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just wondering
Senior Member
387 Posts |
Posted - 06/12/2008 : 8:06:34 PM
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The "outrageous" salaries for new hires are very much in line with what other cities and towns are paying. Like it or not, competency comes with a price. The mayor accepted the challenge of improving the quality of services provide by city government. To meet that challenge, he has brought in higher salaried professionals that will be held accountable for the work they do.
I haven't read any complaints about the quality of service coming out of city hall. A year ago, this and other blogs were filled with complaints about services. It is no suprise that a year ago the city was employing lower paid less qualified individuals.
Consolidation of departments is done for multiple reasons.....and that applies to city government and the private sector. Sometimes it is a strict cost savings event and other times it is to make an organization more efficient. We are seeing the ground work being laid for a more efficient city government. The org chart may not look the same as it has in past administrations, but lets be real......there was a need to improve services, there was a need for change. Cutting positions may have helped offset some of the increases to fixed costs and school funding but it would have to be done at the expense of improved service.
The budget is about 9 million more than last year.....impossible to prevent that by cutting positions. Even if 20 positions were cut, that would only make up a million dollars. Can anyone come up with a list of 20 positions that the city can do without?
And as far as comments about the mayor not being prepared with all of his changes in time for the May 15 budget date.......thats a crazy point to beat him up on. I'll assume that the people blogging here have all been part companies in the private sector that have experienced top level changes. In my own job, I have seen 3 CEO's in 8 years.....never once has a CEO come in and made sweeping changes without the required due diligence. I believe the mayor has addressed the low hanging fruit thus far....and as he has stated, there is more to come. While we are not all privy to the exact nature of consolidations that may be proposed, it would be wrong for him to release information before the time is right.....particularly if there are jobs hanging in the balance. How effective do you think an employee will be if he reads on this blog that his job is being cut sometime in the future? Now add to that all of the spin and specualtion that gets thrown around once a rumor hits these pages.....quality of work would plummet all on speculation.
"let the mayor do his job" - Alderman Sachetta
Did anyone catch the article in the independent yesterday regarding the seperation of powers? |
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Tails
Administrator
2682 Posts |
Posted - 06/12/2008 : 11:23:36 PM
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We are not other cities and towns. We are much smaller than Malden and Malden has a lower budget than us. This is the first year this is true. Mayor DeMaria was pushing all these deals for the “saving the city some money” act and covering up his bloated payroll with the sale of the City Yards, Settling Thibeault lawsuit and the sale of the Devens School and they were supposed to offset and justify his "consolidation of departments" and their higher rate of pay. He couldn't cover this up fast enough with some quick budget numbers and again keeps running into state ethics law issues.
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justme
Advanced Member
1428 Posts |
 Posted - 06/13/2008 : 08:49:59 AM
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I think he's making a big mistake with many of his consolidation decisions. We'll just have to wait see how it plays out. To me, Carlo is trying to reinvent the wheel and it's fine just the way it is.
Frankly, I really don't give a damn what other cities are paying..................... I know it's very easy to say the budget can be cut and realize that without all the information the mayor and his staff have, it doesn't mean anything. That said, I truly believe he could have done a better job with the budget. Mr Carlisle doesn't appear to have the necessary qualifications while Mr DeCoste, who is very knowledgeable, was left out of the loop completely. Why not use all the resources available? |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 06/13/2008 : 10:43:26 AM
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Just wondering,
Could you please elaborate on why you believe that the mayor's new hires that are at the center of the "controversy" have improved the quality of service at City Hall? For now, my views on the subject.
City Services:
I'll give you that one. Slam dunk. It would not have taken a whole lot to improve over the former director but the results so far have greatly exceeded what we were getting previously. Still some room for improvement though, as the Mayor admitted the other night with his "greater things still to come" comment. I'm pretty much satisfied so far though. My only real complaint would be that a few more potholes need to be addressed; it looks as if they may have exhausted that budget for now though. Some of my board mates might take exception with me over the GTA issue but we'll see how that sorts itself out in the new fiscal year. You have to admit though that the solution to that issue wasn't "guys with brooms". I think a big part of that turnaround might be attributed to Peter Pietrantonio, who is not a new hire. The administration also probably deserves credit though for getting more out of him.
