Water, police finances dominated Madden’s tenure

TROY — Mayor Patrick Madden’s eight years leading the Collar City were shaped from beginning to end by city finances, water and policing.

In dealing with those crises and others, Madden said his intent was to always look ahead.

“I tried to govern in a way that was mindful of those who follow us,” said Madden, who is leaving the mayor’s office under the two-term limit imposed by the city charter.

The most consistent challenge was ensuring the city budget didn’t dip into red ink, which would have brought the state comptroller’s office back to City Hall to monitor daily fiscal operations. That led Madden to coin the phrase “fact-based budgeting,” that became the mantra for his administration.

That meant eight years of property tax increases to pay for services and the end of financial gamesmanship using one-shot revenue sources and pushing off bills, Madden said. The result was the city emerged from the Troy Municipal Assistance Corp. oversight and completely retired the state debt the city had to pay off to escape the financial hole it had dug with spending beyond its revenues.

“It was hard,” Madden said.

It meant saying no to people seeking financial support that the city couldn’t afford, instituting the trash fee to get residents focused on costs of garbage disposal with an aim to encouraging recycling to reduce the trash the city had to pay to dispose of at landfills, and retiring city issued debt.

The outcome is the city has $10 million in its reserves compared to $1.2 million eight years ago and the Troy MAC debt no longer hangs over the city, Madden said.

The 2016 water main collapse is a distant memory. Madden oversaw the $40 million investment to build new transmission mains from the city’s Tomhannock Reservoir in Pittstown, replacing lines that were more than a century old. The latest challenge is replacing the lead water lines connecting city homes to the water mains.

Madden’s administration was criticized for not moving faster to spend a $500,000 state grant for lead line replacement. He said the city water department was methodically trying to convince residents to sign up for the database so the city could identify the locations of lead lines. He said even with publicity and additional financial commitment by the city that they’re still not close to a complete inventory. The city continues to work on this project and has begun lead line replacements in order to protect children and other residents from lead poisoning.

Madden, who is a lawyer, said that he and other city officials don’t provide details about the cases due to the direction of the attorney general. Madden said, “They tell us what we can release.”

But the city police have withheld basic information, such as names of victims, even though the state investigators said it’s up to the local department to provide that information, that they aren’t stopped from doing so.

The police department is working to improve transparency, community involvement and accountability, Madden said.  He noted the work the department has done in training its members to handle mental health crises and that the city exceeds mandatory training hours annually.

The Taylor Apartments are being replaced as the city works to restore the street grid at the Congress Street Bridge and encourage development there. Madden said long-term work has begun to revitalize the city waterfront south from the Congress Street Bridge to the brownfields at the south end of the city.

He also guided the city through pandemic lockdowns and saw Troy have a peaceful Black Lives Matter demonstration.

A disappointment is the failure to get the fifth version of the 1 Monument Square redevelopment project built. Madden said this is due to financing, costs and building on a difficult site at the south end of Riverfront Park between River Street and the Hudson River.

In the age of social media, Madden shuns promoting himself. “I’m not an extrovert,” he said.

Madden acted as a CEO, not spending time out on the street except in emergencies. Instead, he relied on his department heads to do that work, while he worked the phones chasing grant money from U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer or working with Assemblyman John T. McDonald III, D-Cohoes, to successfully fund projects.

Councilwoman Sue Steele, leader of council Democrats and the council president-elect, said Madden has done an outstanding job.

“He has left for the new mayor a city better than he found it. He has tackled very difficult issues and had success,” Steele said.

Council President and mayor-elect Carmella Mantello, a Republican, has had an up and down relationship with Madden. During the transition, Madden meets with people in the first-floor food court at the Hedley Building, 433 River St., instead of in his City Hall office on the fifth floor. Madden said this is due to his office being torn apart as he prepares to move out on Dec. 31.

“You have to do policy and put politics aside,” said Mantello, who has promised a more hands-on approach dealing with the departments and employees.

Madden doesn’t have any set plans for post-City Hall life except to get away with his wife Amy, whom he married after taking office.

“I’ve been raised to be a servant to my community,” Madden said. “It was an exhausting but good fruitful experience.”