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Westchester County Has a $17 Million Budget Hole — And They Sent You the Bill

Dan D'Amico
Sep 6
5 min read

I want to show you something that every Westchester County taxpayer deserves to see. Not because it's a political talking point. Because it's in the county's own documents — and it explains exactly why your property tax bill keeps going up while your services keep getting cut.


Watch the full video here:


What News 12 Reported

In May 2026, News 12 Westchester confirmed what many residents were already feeling in their wallets. The headline said it plainly: "$17 Million Projected Budget Shortfall in Westchester County This Year."

County Executive Ken Jenkins acknowledged the gap publicly, citing rising costs across county operations and uncertainty in both state and federal funding streams. The shortfall was real, it was confirmed by a news organization, and it had consequences for every resident in this county.

But here's what News 12 didn't fully explain. Where did that hole come from? I went looking for the answer — and I found it on the county's own website.


The County's Own Words

The Westchester County Executive's official budget proposal — published on westchestercountyny.gov — contains a line that I think deserves a lot more attention than it has received.

In describing the pressures driving the 2026 budget crisis, Jenkins wrote the following about the MGM casino that was planned for Yonkers:


"Another critical issue is the loss of MGM and its bid to build a full-gaming casino in Yonkers. That decision alone represents an estimated $17 million in lost annual revenue for the County, not including the ripple effects across Westchester's economy in the form of lost sales tax growth that would have followed."


Read that again. Seventeen million dollars in revenue the county counted on — from a casino that was never built — was baked into the financial planning for Westchester County. When MGM decided not to pursue the full gaming license, that money disappeared. And when it disappeared, the residents of this county were handed the bill.

You can read the full press release yourself at: westchestercountyny.gov — Jenkins Releases 2026 Budget Proposal


The Full Scope of the Problem

The $17 million casino shortfall was one piece of a much larger crisis. According to an independent analysis by the Citizens and Immigration Center of the Bronx and County Alliance, Westchester entered 2026 facing a $197.7 million budget gap — one of the largest in recent county history.

To close it, the county cut nearly every department budget by 8 percent. 180 county positions were eliminated — almost 5 percent of the entire workforce. Programs were reduced. Services were scaled back.

And then property taxes went up 3.7 percent. On top of the highest median property tax burden in the entire United States.


Why This Matters for District 16

Westchester County is ranked number one out of 3,143 counties in the entire United States for median property taxes, according to Tax-Rates.org. The average annual bill exceeds $9,000. Working families in District 16 — teachers, nurses, bus drivers, first responders — are already paying more than almost anyone in the country for county government.

And when county leadership built a budget around $17 million in casino revenue that never materialized, the response was not to find the waste, not to audit the spending, not to hold anyone accountable. The response was to cut the services those families depend on and raise the bill they pay.

That is not responsible governance. That is a failure of leadership that working people in Yonkers and across District 16 are absorbing — quietly, every year — in the form of a tax bill that never stops climbing.

If you want to understand how Westchester's property tax crisis connects to the broader economic pressures facing this community, read our piece on the full domino effect: The Domino Effect That's Destroying Westchester's Middle Class


What I Will Do Differently

As your County Legislator for District 16, here is my commitment on fiscal accountability.

I will not cast a single vote for a property tax increase until there has been a full, independent audit of county spending. Every contract. Every consultant. Every outside professional service firm being paid with public money. In a $2.5 billion budget, waste does not announce itself — you have to go find it. And we have not been looking hard enough.

I will also fight to fix the structural inequity that has long been embedded in how Westchester distributes county sales tax revenue. Yonkers residents — the people of District 16 — pay into the county sales tax on every purchase they make. But Yonkers is specifically written out of the revenue-sharing formula that returns a portion of those dollars to municipalities. Every other town and village in Westchester gets money back. We do not. That is money this community generates and deserves to see reinvested here.

And I will push for a county budget process that is built on revenue that actually exists — not on projected income from facilities that may never be built.

You can read my full position on taxes and county spending here: Taxes and Spending — Dan D'Amico's Platform for District 16


The Bottom Line

The $17 million casino shortfall is not an isolated incident. It is a symptom of a county government that has been operating without the fiscal discipline and transparency that taxpayers deserve. It is part of the domino effect — the chain reaction in which poor planning and misplaced priorities compound year after year until working families in District 16 feel the consequences at their kitchen tables.

The sources I cited in this article are all public record. The News 12 report is real. The county's own press release says exactly what I quoted. The independent budget analysis is documented and linked above.

I encourage you to read all of it. Verify every word I said. Because what I am building in this campaign is not a political narrative — it is a case built on public documents that any resident can access.

District 16 deserves a legislator who reads those documents, understands what they mean, and fights back on behalf of the people paying the bills.

That is what I intend to be.

Sources:

Dan D'Amico is a candidate for Westchester County Legislator, District 16, Yonkers. Election Day is November 3rd. To learn more, volunteer, or donate to the campaign.



 
 
 

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