Westchester County Budget & Appropriations Committee Meeting - April 27, 2026
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Westchester County Budget & Appropriations Committee Meeting - April 27, 2026
On Monday, April 27, 2026, at 10:07 AM, the Budget & Appropriations Committee of the Westchester County Board of Legislators convened jointly with the Infrastructure & Housing and Public Safety & Veterans committees. Chair Tyrae Woodson-Samuels presided. The meeting lasted until 11:30 AM and covered a range of capital projects, grants, leases, and budget transfers. All items were ultimately approved or referred to the full Board.
Consent Calendar
- Minutes Approval: Minutes from March 30, 2026, and April 6, 2026, were approved unanimously.
Discussion Items
1-2. Correctional Facility Chiller Replacement (Capital Project BCR66)
- The committee reviewed a Capital Budget Amendment (ACT-2026-91) and a Bond Act (ACT-2026-92) authorizing $3,540,000 in bonds to replace one of three chillers at the County Correctional Facility. The chiller (CH3) had recently failed due to sheared gear teeth. Design was completed in-house; construction is expected to take eight months. A temporary rental chiller ($579,000 for six months, plus installation/demobilization) will be installed to ensure cooling during peak summer. The new chiller will include a variable frequency drive for energy efficiency. The other two chillers are planned for replacement in a future capital project (likely 2028-2029). Both items were signed by committee and referred to the Board.
3. Justice Assistance Grant (ACT-2026-90)
- The committee authorized the county to accept up to $75,545 from the FY24 Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant. The county’s share is $30,506.25, to be used for a drone workstation and drone detection equipment in the real-time crime center. The grant is based on three-year crime statistics; Mount Vernon and Yonkers receive the bulk. The item was referred to the Board.
4-5. Citigroup Lease at Westchester County Airport
- The committee considered a public hearing resolution (RES-2026-45) and a local law (LL 2-2026) to authorize a 15-year base lease (with two 5-year options) for Citigroup, Inc. for Hangar E – Bay 2. Citigroup has been a tenant since 2001. Key terms: no county capital cost-sharing, annual escalation (greater of 3% or 5% CPI), $40 per square foot, projected $22 million revenue over the initial 15 years. The lease aligns with FAA fair market value requirements.
- Discrepancy: The meeting minutes state the public hearing resolution was recommended for denial (voted Aye by all present, meaning the committee recommended the full Board deny the hearing). However, the transcript shows the committee voted to approve both items and referred them to the Board. The local law itself was recommended for approval and referred.
6-12. Water District No. 3 – Eastview Pumping Station (Capital Project WD305)
- The committee reviewed a package of seven items to fund the design and construction of a new pumping station and transmission main, enabling Water District No. 3 to access UV-treated water from the Catskill-Delaware facility. The project provides both primary and backup water supply, addressing a catastrophic failure risk (affecting the hospital and jail). Design is 90% complete; total project cost is $42.4 million (including $2.4 million design). A $40 million bond act (ACT-2026-183) was the main funding item. Items included:
- Public hearing (RES-2026-44)
- Environmental resolution (2026-190)
- Three acts (2026-179, 2026-180, 2026-178)
- State regulations resolution (2026-181)
- Bond act (2026-183)
- During discussion, Legislator Nambiar questioned the 40% cost increase from the initial $30 million estimate, attributed to scope changes (e.g., horizontal directional drilling to avoid wetlands). Staff explained that early estimates are less precise and that the increase is due to better design knowledge, not scope creep. All items were approved and referred.
13-15. Budget Transfers and Amendments
- The committee reviewed three items to close out the 2025 fiscal year:
- ACT-2026-87: Transfer of appropriations across departments, totaling $43,104,337 (net zero budget impact). Major variances include $15.6 million for Medicaid disproportionate share payments, special education tuition increases, and health insurance costs ($11.6 million over budget due to high-utilization and catastrophic claims).
- RES-2026-46: Transfers within departments, $21,831,704.
- ACT-2026-88: Amendment to the 2025 County Operating Budget ($27,744,180) and Special District Budget ($1,169,454).
