Frank Castiglia Jr.: Oswego County Needs Redistricting, Reductions

September 9, 2021 Contributor

To the Editor,

Oswego County needs some R N R! (Redistricting) N (Reduction)!

With the 2020 census complete and official. Oswego county has gone from a population of 122,000 down to a population of 117,000. A loss of some 5,000 people. With that information and some comparison to another county it is time for redistricting and reduction in the County Legislature.

Oswego county has 25 legislators, Onondaga county has 17 legislators. Oswego county has a population of 117,000 and Onondaga county has a population of 467,000. Why so many legislators for so few people. This means that each legislator in Oswego county represents some 4,700 people and in Onondaga county each legislator represents some 28,000 people. Now someone will say that Onondaga county isn’t as large as Oswego county. Onondaga county has 800 sq. miles and Oswego has 1,300 sq. miles but if you take away the 400 sq. miles of water Oswego county only has 900 sq. miles of land. We don’t need 8 more legislators to cover 100 extra sq. miles.

The cities of Fulton and Oswego do not require 4 legislators for each city. Each city has 2 legislators for each side of the river. Each city only requires 2 legislators, one for each side of the river. They must reside inside the city limits.

There are towns that have more than 2 legislators that represent them. Most people live across the road from their neighbor or next door and each has a different legislator. This is unacceptable.

If each of the two Cities reduce their legislators by 2 that would reduce the legislature by 4, The remaining 4 reductions would come from the plethora of legislators representing town in the county.

These reductions would save the taxpayers approximately $112,000 a year and over 10 years $1,120,000.

The key is LESS government. The county needs smaller government and better representation.

-Frank Castiglia Jr. missing or outdated ad config

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5 Comments

  1. Again, you show you don’t understand how things work. Each Legislator needs to have about the same number of residents not the same town/city boarders.

  2. Mike, Again you have to look at the picture not the snap shot. Redistricting would equalize the numbers. You’re just worried about getting voted out. Equalizing the numbers would lower the number of legislators. You just tell me why a county 3 times our size has 8 fewer elected officials. Everyone complains about the amount of taxes we have in NY but the Southern States don’t. We have more Government, which equates to more costs which equates to more taxes. Stop worrying about your job and start caring about the taxpayers and the costs they have to pay..

  3. Onondaga County pays their Legislators over $30,000 a year and they have paid aids. (I am not employed by the County and I don’t have to worry about my job.) If you are really worried about saving us money why don’t you go after the school? They are 3 times the cost of the County. The City is double the cost of the County. Instead you make a big deal about $136,000 in payroll expense out of a 100 million budget. I would have to guess that if we did cut back the ones that were left would want and deserve more money for having to deal with more people and a heavier committee load. Time = money. We get our moneys worth out of the Legislature and they don’t have to commit to it like it’s a full time job.

  4. Mike, Now you are deflecting, a typical tactic of a politician, The school budget gets voted on by the public, is it to high YES, The City budget is also to high. But right now we are talking about the County representation and the costs there. Your statement is correct about the School and City budget and the fact that Onondaga pays the Legislators over $31,000. Now the fact about paid Aids is misleading. They only have 2 total aids. So does the Oswego county Legislators, they are called the “Clerk of the Legislature and the assistant” Now if you take the formula of each Legislator Rep. 26,000 people like they do in Onondaga County, Oswego county would only need 5 Legislators and pay them 31,000 that would be a total of $150,000 a year, not over $340,000 a year. Stop deflecting and face the facts Oswego county has 8 more Legislators than needed. We lost 5,000 people and we don’t need 25 legislators.

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