This tangled tale began in the era of Mayor Stewart when a "consolidation" of departments led to a twisted series of plans, hires, raises, promotions and retirements with a net zero gain. The long term costs of hiring and maintaining employee benefits and pensions have, for too long, been yielding to "visions of savings" that have no documented proof by way of "doing the math. This is the City of Plattsburgh and the State of New York.

1. The Dubious Math of Mr. Brodi
And the Elected Leaders That Love Him
or
The Long Term Costs Case
Sources close to Arsene "Mike" Brodi say that he has painted his department as being the victim of the
Mayor Daniel Stewart era when the Department of Public Works was merged with the Department of Parks
and Streets. Sources say that this consolidation, claims Brodi, put too much work into the hands of too few
people. Dan Stewart was Mayor from 2000 to 2006.
It didn't take long for Mr. Brodi to rectify his discontent.
In 2007, "Mike" Brodi, with the approval of Mayor Donald Kasprzak and the Common Council, came up with
his own plan for "consolidating services" and we've been paying for it ever since. We will be paying for a
very long time to come (salaries, health benefits, pensions, raises).
According to a Press Republican article published on May 30, 2007 ("City eyes savings in Rec DPW
consolidations", "Mike" Brodi and Kelly King came up with the plan to "consolidate" services to deal with the
retirement of Kevin Murphy, then the Public Works superintendent. At the time, Kelly King was also
departing as the City Recreation Director.
From the article: "The plan to merge some Recreation Department duties with Public Works
could save nearly $74,000 per year, they say. "Not only is it more efficient this way and
it saves money, it will keep the services we have intact," Mayor Donald Kasprzak said."
According to the Press Republican article, Brodi and King, in the plan, set out to "upgrade" two positions in
the Public Works department, hire a seasonal recreational facilities manager, hire a recreation supervisor
and add a Crew Supervisor in the Department of Public Works.
Three people (the third was Library Director, Sonia Long) were leaving the city at the time and the plan was
to "consolidate" by hiring more new people. There are problems with the math.
First, six seasonal workers were hired, but never left at the end of the season(s). Eventually, this led to an
investigation into improper civil service practices.
Next, "upgrading" two positions and making another person a crew supervisor usually means a pay raise.
Pay raises mean bigger costs to taxpayers for the working life and retirement of the new hire. The plan also
included hiring a recreation supervisor. A year later, the city did just that when they hired Steve Peters. His
final title was Recreation Director not Recreation Supervisor.
According to another Press Republican article from August 17, 2008, "City hires new recreation
director", Peters was hired at a starting salary of $56,483 a year. Peters has been planning and
coordinating all kinds of events ever since he was hired, but, the city hired an events coordinator,
Sandra Geddes, in January 2015. Interestingly, her salary was not listed in the January 28, 2015 Press
Republican news article: "City hires events coordinator". Steve Peters salary at the time of hire was
listed in the 2008 Press Republican article.
Why did we need an events coordinator when Peters had been doing this type of work for years?

2. It's hard to imagine that we had any savings even for a few years after the 2007 "consolidation"
because Mr. Brodi was promoted to Superintendent shortly after Murphy retired. Murphy's average
work life pay (used to calculate his pension benefits) was $99,732. Kevin Murphy's yearly pension is
$62,037 or almost exactly the same as what Steve Peters earned in 2013 (5 years after he was hired).
In 2013, Steve Peters earned $66,002 which was a jump of $6010 from his 2011 salary of 59,992.
In another 2008 article ("Three city department heads leaving this summer") the Press Republican reported
that King's recreation department was under investigation. The mayor ordered an investigation into
department payroll practices. It was stated that the investigation concerned whether part time employees
were overpaid knowingly. In follow up articles, the city had to terminate six recreation department employees
for violations of civil service laws. Other irregularities were articulated in one article that talked about the
failure to charge fees to teams using recreation department facilities. In both cases, it was said to be a failure
of oversight on the part of the recreation management and not a problem with either the terminated
employees or the teams.
The dubious math of Mr. Brodi and the elected leaders that love him added positions to the employee roster
and raises for existing employees. The consolidation had a net of zero gains before the end of 2008 and long
term added costs for city taxpayers.
Last question, why wouldn't the city leaders of 2007 have done the math to figure out the long term costs of
these changes? And, do we have clear long term cost benefit ratio with the current administration's addition
of a Community Development Director and Events Coordinator? I'd like to see the math, how about you?
John Citibois
2016
Sources:
TheOfficeoftheState Comptroller:Theinformation,forthe 12-month periodendinginMarch2013ispublic recordandwas
obtainedfrom the state comptroller'sofficethrougharequestunder the Freedom ofInformationLaw.
LoHud PensionsDatabase:(nota clickablelink)http://data.lohud.com/labor/ny_pensions_2014.php?
ThePlattsburgh PressRepublicanArchives (articlescitedwithinthisarticle)
New YorkState HistoricNewspaperswebsite (http://nyshistoricnewspapers.org/)
Google Search yieldeda cache,butno article from a press Republican blog:
City aims to merge departments as costsaver
blog.pressrepublican.com/archive/index.php?option...
Feb 7, 2001 - Mayor Daniel Stewart said in his State of the City address Tuesday that the ... The
department will be run by Public Works Superintendent Kevin Murphy ... Stewart said the
consolidation will save the city about $72,000 a year, ...