In response to Council Vice-President Janice McCarthy letter to editor Dated April 26, 2019 “The Financial Harm the 2019 Budget Causes.”
Where were you, mayoral candidate Michael Soriano and Councilwoman Emily Petersen for the eight years in which the former administration skimmed off the $9.4 million from the utilities surpluses? The skimming was not a subterfuge or hidden surreptitiously in the budget, it was in plain sight.
The only residents that can hold their heads high in confronting this mismanagement of public user funds are Pat Petaccia. and the undersigned. Together we spoke publicly at council meetings, wrote letters to the editor, and held a petition signing at town hall. Janice go back and read the articles printed in Parsippany Life by journalist Cindy Forrest for background if you still have them.
The undersigned contacted the appropriate government agencies in Trenton regarding the circumventing of the 2% budget cap instituted by Governor Chris Christie. Their response: “We do not like it but there’s nothing we can do.”
Most of your facts you presented are fairly accurate however again where were you when the skimming and ZERO budget increases in election years by the prior administration were being presented? You were a resident of Parsippany and had been involved in politics- having previously run for office. Why weren’t you, Janice, and Mayor Soriano at those council meetings speaking out against those budgets?
Now this Democratic administration is heaping blame on the previous administration – and rightfully so – but also failing to take responsibility for its contribution to the deficit by continuing to skim the utilities surpluses in the amount of $5.8 million in the last two years AND INCREASING UTILITY RATES.
Doesn’t that qualify as a “LEGALIZED PONZI SCHEME?”
Janice if you honestly want to place blame where it is due then you also would have spoken out about Mayor Soriano’s clown car administration bringing in high-salaried political appointments and adding job positions that the town has operated without for years.
Yes, I agree with you the town has been financially mismanaged. In the fall of 2017 I asked mayoral candidate Soriano if he knew what he was walking into. Instead of beginning a cycle of repair the mayor has added to Parsippany’s financial crisis.
Amongst the residents I have spoken with since the public inception of the 1515 project PILOT application your name always comes up as the lone NO VOTE and they appreciate that vote and will not forget.
However, do not sugar coat this administration’s wanton mismanagement of taxpayers money to benefit the Democrat party.
Roy Messmer
Former Parsippany resident
