The Saratoga Springs Department of Accounts has issued an RFP (Request for Proposals) to law firms for legal services to be provided only to the Accounts, Finance, and Public Works Departments.
As the excerpt from the RFP documents, the legal services sought are pretty much for everything.
This is unprecedented. Based on this RFP, Commissioner Moran, Sanghvi, and Golub appear unhappy with and distrustful of the current City Attorneys and want their own legal representation.
Interestingly, they did not include the Public Safety Department. I don’t know if the exclusion of Commissioner Coll and Mayor Safford was because they were endorsed by the Republicans or whether the supporters of this resolution assumed that Coll would not support this poorly considered RFP.
I wrote to Moran, Sanghvi, and Golub:
“Can you shed some light on why Accounts, Finance, and Public Works are seeking their own legal representation through a recent RFP?“
None of the three responded.
This is potentially disastrous. The city would have dueling attorneys at an unknown cost and generating an even more acrimonious Council.
From The City Charter
According to our city charter, the city’s Mayor has the authority to hire the City Attorney. In fact, based on history, the Mayor also has the authority to fire the City Attorney
The charter empowers the City Attorney to act as the city’s “general legal adviser.” The code allows the Council to “provide additional legal service,” but this has always been for hiring attorneys with specialized skills, such as negotiating contracts with our unions. In my memory, it has never been used to usurp the responsibilities of the City Attorney.
Some History And Some Perspective
The Mayor’s right to choose the City Attorney has, in my opinion, been abused in the past. Despite the goal in the code that the City Attorney is counsel to the city, there have been attorneys who appeared to act more as the Mayor’s attorney rather than the city’s.
Still, in the decades I have observed our city’s deliberations, no one has ever suggested that individual Council members should have their own legal representative beyond the support provided by the City Attorney.
David Harper, the current City Attorney, and I could not be further apart on the political spectrum. Having said that, Mr. Harper is a person of the highest integrity. I am confident that when asked to address a legal issue, he follows the law wherever it may take him. He is an excellent lawyer, and this city is very fortunate that he serves us.
Similarly, Mayor John Safford and I could not be further apart on the political spectrum. Still, the issues that separate us have nothing to do with the considerations for successfully managing our city. I don’t think you can find a person fairer and more open than John Safford.
Let’s Hope Cooler Heads Prevail
I cannot emphasize enough how potentially disastrous this RFP is. Commissioner Moran unfairly denounced Harper’s opinion in the on-call debacle in the most intemperate terms, attacking Harper personally. More recently, he opposed paying the fees for a past elected official’s legal costs. Again, he was grossly incorrect on the law, as documented in the carefully crafted legal opinion of Harper and Izzo.
Arming Moran, Sanghvi, and Golub with their own attorneys to fight opinions they do not like would not end well.
As many of the readers of this blog may remember, one of the more unfortunate characteristics of former Saratoga Springs Mayor Ron Kim was his penchant for taking every opportunity to make unsubstantiated disparaging remarks about his predecessors on the City Council. Many of us had hoped those days of ugly personal attacks had ended with his defeat in the last election.
Unfortunately, the ghost of Kim was still present at the April 16, 2024, City Council meeting, kept alive through the efforts of Accounts Commissioner Dillon Moran, Finance Commissioner Minita Sanghvi, and audience member Kristen Dart, with some enabling help from Public Works Commissioner Jason Golub.
The impetus for this most recent display of unsavory behavior was triggered by an item on Mayor John Safford’s agenda to pay attorney Karl Sleight’s bill for approximately $4,800 for representation for former Mayor Meg Kelly related to the New York State Attorney General’s investigation.
Similar bills for legal representation for city officials related to the Attorney General’s investigation had come before the Council for approval a number of times over the past couple of years, and Kim had used each occasion to complain about the expense and to make disparaging remarks about the people being given legal representation. In the end, though, the bills were always approved by the Council as they had to be.
The city is required by the city code and state law to defend and indemnify public officials in need of legal representation for actions brought against them during their tenure in office.
