Youngstown will check all employees’ degrees

YOUNGSTOWN —¬†With a fake college degree in one of Carmen S. Conglose’s personnel files, Mayor Jay Williams is ordering city officials to check the authenticity of degrees for every employee who receives a bonus for having them.

“Until now, it’s been the honor system,” Williams said Wednesday. “...The process in place since 1999 was to accept the degrees from the employees at face value.”

That apparently hasn’t worked.

A phony 1986 bachelor of science degree in applied science from Youngstown State University is in Conglose’s personnel file at the city’s finance department.

Conglose, who retired Dec. 31 as the city’s deputy director of public works, insists he doesn’t know how the bogus degree got into his file.

But The Vindicator reported Wednesday that Conglose testified in a July 30, 2003, sworn court deposition that he earned a bachelor of science degree in applied science from YSU.

The state auditor’s office is helping the city investigate the matter.

Read more in Thursday’s Vindicator and at vindy.com