Frank Basile’s firm was hired as a subcontractor in September 2007 by the Town Board for a limited number of accounting functions.
But over the course of a year, FJ Basile CPAs, PC, gradually assumed a prominent role in the town’s major projects, including planning for the New Hartford Business Park and a proposed stoplight along Route 840 to serve the park’s tenants.
As town officials called him time and again, the cost shot past budgeted
estimates.
Eventually, the town paid $122,149 in 2008, more than three times
the budgeted figure of $40,000.
Now, some town residents say the board should have been more watchful of spending.
“It sadly reflects on this Town Board’s sleepiness at the wheel,” said Donald Backman, who served two terms on the board before he was defeated in 2005 by current Councilman Robert Payne. “Nobody’s watching. Nobody’s paying attention.”
Town officials defend the money paid to Basile’s firm, saying the issues the town dealt with in 2008 required an expert.
“He worked on meeting some federal regulations we had been deficient in, and he has provided the oversight I think was necessary,” Councilman David Reynolds said.
Earlier this year, the town again planned to use the services of Basile’s firm, budgeting $100,000 for 2009.
Then, amid criticism and questions from civic group Concerned Citizens for Honest & Open Government, board members decided not to renew Basile’s contract, saying Councilwoman Christine Krupa could assume part of the role his firm handled.
Needed work
That leaves the town – a hub of area commercial growth and retail activity – with one financial official, bookkeeper Carol Fairbrother, and a part-time chief executive officer: Supervisor Earle Reed.
The situation also leaves lingering questions:
* Does the town have adequate personnel to handle its business?
* Could issues on which Basile worked have been handled internally?
A Concerned Citizens member thinks so.
“Reed is the one who was elected to do a lot of the work that the town has been paying Mr. Basile $150 an hour to do,” said Catherine Lawrence, one of the group’s co-founders.
Basile made $150 per hour while his associates made $80 per hour.
Basile and Reed said the issues they were confronting required financial expertise.
Basile spent time updating the town’s accounting standards and pronouncements to bring them into federal compliance for reporting purposes.
“We had to get this thing done,” Reed said. “It had been ignored for years.”
Basile, a certified public accountant, said the firm was hired for four specific functions, but eventually was asked to work on more than 20 issues throughout the course of its 16-month contract.
He said many of the issues should have been addressed before Reed’s administration. If they weren’t addressed, they would have negatively impacted the town’s bond rating and negotiations, he said.
“It was work that required the expertise of someone with a financial background,” Basile said. “Just because a supervisor acts as a CFO doesn’t mean they’ll have all the expertise available.”
No comptroller, no problem?
To track the town’s perceived need for Basile’s firm, it’s useful to look back to January 2002 and the bold strokes of a newly minted supervisor, Ralph Humphreys.
Within days of taking over, Humphreys eliminated the previously full-time town attorney and comptroller positions, with the Town Board’s approval. The comptroller at that time, Patrick Tyksinski, became a part-time financial consultant, and Humphreys estimated the move would save between $34,000 and $40,000 annually.
In 2001, the budgeted amount for Tyksinski’s salary was $38,110.
The smaller staff continued for years, although last year, bookkeeper Fairbrother was awarded $71,544 for unpaid overtime worked between 2002 and 2007.
But when Basile’s firm was hired, there was a backlog of work to be done, town officials said. He had to update accounting procedures to meet federal guidelines, and he also updated the town’s internal control systems, policies and procedures.
Eventually, Basile’s company was asked to work on multiple issues, including the payment agreements and bonding for the New Hartford Business Park and the search for a new building to accommodate the town’s cramped courts.
There is debate on whether that time was necessary.
Lawrence said Reed used Basile as a “crutch” and pointed out the state’s definition of a town supervisor — a chief executive officer in charge of generally administering town affairs and preparing its budget.
Reed, who makes $14,795 annually as supervisor, accepted responsibility for the extent of Basile’s bills. He also said the confluence of events in 2008 was too much for town staff to handle.
“If there’s any blame, I guess it would be on my shoulders,” Reed said. “I was trying to do a whole bunch of things and it’s done. Frank’s been a good friend to the town.”
From Basile’s perspective, the town’s “progressive” nature and the frequency with which myriad projects often are being worked on at once made his service necessary.
However, a comptroller could have handled many of the responsibilities taken up by his firm, he said.
“If there were a town comptroller, our hours would have been a lot less,” he said. “The amount of time we would have spent would have been a lot less.”
Structure stretched thin
Signs of a town ill-equipped for the growth it brought upon itself are easy to come by in New Hartford.
There are the cramped quarters of the one-man planning department led by Kurt Schwenzfeier, the dingy conference room at the Sanger Building, the overcrowded courts in the police building on Kellogg Road.
Those signs are joined by other indicators of the price of development, and the town’s reliance on Basile’s firm is among them. It’s a common story across the state, where people and commerce have been moving away from traditional urban cores and to the suburbs for the past 50 years.
“Rapid growth is as much a strain as prolonged economic decline,” said Kathryn Foster, director of the University at Buffalo Regional Institute. “It requires every system of your community to anticipate and respond to change.”
Krupa acknowledged that it is Reed’s job to administer the town and pointed out that he did work on the important issues.
However, contracting with Basile’s firm was necessary when there was need for financial expertise, she said.
“Is it Earle’s job, technically? Yes, it is,” she said. “But if he doesn’t have the necessary background to fulfill the function, then you have to go outside.”
According to board member Richard Woodland Jr., the situation takes consistent monitoring.
Board members were aware of their increasingly expensive commitments to Basile, having to approve invoices submitted to the town each month. But Woodland said he believed the services Basile performed were a must.
Woodland was on the board when the comptroller position was eliminated, and he was noncommittal about bringing it back.
“I think you could make arguments on both sides of it,” he said. “Both ways have worked. But as you said, the town is growing.”