Mayor's Office:
I don't know that people have had issues with the quality of service provided by this office under either administration with the exception of the perceived (I'm being nice) dead weight in the prior administration. I haven't used the office personally under either administration but, I would assume that it would have to better without the dead weight. I can't have an opinion on it beyond that.
City Solicitor:
So far, to me, this has been somewhat of a wash. It's a hard office to measure as we only get to see a portion of what they do. The mayor made a good point the other night. The head of this department is going to be a political appointment, loyal to the mayor no matter what; so let's move on from that in looking at the department's performance. I haven't agreed with some of the decisions by either legal team but who am I to judge? As I see it, the current legal department is struggling to get things done. They still haven't finished with elimination of the board of fire commissioners and it seems to have fallen of the charts; it didn't seem to be that hard. Where are the ordinances changes required to consolidate departments? From listening to the Mayor, I get the feeling that he knows what he wants to do on that end but he seems to be held up by the ordinance changes. Why can't Ms. Deveney get her special employee designation piece on an agenda? She'll be out of compliance with the State Ethics commission ruling now until at least the end of August if a special session isn't called for? There may be reasons for these things not getting done but we are not privy to them. There may be more upside to the current legal team than the previous one (sorry, but the guys on Hanlon's team weren't interested in turning in more than hack performances) but they still have a ways to go to show it, in my opinion.
Budget Director:
It seems as if we may have traded one problem for another. There seemed to be some type of unofficial commitment by the City Council to insure that the budget process went smoothly this year. Otherwise, I'd have to believe that there would have been a lot more yelling and screaming about the budget book that they received. The office suffered due to the fact that it sat vacant for two months. Mr. Carlisle and the mayor needed to present this budget to the city in a way that would have better supported their arguments; that didn't happen for me and a lot of other people it seems either. Justifying your budget by pointing to the analysis done by the local press is ludicrous, especially when the analysis done by some of the papers is flat out flawed, to be kind. The much ballyhooed capital budget (see next Monday's agenda) seems to consist of nothing more than adding additional expense requests to the agenda; some of these requests appear to be destined to be added directly to the tax levy. Was this just a shell game so that the savings in the city side of the budget would appear to be bigger? The biggest home run that the Mayor could have hit in his first six months in office was to turn in the tightest budget that he could have; by his own admission, he didn't. Unless, he intends to submit more cuts before the tax rate is set, we'll all likely pay for that. How can we avoid it? More "robbing Peter to pay Paul"? Let's not get any further ahead of ourselves on that issue than that though; there'll be plenty of time to comment on it as it unfolds.
Purchasing Agent:
Let face it. Mr. Pedulla did not have many supporters last year. Some questions were raised on how he reorganized the work of the office and what it was perceived to have cost the city. Mayor Hanlon tried to convince us that the changes were saving the city money but was never able to quantify the savings to us. As of yet, Mr. Carlisle's impact on this office is unknown. Neither were certified when they were appointed to the position; certifications came, or will come, on the taxpayer's dime in both cases. One difference though. Mr. Pedulla came from private industry; Mr. Carlisle has been doing the job in the public sector, without certification, for some time. Although it's not a requirement for the job, the question of why he had never gotten it before was never answered (or asked for that matter). If we were only going to compare purchasing directors, I'd have to just write this one off as an incomplete at this point. However, the addition of the person from the school building commission has the potential to make this a stronger office if they come as advertised. Before the city council essentially cut a clerk from this office, there was going to be an increase in salaries in this office; may be that was going to be somewhat justified from a quality standpoint. Now, there is a going to be decrease in salaries and the possibility of an increase in service. I still have to give it an incomplete for now but it clearly has the potential to be better. Will Mr. Carlisle play a part in that? Only time will tell.
Personnel:
Although this office does not strictly fall into the criteria for this argument, I don't see how cutting the manpower in this office by approximately a third improves the quality of service at city hall for city employees. Surely, the personnel director had to have more responsibilities than acting as a buffer to the legal department and acting as a supervisor to the other two people in the department. But that's all that's been discussed in terms of how he will be replaced. Reforming the city's health care coverage is probably the one single issue that can have the biggest positive impact on the city budget's bottom line going forward. How does the administration insure us that this issue is going to get addressed in a timely manner? With everything that's going on, including the renegotiation of all city labor contracts with the exception of police and fire, it hard to imagine how it's all going to get done with fewer people available. Again, this is a change that hasn't been explained well enough for everyone's satisfaction.
