John Milardo: City Officials & Mayor Drew Rehearsed Statements

Also appearing on Middletown Patch  here: http://middletown-ct.patch.com/articles/milardo-letter & and as part of John Milardo's latest edition of his newsletter "And Justice for All." Milardo's previous edition touching on a variety of problematic topics is featured here: http://www.middletowninsider.com/2013/01/guest-blog-his-town.html.  We previously covered the story of Mayor Drew loosing his cool at PRC here: http://www.middletowninsider.com/2013/01/mayor-drew-losses-his-cool-at-prc.html
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"Which is it?"
by John Milardo

About three years ago, when I was the union president of the Middletown Managers & Professionals Association, someone called to inform me that the city of Middletown was getting ready to privatize the sanitation district trash and recycling collections performed by employees of the public works department.

This was the first time anyone I knew had heard this news. It would have affected MMPA members, so I began to investigate and ask some questions of the finance department.
The finance department informed me that the sanitation division was $250,000 in the red, and it was only going to get worse. When asked how long the deficit had been going on, the finance department could only say they were just made aware of the situation.

Upon further investigation, I was told that a local private trash collection company was ready to sign a contract with the city and take over the sanitation division's collection routes. Employees would then be either transferred or laid off from work. I set up a meeting with the finance director to look into the matter, to find out how this could have happened.

When the meeting took place, I was told it was a false alarm! Someone had made some accounting errors, and not only was there $500,000 in the fund balance, but the division also had plenty of funding in the capitol account for the purchase of new trash and recycling trucks for the next five years. That’s a $750,000 mistake. No contract to privatize was signed.

Why am I bringing this up now? I’ll tell you why. On Jan. 22, at the monthly Personnel Review Commission meeting, the public works director was requesting to have the Teamsters Local 671 manager position in the sanitation division changed to add truck driving route duties, and eliminate the AFSCME, Local 466, truck driver who now performs the work.

Tony Lepore, business agent for Teamsters, Local 671, objected to the change. When the assistant superintendent of sanitation job was created, the intent of the driving duties listed in the job description were strictly for supervisory purposes (a pickup truck), as had always been the case with all the past supervisors who held this position in one form or another. The position manages employees, complaints, problems, and the district.

The public works director stated he was performing his due diligence in looking to save money in the sanitation division, because the division is having financial problems, and it could not handle the increase in wages to fill a vacancy. At one point, the director stated if he knew the existing job description contained driving duties in it, he would have had the retiring assistant superintendent of sanitation drive a trash route all along.

Mayor Daniel Drew was in attendance at the meeting, and he concurred with the director. They needed to save money or pass the increase onto the sanitation district taxpayers. The director also stated if the Teamsters did not agree with the proposed language change in job duties, he would have to inform sanitation users that an increase was coming and it was due to the Teamsters. Mayor Drew nodded in agreement with the statement. Is that a responsible action by local leaders?

Teamsters Business Agent Lepore began to speak regarding the issue, when for no reason the mayor laughed at him. Lepore called the mayor on it, and didn’t let him get away with it. A lively one-way discussion ensued. The mayor's behavior only leads me to believe he probably did behave improperly at the last PRC meeting to Commissioner Deborah Kleckowski.

The mayor called for a recess to meet with his new city attorney and the deputy city attorney. They came back in the room and the mayor withdrew the assistant superintendent of sanitation job description change from the agenda.

He stated the existing language gives him the authority to order the employee to do the work, and he did not care about what the intent was regarding driving duties for the job when it was originally approved. Both the Teamsters and AFSCME labor organizations stated they will file charges.
You could tell the mayor and public works director had practiced their testimony together. Statements that stood out at the meeting to me; the director stating he did not know what duties were entailed within a job description in his own department. This is the most basic knowledge any supervisor/manager needs to know. The statement made by the director that the sanitation division could not absorb the increase in their salary account to hire a vacant driver position is not correct.

First of all, both the assistant superintendent of sanitation and the truck driver position are 100-percent funded with the existing budget. There was no additional cost to the sanitation district taxpayers, the money is already there.
Secondly, because of my past experience with the sanitation divisions accounting practices, I later checked with the finance department, and the sanitation division is in great financial shape, and has been for the past few years.

John Milardo
“And Justice For All” is a newsletter involving the opinions, views, and commentary as a lifelong Middletown resident. In my capacity as a former employee of Middletown (retired) for more than 41 years, I have a different perspective regarding how and why public figures do what they do.
https://docs.google.com/file/d/1RDeTx8hfRH2p18W7M9yN4wKJU0Byal-VkKJo1nfT5Yim1Orvk0kClxZx7YLq/edit?usp=sharing 

Dumb Decisions Made By the Middletown Common Council

Dumb Decisions Made By the Middletown Common Council * (Aka things we bet you didn't know about the folks that run the city.)

Note: In order for things to get down in the city, it is the Common Council (Democrat controlled since 1991) that votes on proposed ordinances and not the Mayor. (I.e. A city mayor can propose a tax decrease in his./her budget, but the common council by virtue of 2/3 majority, can override that budget and replace it with their own plan.) According to the town charter, the mayor of Middletown can only vote in the event that there is a 6-6 tie on the floor.

1. Remington Rand- In 1999 the city took ownership of the 184,000 square-foot industrial building at 180 Johnson Street through a foreclosure settlement. According to a 2010 Middletown Press article: "Eighteen tenants, including a landscaper and a mail sorting business, currently rent space in the building from the city, bringing in between $60,000-$100,000 annually for the city's economic development fund." The problem one may ask: the Democratic controlled common council was projecting the sale of the property and putting that amount into the budget. Confused? It’s like this, imagine that you want to sell your car and use the money to pay for a new roof. Sounds good on paper and it seems pragmatic, but if you don’t sell the car and the roof bill shows up. That is exactly what happened with the Rand property, the sale never happened and the Dem approved budget had monies (sale of Remington Rand) in their budget that didn’t exist. Translation: The property didn’t sell and the Dems spent the money that they didn’t have.

2. $25,000 (Was it more?) to It's Only Natural- If you are the owners of Middletown's Natural Health Store, It's Only Natural (ION) then in your soy/tofu soaked mind it's a great decision: free money. This really happened folks, the ION owners decided to ask Middletown's Common Council for money to help their business; they claimed that due to the construction of the Arrigoni Bridge, their business was becoming dry and the owners were losing monies. Did anybody from the council ask to see data or evidence (their books!) that supported this claim of lost funds due to bridge construction? Nope, and the council quickly voted 10-2 in favor of giving ION the $25,000 they sought. The two dissenting votes: Two female Republicans named Linda Salafia and Debbie Kleckowski.

3. 1,000,000$ in Union Concessions rejected in 2009- In 2009, the MMPA offered to concede a $1,000,000 in concessions to the city of Middletown to help with the budget deficit? What happened? The mayor and his staff warmly worked with John Milardo and Local 6092/ MMPA to take advantage of the generosity offered by the union to help the city. Results: The common council in all their wisdom voted not to take this one time gift of a million dollars. Reminds one of the Jedi council rejecting Anakin Skywalker membership into their guild- worked well for them did it not?

4. The New MHS High School- Where does one begin? From wetlands to the indicated Tomasso LLC the project was a mess from the very beginning. The finished product: No locker rooms, a cracked pool, lack of fire lanes and a budget that ballooned approximately $15 million over budget. (source H. Courant July 16, 2005) According to other town and newspapers sources the school has been plagued with the following issues as well: the immobility of the grandstands in the gym, the minimal size of the pool deck, the collapsing retaining wall at the truncated Cynthia Lane and more all given to us by a Democrat controlled common council and architects hand picked by then Mayor Dominique Thornton.

Administrative Assistant or Chief of Staff..Mmmm?

