Ed Mangano's midterm report card

Halfway through his first term as county executive, Ed Mangano is proposing yet another budget that takes a hatchet to spending.

Whenever the county is faced with a budget hole, Mangano cuts. Even though he is being forced by the Nassau Interim Finance Authority to close budget holes without the one-shot revenue deals that previous administrations had the benefit of, it seems as though Mangano refuses to consider increases in taxes, rather than just cuts, to close budget gaps. Whether it be jobs, services or programs, nothing is safe from Mangano and his single-minded desire to follow his campaign promise and not create new taxes for Nassau residents.

Which made us wonder: Just how well is Mangano sticking to his campaign promises? How is what he said he would do stacking up against what he’s actually doing?

Cutting taxes: A
  Mangano pledged that he would reduce taxes on homeowners, starting with the energy tax that the Suozzi administration implemented in 2009. In fact, minutes after taking his oath of office, Mangano signed a law repealing the tax, which would have cost residents about $70 a year.

He has also not raised taxes since he took office, opting instead for budget cuts.

For keeping one of his biggest promises, we give Mangano an A.

Reforming the assessment system: Incomplete
  In his campaign, Mangano said that the key to fixing the county’s budget was to fix its assessment system. According to Mangano, more than $1 billion of the county’s $3 billion in debt was tax certiorari payments. Tax certioraris are the payments that municipalities make to residents when they can prove they have been overtaxed.

Mangano promised to freeze county assessments for one to five years, and he did — for four years. Last year he replaced the county’s yearly assessments with a four-year cycle, calling it the Tax Stabilization Order of 2010.