The Democratic majority in the Erie County Legislature passed budget amendments Monday that brings back urban initiative funding and delays new jail plans in Alden.
ERIE COUNTY, N.Y. — The Erie County Legislature approved amendments to the 2026 budget proposals on Monday during a special session.
Perhaps the biggest change to the budget, plans to bond $20M for the study needed to design and build a new Sheriff’s Office jail in Alden.
Chair of the Legislature Timothy Meyers says that lawmakers got mixed reactions from constituents about the plans for a new jail that could cost the county nearly $500M.
“We know that it would force us to go over the property tax cap,” Meyers said. “Nobody wanted to do that.”
The Democratic majority passed an amendment that shifted $1.25M to an urban initiative line item for the cities of Buffalo, Lackawanna and Tonawanda.
Previously, County Executive Mark Poloncarz did not propose funding that item in the 2026 budget.
Democrats on the majority also shifted $1.65M to a “legislative earmarks” item in the budget, which was also not proposed in Poloncarz’s initial budget plan.
The math suggests, if divided equally amongst each legislative district, every lawmaker would be able to dedicate $150,000 for their district.
However, it’s not exactly clear if that is how the money will be divided up, as specific plans have not been announced.
Republicans in the minority caucus proposed their own budget amendments, which called for $12M in cuts to the proposed budget.
Those cuts included $3M from Visit Buffalo, $1M from the Dept. of Social Services, specifically the ‘other expenses’ line item for that department, and $986K from Youth Detention department.
“The County Executive has said that we’re in for dead flowers and arsenic,” said Legislator Lindsay Lorigo. “The Comptroller agrees and said we’re headed for doom and gloom, if that’s the truth, we can’t just keep punting it and playing politics.”
The minority caucus amendments were rejected, across party lines and the Democrats passed their own.
As for the jail study being dropped from the budget, the decision drew the ire of Sheriff Garcia.
In a statement, Sheriff Garcia said: The Honorable Members of the Erie County Legislature have exercised their obligation to carefully review the budget. We deeply appreciate their consideration of this capital project. However, we are disappointed that the plan – which was recommended by experts and would positively transform conditions for incarcerated individuals and our working staff – will not move forward at this time.”
“This regrettable decision comes with a cost, as substantial investment in our two Jail Management Division facilities will be required in the coming decades. This includes an estimated $54 million in work that was identified this year for urgent and important projects. Removal of this proposal from the budget does nothing to address the fact that the duplication of services between our facilities costs Erie County taxpayers more than $15 million each year. I have done my job by bringing this to the legislators’ attention. It is my hope that they understand the magnitude of this situation. As I have said all along, doing nothing is not an option.”