This is axiomatic. No one would run for office if they were not assured that if circumstances arose while they are in office for which they needed representation, they would have to pay for it themselves.
The Ambush
Pre-agenda meetings which take place the day before the regular Council meetings are an opportunity for Council members to present the resolutions they will be submitting for consideration at the regular meeting. At this public meeting Council members are supposed to raise any issues they may feel need clarification in preparation for the regular Council meeting. They are also supposed to have the courtesy to advise their colleagues of any resolutions they plan to oppose and why.
The following video is from the pre-agenda meeting held in preparation for the April 16 Council meeting. The Mayor lists his items including a resolution to pay Kelly’s legal bill. Readers will observe that Commissioner Sanghvi expresses no concerns about paying the bill.
Dillon Moran is not present but his deputy sits silently and Moran never contacted Mayor Safford to advise him that he would oppose paying Sleight’s bill.
There was no hint of what was going to unfold at the Tuesday night Council meeting.
The Ugly Gratuitous Attack on Meg Kelly
The debacle began during the comment period of the April 16, 2024, Council meeting when Kristen Dart spoke.
Section 9-1 of the city code reads: “The City Council of the City of Saratoga Springs agrees to provide a defense and indemnify its officers and employees in any state or federal legal action arising out of any alleged act or omission which occurred or allegedly occurred in the scope of official duty or public employment…”
In a letter to the Special Council in the Attorney General’s office, Kelly’s attorney Karl Sleight had responded to one of the many accusations in the Attorney General’s report by observing :
“As an initial point of fact the Report’s statement that Mayor Kelly had any ability to create policy and direct personnel outside of the limited powers of the Office of the Mayor is belied by the City’s charter and its Commission form of government. Mayor Kelly did not have the governmental authority to do what you alleged she did.”
Dart used this to claim that Sleight’s defense was proof that Kelly had acted outside her duties as Mayor and that therefore she forfeited legal protection that would be paid by the city.
Dart made this argument cynically ignoring the context of Sleight’s letter.
Dart totally misreads the Sleight letter. He is arguing that not only is there no evidence in the report supporting the allegation that she directed Chief Crooks but that since the chief reports to the Commissioner of Public Safety, she would have no authority to take such action.
Even if Kelly had improperly attempted to direct Chief Crooks she would still be indemnified because she was acting in her role as mayor. This distinction is specifically addressed in the City Attorney’s opinion (see below).
Dart, who is not a lawyer, should have had the sense of humility and courtesy, to have consulted an attorney before doing what constituted a hit on Kelly.
Dillon Moran: Unencumbered By Responsibility
When the item to pay Sleight’s bill came up on the Mayor’s agenda, Moran and Sanghvi swung into action in what had all the appearances of an orchestrated performance that had begun with Dart’s comment.
Moran attacked first playing off of Dart’s comment. He begins by reasserting another false allegation namely that Kelly did not cooperate with the Attorney General’s investigation so he cannot vote to pay her legal fees. He conveniently ignores Sleight’s correspondence with the AG. Sleight’s letter documents that the AG’s office canceled the scheduled meeting with Kelly and Sleight. Further, Sleight expresses concern about engaging with the Attorney General’s office in light of a federal suit brought by Lexis Figuereo against Kelly, among others. Sleight expresses concern that the AG’s office had “collaborated with the plaintiff in the federal court action.” It is worth noting that for some reason, the AG’s office did not see fit to respond to Sleight’s letter.
Most fundamentally and most critically, Moran chooses to simply ignore that city code and state law requires that these bills be paid. The idea that because he does not like the way Kelly interacted with the AG somehow abrogates our city code and state law is stunning.
Sanghvi Suddenly Has Questions
As the earlier video of the pre-agenda meeting documented, Sanghvi voiced no concerns about paying the legal bill nor did she even have any questions. Not so at the actual Council meeting.