- Budget Director Larry Soule noted that despite large transfers, the county expects to break even for 2025. All items were approved.
16. Easements for New York Power Authority and Transco (ACT-2026-89)
- The committee authorized granting temporary and permanent easements over county roads and parkland (approx. 1 acre on Bronx River Reservation) for the Propel NY Energy underground electric transmission project. The county will receive $950,000 in total consideration ($94,000 temporary easement, the balance permanent). Payment will be received before construction begins (likely 2026); funds were not included in the 2026 budget. The easement includes segments in Tuckahoe, Yonkers, and Mount Vernon. The item was approved and referred.
Key Outcomes
- All agenda items were approved by committee votes (typically 6-0 or 5-0, with absent members noted).
- Referred to Full Board: Items 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, and 16 were signed by committee and referred to the Board of Legislators for final action.
- Approved Directly: Item 14 (resolution for within-department transfers) was approved by the committee.
- Public Hearing Scheduled: A public hearing on the Citigroup lease was set for May 18, 2026, at 7:30 PM (despite the committee's recommended denial of the hearing resolution, the local law was still referred).
- Next Steps: The correctional facility chiller rental will be installed within weeks to cover summer demand; the permanent replacement is expected by early 2027. The water district project will proceed with state comptroller approval.
Meeting Transcript
This meeting is being recorded and summarized. All right, take two. Good morning, everyone. Legislative Woodson Samuels here, and this is the budget and appropriations committee. It's April 27th. And I'll start us off with the roll fall vote. I am present. Majority Leader Holski. Present. Definitely the Nambiar. Here, let's say the Pierce, Dimity Vice Chair Tubiolo, Majority Williams. Presence. Legislator Williams Johnson. Chairman Gosh. All right. We are open at 1009 a.m. And we're going to take an item out of order. I'm going to start out with the last item, which is actually item 187. 2026-187. Join us at the table. And just for the record. And uh you want us to move it around. That's why I'm going to just for the record. This is uh items 226-187, an act authorizing County of Leicester to grant permanent and temporary easements in YPA and Transville LLC. Gentlemen, thank you for joining us this morning. Please introduce yourselves to the record and let's dive into the item. Sure. Good morning, everybody. Happy Monday. Peter Truxagraf for a company commissioner County Parks. Good morning, David Vital, Deputy County Attorney. Good morning, Rob Bokane, Director of Park Planning, Parks Recreational Conservation. Thank you for being here. Okay, I'll start and then you can continue. Um actually Parks has really a part of this. This is uh this is Transmission Lines through New York Transco and New York Power Authority. Um very you know long distance energy lines that they are uh they are putting in known better as different programming sorry. Uh Propel New York, yeah, Propel New York. And basically um they're a forward thinking group. I'm sure you've heard about that before. We were doing some other things that are traversing some of the park parkland um about putting a clean high energy um transmission lines as well as substitutions and so forth underground, a lot of things go under the ground, some of them actually go into the water. This particular one um is on municipal property. There's a small section uh that's on the Bronx River reservation. It's about 44,000 square feet or approximately one acre, and it's in the uh sort of Bronxville, Tuckahoe area down Tuckahoe Road where they will need to go underground uh to to place some of these lines. So it's really a two-part, uh, it's a temporary easement, uh, which you know is for storage of vehicles, equipment, materials, and actually performing the work, and then of course the permanent easement for being able to service those lines throughout. Uh it will be minimal disruption to us as county parks. Um, you know, we are we have much much much larger of our own projects um that you know you know cause some closures. This is probably not gonna cause closures, it might be you know some detouring, but it's a very small area if you know Tuckahoe Road area where it's splits and goes it's it's in that area. So the parks department um you have to come to the parks department uh for these types of easements, and we are obviously very much in favor of it. We're also working on you know something larger and similar on Caprole Point part, which you've seen, and this is to really help us all in the future um to have cleaner energy and a lot of what we're trying to do in all our infrastructure is look at the different types of energy sources and what we can change them to when we do have our own capital projects.
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