Residents deserve to know why Uniontown has no budget
A dispute over a “management consultant” earning $22.50 per hour is why Uniontown doesn’t have a budget as the clock ticks down to a new year.
Yep. The Uniontown City Council failed Dec. 20 on a 2-2 vote to pass a 2018 budget, which, if adopted, would have resulted in no tax increase. The split vote came during a contentious, hour-plus-long meeting of the city council to consider the budget after the council’s review of the proposed budget, or at least a chance to do so. Whether or not the councilmen scrutinized the proposed budget before the meeting, which they should have, is uncertain. Judging from last week’s meeting, it’s difficult to say.
As a result, Uniontown taxpayers, who already pay higher taxes than residents in neighboring North and South Union Townships, are in limbo. City employees, including those in critical public safety departments such a police and fire departments, don’t know if they will get a pay raise. City departments don’t know if they will get or should seek grants for new equipment to replace aging ones, some in service for decades. And critical city infrastructure needs fixed before repair costs mount or the city is sued.
Happy New Year, Uniontown!
It was obvious and quickly evident the “special meeting” called to adopt a 2018 budget was in trouble when Uniontown Mayor Bernie Kasievich opened the meeting saying he was “not 100 percent satisfied with the budget.”
If the mayor says that before any deliberations, you know trouble is brewing. The mayor, after all, takes credit or blame for whatever happens. The buck stops with the mayor. And in this case, all the bucks in the city budget.
The proposed budget eliminated the budget line item for a “management consultant.” But Kasievich wanted the position in the budget. Councilman Jared Billy, the city’s director of accounts and finances, the council’s bean counter, didn’t. He eliminated the consultant’s position and line item in the budget.
Billy, bewilder and obviously ticked, minutes later asked Kasievich and the other councilmen, “Did anyone read it (the budget)?”
With a Dec. 31 budget deadline looming and the tie vote cast, Billy scolded the council saying they were doing “such a disservice to the city.” He went as far as to say council was “incompetent.
“What you are saying to the public,” Billy lamented, “is you don’t know what you are doing.”
Several issues of importance were mentioned in the lead up to the budget vote — the absence of a comprehensive budget plan, the fund to repair the city’s sewage system, which Kasievich said was in “dire need,” municipal equipment upgrades and repairs to city-owned building and property. All need to be addressed.
But it is the dispute over the hourly “management consultant” that has Uniontown without a 2018 budget. Why? Is it patronage? Is it revenge, as Billy, who has butted heads with council, ends his term as councilman as the calendar flips to 2018? Is it one city employee ticked about another? Is it incompetent municipal governance? Is it too lean of a budget? Is it dispute over an employee’s job description and function?
Management consultants are usually listed on the expense, not income, side of any client’s financial ledger. They are generally accounted for costing money, even if they come up with ideas of how to make money.
The same is true for municipal finance. Management consultants may well offer advice on how to generate revenue, but they are typically paid to give professional advice, which makes them an expense.
Whatever the job title, Kasievich says the city employee in question is a “revenue generator,” someone who brings money into the city. And, yes, the mayor is right. The “management consultant” traverses the city and collects quarters from parking meters, coins that go to the city’s coffers. If meters are broken, the employee fixes them.
And the “management consultant” also performs other duties, but the consultant’s job description is uncertain. Certainly not readily made here. But writing parking ticket violations is not among them. The consultant collects the quarters. Another paid city employee walks the city and writes tickets for parking violations. Can’t blame you if you think that doesn’t make sense. Both walk by the same parking meters every week or whenever.
How much money is collected from parking meters? How many meters are there in the city? How many malfunction? How many hours does it take to collect quarters from the meters? Is a parking violation issuer and another who collects the coins needed? Can the functions be consolidated? Those are good questions. Answers are hard to come by.
Billy, the council’s bean counter, said that the consultant was paid $15,277 so far this year and that collection from parking meters, the number of meters is not available, totaled $41,893. Another $43,795 has been collected from parking tickets, but that includes all parking violations, for example, double parking or obstructing crosswalks, not just meter violations.
So, Mayor Kasievich appears to be right, the consultant is a “revenue generator” for the city. Or is he right?
Let’s do the math. The consultant’s pay so far this year, $15,277. Divided by 52 weeks per year, that is $293.78 per week. Divide that by $22.50 per hour wage and the total is 13.05 hours per week. Not bad at all, right? Minimum wage in Pennsylvania is $7.25 per hour. And that’s all on top of the salary for the other employee who writes the tickets.
Each city council member, elected by the city’s residents, earns only $80 per month. And their hours representing city residents — council and committee meetings, constituent services and more — are many.
That’s not all. The consultant is in question is paid not from parking revenues but from the accounts and finance section of the city budget. And in addition, each time the consultant collects quarters from the parking meters, this column hasn’t gotten an answer as to how long that takes, a paid police officer accompanies the consultant. No one would answer this column’s question of the hourly salary of the police officer.
Yeah, it makes sense that the consultant has police protection while collecting quarters from meters, but the police officer is taken off the beat for the time it takes. And what is that cost to Uniontown taxpayers? No one will say how much time and salary is involved. And with that added cost, is the consultant a money generator?
The mayor did not respond to an email with questions about the parking situation and the management consultant.
All this only adds to the confusion over the consultant, the budget impasse, future city employee salaries, taxes to be paid by Uniontown residents, and what happens next when the city council meets again to approve the budget.
Why? Billy, whose council term ends the first week of January, has already informed the city council that because of prior commitments he will be absent from the next special budget meeting. The budget was supposed to have been passed by now. What happen if the council votes another 2-2 tie vote?
Mr. Mayor, city taxpayers and employees want, deserve, answers.
Richard Ringer is a resident of Uniontown.