State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli issued fiscal stress scores today for the 17 cities in New York that have fiscal years ending between March 31 and July 31. This includes the “Big Four” cities of Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse and Yonkers.

“Fiscal stress scores have improved in several of these cities, but not everyone has smooth sailing ahead,” said DiNapoli. “Our monitoring system shows some cities are still close to becoming fiscally stressed. Local officials should use their scores to address areas of concern as they prepare their budgets and long-term financial plans.”

Using financial indicators that include year-end fund balance, short-term borrowing and patterns of operating deficits, DiNapoli’s monitoring system creates an overall fiscal stress score which classifies whether a municipality is in “significant fiscal stress,” in “moderate fiscal stress,” is “susceptible to fiscal stress” or has “no designation.”

The city of Yonkers, designated as “susceptible to fiscal stress,” is the only city in the group to receive a stress designation. However, the city did improve its score from the prior year and moved out of the “moderate fiscal stress” category.

In addition to Yonkers, the following cities were also evaluated: Auburn, Batavia, Buffalo, Corning, Hornell, Lackawanna, Long Beach, Olean, Rochester, Salamanca, Syracuse, Utica, Watertown and White Plains. Each of these municipalities were classified in the “no designation” category. The cities of Amsterdam and Rensselaer failed to file their financial information for the 2015 fiscal year and could not be issued a score.

The cities of Long Beach and Utica improved their scores and moved out of a fiscal stress designation. However, both cities, along with the city of Syracuse, are in close proximity to the “susceptible to fiscal stress” category.

A total of 101 municipalities and school districts have been classified in some level of fiscal stress as of their 2015 fiscal year end date. DiNapoli released fiscal stress scores for school districts in January and for villages in February.

In September, the Comptroller will release the updated fiscal scores for all counties, towns and the majority of cities in New York. Last year, 47 of these entities were considered in fiscal stress.

To search for a specific local government’s fiscal stress scores, visit: http://wwe1.osc.state.ny.us/localgov/fiscalmonitoring/fsms.cfm

For an overview of Comptroller DiNapoli’s Fiscal Monitoring System, visit: http://www.osc.state.ny.us/localgov/fiscalmonitoring/index.htm

For access to state and local government spending and 50,000 state contracts, visit OpenBookNY. The easy-to-use website was created by DiNapoli to promote openness in government and provide taxpayers with better access to the financial workings of government.