Suddenly Sanghvi is full of questions. She even resurrects the issue that had been raised in the Kim era of potentially capping the amount of money spent on legal fees claiming that the City Attorneys allegedly told her that the city could do this. Her statement was subsequently refuted when the City Attorney memorialized the issue in a recent opinion (see below).
The legal bills must be reasonable. The city should not be impelled to pay for a lawyer who charges $1,000.00 an hour or bills for an unreasonable amount of hours given the scope of the work. It is not unusual for municipalities and insurance companies to insist on negotiating such bills.
What the city cannot do is place a cap on the total amount the city will pay for representation as was discussed in the Kim era and was now repeated by Sanghvi.
The Denouement
There were a number of possible ways forward for the Council on how to deal with this issue at this point. Safford could have asked for a vote but he could not be sure it would pass given the objections Minita and Dillon were suddenly raising. Given the sensitive legal issues involved and the need for privacy for the parties involved, Public Safety Commissioner Tim Coll proposed the Council goes into executive session to discuss the matter with the City Attorneys. Commissioner Sanghvi said she was amenable to this. The Council potentially could have resolved these issues in an executive session and then voted. But at this point, Public Works Commissioner Jason Golub interceded for some reason and urged the Mayor to table the resolution which Safford did. This had the effect of postponing the inevitable vote to approve this bill and giving Moran another chance to perform at the next Council meeting. (This also gave time for Wendy Liberatore to do her predictable TU article rehashing uncritically all the AG accusations and giving Dillon another platform for his phony self-righteous attacks on Kelly. The headline for her story documents why Golub’s move to table was unfortunate as it provided credibility to what Golub had to know was nonsense. The title of Liberatore’s story tells it all: Saratoga Springs officials flinch at paying more legal fees for former Mayor Kelly.)
Jason Golub: An Unpleasant Experience
Previous to last week I had always respected Jason Golub. While I was frustrated at his passivity regarding much of the craziness at City Council meetings and in particular his disinterest in addressing some of the more disturbing behavior of Dillon Moran at the Council table, I attributed it to his style.
Unfortunately, his performance at the Council meeting in killing the Mayor’s attempt to vote on the legal fees has exposed another side of him. A text he sent to me during the Council meeting establishes that he was fully aware that the attorney bill had to be paid. His confidence that Kelly would be paid makes clear that he knew the arguments put forward by Moran, Sanghvi, and Dart were without merit. So why did he intercede to table the vote rather than to let it be approved?
He had to know that his action prolonged Kelly’s vulnerability and left the dubious business of blocking the payment of her bills unresolved and subject to exploitation by Sanghvi and Moran.
In a subsequent conversation I had with Golub I was disappointed in his adamant defense of allowing the issue to go on. He offered multiple excuses. He alleged that he did not hear Sanghvi agree to go into executive session (Readers should review the video and determine for themselves whether it is credible that he did not hear her.) He argued that Kristen Dart is an attorney and he needed to take the issues she raised seriously. (Kristen Dart is not an attorney and we have already established that he knew Kelly should be paid.) He attempted to blame Mayor Safford for tabling the resolution. While Safford technically tabled it as chair, Safford did it only when Golub urged him to.
[Blogger received this statement from Dr. Connie Woytowich who is running for re-election to the school board.]
Hello Saratoga Springs Politics,
As I seek re-election to our local school board, my focus remains on enhancing our school district’s education. Due to a packed spring schedule as a mother, teacher and active school board member, I am concentrating my efforts on the upcoming candidate forum, in partnership with the school district and the League of Women Voters, scheduled for May 14th at 7pm at Saratoga Springs High School. I invite you and your readers to join us.
For more information about my background in education, my public service, and my commitment to our community, please visit my campaign website at connieforschoolboard.com.
Running as an independent, I advocate for board stability and endorse the re-election of my fellow members, John Ellis and Amanda Ellithorpe. School board experience is crucial during these times of challenges, including declining enrollments and variable state budgets.
Thank you for your continued support. I look forward to achieving more for our children and encourage you to vote for incumbents Connie, John, and Amanda on May 21st.
