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Utica Common Councilors: NYS should investigate GroWest
UTICA, N.Y. (WKTV) - It was back in April when Utica Mayor Roefaro asked the city's Board of Estimate and Apportionment to approve the hiring of the law firm Hage and Hage to investigate a secret matter.
Even not knowing what the investigation was about, the board voted 3 to 1 to pay Hage $150.00 an hour for as many hours as it takes. This past Wednesday, five months later, the law firm presented its findings to Utica's Common Council and said it would cost Utica taxpayers at least $100,000. On Sunday afternoon, in front of the not for profit GroWest, which is the focus of the investigation, Utica Common Council members Jim Zecca and Frank Vescera announced they need the public's help to get the state involved in the investigation. Zecca urged Utica residents Sunday, "to contact their state representatives to demand a New York State Attorney General and State Comptroller investigation of the Gro-West/city government debacle." Zecca and Vescera say they will be writing a letter to both the Attorney General and the Comptroller on Monday. GroWest fixes up homes for low income families. Here's how the process works : a low income homeowner applies to Gro-West for a Federal HUD grant to help fix up their home. GroWest then hires a contractor to do the work, through a bidding process. When the work is complete, GroWest is reimbursed by the city, with federal money from HUD. According to the investigation completed by Hage and Hage, there has been mis-use of about 140 million dollars of funds distributed to GroWest by the City of Utica over a period of several years. The mis-use was done in several ways, including bid rigging, the purchase of material not needed for the particular project, falsifying time-sheets, unfinished projects, exceeded deadlines and the purchase of excess materials. GroWest employees, private contractors, even City of Utica employees are being investigated for possible wrongdoing. Vescera says it's imperative an independent investigation is done on all wrongdoing, especially when it comes to city employees, "we are compelled to ask the State Attorney General's office to come in and to take over the investigation and for the State Comptroller's office to come in and do a thorough audit because the conflict of interest does still exist." Zecca and Vescera aren't happy a private attorney was hired in the first place, they feel the state should have investigated from the get-go, and secondly, the city hired the same attorney GroWest hired., Hage & Hage. They two council members say that is a conflict of interest. The FBI is already involved in the investigation and Utica Mayor David Roefaro released a statement Sunday afternoon. Roefaro says "the FBI is actively involved in the investigation, and they supersede the state, but that doesn't mean the FBI can't work with the Attorney General's office if it came in. We have been cooperating with all agencies that have reached out to the city. Much of the money misspent is federal money and that is why the FBI has taken an active role in the investigation." |
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