindisi said these billions of dollars in cuts stabs the Southern Tier and especially cities like Binghamton, right in the back. To boot, Brindisi’s announcement comes just one day after the president held an infrastructure press conference but yet presented no bill, no plan and no timetable at all. And on the heels of that press conference, Tenney continues to defend these cuts to critical infrastructure programs that would hit Binghamton taxpayers hard, while lining the pockets of Wall Street and hedge fund managers.

“That is why today, one day after we thought we were getting an infrastructure bill from the White House and didn’t, I am here exclusively in Binghamton saying: no more waiting,” Brindisi said. “I am immediately announcing Part 1 of my infrastructure plan here because there has been a real focus on repaving streets and remaking neighborhoods, and it is clear as day that if Congresswoman Tenney gets her wish, the federal programs that have paved Binghamton streets and helped to keep local taxes as low as possible, would be done away with and replaced by things that help investors, not taxpayers.”

Part 1 of Brindisi’s infrastructure plan does three things:

First, it restores a decimation of Community Development Block Grant dollars Binghamton is facing right now—numbers that over time would stretch into the millions and impact local taxpayers. These federal dollars have paved local roads and helped keep local taxes from rising due to the federal investment. The City’s mayor has urged federal representatives to fight these CDBG cuts: pressconnects.com/story/news/local/2017/03/20/federal-cdbg-cuts-cost-binghamton-17-million/99410062/.

Second, the plan would both revive the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery grant program and expand it, so Binghamton could actually win one, something Brindisi says locals deserve the chance to compete for under better funding circumstances. Since 2009, TIGER has delivered $5.1 billion to 421 local infrastructure projects across 50 states but never in Binghamton and Brindisi says it is because the program needs to be expanded so Binghamton can fairly compete with its smaller population. Brindisi’s touted plan would increase the national TIGER grant pot to $10 billion and create 130,000 new jobs, many trades-focused and in Binghamton if the city competed and won an award.

Thirdly, the plan would make clear that local taxpayers cannot and should not bear the burden of crumbling leadlaced sewers and aging water systems. Brindisi would push for an infrastructure bill that, aside from the aforementioned, created a national pot of direct federal dollars that Binghamton could compete for to unlock projects that are, right now, sitting on a table looking for funding. The EPA has said that we must invest over $655 billion into our water infrastructure over the next 20 years to keep pace with our needs alone. Brindisi would fight to include just $110 billion of that amount into a federal infrastructure bill and then work to bring a portion of those funds to the Southern Tier to fund local projects that remove the lead in our pipes, keep the sewer tax in check and water bills from sky rocketing.

Brindisi explained that though this is just Part 1 of his infrastructure plan, the moral of the story is that if we are going to grow jobs and keep taxes in check locally, we cannot have members of Congress like Congresswoman Tenney passing all these incredible burdens on to local taxpayers.

“CDBG and TIGER are just two places where the White House is going to hurt local taxpayers in Binghamton and just two of the places Claudia Tenney is letting them get away with it by talking about things that do little for us locally. Well, not if I can help it,” Brindisi said.

By martha

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.