Another lively broadcast from Dan DeFedericis, Robin Dalton, and Adam Israel. They cover “politicians behaving badly” from the April 16, 2024, Saratoga Springs City Council meeting and an extremely informative interview with a consultant who specializes in short term rental issues.
Wendy Liberatore and the Times Union have once again done a disservice to the public by this time publishing inaccurate information surrounding the removal from the Council chamber and arrest of a woman at the April 2, 2024, Saratoga Springs City Council meeting.
In an article in the April 4, 2024 edition of the Times Union Liberatore claimed that Mayor John Safford “could not keep the atmosphere calm” and erroneously reported that he asked the police to remove a woman who was being disruptive. This is not an accurate description of what occurred.
Arrest at Council Meeting Highlights Changes to Public Comment Protocol
In a way the April 2, 2024, City Council meeting was “deja vu all over again” as Yogi Berra once said. A 54-year-old white woman, who had previously participated with Saratoga Black Lives Matter in the disruption of Council meetings and been arrested, interrupted the public hearing on Public Works Commissioner Jason Golub’s paid parking proposal. Once again she grabbed the microphone and wouldn’t give it up, and among other things screamed at the Mayor to “shut up”. In the incident she was involved in under the previous administration, the meeting descended into chaos with additional arrests. Here’s how this recent incident was dealt with.
While as Mayor Safford told Wendy “you can’t legislate civility” you can put in place procedures that are designed to de-escalate a toxic situation should it arise. In this case, the procedures Safford and the Council have put in place allowed the person to calmly be removed and the meeting to continue without descending into chaos, more shouting, and dysfunction as has been the case in the past.
Arresting People Who Disrupt Meetings: It’s Complicated
Our city has struggled with the challenge of maintaining order in dealing with members of Black Lives Matter who have repeatedly disrupted City Council meetings for years now. Many have wondered why most persons arrested in the past for disruptive behavior at Council meetings have had their charges dismissed. To some extent, this can be attributed to the mishandling of these events by previous Council members.
The key here is distinguishing the roles of the Mayor who chairs the meeting and the police. If a person behaves in a manner that violates the policies established by the Council, the Mayor has the authority to rule the individual out of order. This behavior could include, for example, a person refusing to relinquish the microphone when their time limit for speaking has lapsed or an individual in the audience yelling or otherwise hampering the deliberations of the Council.
But neither the Mayor nor the Commissioner of Public Safety is a sworn law enforcement officer and thus they cannot decide who or when a person can be arrested. Allowing politicians to have people arrested is a slippery slope that would be subject to abuse. The decision as to whether any of this behavior rises to the level of disorderly conduct is now in the hands of the sergeant of arms (a police officer assigned to City Council meetings). The police officer has the authority to attempt to remove the person from the meeting by requesting them to leave. If the person refuses the police officer’s order, at the discretion of the officer, the person may be charged with disorderly conduct and forcibly removed.
This is what happened at the April 2, 2024 meeting. The person refused to give up the microphone and the Mayor first ruled her out of order and then requested that she leave. Only when she continued to yell into the microphone did the sergeant at arms approach her and ask her to leave. When she refused, he arrested her. Another habitual BLM disrupter who calls herself Diogenes hovered around the police officer but did not interfere with the arrest. The video documents the incident. I would add that the officer involved showed great restraint and empathy in his attempt to deal with the woman who was clearly disturbed.
So it is important to note that Safford did not ask the police to remove the disruptive speaker as Wendy reported. This was a decision made independently by law enforcement. Safford calmly tries to reason with the woman and then tells her repeatedly that she needs to leave, but it is the police officer who uses his professional judgment on when to move forward and how to proceed with the removal of the disruptive person, not a politician.
Mayor John Safford has worked closely with Public Safety Commissioner Tim Coll to reassess the role of the Council and the police in maintaining order and to establish standards that are fair to both the Council and members of the public attending Council meetings. A new set of procedures for dealing with disruptive members of the audience were presented and adopted by the Council and these were the rules that were in play at the April 2 meeting.
It is impossible to prohibit members of the public who may become disruptive from attending meetings, but I have witnessed way too many Council meetings shut down or dragging on till almost midnight because members of the public have been allowed to remain out of control. While disruptions cannot be avoided, in my opinion, these new procedures have been thoughtfully planned and were effectively executed. The meeting continued, other members of the public were able to speak during three public hearings that were scheduled plus a public comment period, the city’s business was conducted, and the Council adjourned by 9:30.
Commissioner Sanghvi’s Odd Memory Loss
According to FOILed documents I received, Commissioner Coll submitted a draft of rules for public comment written by Mayor Safford to the New York State Committee on Open Government (COOG) for review before the Council voted to adopt the document. The January 2, 2024, response by COOG is at the bottom of this post.
Oddly, though, Liberatore includes this remark from Finance Commissioner Minita Sanghvi who seems to have been unaware of or to have forgotten conversations the Council members were involved in and the memos that were circulated before the adoption of these rules.
Sanghvi said she has proposed to the mayor that the city reach out to the state Committee on Open Government and other advocates to come up with a plan for meetings.
Times Union
Sanghvi received Coll’s memo with the COOG review of the proposed plan for handling public comment at Council meetings. The Mayor submitted the proposed rules to the Council for adoption and the Council vigorously debated them. Commissioner Sanghvi was the sole vote against the adoption of the rules objecting to any kind of limit on public comments.
Notwithstanding Commissioner Sanghvi’s remarks to the Times Union, the COOG was clearly consulted and she had been provided with their assessment of the rules before she voted.
These are the proposed procedures with commentary on right by COOG
With a little sleuthing, I am happy to report that I can now explain to them exactly how this happened. Documents acquired through the Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) clearly show Deputy Accounts Commissioner Stacy Connors’ reply to a request from the Finance Department to submit a budget transfer for $1,128.15 to cover the rest of what Connors had collected for On-Call pay for 2023. Connors’ reply email asks not for the amount requested from Finance to be transferred but for a different amount, $6520, that could cover On Call pay to her for all of 2024.
Request From Finance Department For Transfer of $1,128.15 To Cover On-Call Shortfall From 2023
Accounts Responds WithBudget Transfer Request From Stacy Connors for $6,520.00.
Improper Request
These emails document an apparent attempt to budget On-Call pay for a full year covering every week in 2024, totaling $6,520.00 for Stacy Connors, in spite of a legal opinion by the City Attorneys that the legislation establishing on-Call pay was not intended to compensate Deputies for performing their regular responsibilities, such as attending City Council meetings, an activity that Connors was given extra on-Call pay for in 2023.
Readers should understand that the Finance Commissioner plays a crucial role in the system of checks and balances in the commission form of government. It is the responsibility of the Department of Finance to not only maintain the city’s financial records but to scrutinize all expenditures to make sure they are appropriate. Sanghvi needs to explain how and why she and those who work in the Finance Department let Connor’s request for a year of On-call pay get on Sanghvi’s agenda. If this change was “missed” what else is Sanghvi and the department she oversees “missing”?
In his March 25, 2024 column, Daily Gazette writer Andrew Waite took Mayor John Safford to task, claiming Safford had failed to deliver on his campaign promise to bring civility to City Council meetings because of the audience behavior at the March 19 Saratoga Springs City Council meeting. The problem, according to Waite, is the “mayor’s failure to establish meaningful dialog with outspoken members of the community as well as missteps by the Mayor and Public Safety Commissioner Coll…”
Most of us are familiar with the “Uncle Henry” syndrome. “Uncle Henry” is the family member who must be invited to Thanksgiving dinner. The rest of the family must endure his apocryphal pronouncements about things he has little understanding of or knowledge about. Waite has demonstrated his entitlement to this role with this column as well as others he has written (most notably his similarly flawed column on the Attorney General’s report on Saratoga Springs).
“He’s [Mayor Safford] not running meetings any more smoothly than when former Mayor Ron Kim failed to keep things on track…”
Waite, March 25, 2024
This is simply untrue. Mayor Kim had given up any control over the public comment period. He first expanded the time limit for individual public comment to four minutes and then abandoned any limits altogether. Kim’s meetings were marathon events that, at times, ran over five hours. On at least two occasions, Kim had to adjourn the Council meeting without completing the city’s business because of the out-of-control behavior of members of Saratoga Black Lives Matter.
Mayor Safford was able to largely enforce his three-minute limit on speakers at the March 19 Council meeting. Only after Conservative Committee Chair David Buchyn used a quote from Lexis Figuereo that included the “n” word was the public comment period disrupted. Even then, in contrast to Kim, Safford’s patient repeated efforts to bring order were successful after only five or six minutes.
The Council was able to conduct all of its business without interruption and adjourn around 9 p.m. These are definitely improvements.
Misassigning Blame
Most disturbing was Waite’s assignment of blame for some of the regrettable behavior that did still occur at this Council meeting.
Central to Waite’s article is his allegation that the source of BLM’s uncivil behavior at meetings is the failure of members of the City Council to engage with them. This is so patently false and so easily refuted that it exposes the utter lack of Waite’s journalistic integrity. He is oblivious to the idea that the BLM people bear any responsibility for the toxic character of Council meetings.
First, consider the uncivil behavior (hint: it is not the Mayor).
Here is Waite’s opinion on how to stop this behavior:
“If Safford and Coll are serious about trying to bring civility to the city, they have to be serious about establishing meaningful relationships with members of the community – especially vocal and well-mobilized Black Lives Matter activists.”
Andrew Waite, March 25, 2024
Apparently, Mr. Waite is unaware of and has not bothered to research Mr. Figuereo’s unwillingness to enter into direct dialogue with members of the City Council over the past four years. For example, as long ago as 2021 then Finance Commissioner Michele Madigan proposed that the city hire a mediator to work with the city and BLM to respond to BLM’s demands. In fact, the city allocated money for this. Madigan invited BLM to participate in the selection of a mediator.
Figuereo rejected the offer. He had no interest in engaging beyond the group’s repeated, toxic protests.
This effort was not isolated. Over the years, many Council members have tried to engage with Figuereo one-on-one to no avail. Most recently, Pubic Works Commissioner Jason Golub, at a Council meeting, urged BLM to meet with him to discuss their concerns rather than continue to disrupt Council meetings. To date, BLM has not bothered to take him up on that offer. As recently as March 8, Public Safety Commissioner Tim Coll called Figuereo and invited him to have lunch and discuss his concerns. Figuereo put him off, telling him he would get back to him the next day. He never did.
A week and a half following the call, at a Council meeting, Figuereo blamed Coll’s letter to the editor in Saratoga Today for his unwillingness to meet with Coll. The letter was critical of BLM, but the tone was professional. (Use the link to assess it for yourself.)
Nevertheless, Waite puts on blinders and his Uncle Henry hat and takes Figuereo’s complaint that nobody wants to talk to him and have a relationship with him at face value.
More Misassigned Blame
Waite has also decided that “Coll has been part of the problem” because he “chose to fact check the New York State Attorney General’s report” without “acknowledging and condemning gross misconduct by past city officials.” Waite later admits that “…perhaps the AG report did deserve some scrutiny for conflating facts about which particular law enforcement unit demonstrated aggression at various levels.” What Waite refuses to acknowledge is that Figuereo is involved in several lawsuits against the city. It is simply ridiculous for Waite to demand that any city official make a statement “acknowledging ….misconduct by …city officials” while these cases are pending. It is equally odd to see any of this as somehow justifying BLM’s disruptive behavior at Council meetings
The Case of Jarrod Iler
Waite once again puts on his Uncle Henry hat in his discussion of the consideration of the hiring of former Troy police officer Jarrod Iler for a position with the Saratoga Springs Police Department. Some years ago, Iler had shot and wounded a black man the Troy police were trying to pick up for a parole violation. The man attempted to flee police in a car and tried to run down Iler, who fired his gun. Iler was cleared of any wrongdoing by a grand jury and went on to serve with distinction as an officer in Port Lucie, Florida. When Coll became aware of the Troy incident, however, he withdrew Iler from consideration, taking full responsibility and instituting a more vigorous vetting process for future hires. Waite ignores the fact that Coll had announced that Iler had been dropped from consideration before the March 19 meeting. No one from BLM had contacted Coll to voice concerns about the potential hiring and to urge him not to be hired; nevertheless, Waite insists that Coll backed off because of the public outcry. Waite also never asks why BLM bothered to show up to protest when they knew, as documented in the video of the meeting, that Iler was not going to be hired. They were not there to protest his hiring as that issue was dead, and they knew it.
In fact, this was simply another of the many opportunities for the BLM people to spend an hour and a half insulting and attempting to humiliate the members of the Council.
All of this was lost on Mr. Waite.
A Cheap Shot By Waite
Mayor John Safford is a kind and generous soul. He has the thankless job of trying to manage a meeting in which angry and troubled people abuse their privilege to speak during the public comment period to insult and belittle the soft targets of Council members who have to silently listen to them.
Safford was well aware of the volatile nature of the meeting and that attempting to remove a BLM person from the meeting had the potential to descend into a scrum during which someone might be hurt. It was apparent that raising his voice or otherwise behaving belligerently would only raise the temperature in the room. To his credit, he maintained the persona many of us know him for; a person trying to do the right thing.
This is not the way Waite saw things:
But in trying to enforce his own rules, Safford sounds a lot like a meek parent issuing empty threats to a young child without follow-through.
[JK: I received this from Ed Lindner of Bikeatoga]
Hi All: Now that we’re done digging out from the big snowstorm, we can go right back to thinking about getting out on our bikes and urging city officials to make Saratoga Springs a more bike-friendly community!
One point that’s often overlooked when we talk about building good quality sidewalks and bike lanes is that these investments in Complete Streets are an investment in public health – particularly for seniors. As AARP says, “a bike-friendly community is an age-friendly community.”
If you’re looking to stay healthy and active as you grow older, come join us for a free panel presentation at the Saratoga Springs Public Library on Wednesday, March 27th at 7:00 PM.
Our panelists:
Jill VanKuren, CEO Saratoga Hospital
Scott Clark, CEO Saratoga Regional YMCA
Robyn Haberman, Associate State Director AARP New York
Michael King, Transportation Planner. Owner, TrafficCalmer.com
We’ll explore the resources available at Saratoga Hospital and the Saratoga Regional YMCA to support seniors who want to stay physically active and independent. AARP representative Robyn Haberman will discuss how public investments in sidewalks and bike lanes can help make Saratoga Springs an “AARP Livable Community.” Mike King will talk about our city’s Complete Streets plan and the things that we can do better.
We hope to see you on March 27, 2024. The program will run from 7 to 8:45PM in the Harry Dutcher Community Room at the Saratoga Springs Public Library. – Ed
The image below was taken from Finance Commissioner Minita Sanghvi’s agenda for the March 19, 2024, Saratoga Springs City Council meeting. It documents her attempt to inappropriately fund on-call pay for the Deputy Accounts Commissioner for all of 2024.
Now Moran, with Sanghvi’s assistance, is back trying again to access this on-call money inappropriately for his deputy for 2024.
An Inept Attempt At Damage Control
As documented in an earlier post, Commissioners Sanghvi and Moran attempted to slip through the Council an authorization to move money in the Accounts Department from “Risk and Safety” to a line identified as” On Call -Cover Payroll Expenses.” The amount, as seen above in a link to an item on Sanghvi’s agenda entitled innocuously “Budget Transfers-Payroll and Benefits,” was $6,520.00, enough to fund Connors for another year of on-call pay.
Outed the day before the Council meeting, Moran and Sanghvi were forced to back off, at least temporarily, from this proposal at the March 19, 2024, City Council meeting and to scramble to come up with an explanation for the switch they ended up making at the table.