Just my opinion, but I don't see a great increase in the quality of service at City Hall yet because of the new hires, with the obvious exception of City Services. There is some potential for things to get better overall but it hasn't been fully realized as of now. The change in the personnel office is troubling to me but if they are able to accomplish everything that they need to accomplish in a timely manner, who am I to argue? |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 06/13/2008 : 11:31:17 AM
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In regards to the editorial in this week's Independent regarding the seperation of powers, I read it and tend to agree with it, for the most part. There are too many members of the council who don't understand their role and responsibilties. However, in regards to the personnel director, I think that most of them were just expressing their opinions. We could have an argument about whether or not that was appropriate in a budget hearing setting; I'm not sure that I could win that one though.
There actually is a section of MGL that would allow the council to add to the budget (You must be logged in to see this link.) but it has strict limitations. Some could try to argue that they could use this section of MGL to restore the personnel director position; however, I just don't see that being a possibilty.
I'm glad that the Independent is a "stickler for the rules". As such, I'm not sure why they didn't come out in support of the BOA's original decision to holdoff on Mr. Carlisle appointment as Purchasing Director. 7 days notification is the rule. As the title of the editorial states "Some people still don't get it".
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billydee
Member
21 Posts |
Posted - 06/14/2008 : 10:39:13 PM
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I called for the resignaton of Ms. Erin Deveney as City Solicitor because of the unethical and illegal behavior she exhibited by accepting the position as a Chief of Staff without clearing both her ethical and legal hurdles. My plea apparently has been heard. A few hours ago I was informed by a City official that Ms. Colleen Mejia is about to be appointed City Solicitor. I applaud the Mayor for such a move if the rumor is true.
However, in light of the irresponsible request by the Mayor to transfer $2 million from Free Cash to lower next December's taxes. Order #13 on Monday's Council agenda (6/16/07) is frivilous and fiscally irresponsible because it digs taxpayers $4 million in the hole in 2009. The Mayor just submitted an FY '09 Budget that was (before City Council cuts) $16,000 below the Proposition two and 1/2 limit. This Mayor has no clue about municipal finances. His out of town Budget Director does not live here and will be gone from here as soon as the going gets tough like it did in Southbury or wherever he is from. Order #13 should be voted down for sheer stupidity. If not, the Mayor should fully disclose his financial outlook through the November 2009 mayoral election in the Finance Committee while explaining this Order #13 transfer. The Mayor must be fully accountable to the Taxpayers on all future municipal finance request since we are no better off today than we were with Mayor Hanlon a year ago.
As for Ms. Mejia, I heard she is good. But she should be held to the highest standard of honesty to the taxpayers in accepting the City Solicitor position. I posted on this blog that there was a cloud over the City Solicitor's Office as long as Ms. Deveney stayed in that position. I want full disclosure on Ms. Mejia's appointment in the Administrative Affairs Committee. Rumor has it that she condoned payroll fraud in her own department and has been paid a City Solicitor salary even while Ms. Deveney has been serving as City Solicitor. Rumors come and go in Everett and discussing her appointment in Administrative Affairs should air these rumor and perhaps put them to rest. Can we afford to take any more chances with bad appointments with taxes going up and quality of service at City Hall going down? I think not. Willy nilly approval by the BOA of her appointment will be unacceptable in Ms. Mejia's case. We, the Taxpayers, are beginning to rise! |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 06/14/2008 : 11:24:49 PM
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Billydee,
Whether or not this rumor is true, that was an excellent post you made the other day in regards to Ms. Deveney. I was very much in agreement with it and had failed to mention that the other day. Any word if Ms. Deveney will still be with us as chief of staff? That would open up a whole other can of worms.
