McNally clings to power

The brain trust in city hall has failed to update Youngstown’s website, which means the profile of Mayor James A. McNally is incomplete.

Here’s what it says now:

“In 1991, Mayor McNally graduated from Georgetown University with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Foreign Service. Mayor McNally received his Juris Doctor and Master’s in Public Administration in 1996 from the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law and the Levin College of Urban Affairs. From 1996 until 2002, Mayor McNally served as Assistant Law Director for the City of Youngstown. From 2002 through 2004, he served as Law Director for the City of Youngstown. Finally, he served as Mahoning County Commissioner from 2005-2012 and won the General Election to serve as Mayor of Youngstown on November 5, 2013.”

What’s incomplete about that profile? It does not mention the most important achievement of McNally’s 20-year public service: His criminal record.

Here’s what the updated profile should say, in part, on the city of Youngstown’s website:

“Mayor McNally has the distinction of being the only serving officeholder in the Mahoning Valley who is convicted of four misdemeanor charges. Mayor McNally is wearing his criminal record as a badge of honor because it proves his willingness to kowtow to a very wealthy, influential businessman.”

Yes, writing that was cathartic for this columnist – because the reality is that hell will freeze over before the city of Youngstown’s website makes any reference to the mayor’s criminal background.

Re-election bid

In fact, on the day he pleaded guilty in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court to the charges relating to the Oakhill Renaissance Place criminal conspiracy, McNally made it clear that he will not resign and has every intention of running for re-election next year.

So, why is the mayor clinging to his public job for dear life and, in so doing, exposing himself to ridicule and derision?

The answer can be summed up in one word: Money.

It starts with the mayor’s annual salary of $104,935. (“Let them eat cake,” Marie Antoinette sniffed when told the peasants had no bread.).

In a city with a declining population, a median income of $24,000 for a family of four, and a majority of the residents on fixed incomes and, therefore, not paying income tax, a six- figure salary is obscene.

But McNally is a lawyer, which means he should have no difficulty making that kind of a living in private practice, right?

Not really. A veteran attorney who runs a law firm says that in order to earn a salary of $100,000-plus, a lawyer in private practice would need to bring in about $300,000 in fees. That’s because there is a lot of overhead, including employee wages, worker’s compensation obligations, pension plans and the rest.

McNally has none of those worries.

In fact, here’s a nugget that explains why he’s so willing to suffer the wrath of his detractors by remaining in power: In addition to his salary of $104,935, McNally is vested in the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System, for which he pays nothing.

Yes, dear overburdened taxpayers, the criminal mayor of the city of Youngstown is in the public pension system that sucks $25,184 a year from the city treasury.

To be fair, the city picks up the pension contributions for all its management employees in lieu of pay raises. The plan was put in place several years ago.

In addition to the pension kick-in, McNally also receives health care coverage for which he pays 10 percent of the premium.

That’s why he has no qualms being in a class of his own when it comes to his latest achievement in office. There’s gold in the crumbling walls of the city of Youngstown – for those lucky enough to have access to it.

White-collar criminal

McNally’s guilty plea to the four misdemeanor charges is noteworthy not only because Youngstown is now led by a chief executive who is a criminal – albeit a white-collar one – but it is an admission by him that he broke the law and violated his oath of office while serving on the Mahoning County Board of Commissioners.

Indeed, he was a major participant in the Oakhill Renaissance Place criminal enterprise. In addition to the attempted disclosure of confidential information; McNally pleaded guilty to two counts of falsification and one count of attempted telecommunications fraud. Pay attention to these words: “falsification” and “fraud.” What they add up to is the profile of an individual who used his public position to run interference for Anthony M. Cafaro Sr., who had a financial interest in deep-sixing a county project.

Cafaro, the retired president of the Cafaro Co., did not lead the charge against the purchase of Oakhill Renaissance – the former Southside Medical Center – for altruistic reasons. He had an agenda and was able to recruit a bunch of government pariahs to do his dirty work.

But it wasn’t just McNally who pleaded guilty to being a participant in the criminal enterprise headed by Cafaro Sr. Former Mahoning County Auditor Michael Sciortino admitted to a felony count of having an unlawful interest in a public contract, as well as misdemeanor counts of falsification and receiving or soliciting improper compensation.

McNally was fined $3,500 but was permitted to keep his job as mayor. He does face a possible jail sentence of 18 months, which will be imposed if he fails to cooperate with prosecutors in the ongoing investigation of Oakhill Renaissance.

Sciortino is prohibited from holding a public office for seven years and faces a 30-month jail sentence if he does not cooperate with the prosecution.

The third defendant in what should be the first round of the Oakhill Renaissance prosecution is Youngstown Atty. Martin Yavorcik.

He is accused of taking money from members of the Cafaro family to run for county prosecutor against Paul Gains.

Gains has become Public Enemy No. 1 in some circles because he had the temerity to do his job as Mahoning County’s lawyer. He forwarded boxes of records relating to the Oakhill purchase and subsequent legal battles to the Ohio Ethics Commission with this appropriate request: Review the documents and decide if further action is needed.

The ethics commission conducted the review and concluded a criminal investigation was warranted.

What should be clear is that McNally, Sciortino and the others in the Oakhill criminal enterprise weren’t playing tiddlywinks with Cafaro.

The city of Youngstown deserves a mayor who does not have a black cloud hanging over his head. If he does not resign, he should be given the boot next year.

CORRECTION

In coverage of Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally’s trial results, The Vindicator described one of the crimes to which he pleaded guilty as “attempted unlawful influence of a public official” and then referred to that charge as “attempted bribery.”

Neither “attempted unlawful influence of a public official” nor “attempted bribery” is correct. The mayor pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor, which in nonlegal phrasing is attempted disclosure of confidential information.

Misidentifying the mayor’s crime arose from an apparent clerical error in one of the many counts of McNally’s indictment: Count 63. The indictment’s heading for Count 63 called the crime “public official or employee’s unlawful influence,” which would be akin to bribery as popularly understood.

But the indictment’s heading for Count 63 was mistaken. The actual language of the indictment quoted from a state law that bars public officials or employees from disclosing confidential information.

At McNally’s guilty-plea hearing, the court granted the prosecutor’s recommendation to amend Count 63 of the indictment to make it an attempted disclosure of confidential information instead of a completed disclosure of confidential information.

But no one addressed the mistaken heading of Count 63 – ”unlawful influence”– as it appeared in the indictment. Because of that heading, The Vindicator described the mayor’s conviction as pleading guilty to “attempted unlawful influence.”

He did not. McNally pleaded guilty to attempted disclosure of confidential information.