TASK FORCE SETS PRIORITIES Ruffles To Lead County Response To Corona Threat COOPERSTOWN – County Treasurer Allen Ruffles has been appointed to chair the task force that county board Chairman Dave Bliss convened this morning to implement the response to the coronavirus threat. The task force identified the following components that need to be addressed: Employee safety in the field – meeting state mandates and best practices. Limiting exposure at work Potential changes to work schedules and related labor issues…
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EDITORIAL If Not Allen Ruffles, Someone With SOME Of His Qualities The question was, “Do you think THEY will let the county administrator do the job?” They, of course, being the county Board of Representatives. But the question misunderstands how the new county administrator job is envisioned. Judging from discussions surrounding the new job’s creation, the county representatives aren’t looking for someone to tell them what to do. They’re looking for someone who will allow them to do what THEY…
COUNTY TREASURER HOME Assigned To Djibouti, Ruffles Trained Rangers, Dodged Elephant Herd By JIM KEVLIN • Special to www.AllOTSEGO.com COOPERSTOWN – Only once did Allen Ruffles feel he was in any danger. A sergeant in the 403rd Civil Affairs Battalion, Army Reserves, he was living in a small wooden house in Uganda, training local wildlife rangers in anti-poaching techniques. One morning, Ruffles – Otsego County treasurer in civilian life – heard a rumble and looked out the window at a…
Out of Africa County County’s 2020 Budget Under Tax Cap, Over $120M By JIM KEVLIN • Special to www.AllOTSEGO.com COOPERSTOWN – The 2020 tentative Otsego County budget is done, by way of Uganda, Burundi and Tanganyika. It is under New York State’s tax cap, and Otsego County continues to be “one of the lowest taxed counties in the state,” County Treasurer (and Sgt.) Allen Ruffles reported Monday, Nov. 18, in a Zoom-enabled videoconference from his quarters in Djibouti, where he…
CLICK FOR TENTATIVE 2020 COUNTY BUDGET 2020 County Budget Would Top $120M COOPERSTOWN – The Otsego County Treasurer’s Office today released a tentative budget for 2020 that, if adopted as is, will cross the $120 million mark for the first time, by $200. If approved, the tax levy would rise 3.73 percent to $12,144,437. The public hearing on the budget is at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 26. The budget must be adopted by mid-December.…
LETTER from DAN CROWELL In September, Budget Is Always Out Of Balance; By Year’s End, Balanced To the Editor: I hope all is well in our hometown! I saw your article (“Treasurer Warns Of Overages, But Chair Unruffled,” Sept. 20 on www.All- OTSEGO.com) on the budget gap. For what it is worth, in some ways the county treasurer and county board chair’s perspectives are portrayed as divergent. However, from my experience, they are both right. There is no black magic…
Treasurer Warns Of Overages, But Chair Unruffled $12M Gap Already Down To $7-8M, Bliss Says As Deliberations Ensue By JIM KEVLIN • Special to www.AllOTSEGO.com COOPERSTOWN – Saying he has no “black magic” to fix it, County Treasurer Allen Ruffles has advised the county Board of Representatives it is facing a $12 million gap in the upcoming 2020 budget. “I hear every year that Dan (Ruffles predecessor, Dan Crowell) used to work his ‘black magic,’ and always reduced the budget…
Army Reserves Deploys Allen Ruffles County Treasurer Departing For Year’s Mission In Africa…
County Treasurer Deployed In 2019 Ruffles Called To Horn of Africa By JIM KEVLIN • Special to www.AllOTSEGO.com COOPERSTOWN – Allen Ruffles, in his first year as county treasurer, has received word he will be deployed to the Horn of Africa early in 2019, perhaps for nine months. As his predecessor Dan Crowell, he is in the Army Reserves, serving as an E5 sergeant in the 403rd Civil Affairs Delta Company. Crowell was also deployed for nine months during his…
Editorial for November 30, 2018. Ruffles Takes First Step Against Whack-A-Mole For years now, Otsego County’s annual auction of foreclosed-on tax-delinquent properties has eaten up a lot of oxygen at the county Board of Representatives’ monthly meetings. It’s the Whack-A-Mole of county government, which suggests: There are unresolved issues. So a take-charge presentation by the new county treasurer, Allen Ruffles, at the November meeting was welcome, if partial. First, he declared, having studied the issue, giving delinquent taxpayers four years…