In an interesting move, Mayor Pedro Segarra has vetoed the raise for the City Treasurer that was approved by the Hartford City Council Monday night. Segarra makes the claim that the raise was a violation of Connecticut's Constitution and cites his reasons in the letter below.
The same reason used for the veto was also posted here on the blog as a comment at least one day prior to the veto being submitted to Town Clerk John Bazzano.The "anonymous" commenter had posted "One problem, the state Constitution prohibits a raise until 2015
"The compensation of an elected official of a political subdivision of the state whose term of office is four years or more may be increased once after such official has completed two years of his term by the legislative body of such political subdivision"
I guess my readers know what they are talking about.
Here is the veto letter below:
Segarra Cloud Veto
It goes to show you how incompetent city council is when they can't even look up laws first. One has to wonder how many illegal things they have passed that no one noticed. What a joke they are.
ReplyDeleteI would say something snarky like "it's clearly amateur hour at city council," but, seriously, HOW MANY attorney's are currently serving?
ReplyDeleteIs no one on council doing any form of due diligence on anything they are voting for? Is the approach just collective sleepwalking through life? (which would explain how we got to this point).
Now the question becomes...who was awake at the wheel in the Mayor's office and why is it that that information was not sent over to the City Council PRIOR to the vote?
Either 1) the information was known in the Mayor's office and they purposefully didn't send it, 2) the Mayor's office did send it and the City Council chose not to act on the information, 3) the Mayor's office came by the information 11th hour, after the vote, which would make one question the source of the information - who caught it?
Considering the issue of City Council actually endorsing the Occupy Hartford movement, my comments on the issues arising from such an endorsement (http://itsenoughto.blogspot.com/2011/10/day-eighty-four-this-shouldnt-happen.html) and the lawsuits arising from around the country from communities who have done just that (http://nation.foxnews.com/occupy-wall-street/2011/11/29/tea-party-alleges-double-standard-occupy-friendly-mayor) it should make one wonder...should the City Council be allowed to have any input on even bigger decisions, such as budgets and the way that the city conducts business?
If they can't handle the minor things, such as a simple raise clearly governed by a statute, how are we to have any confidence that they can tackle larger problems?
Funny how the WFP had it right on this one. Deutsch flat out said NO to the resolution and Cotto said that the Council was moving too fast and should instead refer the item to properly vet it out. No one seconded his motion, not even Deutsch who seemed more intent on making a statement.
ReplyDeleteThis Council has a way of making a joke out of the entire process and I don't hold out a lot of hope for the next four years either. Even the lone Republican, who luckily was not elected, voted for the pay raise, so much for fiscal responsibility.
ReplyDeleteThe Treasurer candidates who ran knew before hand what the salary was and to try an end run through the Council for a raise is an abuse of the public's trust. Furthermore, since the Council had gone through this four years ago when they tried to get their own raises, they should have been well aware of the legal requirements.
And to answer your question Micheal as to what happened in the Mayor's Office, they most likely read the comment on the blog and started researching to realize that the raise was illegal as "Anonymous" stated.
No matter how it happened though, the message should be loud and clear to the Council that people are watching their actions and will be speaking out
Adam Cloud do not care about anyone but himself. And look who submitted the request rJo Winch she is about as bright as they come. Cloud thinks he runs the city and Pedro has to answer to him and the Clould nation. You know they are going to run the city. Why do you think his wife is refusing to move to another department. Her husband is running the city.
ReplyDeleteQuiz - whose budget is higher, the Cty of Hartford or the State?
ReplyDeleteGovenor - 150,000
Sec of State - 110,000
St Comptroller - 110,000
Attorney General - 110,000
*State Treasurer - 110,000
**City Treasurer - 140,000 +10k
*manages 25.2 billion dollars
**manages 1 billion dollars
Fryar couldn't even run a decent campaign for crist sakes and we are to believe anything he says?
ReplyDeleteNewt,
ReplyDeleteFryar makes sense but the voters did not want common sense this time around and he was doomed running as a Republican with the current party leadership in Hartford
this time around and he was doomed running as a Republican with the current party leadership in Hartford
ReplyDelete-----------------------------------
Come on, Kevin. Give it a rest. The electorate will have none of what Republicans offer regardless of leadership or candidate. Lack of common sense at City Hall more than matched by similar lack in the electorate.
anonymous 6:48: you have to pay if you want to get the best.
Adam cloud could screw up a cup of coffee. But then again only about 2% of the htfd pop votes in an election. Maybe i will run next time and pay bums and use my flunkies to block vargas supporters like pedro did .
ReplyDeletePeter Bush said ...
ReplyDelete"anonymous 6:48: you have to pay if you want to get the best."
That all depends on what you mean by best. Hopefully, you will not have to eat your words down the road.
Even I know that a raise could not legally be voted on and I've been out of City of Hartford employment for 3 years.
ReplyDeleteOne can't second quess the games the departments play with each other. Maybe council know it was illegal but did it anyway hoping the Mayor would not know. Or maybe they voted to save face with Mr. Cloud knowing the veto would follow.
Why didn't Corporation Council object and adivse council?
Too many people are playing dumb. Any not all of them are dumb.
Politics.....isn't it a shame?
I see that Michael Fryar continues his crying.
ReplyDeleteAs I have posted before, his party lost because folks like him never complained when the Republican Councilperson voted for every tax and spending increase in the Perez administration.Nor did the Republican Party leadership or their party complain at all about big spending and tax increases.So when the Republicans decided to act as a minor party and did the cross endorsement deal with Segarra,the voting public was justifiably disgusted with the Republicans for not acting like a real majority party and decided to vote for the WFP.I cannot say that I blame them.
It is time that Mr Fryar stop the crying about socialists and commies in the WFP and in Hartford and understand that he and his party have ruined their party for probably a long time,and place the blame where it belongs,on themselves.