State cracks down on IDAs' bookkeeping

Canandaigua, N.Y.

State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said Wednesday his office will generally accept only audited, complete financial statements from the state’s 116 Industrial Development Agencies starting with 2007.

He said failure to provide the information could cost IDAs their ability to provide tax breaks to businesses.

“IDAs are supposed to create jobs,” DiNapoli said. “Given the way IDAs are currently reporting information, there is no way of knowing that.”

The comptroller’s office found the IDAs — independent public authorities — did little to verify individual employers’ job claims in projects totaling some $41 billion. Also, IDA reports had incomplete costs for 27 percent of the IDA-influenced projects and incomplete job-creation data for 9 percent of the projects.

Over at the Ontario County IDA, staff are seeking to clear the agency’s name after years of ignoring certain payment-in-lieu-of-taxes agreements. These are known as PILOTs.

And in the case with three of these PILOTs pertaining to the Canandaigua Airport on Brickyard Road, they were established because a government entity, the IDA, bought private property and removed it from the property-tax rolls. Through the PILOTs, the IDA offsets the tax revenue lost to school districts and municipalities.

Complicating matters is the fact that the IDA technically owns only the site of the airport, not the buildings on it, which are owned by private entities.

These PILOT agreements were not common knowledge, not even to other branches of Ontario County government. In 2005, county tax officials uncovered a PILOT with Paul Yarnall on his house at the Canandaigua Airport.

Town Assessor Don Collins said Robin Johnson, director of Real Property Tax Services, found the PILOT after “she did some digging.” After that, Johnson uncovered another PILOT, said Collins, for the building housing the company that manages the airport, Canandaigua Air Center LLC. Last fall, a third airport PILOT, for a hangar belonging to Canandaigua Aircraft LLC, came to light.

On Wednesday, Maureen Duggan, a consultant for the IDA, presented the county Board of Supervisors’ Planning and Research Committee with a list of the 70 companies that had PILOTs with the IDA in 2007. Only one had not paid on its PILOT in 2007, stated a letter from county Administrator Geoff Astles, though that information pertained only to payments owed the county. He had no figures on any possible payments to school districts or municipalities.

That one company is Canandaigua Aircraft LLC, which is in a dispute with the county over payments on its PILOT that dates back to 2001. The county claims Canandaigua Aircraft LLC owes $36,715.89, in total, to the county, school and town.

Duggan reported that for 2008, four companies owe the county on PILOTs. According to the county treasurer’s office, owing are: Canandaigua Air Center LLC; Canandaigua Aircraft LLC; Kirkland Management, also in Canandaigua; Zoto’s International in city of Geneva; and Blossom Properties in Victor.

Information was not available on Friday as to whether those, or any other companies, owe other taxing jurisdictions, such as the school districts, on their PILOTs.

Mary Gates, finance manager for the IDA, said she is preparing a report for the Office of State Comptroller that will show where all the IDA’s PILOTs stand on all their payments. Each company must verify its payments to all taxing jurisdictions by showing documentation and signing an affidavit.

Meanwhile, the Board of Supervisors is scheduled to vote on reappointing IDA Executive Director Michael Manikowski at its meeting Thursday. Manikowski became director in 1985.

Town Supervisor Lloyd Kinnear, a member of the Planning and Research Committee, said he thinks the IDA has made progress in cleaning up its books, though he is undecided if he will support Manikowski’s reappointment. Kinnear said he wants Manikowski to explain a number of decisions, including why Manikowski didn’t make sure the IDA notified the taxing jurisdictions on the PILOTs.

Manikowski has explained the omissions as “a slip-up.”

“You can’t put them on the roll unless you know about them,” said Town Assessor Collins.