The
Ongoing OSC Audit Of Piermont And Outgoing Mayor Bruce Tucker
Dear Ms. Crisafulli, and OSC Colleagues:
I write to respectfully request that the ongoing Audit
of Piermont, New York and its Mayor Bruce Tucker be expanded to include all
grant monies sought, secured, or directly or indirectly obtained by
Tucker and his Village Hall associates from 2018 through the present day. My
understanding is that this would sweep-up grants which Piermont sought,
secured, or directly or indirectly obtained from the New York State Department
of State (NYSDOS), the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation
(NYSDEC), the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA), the New York
State Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services (DHSES), and perhaps
other state and federal donor agencies as well.
You may already be aware that recently, I served
NYSDOS with a FOIL request seeking all records relating to Piermont grant
money. NYSDOS first baselessly rejected that FOIL request in toto. I
appealed and won. As a result, NYSDOS then furnished me with a voluminous set
of records in digital form. I can share that full set of NYSDOS records with
you on a flash-drive or in whatever other manner you like. However,
particularly given that in substantively responding to the FOIL, NYSDOS did
redact certain portions of those records likely containing agency-internal
deliberative materials, I realize that you may fare far better than me by
obtaining the same records directly from NYSDOS but in unredacted form instead.
I also realize that you may have even already
sourced Piermont’s NYSDOS grant money records previously, since to me, those
records would seem like essential components of an audit of a municipality. I
hope so.
In any event, after my careful review of the NYSDOS
Piermont grant files, there appear to be problems with the manner in which
Mayor Bruce Tucker, Piermont “Grants Administrator” Sylvia Welch, Piermont “Village
Clerk/Treasurer” Jennifer DeYorgi Maher, other Piermont officials, and others
associated with Piermont village government, sought, secured, and obtained Piermont
grant monies from NYSDOS. I have posted raw documents from the FOIL-produced NYSDOS
public-record files to the Internet so that Piermont residents can review them
– since, if there was in fact governmental malfeasance in this regard, it is
Piermont residents who would have been most adversely and directly affected,
and because these are records which in my view Piermont residents really should
see. I also needed a manner in which I could easily post yellow-highlighted
excerpts from the files, for your view, too, for the purposes of this letter
request. I am sure that you can read-through the blogged photos and rhetoric,
so as to focus on the raw documents alone. The raw documents alone are enough
to warrant expansion of the Piermont Audit.
Without limitation to a plenary review, a summary of
my findings with corresponding Internet hyperlinks, follows below:
1. Piermont
Was Required To “Local Match”. As I am sure that you are already aware,
NYSDOS allows municipalities to apply volunteer time in lieu of village
monies as “local match”. In Piermont’s case, the “local match” was apparently 25%
to NYSDOS’s 75% of what was initially a US$80,000 grant. However, given that a
later-occurring Nelson Pope Voorhis vendor cost-estimate communicated to
Piermont, alone exceeded US$140,000 outgoing, I am wondering if that US$80,000-incoming
grant number had to have been ultimately overtaken, perhaps as reflected in
more recently-materializing documents which I do not yet have.
2. Sylvia
Welch’s 154 Blanks. In any event, as you know, in a “local match”
arrangement, the village is required to prepare, sign, certify, and submit
accurate time-sheets with textual descriptions of services corresponding to
each individual logged time-increment. Yet at one point, Sylvia Welch, acting
on behalf of the Village of Piermont, instead submitted time-sheets with 154
blank services-descriptions:
Additionally,
you will note that throughout all the Sylvia Welch-furnished time-sheets, almost
every single logged time-increment was an integer sans any following
decimal, which suggests that each individual numerical entry must have been intentionally
rounded-up so as to increase the total Piermont “match” number.
3. Sylvia
Welch’s 83 “Dittos”. In another batch, Sylvia Welch submitted time-sheets
containing illegible cursive handwriting, lazily indicating quotation-marks as
“Ditto” indications in lieu of textual services-descriptions 83 separate
times:
I do not see
how any state agency could accept the indecipherable portions of these documents
in lieu of matching money.
