Coronavirus: Westchester County Faces 'Fiscal Monsoon'

WHITE PLAINS, NY — Because of the new coronavirus and near total shut down of businesses, Westchester County is facing the loss of anywhere from $90 million to $160 million in revenue. County Executive George Latimer said, as a result, the county will begin taking action to reduce spending in the 2020 county budget by $21 million.

"We are not going to sugarcoat this with the residents of the county," he said. "This is a fiscal disaster."

Latimer said, during his Wednesday news conference, that the county is facing a loss of between $60 million and $125 million in sales tax revenue and another $10 million loss from hotel occupancy taxes.

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Buses are no longer providing any revenue due to the passengers boarding and exiting from the back of the bus in order to protect the health of the drivers, he said.

Latimer said also that there will be loss of revenue if the opening of Playland or the beaches and pools are delayed, if they are even allowed to open for the season.

He said the county will take actions under "Westchester Forward — Phase 1," that will begin to deal with the fiscal impacts of societal shutdown that has accompanied the coronavirus outbreak.

Some elements of Westchester Forward have already passed the Board of Legislators. The plan reallocates $10 million planned for the reserve fund, reduces $6 million to $8 million in spending by borrowing for property tax grievance payments and saves $5 million by borrowing for annual pension contribution costs.

"We saved money for a rainy day and that rainy day has come," Latimer said, calling the situation a "fiscal monsoon."

He said there is no way to determine how much more impact the virus will have on the county's economics.

"You can't tell how far you have to rise up until you stop falling," Latimer said. "And we haven't stop falling yet."

He said that the first phase does not impact county workers or county contractual relationships. When and if a second phase of cuts is necessary has yet to be determined.

Westchester County has 20,947 confirmed cases of the new coronavirus, according to the state's Wednesday numbers. That is up 756 from Tuesday.

The county released numbers of confirmed cases per community, with Yonkers now at 3,051 — up from 2,937 from Tuesday. New Rochelle still leads Mount Vernon in the number of cases, with 1,317 for New Rochelle and 1,313 for Mount Vernon.

The county map with numbers by community is below.

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