Arezzo Accounting

WOW.  Big props to Forde Prigot whose eagle eye spotted this beauty on the 2012 Municipal Budget Data Sheet.

For newbies to Old Guard accounting, and to why the battle against Reform is at a fever pitch, pay attention.

GA has discussed Old Guard accounting at the Hoboken BoE, where prior to the Kids First takeover, school monies were tapped like a beer keg at a Frat party.

Let's see...

There was GA's BoE jobs bank post (1,015 employees with no named title, missing names, work site location, etc.), the 6 million giveaway (118 employees paid after termination),  $48K education money spent on cell phones (157 cell phone accounts), dinners at nice restaurants (yummy steak for Board members!), trip giveaways (outings to Atlantic City with $300 stipends for 'friends'), diappearing money ($1.9 million simply disappeared in excess payment to vendors with no record of approval) and plenty more.

Amazingly, all this looting just represents a single year: 2005-2006.

Who were the BoE officials in the 2005-2006 school year?

Frank Raia, President

Carmelo Garcia * VP

Frances Kearns *

John Raslowsky

Theresa Burns

James Farina

Magdelena Porrata

Ron Rosenberg

Wanda Alicea

Oh, there are horrors galore to be mined in past Boe audits, lurking in the shadows, waiting to slap us anew.

But back to 'Forde's Find', feast your eyes.

You are looking at Construction Fees: anticipated 2012 and what was anticipated in 2011 vs. the actual cash amount realized in 2011.

Need to get closer?

Huh?... you say.

The amount collected in 2011 was  $641,674.89 more than the Construction office had anticipated- nearly double.  How could that be?

Two words: Al Arrezo.

He was canned in in early 2011.

And imagine, he's suing the City for his job back.  What BALLS.

GA wonders exactly how the Construction Fee scam worked.  I am guessing that paperwork on jobs was never done, so technically the money wasn't 'missing'.  It just never showed up.  Meaning on paper, there would be no way to accurately track what was built in the Arezzo Era, never mind what drawings are on file in City Hall.

It would suggest to GA all kinds of potential cost-saving 'cheats' on Building code requirements- some affecting safety- for the right price. Of course, conjecture.  But, without documentation, how do we know?

GA knows the office is being properly run now.

Now Construction fees are showing up.  So are parking fees.  Zimmer has directed Corporation Counsel to wrap up lingering lawsuits, endless billing, and isn't playing ball on the Old Guard settlement scams.  The BoE is being properly run and audited (thanks to Kids First).

No wonder the 'fight' against Reform is so bitter and personal- why the Old Guard pulled out all stops to keep low-turn out elections off a November-cycle.  

The Old Guard is fighting for their very survival- financial survival, that is.

Because unless they've got their paws on the levers of power, they can't tap the city's coffers like a beer keg and hand out jobs to hacks and skip the paperwork to skim some graft...

It's why more of us need to register more of us to vote, and to EDUCATE our neighbors and what the 'battle' is about.

We (Reformers) are not perfect, but we are not thieves.

And thanks to Forde for this lesson in Arezzo Accounting.