4. Sylvia
Welch’s “Self-Certifications”. Perhaps most troubling from a regulatory
perspective, Sylvia Welch certified multiple time-sheets as both the
“volunteer” rendering the work, as well as the “Oversight Individual”
certifying herself. And that’s just ridiculous:
5. Sylvia
Welch’s Math Puzzle. Of note is a Sylvia Welch invoice which, on the face
of the invoice, appears to miscalculate the amount owed with a significant
error in her favor - 11.5 hours of work at a US$60/hour rate, as somehow totaling
US$1,110:
While true, Ms.
Welch may have intended a second “invoice” attached to the first invoice to
make up for the US$420 discrepancy, the second “invoice” appears to have fallen
somewhat short in the calculation - although perhaps this was just a matter of
her “rounding-up” again. Moreover, the second “invoice” is actually another
NYSDOS “volunteer” time-sheet citing Ms. Welch as the “volunteer”.
6. Sylvia
Welch’s Multiple But Mutually-Exclusive Functions. As above, it is also
concerning that Sylvia Welch is characterized throughout the Piermont-submitted
NYSDOS records, appropriately or not, as both “volunteer” and also as a pay-to-play
grant writer and consultant:
In this
regard it is worth inquiring whether any of Ms. Welch’s time-increments were
“double-counted” as both “volunteer” matching offsets and also as billable
invoiced items:
If so, I
cannot imagine that NYSDOS would have wanted to go along quietly with such an
approach.
7. Bruce
Tucker And Piermont Kited “Progress”. It appears that Piermont Mayor Bruce
Tucker and his associates kited “progress” on the NYSDOS grant mission for
years, from 2018 forward to the present day:
Yet
unbelievably, the original expectation was that the work would take a total of
18 months:
From an
outside perspective, Tucker and his associates appear to have deployed a
combination strategy of delay and “mission-creep” so as to justify the
Village’s continued hold on the NYSDOS grant monies.
8. The
Vendor Takes Were Excessive And Confiscatory. Additionally, the sheer
amount of total money collected by Sylvia Welch, “Planner” Nelson Pope Voorhis,
and any other contractors or sub-contractors on the project, manifests as
excessive and confiscatory. This was originally supposed to be a
straightforward NYSDOS grant for a code update:
9. Nelson
Pope Voorhis Are Infamous Anti-NIMBYs. Speaking of vendors, you will recall
Piermont “Planner” Nelson Pope Voorhis as the same notorious outfit that
inserted the infamous “anti-NIMBY” clauses in their Southold contract, in their
Hampton Bays contract, and perhaps in other of their contracts as well. In the
case of Hampton Bays, Nelson Pope Voorhis is said to have contractually
promised “to ‘neutralize’ the opposition’s hot-button issues by having them
appear as traditional NIMBYs who consistently present misinformation to promote
their own limited agendas”:
Given that
distasteful on-record history of Nelson Pope Voorhis, it is a fair question to
ask whether any portion of the Piermont grant monies were used for the
inappropriate NIMBY-squashing purposes – which, until recently, Nelson Pope
Voorhis was so happy to insert into their contracts with municipalities.
10. The
Vendors Got Paid, At Least In Part, For A Non-Result. It is also a fair
question to ask whether Piermont should be entitled to keep grant monies
originally dedicated to tasks that were ultimately not performed. This is an especially
acute concern when you consider that Piermont’s malicious “Local Law 4” and
“CBM Zone” were ruled jurisdictionally void and, effectively, therefore non-existent,
by Justice Greenwald in last year’s Young v. Village of Piermont
decision:
After all, the
NYSDOS grant monies paid-over to Piermont appear to be predicated upon and
contingent upon not just claimed progress, but also action, and completion of
steps – completion of the actual purpose and objective for which the grant
money is initially cash-flowed. Accordingly, it is now apparent that at least
some of the Piermont grant money purposes and objectives were never achieved.
While it is true that the developer involved in the Young v. Village of
Piermont litigation has appealed to the Second Department, it is similarly
true that Bruce Tucker and the Village of Piermont should not be countenanced
to have spent even one penny of NYSDOS grant money on the senseless Young
litigation which Tucker evoked and then fought against his own Piermont
neighbors and constituents – if that is where any of the NYSDOS grant money
went.
