Now that action has been taken on Capizzi’s contract,
the public has the right to know the process behind it or lack thereof.
Below are some questions I asked the negotiations
team. I directed the questions to Leto.
1. It was the role of the full Board to set
negotiation parameters prior to negotiations.
Who set the parameters and when?
What were the parameters?
Response: There were no negotiation parameters.
2. How many times did negotiations take
place? Dates? Subjects discussed? Who was in attendance?
Response: They met once for about an
hour. The following were in attendance:
Leto, Scorzetti, Carbonetti, and Telep.
3. The contract was sent to the County for
approval before Board members received any update.
Response: No explanation.
5. What resources and data did you use for
determining the salary? What is the
State average salary for a six year Business Administrator? Have you reviewed contracts for comparable
districts?
Response: They didn’t use any
resources. They didn’t know any State
averages. They didn’t review any
contracts for comparable districts.
6. Who negotiated Mr. Capizzi’s first contract
and each contract thereafter because the salary started really high?
Response: Nobody knew.
7. Was performance discussed when determining
the pay increase? For example, some
things to consider: there is a 2.08% tax increase and the budget wasn’t
discussed all year, $440,000 was spent on architect plans for a project not
needed, OPRA and OPMA issues, legal bills run up unnecessarily, unfair hiring
practices…
Response: Performance wasn’t discussed.
Mike Nardino said Capizzi's salary increase was only $3,500 as
though it was nothing. I explained that
2% on a lot is a lot and it should not be a guarantee each year. Mr. Capizzi started a lot higher than
other BAs.
Joe
Leto said they offered Capizzi even more during negotiations. I said, I am sure the Lodi taxpayers will
love to hear that. Leto then tried to
explain himself and said he didn’t offer it personally, the committee did. He claimed they offered Capizzi more for
travel expenses.
