43
Fiscal commission rejects Niles recovery plan
CORRECTED
By Jordan Cohen
NILES
The Financial Planning and Supervision Commission by the narrowest of margins Wednesday rejected the sixth version of the city’s Financial Recovery plan from fiscal emergency.
The 4-3 vote marked the first time the commission has rejected a plan since its formation in late 2014.
Leading the no votes was council President Robert Marino, who sits on the commission as does Mayor Thomas Scarnecchia. The mayor voted for the plan he had developed.
The decision means the mayor will have to come up with yet another version by the next time the commission meets. A date has not been set.
The plan must provide data the panel has demanded on two significant future expenditures – upgrading the city’s 14 municipal buildings and paying an outside contractor to install more than 6,000 computerized water meters in the city’s possession since 2010.
For the past two years, the meters have been housed in the empty Waddell Park Swimming Pool.
“My expectation is that our needs have to be defined [in terms of] costs and what we can financially afford,” Marino said. “I expect this information to be incorporated with known facts.”
An architect’s study already has indicated upgrading the Safety Service Center into compliance could cost nearly $1 million. The facility analysis covering all 14 buildings and their repair costs is expected to be completed “in a month,” said Service Director Ed Stredney, which will further delay the time to complete a newly amended plan.
The water-meter dilemma will add to the delay.
Council, which met after the commission, would only give first reading to an ordinance authorizing contractor proposals for installing the residential water meters. A third reading would not pass until mid-May, and the bid process is likely to take several weeks, meaning there could be no decision until June.
“I wanted to take time with the process,” said Councilman Barry Steffey, D-4th, council finance chairman.
Commission Chairman Quentin Potter voted for the plan, but conceded the next version needs to address infrastructure costs. Potter said he will not schedule the panel’s next meeting until all the information is available.
“I’m quite upset, but we will work to do what the state requires of us,” Scarnecchia said.
The city’s fiscal supervisors also complained to the commission some department heads and officeholders are not complying with requests to provide timely financial information.
One they named was Janet Rizer-Jones, the city’s part-time treasurer. Potter said the panel could, if necessary, request a court order requiring compliance against any official who does not comply with the auditors’ requests.