Pano’s Construction Underway
May 23, 2008
More Top Secret Public Documents
In our ongoing effort to supply public information to the people, we are pleased to offer this PDF version of the meeting minutes of the Western New York Health System, a.k.a. Newco.
I began this pursuit with a FOIL request sent on April 25, 2008, asking for both the meeting minutes dating back to January 1, 2007, as well as a complete and detailed list of financial receipts and expenditures of the Western New York Health System, a.k.a. Newco, going back to the same date.
The initial response was this, received on April 29:
Dear Mr. Quigley:
As counsel to Western New York Health System (sometimes referred to as Newco), I have been asked to respond to your request of April 25, 2008 for certain information and documents under the Freedom of Information Law (Article 6-A of the Public Officers Law of New York State).
We regret that we cannot comply with your request as the Freedom of Information Law does not apply to Western New York which is a New York not-for-profit corporation and is neither a state, municipal nor public entity as defined by General Construction Law Section 66. Further, Western New York does not perform a governmental or proprietary function for New York State or for any municipality (see also General Construction Law Section 66).
We can also advise for the same reasons that Western New York is not subject to the Federal Freedom of Information Law. (more…)
May 21, 2008
Mayor’s Impact Team—Preliminary Audit Report
Here’s the text of preliminary audit report of the Mayor’s Impact Team, filed this afternoon by the City Comptroller with the Common Council:
In response to the Council’s request for an immediate audit of the Mayor’s Impact Team, following an incident on April 25, 2008, resulting in the suspension of three city workers, I am filing this preliminary report pending completion of the full audit.
Let me begin by commending the mayor for his swift disciplinary action in the matter in which workers were found to be performing landscaping work during regular working hours at the private property of one of the individuals involved. Such actions are an abuse of the public trust and cannot be tolerated. The mayor’s response is appropriate and sends the right message to the work force and the public. But in this matter, there is more to be done.
What we have found in our preliminary review of the Mayor’s Impact Team is a lack of controls across the board that in effect condones an environment where incidents like the one that allegedly occurred on April 25 can take place. Let me cite a few examples.
A spot check on May 13 at the Impact Team’s headquarters in Shoshone Park found time sheets that had been signed twice for the day, even though the workday was not yet complete. Also at Shoshone Park we discovered poor inventory controls with a lack of proper marking and reliance mostly on the memory of one employee.
We also found areas of concern regarding fuel, a costly item in the current economic environment. Four employees have access to the Fuelmaster system but gas cans can be filled for mowers and gas-powered equipment with no odometer readings, using instead the reading from the truck carrying the equipment. If a gas container can be filled, so can an unregistered vehicle, or at least topped off. Tighter controls are obviously needed.
As to the day in question, April 25, according to MIT officials, members of the Impact Team were absent without leave that afternoon when the work on the private residence took place. The sign-out sheets for that day indicate that two employees including the crew chief, who approved the time sheet, signed out at noon. Another worked signed in and out and later crossed his name out altogether.
After the fact, a slip requesting a day off for that employee appeared in Public Works offices, signed by the crew chief. There are no records to account for the use of city vehicles or equipment.
According to payroll records, an employee was paid for eight hours even though the time sheets reviewed by my auditors indicated less than a full day’s work was done. One employee was credited with a personal day off, but was suspended in relation to the incident. The crew chief was correctly paid for five hours. An adjustment of salaries to reflect the correct number of hours worked is warranted. There is no proof that time sheets were altered or changed, but the fact remains the opportunity was clearly present. Clearly, what is recorded on the time sheets for April 25 does not match what was reported to the timekeeper. Since there seems to have been a practice of pre-signing time sheets, it is uncertain whether an employee worker the time stated on any given day.
We will provide the Council with the complete audit shortly. The need for stronger controls and oversight is evident and should be implemented immediately. I should note the vitally important work performed by the Mayor’s Impact Team and the need to have them continue to provide their services to the community. I’m confident that with the proper controls in place, the Impact Team will become even more valuable as a city resource. We will have more recommendations in the full audit report.
May 20, 2008
High School Principals to Williams: Get Out of Town
A friend called in to tell us that a friend called him just now with this news, which he heard third-hand: (Does that insulate our sources sufficiently from the fury of the Buffalo Public Schools administration?) Last night Buffalo’s association of public high school principals registered a unanimous vote of no confidence in Superintendent James A. Williams. The vote of no confidence follows closely on the heels of Williams’ announcement that he is staying in Buffalo; his contract (renewed last fall by an administration-friendly, outgoing board of education) runs through 2011. Williams had been a finalist for the superintendent’s job in Memphis, Tennessee. Word is, Williams is furious about this and has been burning up the phone lines, chewing out those principals he deems responsible for the measure. To which one might reply: Dr. Williams, the vote was, according to our sources, unanimous. UPDATE: The secondary school principals apparently asked the entire principals’ union to join them in taking a vote of no confidence in Williams. Buffalo Teachers Federation President Phil Rumore told Channel 4 News at Wednesday’s school board meeting that his executive committee might ask union members for a no confidence vote as well. If both those things happened, the only folks left in the district supporting Williams would be his cabinet and a handful of board members.
May 19, 2008
Public Transportation and the Suburbs
New York Times columnist and Princeton economist Paul Krugman is currently visiting Germany, where the automobiles are more fuel-efficient and the public transportation systems are much more deeply rooted in the landscape.
Krugman’s column “Stranded in Suburbia” concludes, as I did in Artvoice last week, that far too many Americans are stuck with gas-guzzling SUVs and few alternatives but to keep driving them.
Why? Because there’s no federal transportation policy except the one that subsidizes sprawl and leaves this country addicted to oil-guzzling personal transportation.
The map proves it: Sprawl means stranding. Just look at the Buffalo area: 61% of Erie County’s population lives outside the 42 square miles of Buffalo (the rapid transit begins and ends well within Buffalo’s limits). You may search the map in vain for the trolley line that connects downtown to the airport, or the light-rail network that uses existing rights of way to connect to the university, the hospitals, the suburban shopping centers and the schools.
But of course, if you have the time, you can take the bus in our relatively compact region.
My 14-year-old daughter went to the Walden Galleria Mall on Sunday afternoon. When she and her pals finished, they caught one of the last hourly buses, at 7:08pm. They reached downtown by 7:51, then spent 25 minutes walking home. Had they waited until 8:15pm for the Delaware Avenue bus connection, the one-way bus trip would have taken an hour and 25 minutes. Fetching the kids for the 20-mile round trip would have taken at most 40 minutes.
There’s not much mystery about where the median-income family will spend its $600 federal “economic stimulus” check. One expects that it won’t be on bus passes.
All the more reason, then, to challenge President Obama or President McCain—starting now—on a new commitment to a mass-transit policy for every urban region. If we start in 2008, maybe we’ll have some infrastructure in place by the end of the 44th president’s second term.
In Berlin and throughout Europe after World War II, there was no alternative to public transportation. Streetcars and subways are the norm. The ironic long-term consequence of poverty and devastation is that Europeans do not depend upon cars the way rich, sprawling, unravaged and now stranded America does.
May 16, 2008
James Williams Withdraws From the Running in Memphis
“It wouldn’t be fair to the children, ” said Buffalo Schools Superintendent James A. Williams, announcing this afternoon that he had withdrawn his name from consideration for a job as head of the Memphis schools. Upon reflection, Williams said—pulling out the regal first-person plural—”Our greatest achievements are here, in Buffalo. We’ve had a very good three years.”
Williams had been due to interview for the job in Memphis on Monday, May 19. That would have been the formal interview; he’d already done a phone interview, which landed him among the finalists. As Jamie Moses wrote in AV this week, Williams trolled for jobs in other cities while he was superintendent of Dayton schools, too. He said at today’s press conference that Buffalo was it for him; that he’s made a commitment. Moses’ article indicates that he’s said that before as well.
Williams was joined at the press conference by senior staff and the five school board members who seem to think he can do no wrong: Mary Ruth Kapsiak, Vivian Evans, Chris Jacobs, Florence Johnson, and Pamela Perry-Cahill. The four who tend to challenge Williams and his steamrolling style—Ralph Hernandez, Lou Petrucci, Catherine Nugent Panepinto, and Catherine Collins—were absent.
Williams’ performance was recently evaluated by the board, and the overall score he received—comprising an average of the individual scores given him by each board member—was reportedly pretty good. (Of course, it was an average, and there has been some grumbling that dissenting opinions never made it into his final evaluation.)
Did that vote of confidence, asked Channel 2’s Rich Kellman, figure into his decision to stick around?
“I’ve always had the confidence of the board,” Williams said. “When I say ‘the board,’ I mean the majority.”
TATS is back!
Thursday at the Square 2008 has announced its line up. Five bands come to Lafayette Square, one per week from May 29-September 4. This year, concerts will begin at 6pm instead of 5pm, giving downtown office workers time to tidy up and tie one on, and maybe still get close enough to see the band…
5/29: Galactic, with the New Deal
6/5: The Disco Biscuits
6/12: Yonder Mountain String Band
6/19: The David Sanborn Group
6/26: Martin Sexton, with the Mike Doughty Duo
7/3: Jakob Dylan & the Gold Mountain Rebels
7/10: Jimmie Vaughan, with JJ Grey and Mofro
7/17: Mickey Hart Band featuring Steve Kimock and George Porter, Jr., with Tea Leaf Green
7/24: Gin Blossoms
7/31: Spirit of the West
8/7: Zappa Plays Zappa, with the Whigs
8/14: Mike Gordon, with Samantha Stollenwerck
8/21: Saliva
8/28: Candlebox
9/4: Big Head Todd & the Monsters, with Indigenous
May 15, 2008
FOILed Again: (Partial) Satisfaction
On Monday afternoon, Cavette Chambers of the City of Buffalo’s law department sent me some of the records I’d asked for several weeks ago, regarding the Mayor’s Impact Team. I originally requested all records related to the team’s budgets and expenditures dating back two years.
Here’s the letter of decision from Chambers, and here’s the gist: I was not given access to the team’s 2006-2007 budget, she said, because those records do not exist. I was not given access to audits performed on the team, because no audits had been performed up until the one launched by City Comptroller Andy SanFilippo two weeks ago. Finally, I’ve been denied all correspondence (paper, email, etc.) related to the budgets and expenditures because, she says, they are “intra/inter-agency materials.”
That last denial cites New York State Public Officers Law 87(2)(g):
2. Each agency shall, in accordance with its published rules, make available for public inspection and copying all records, except that such agency may deny access to records or portions thereof that:
…
(g) are inter-agency or intra-agency materials which are not:
i. statistical or factual tabulations or data;
ii. instructions to staff that affect the public;
iii. final agency policy or determinations; or
iv. external audits, including but not limited to audits performed by the comptroller and the federal government; or
I’m not a lawyer, but I don’t believe that the correspondence Chambers has denied access to isn’t covered by one or more of those four exceptions. Especially by (iv), given that an audit of the Mayor’s Impact team is near completion. Any lawyers out there want to enlighten me?
This is the document I was sent: Mayor’s Impact Team records. We’re sorting through it now. Meanwhile, I’m told the comptroller’s audit will be released next week. I also am told it will be thorough; time will tell.
Common Council Action Plan
As promised here, we’re posting the Common Council of Buffalo’s 2008-2009 Action Plan. (God knows why.) Seriously though, it’s worth a quick scan. My favorite part is at the beginning, in which we learn what the Romans had in common with Buffalonians.
Have you guessed it yet?
Both sacked their own cities:
…The assumption may reasonably be made that the fall of Rome, with the corresponding loss of its great buildings, was caused by invading barbarian armies bent on loot and destruction. From the time of the “Sack of Rome” by the Vandal Alaric in 410, to invading German mercenaries in the 16th century, it is presumed that the awe-inspiring structures of antiquity were pulled down, burned, ravaged and pulverized by conquering outsiders. The startling reality is that the destruction of Rome was not mainly carried out by rampaging armies during time of war, but most of the monuments and structures were destroyed by the Romans themselves! Over centuries the Roman people pulled down the marble statues, temples, basilica and baths. They tore these great buildings down and fed the marble into furnaces to produce lime. Other buildings were knocked down piecemeal by wealthy aristocrats to adorn their Renaissance palaces, to be seen only by a few. Save for the ancient Roman fascisti symbol of the bound ax and sticks adorning Buffalo’s ornate Council Chambers, what parallel does the destruction of Rome in centuries past have to do with the Queen City of the Lakes in the 21st century?
The answer is, just like the Romans, Buffalonians at times have been responsible for demolishing, tearing down or destroying the City’s architectural heritage. And this destruction still continues, although with greater difficulty due to the resistance of preservationists who grasp the importance of the City’s rich built environment to future generations.
This must be the writing of Council President Dave Franczyk.
May 13, 2008
The Raucous Caucus: Politics Vs. Substance
Two weeks ago, during the April 29 Common Council meeting, Masten District Councilmember Demone Smith threw a bit of a fit. The previous Friday, the Common Council had released its annual action plan, and Smith complained he’d been given inadequate time to review that plan and had not received a personal invitation to take part in its public release.
Don’t worry about what this “action plan” is. It’s pretty close to meaningless. What’s important is that Smith, who is one of four councilmembers who comprise a minority bloc, felt slighted by the five-member majority bloc. He accused them of freezing out him and his three fellow bloc members, though none of the other three joined him in his complaint.
Council President Dave Franczyk and Lovejoy District Councilmember Rich Fontana tried to head off Smith’s indignation, arguing that every member of council had received drafts of the plan and invitations to the unveiling by email, to which Smith replied, “Everybody knows my email doesn’t work.” (”Get it fixed,” Franczyk said.) Franczyk said they’d discussed the plan in legislative caucus—the closed [note: I stand corrected, the caucus is open] meeting of councilmembers in which all the voting in the public session is predetermined—but Smith had not attended. (”All I ask is that councilmembers take some responsibility,” Franczyk said.)
But Smith was tapping into his own deep vein of resentment: Ever since last November’s Common Council elections, he’s been in the minority, whereas when he took over the empty Masten seat from the departing Antoine Thompson, he was part of a solid majority aligned with Mayor Byron Brown. It’s no fun to go from starter to second string.
By the end of the exchange, Franczyk and Smith were talking over each other heatedly, and Smith said that if the new majority was going to trample over the other councilmembers, then maybe the minority bloc would have to create it’s own legislative caucus.
What that would accomplish is not clear, apart from creating another set of meetings closed to public scrutiny for councilmembers to miss. But last Thursday Smith filed this letter with the City Clerk offering a rough outline of a proposal for a new legislative caucus, which he calls the “Progressive Caucus of the Common Council of Buffalo,” which “will make the Common Council of the City of Buffalo more democratic by creating an additional center of legislative power that promotes cooperation.”
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