If Mrs. Mejia were to be named City Solicitor, it would most likely have to be at a salary of the current ordinance maximum, at most, until July 1, 2009. Ordinance changes take four readings. There aren't that many regular meetings scheduled before the new fiscal begins. The ordinance can be changed during the fiscal year but any changes to it can't take effect until the beginning of the next fiscal year. I suppose special meetings could be held but I don't think that the city council would be happy with that. The administration could try another "gets paid as something else" move but that should go over like a lead ballon. Maybe try to get the the next fiscal year restriction removed from the ordinance? Who knows?
It'll be interesting to see if and how this plays out. |
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nicholas
Member
6 Posts |
Posted - 06/15/2008 : 1:34:44 PM
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| I agree with Billydee on transferring another $2 million from free cash to the upcoming taxes. Carlo transferred $ 2 million back in the winter. If the order is approved by both the Council and BOA, we will have a $4 million tax break this year, which we will have to make up in 2009. Isn't anybody listening about the taxes? My mother sure isn't. Tut when I exlained that she would get a tax break this year but would have to pay for it next year, that got her attention. We should all have our councilpeople and aldermen vote NO on Item #13. Thanks Billydee for highlighting another City Hall tax screw up. |
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kimmy
Member
32 Posts |
Posted - 06/15/2008 : 2:52:14 PM
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| This epidemic of borrowing from Peter to pay Paul is getting out of control. The spending is out of control to. There needs to be control and accountibility and thats why you have members of the council. You have to work and cut what you have not keep borrowing. If you keep borrowing and borrowing on a home you end up loosing it. You only delay the inevidable. I have to agree with what I have read and seen. We should not be paying GTA all this kinds of money for street sweeping. They should use what they have and get out there with brooms just like Carlo Demaria said they would do and with the agreesive pension payment that will have to be made in the future this second 2 mil transfer is wrong. |
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just wondering
Senior Member
387 Posts |
Posted - 06/17/2008 : 8:00:18 PM
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| Kimmy....the cost of paying GTA is much less than the cost of doing it ourselves. I may be off by a dollar or two, but i think we pay 72 per hour. That includes the cost of labor and use of the vehicle which we don't have to maintain. |
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massdee
Moderator
5299 Posts |
Posted - 06/17/2008 : 9:13:01 PM
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| The amount I heard was $77.00 an hour. Are you saying GTA is also providing the driver of the sweeper? If that is the case, what is the city driver doing? Isn't that like paying for something twice? |
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Tails
Administrator
2682 Posts |
Posted - 06/17/2008 : 11:05:10 PM
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| That's $3,000.00 per week taxpayer’s money. At the end of the season we, the taxpayers, will have paid GTA $102,000.00 and it has not been determined whether or not that includes man hours. The only thing wrong with sweeper # 2 is it leaves a line down the middle of the street. So install another broom and fix it. Let’s not pay our buddies as a thank you for campaign support on the taxpayer’s dollar. Speaking of sweepers, there was another sweeper down at the city yards that’s no longer there and I believe I saw it where GTA stores their trucks. I thought that had to go out to bid. I’d like to see the bid for it? |
Edited by - Tails on 06/18/2008 10:18:56 PM |
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justme
Advanced Member
1428 Posts |
Posted - 06/18/2008 : 08:47:35 AM
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A GTA employee is the driver.
Unfortunately, city vehicles and equipment have been allowed to deteriorate to a point where replacement is the only option. That's a major capital expenditure that we will probably see a request for soon. It's really too bad none of our recent mayors were willing to spend a little on a regular basis. Now we'll have to lay out a lot................ |
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Tails
Administrator
2682 Posts |
Posted - 06/18/2008 : 09:05:12 AM
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From what I gathered at the budget hearing, the only problem with sweeper # 2 was a second broom. Simonelli asked the questions when he inspected the equipment. I am total agreement that the prior administrations did not keep up with the up-keep however, I still feel a one time investment, on our own machines,would be the cheapest route. I'm having a hard time believing that it will cost $102,000.00 to install an additional broom on the other sweeper. Also, what are city service employees that should be doing this sweeping doing now and we must be paying for man hours because we are taking away GTA employees that would be doing something else (if they were not doing the street sweeping) I would not even have a problem with this if it was temporary but it's not looking that way. The taxpayers have already paid out, at least, $36,000.00. That money should have gone towards fixing the other sweeper and they had 6 months to deal with this and sweeper # 2 is still sitting there, getting rusty.
