During “new business”, I pointed out that Lodi made
news again this week when it was ranked #7 for “towns where property taxes hurt
the most.” I informed the board that the
only cities with worst rankings were places like Passaic, Paterson, East
Orange, and Orange.
I told the board that they have to stop nonchalantly spending
thousands of tax dollars on ethics complaints.
I asked them to explain why they abandoned their past practice of having
the board vote before a claim is submitted.
I pointed out that they didn’t even inform the board. I reminded them that they weren’t facing
criminal charges or fines where they have to reach into their pockets. I reminded them that Trustee Mastrofilipo
told them before their votes on Carafa’s removal that tax dollars better not be
spent on legal bills. Nobody objected at
the time. I asked them why they couldn’t
answer a simple complaint on their own and let the State make a decision as to
whether their vote was ethical or not.
Jonathan Carafa and Mike Nardino went on and on about
this blog. I told them they were
changing the subject and that we were talking about them wasting thousands of
tax dollars needlessly. Mike Nardino
said that Joe Licata’s ethics complaint has been going for two years because of
me. I informed them that Joe Licata lost
two decisions and cost Lodi thousands.
People shouldn’t be unethical.
I told them if they file an ethics complaint against
me, I would never use tax dollars to answer the complaint or ask the board for
an attorney. That shows no regard for
the taxpayers.
Mike Nardino said that he tried to answer on his own
but it was returned because he didn’t provide “proof of service”. Dominic Miller said the same. I don’t think they understood what “proof of
service” meant. I explained that all
that had to do was send me a copy of their answer and then show the state that
they provided me with a copy. I told
them that they don’t need to pay an attorney $5,000 to mail me a certified
letter. All they had to do was hand me a
copy. I would help them show “proof of
service”.
Finally, I made the motion for the board to take a
vote on submitting the claim to the insurance provider (a vote that should have
already taken place). I voted ‘No”. Trustees Nardino, Carafa, and Miller voted “Yes”. I was shocked. I couldn’t believe they voted on a claim for
themselves. I explained to them that state
ethics code prohibits them from voting on anything that directly affects
themselves or immediate family members. They
should have abstained.
The three
argued they were allowed to vote.
Minutes later, Miller changed his vote to abstain. Carafa followed. Next, Nardino. Finally, Carbonetti changed his vote from “Yes”
to abstain although he wasn’t part of the claim.
So the vote to submit their claim failed: 2- NO, 0-YES, 6-ABSTAIN.
If Miller, Nardino, and Carafa want to spend $5,000 to
have an attorney mail me a copy of their answer, then let them use their own
money. Let them go to the taxpayers to
explain why Lodi should be paying their legal bills for something so
ridiculous.
Once again, when you are ranked #7 for “towns
where property taxes hurt the most”, the last thing you should be doing is
paying an attorney $5,000 to mail an answer to a simple ethics complaint.