Their strategy was to replace the number on the budget transfer with a lower number at the table when that agenda item came up and to offer a rambling set of excuses for the change.
Sanghvi claimed the $6,520.00 figure on her agenda was an error. The budget transfer amount should be $1,128.15, she said, to cover a deficit from paying Connors on-call money for the final quarter of 2023. The problem came when Mayor John Safford asked her, “Where did the number $6,520.00 come from?”
Moran and Sanghvi were all over the ballpark with rambling, often irrelevant, stories and excuses, none of which answered the Mayor’s question.
Moran often interrupted Sanghvi and had to be asked by the Mayor not to speak over the other Commissioner. At one point, Moran responded, “You think I do this stuff? I’m not involved in these things.” This was ironic because his deputy who was sitting behind him was the person who submitted the request for $6,520.00 to the Finance Department. Notice how, in the clip below, Moran goes on the offensive and tries to change the subject to the mayor’s office.
In this video clip, Sanghvi responds, “I believe the person [JK: Note she does not name the person she is talking about] redid it, not knowing it was only to cover the shortfall and not for the whole amount. This is my assumption; I have no idea what goes on in people’s minds.” [My emphasis] Again, the irony is that the person she is talking about who submitted the change is Stacy Connors, who is sitting behind her.
Readers may recall that the resolution establishing on-call was doctored to add the word “event” Adding that word was somehow supposed to justify Connors putting in for on call pay for attending things like the State of the City address I guess. The changed resolution was uploaded to the city’s website from Ms. Connors’ computer. As of the date of the Council meeting, it still had not been corrected despite the two City Attorneys confirming that this was not part of the resolution passed by the Council.
It Doesn’t Hold Up Under Scrutiny
What actually happened was that Sanghvi’s office had notified the Accounts Department that they had to address a deficit of $1,128.15. This was money paid in 2024 for the final quarter of on-call for Stacy Connors for 2023. It was pretty simple and direct. Accounts was asked to submit a budget transfer for that amount.
But Moran’s Deputy, Stacy Connors, did not submit a budget transfer for that amount. Instead, she altered the amount to $6,520.00. This would cover paying her for being on-call for all of this year. It is important to note that the change would obviously benefit her. It begs credibility that she was “confused” when she altered the request.
Under the commission form of government, Sanghvi and her staff are supposed to scrutinize all expenditures to catch abuses and errors. Sanghvi fails to explain how her staff, who had asked Accounts for a specific amount for the original transfer, was oblivious to the obvious major increase in that amount that they subsequently received and put on Sanghvi’s agenda. She also fails to explain how she missed it herself, as she is the one ultimately responsible for what goes on her agenda.
It’s Always The Coverup
What really raises questions about Moran’s and Sanghvi’s culpability in trying to get this funding through the Council is their utterly inept attempts to deflect, rationalize, and explain away the attempt to get the Council to approve funding on-call for Connors for the year.
The full discussion is nine minutes long, which I have included below. While I am providing some excerpts to get a proper sense of the poverty of Moran’s and Sanghvi’s attempts to evade the issues, I urge the readers to listen to the entire discussion.
Note how Sanghvi dismisses the City Attorneys’ opinion, which affirmed that the original resolution was designed for emergencies only, and instead tries to go off on a tangent, claiming the problem is with the resolution, which she claims should be amended or rescinded.
The problem for Sanghvi, and why she was so dismissive of the city attorneys’ opinion, was that the resolution was not the issue but its misuse to improperly pay deputies. Based on the discussion, it is unclear whether Sanghvi accepts that the payments were improper, of which her own deputy was a beneficiary.
Some Excerpts
Sanghvi dismisses attorneys opinion
Of course, the opinion affirmed that the adopted resolution did not authorize the payments to her deputy and two others. It’s no wonder she dismisses it.
The Account Department Was Advised By Finance What To Request To Correct The Deficit
Saratoga Springs Politics 