5.Appointing Dan Drew to Vinny Lofreddo's slot- Here is how it went down: Vinny Lofreddo the once and future Middletown Councilman (and Mayor for a day in 1965) decided it was time to take his leave from the council due to a new job appointment in Hartford or wherever. The Dems in classic Dem fashion, appointed the town's 'savior' Daniel T. Drew to Vinny's old job making him a councilman by appointment not election. What does this mean? This means that you, the public electoral body of Middletown, did not choose the one time defender of a UCONN student show entitled "I Did Your Mother" to the role of councilman. Yes, we know he was elected Mayor all buy himself (with the help of Wesleyan students), but one needs to ask themselves: What would women’s right activist and Rush Limbaugh nemesis Sandra Fluke say about Dan’s defense of a show entitled, “I Did Your Mother?” When she showed up in Middletown in late October 2012 to help the cause, was she aware of Dan’s involvement with the UCONN show, “I Did your Mother?” What would she say to Dan about his abuse of females in meetings, most notably Councilwoman Deborah Kleckowski who asked a very innocent question about proper time with regard to vetting the new Deputy Police Chief? One can guess that Fluke would ignore Dan’s digressions with regard to women in this case because of the politics involved.

Did you read : http://www.middletowninsider.com/2013/01/guest-blog-his-town.html

Early Retirement Pay Outs Costly to Taxpayers & Other City Pensioners

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    The following is a draft of a memorandum of understanding proposed between the City and the Teamsters Local #571 offering certain employees an incentive to retire prior to their normal eligibility.  The following is a draft and has not been formalized or accepted by the Council and could change.  We understand that the employees have until November 7th to indicate their interest in the package and until that point the actual cost to the City has not been determined.  

     However, this is going to be an expensive package if implemented:  there are between 40 and 50 members of the union and of course it's unknown how many will take the offer so there are no numbers regarding the impact on the general fund as of now.  For those directors that are not part of the union, it is rumored that the City is offering up to 5 years of service;  so say you've 18 years of service, that could be now 23 years of service which at 2.5% would be 57.5% of the average of the highest 3 years of salary.  If the average salary is $90,000, the annual pension would be $51,750 or $4,312.50 per month.  Now they would be able to start collecting this pension 5 years earlier than they normally could have.

     Pensions from the City are capped at 70% of a set average salary, however this union's contract has adjusted that cap to 80% based on the retiree paying a higher percentage for their health insurance.  This draft offers some employees who have been with the city for 35 years or more a cap at 85%.  If their average salary were $100,000 (which is possible since overtime is included in their base salaries for the calculation), an additional 5% is $5,000.00 per year.

     However, the general rule of thumb has been that a golden handshake only saves money if you don't replace the retiring members; that doesn't seem to be the case here. If the building official retires, are you not going to replace him?  From the council agenda, it appears that the intent is to replace the Director and or Deputy Director of Personnel with Deputy City Attorneys, savings?? 

     Also, during the budget process this year, the pension funds was not funded to the extent that the actuaries had indicated and a special committe was to be formed to review the pension funding.   By giving the highest paid employees effectively a minimum of an additional 5% to their pension for their lifetime is going to be a tremendous hit to the pension fund.  These numbers of course are not available as of yet.  Remember, this union just won at the state labor board a case against the City and BOE where a union member retired and was replaced by a non-union worker, so they've a history of protecting their positions.

     Health insurance should be mentioned here also cause it's not mentioned in the offer at all; so not paying any more or less as a result of getting a higher pension.

     These seems to be an expensive way to get people to retire.  Offering 5 additional years to those employees who are not members of the union just to get them to retire is very generous!  Seems that it would be less expensive to negotiate with those employees who you wish to have leave on an individual basis rather than give away the farm to the whole management tier.

     Drew is cleaning house of directors who did not support him under the "guise" of saving money, however; the fact is that this will over in-flat city government departments and cost more.One can only speculate whom Drew and the Democratic majority/Serracrats have in mind to place in possible new director positions....
Lisa Santangelo? Another unqualified relative of Councilwoman Hope Kasper?