Is Skip Scirocco throwing Saratoga Springs and the
taxpayers under the bus? The granting of
a million dollar waiver of water hookup fees is and will continue to burden
taxpayers with higher water and sewer bills.
Since Scirocco has been in office one of the water charges has risen
from $12 to $48 and will continue to escalate until these developers who gained
Sirocco’s favor pays the City the money they owe.
The matter of how Scirocco runs the waiver of fees and his
lame brain excuses for doing so is now in the hands of the NY State Attorney
General’s hands. The AG’s department was
in City Hall weeks ago removing all relevant materials and Scirocco was warned
by the AG and in a City Hall memo not to shred or remove any documents that are
the property of the City’s. It is
alleged that after this warning Sirocco’s son was seen carrying out a box of
materials from his father’s office,
again this was alleged to have been seen by a City Hall employee who has
reported the action.
A few Friday’s ago Commissioners Madigan & Mathiesen
drove down together to Albany to be interviewed by someone in the AG’s
office. Remember that Madigan last year
had said that she audited the ‘supposed’ hookup fee waivers and found nothing
wrong but recently has admitted that maybe she didn’t go deep enough in her
audit. This sounds like a great
Commissioner of Finance. Hopefully
sometime soon we will find out what happened and why Scirocco gave these
waivers when the developers didn’t even pass the 1st requirement of
having to install 12” water mains.
The trio of Madigan, Mathiesen and Scirocco are starting to
sound like a bunch of out of control puppets at Council meetings. Obviously these three have formed an alliance
to make the Mayor look bad and they give her a hard time as often as they
can. Commissioner Madigan, thank God you
have Christine Gilmet-Brown in your office or you would not be half the successful
Commissioner you think you are.
The reason I mention the three Commissioners forming a ban
is because since early last year they have decided that 1. They do not like the
Mayor and 2. They want to shift any control of the Mayor’s office into their
own.
I was at this past
Tuesday’s Council meeting and what a circus it was, well the second circus
after the Sustainable Saratoga clan rallied against PUD’s and the desperate
need to ban plastic bags in the City.
The group is slowly becoming the minority voice of the majority and we
better turn out and speak up or they will get their way on every issue they
dream up. Politicians vote on issues
depending on how many people show up and exert pressure at meetings. Anyway, the second circus was during the
Mayor’s portion of the meeting.
Through a technicality 3 Housing Authority Board members seats were
deemed vacant by State law because the appointing Commissioner at the time
(Mayor Johnson) did not inform the appointees that they had to sign an oath of
office form which next to tying your shoes is the easiest thing to do. So, Mayor Yepsen has the right as every other
previous Mayor had, to fill these positions.
Yepsen being the most transparent Mayor in Saratoga’s history now
advertises commission & committee seats up for appointment and chooses the
appointments from the list, which by the way any citizen of Saratoga Springs
can be a part of. Well, that did not sit
right with the 3 Musketeers and they argued why they were not informed of the
replacements. Scirocco went as far as
saying he hoped ‘this isn’t a power grab’ and that the Charter should be
changed so that all appointments have to be passed by the Council. Again the asinine thinking of Scirocco even
when Johnson made his 11th hour mass appointments which usually goes
to the incoming Mayor, his lips were sealed as they are 99% of the time unless
he in stammering at Council meetings. He
was joined at the lip (yes lip) with Scott Johnson for 6 years and as Johnson systematically
never reappointed a Democrat to a seat, he filled the seats with friends and Party
members and did we ever and I mean ever hear 1 word out of Sirocco’s mouth
admonishing Johnson, or Madigan & Mathiesen for that matter? At the meeting Madigan and Mathiesen uttered the
words that they want to be informed on who the Mayor is going to appoint, I say
why? It seems to me that the three
horseman of death want to be the ones to grab power and by banding together they
feel they will become 3 larger kings of their domains. Tuesday night’s meeting was one of the most
embarrassing meetings for Scirocco, Mathiesen and Madigan that I ever witnessed
and by the way the Mayor did reappoint one of the SSHA board members that were
removed and he just happened to be a Republican.
A very big circus atmosphere in the old chamber Tuesday
night and 3 clowns highlighted the evening.
Next up, a look at
the increasing number of working supervisors Scirocco has appointed at inflated
salaries and how many DPW workers these new supervisors oversee.
