“[Nogid] worked under [former County Executive Tom] Suozzi and [County Executive Ed] Mangano,” Schnirman said. “He’s a non-political guy who is an expert. What Nogid is expert in is financial turnaround, dealing with Wall Street credit rating agencies and debt management, and that’s what we need here. We’re expecting him to identify the depth of our deficit, and put together a corrective action plan to place Long Beach’s finances on the road to recovery.”

Last month, Moody’s Investors Service downgraded the city’s financial status, in a scathing report released on the heels of a cash-flow shortfall a month earlier that forced the city to borrow $4.5 million to make its payroll by Christmas — and to meet its payout obligations for a number of retirees.

Additionally, Schnirman also noted that overtime has skyrocketed across nine departments and have exceeded their budgets for the year. In December, the Herald reported that overtime in the Beach Maintenance Department, for example, more than doubled the budgeted total of $150,000, climbing to $310,469, while the $307,000 in overtime expenses in the Sanitation Department exceeded its earmarked amount by more than $129,000. Police overtime, according to an internal memo, was $24,000 above its budget of $750,000 for the year.

Long Beach is also saddled with $48.3 million in general-obligation debt, and part of the reason for declaring the fiscal crisis, Schnirman said, includes not only the Moody’s downgrade — which impacts borrowing fees paid by the city and its taxpayers — but also the city’s deteriorating financial position since 2008 “marked but a lack of structural balance due to declining mortgage tax revenue and increased expenditures."

As a result, Moody’s has placed the city on a “negative watch warning” of a potential additional downgrade. As comptroller, Schnirman said that Nogid will provide “expert assistance” as the new administration works to turn the city’s finances around.