I also understand this company was on a state preferred list but it is still my understanding that this project should have gone out to bid. |
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billydee
Member
21 Posts |
Posted - 06/20/2008 : 2:49:10 PM
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Tetris,
This is a delayed response to your post to me regardng Ms. Deveney. It took a while to talk to my insiders at City Hall. It does appear that Ms. Deveny will remain the Chief of Staff. I was told that the Mayor has already indicated to members of the BOA that Ms. Mejia will be the City Solicitor. I asked my insiders how Ms. Deveney and Ms. Mejia are getting along in light of this development. They said "fine for now" but they tell me that Ms. Mejia has always been frustrated with Ms. Deveney failuure to act in a timely fashion. Rather than grease the wheels of the Administration, Ms. Deveney clogs it up with her standard delays and failures to take action. I also heard another rumor this week. The rumor is that Ms. Deveney has been offered a high ranking position with the Registry of Motor Vehicles where she used to work. My insiders only know that she was offered the job, not that she is taking it.
I've been thinking about your "can of worms" statement should Ms. Deveney not remain as Chief of Staff. After reading the Leader Herald's commentary about Mayor DeMaria's first six months, I found it surprising that the Leader Herald critiqued the Budget Director but not the Chief of Staff. I was told that Carole Ragucci (once a legal secretary) was Mayor Ragucci's Chief of Staff. My friends at City Hall said that "she got the job done." I find it ironic that a lawyer (Ms. Deveney) really can't light a candle to a legal secretary (Ms. Ragucci) in terms of "getting the job done." There would be no loss to Mayor DeMaria or the City if Ms. Deveny resigned the Chief of Staff post. Mayor Mayor may have gotten the City Council votes for his deficient albeit first budget. However, let us not forget that Hanlon got the votes for his budget in his first six months in office too. The City Council cuts in Hanlon's first budget two year's ago ($4,500) was far less than its cuts to Mayor DeMaria's budget ($272,000). This is really not a good sign for the new Mayor, because we all know what happened to Hanlon a year later. The Council Council had major difficulties with Hanlon and it attempted to cut nearly $3 to 4 million dollars from Hanlon's budget in 2007 before arriving at the $2.5 million in cuts before Hanlon got his budget by fiat.
You may ask, what does all this have to do with the Chief of Staff? Ms. Deveney did not even do as well as Hanlon's "Chief of Staff by default," Janice Vetrano, in her first six months on the job. City Hall folks and Councilpersons tell me Ms. Deveney has an annoying habit of not returning calls or not respondig to important emails. She takes copious notes in any meeting one has with her. She takes notes but she does not seem to know when action is required, even if she should act as an extension of the Mayor to save the Mayor from himself. This Mayor hardly shows up for work. John Hanlon, loved the Mayor's job. With the exception of his trips to Vegas, Fox Woods or his Mayoral Retreats, he was in the corner office nearly everyday. He also showed up for work right around 8. Sometimes the Mayor's Office is not even open at 8 o'clock under Carlo. He shows up by 11 AM or some time in the afternoon or not at all. If he does not show up 8 in the morning, then his Chief of Staff must show up at 8 in the morning. Who cares if Ms. Devney works until 10 or 11 at night, if she is not covering the Mayor's ass at 8 in the morning? My City Hall friends have been telling me these things for many months. Now I see how it ties into Carlo's C- performance after 6 months in office. Yes, the Everett streets are cleaner under Carlo. But Carlo acts more like the Executive Director of City Services than a Mayor. His Chief of Staff is ineffectual and his Budget Director is an idiot. Carlo tells people he eliminated the Personnel Director job because he really is the Personnel Director. If that's true, when the Mayor/Personnel Director hired Ms. Deveney as Chief of Staff and Carlisle as Budget Director, he obviously did not know what he was doing. Carlo should have deferred to human resource specialists in making these decisions. Now he must live with his apparent errors becaue he is "too sensitive" to take criticism (if you watched the last BOA meeting). He also has too much pride to admit he has made so many mistakes in such a short period of time. He simply wants to talk about clean streets and the beautiful flowers his wife is planting in Everett Square.