11. The
Original Grant Money Purpose, Skipped. The original intention of the
Piermont grant monies circa 2018 and 2019, was application of the monies
to a Piermont “Zoning And Building Code Update”:
However, as
alluded to above, it appears that there was sufficient mission-creep over the
seven years that followed, including a seemingly-newfound “need” for a
“Comprehensive Plan”. The “Comprehensive Plan” turned out to be a flawed potpourri
at best. Tucker and his associates hustled the
“Comprehensive Plan” to the finish-line this year, fearing loss or
payback of grant money otherwise. What the “Comprehensive Plan” was in
practice, was Tucker’s back-door attempt to provide cover for a community-unwanted
real estate development at 447-477 Piermont Avenue. Tucker and his associates
actually supported the scheme of this construction – intended to be built on
top of a former Sunoco gasoline station that had underground gas tanks. The Young
v. Piermont decision stopped them. In any event, the dramatic Tucker-forced
shift from “sustainable code update” to “fulsome comprehensive plan” could lead
one to doubt whether the NYSDOS grant monies were actually even ever applied
for their specific intended purpose. While I realize that NYSDOS contemplates that
amendment of its grant agreements will occur from time to time, it is not clear
to me on the other hand that any grantee should be allowed to sua sponte
re-direct grant monies to whatever new and different self-serving purpose that the
grantee conjures up. Perhaps in this regard, NYSDOS procedures need to be
shored-up accordingly, and in any event, the overall question in the Piermont
context is worth an auditor answer.
12. The
Costs Of Legal Work Were Not As Originally Represented. In another example
of grant money mission-creep, legal services were originally warranted to be
donated by local attorney Steven Silverberg to the Piermont “Zoning And
Building Code Update”. Yet when Mr. Silverberg was said to retire, the Village
replaced him with a decidedly for-profit alternative who apparently would not donate
services to the Village:
Moreover, my
understanding is that Mr. Silverberg may have not actually “retired”. Mr.
Silverberg currently appears on the NYSUCS website as “currently registered”
and therefore active, and also apparently chairs the Rockland County Planning
Board:
Accordingly,
it appears that some Piermont village government scribe may have
mis-represented the reason for replacing Mr. Silverberg’s donated services with
the pay-for services of alternate counsel – and unfortunately, I have yet to
locate any authorship attribution on the document headed “Justification
C1001339”:
Perhaps you
can locate that information, though.
13. Piermont
Appears To Have Disrespected DEI Expectations. Finally, it is alarming how
Piermont village government seems to have proceeded in cavalier fashion with
respect to Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO), Minority and Women-Owned Business
Enterprise (M/WBE), and Minority Labor Force Participation (MLFP) expectations.
The Village even failed to complete the NYSDOS-required form wherein MLFP
percentages were required, initially, only to be corrected by NYSDOS for the
omission:
While the
Village ultimately designated an M/WBE vendor for the project, it appears from
the time-line that Piermont did so as a strategic afterthought and not out of
any true commitment to DEI and its importance. I know not whether this issue is
within the purview of OSC responsibility, but in my view, it should be.
Thank you for reviewing and considering the foregoing
request.
As you all know, I very much appreciate all your work.
Very truly yours,
John J. Tormey III, Esq.
cc:
VIA
U.S. MAIL and E-MAIL:
Matthew
P. (Matt) Colangelo – Auditor 2 (Municipal)
State
of New York, Office of the State Comptroller (OSC)
Division
of Local Government & School Accountability
New
York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli
33
Airport Center Drive - Newburgh Regional Office
New
Windsor, New York 12553 USA
VIA
U.S. MAIL and E-MAIL:
Brian
Sheevers
- Auditor 3 (Municipal)
State
of New York, Office of the State Comptroller (OSC)
Division
of Local Government and School Accountability
New
York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli
33
Airport Center Drive, Suite 102 - Newburgh Regional Office
New
Windsor, New York 12553 USA
VIA
U.S. MAIL and E-MAIL:
Laura
A. Newhall – Auditor 3
State
of New York, Office of the State Comptroller (OSC)
Newburgh
Regional Office
New
York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli
33
Airport Center Drive, Suite 102
New
Windsor, New York 12553 USA
“The
fact of the matter is, Kevin Timoney is simply terrified of answering the hard
questions that face both Piermont mayoral candidates in this election cycle:
