“Fighting for you.”

THESE ARE just three of the catchy slogans that headlined a dozen or more pieces of campaign literature sent by then-candidate for mayor Jay Ruais. While proclaiming himself “the only candidate who won’t raise taxes,” he attacked rival Kevin Cavanaugh, saying he “allowed property taxes to skyrocket, hurting businesses and residents.”

Calling himself “the only candidate who will bring fiscal discipline to our city and won’t raise your taxes,” Ruais promised to “prioritize and reduce spending to finally deliver a tax cut” and “support the tax cap and NEVER raise taxes.” (Emphasis added.) In fact, all but two of his campaign pieces promised less spending and a tax cut — promises that are also on his campaign website.

Unfortunately, when Mayor Ruais proposed his budget, the promises he made as a candidate were nowhere to be seen. At just under 4.5%, the tax hike from the budget he initially proposed would have been the largest since the Baines administration. Later, Ruais would blow his own horn for at least coming in under the tax cap, but that’s a far cry from cutting our taxes.

The mayor allowed the school district to use bogus revenue in its budget to dodge spending cuts the tax cap would have required. In all, Ruais’ budgets increase spending by more than $9.5 million and taxes by almost $9.1 million. That yielded a tax hike of 3.82%, one of the largest since Mayor Bob Baines.

Along the way, Ruais successfully pressured aldermen Chris Morgan, Ross Terrio, and Kelly Thomas to abandon an attempt by Republican colleagues to present a budget that actually did honor the tax cap, “prioritize and reduce spending,” and “finally cut taxes.”

At a special meeting of the Board of Mayor and Aldermen hastily called on Oct. 30, Ruais had an opportunity to nearly make good on his promise not to raise taxes. Instead of getting $90 million in education adequacy aid from the state, the school district had received $96.5 million. As it was more than projected in the budget, the school district asked the Board of Mayor and Aldermen for a supplemental appropriation to spend the ostensibly unexpected windfall. With four of the seven Republican aldermen absent from the special meeting, the school board’s request to increase their budget by that $6.5 million was approved on a 7 to 3 vote.

Ruais could have vetoed that but didn’t. In fact, the mayor seemed eager to have it pass, calling for a vote to approve the spending without discussion, which, thankfully, Ward 8 Alderman Ed Sapienza demanded.

Had that $6.5 million not been appropriated to the schools, it could have been used to lower the tax increase by 49 cents, reducing the Ruais tax hike from 72 cents to just 23 cents. Instead of a tax hike of 3.82%, Manchester property owners could have seen an increase of just 1.2%. Taxpayers battered by inflation would have appreciated that.

With that additional $6.5 million, the Ruais administration increased school spending by a total of more than $7.5 million and total city spending by $16 million in a year.

This is not prioritizing and reducing spending, as Ruais promised. The mayor could have nearly eliminated the coming tax hike and stabilized next year’s school budget had he opposed spending that money. Instead, he went from a “win-win” to a “lose-lose” because he didn’t oppose the schools.

Before Ruais moved to Manchester in 2021, he spent more than a decade working for Rep. Frank Guinta and lobbying Congress. He seems to have learned how they do things in Washington, D.C., a place where politicians perpetually raise taxes and spending while claiming to do the opposite.

Jay Ruais has abandoned his promises on taxes and spending, betraying the city’s hard-working, struggling taxpayers.