Because I voted for Carlo, I did some soul searching before arriving at these conclusions. But I was really voting against John Hanlon after my taxes went up and he lied about our Prop 2 and 1/2 problem last year. Now I wonder if I should have voted for Hanlon during the Primary. Hanlon at least showed up for work and had many more years of public service than Carlo. Carlo shows himself to be a lazy Mayor who relies too heavily on "an inner circle" where Everett outsiders are the only members (Thiebeault, Deveney, Carlisle and Zaniboni). Mr. Carlisle is an incoherent Budget Director and uncertified Procurement Officer. Ms. Deveney is a smart, well-spoken Chief of Staff who does not seem well suited for this position in City Hall in Everett. Her law talents had to be called into question because she essentially advised herself on the City Solicitor appointment. With Ms. Mejia's appointment to City Solicitor, we all know now how that backfired. A lawyer friend has been telling me for years that a lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client. If there is any truth to the rumor that Ms. Deveney was offered a better job with the Registry, she should take it and take it soon. She is not Chief of Staff material, not in Everett and not under a lazy Mayor who relies too heavily on others rather than than simply learn the Mayor's job by showing up to do it. It is ironic to think that Carlo has become "an outsider" in his own City Hall, much like his "not-from-Everett" inner circle. City Hall is a "live" place and is much like a football game. You either play, watch or shut up. No one on the field wants people telling them how to play from the sidelines. This Mayor is not even playing because he tries to run City Hall from the sidelines. He is also float riding, still riding the float from the days when he was on the City Council. No, Carlo, we need a Mayor, not an Alderman or City Councilman.
With that said, I think that the Leader Herald commentary was overly generous to the Carlo DeMaria Administration. I voted for Mayor DeMaria and now regret that decision. His Budget was far worse than either of Hanlon's budgets. The Leader Herald "got it" right in an editorial several weeks ago about how the Mayor's Budget will be the first real test of leadership. Carlo failed that test miserably. He talked of "cost savings" when his budget increased by nearly $8 million dollars. Either "he does bad political spin" or "he believes his own hype." It is probably the latter because Carlo tells everyone that he is saving money by eliminating the Personnel Director position, even though there is no savings. "For heaven sakes, Carlo, if you're not the brightest bulb not be able to add numbers, then don't add laziness to your resume!" Carlo threw that budget together in less than 3 weeks, without even discussing budgets with Department Heads, all of whom worked in City Hall on a daily basis longer than he, his Chief of Staff or Budget Director. The truth is that he needed to cut the FY '09 Budget by at least the $2.5 million that the City Council attempted to cut a year ago. Instead, he eliminated "essential position" like the Personnel Director while adding "a Quality Assurance Specialist" positon for his cousin in the Budget Office. How smart and nepotistic is that? Carlo should have been doing the hard work of elminating several non-essential personnel positions or uncertified building inspectors who've had more time than Dick Dellisola under Ragucci to get their certification. Thanks to Hanlon and Carlo, the City is on a financial trajectory that will be force it to lay off all personnel (includibg Fire and Police) during the next couple of years. The City's finances are being improperly managed with Carlisle as the key financial point person. Carlo's Budget Director was thrown out of Stouthbridge because the town is in such bad financial shape. Carlo does not understand the City's finances. He does not listen to his Auditor. He listens to a baffoon for a Budget Director who only cares about his Everett salary after being kicked out of Southbridge.
I wish I voted for Hanlon in the 2007 Primary in retrospect because his public service warranted that vote over a vote for Carlo DeMaria. I could not vote for Joe McGonagle because he is simply not a nice person. His drunken and outrageous behavior the weekend before the election only vindicated my earlier vote. But now Carlo is so far up Thiebeault's ass that his neck will break when Thiebeault turns. After Ragucci, it was perhaps inevitable that Everett would have a few one-term Mayors before it gets it right. It will soon be time for a new Mayor to emerge, if this Mayor does not admit the error of his ways and make a 180 degree turn in his job performance. He seems to forget that he only won by 350 votes. |
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Budget FY 09
