KNOCKING BOOTS AT THE WORKPLACE

Unless you've been living on a Tibetan mountaintop for the past two weeks, you've probably heard at least something about the work-place sex scandal surrounding ESPN broadcaster/former Mets manager Steve Phillips and his apparently consensual partner, Brooke Hundley.  Both have recently received their walking papers from their employer.

In a statement to the NY Post, an ESPN executive acknowledged that the company does not currently have a written policy against workplace romances but " . . .clearly when those relationships do occur, they can present conflicts. And when those relationships present a conflict or potential conflict, we'll take appropriate action."  (See http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/eye_on_the_ball_ynTOHDfvJNuJ36ORy7mpJJ )

Sounds like they've got it right, even if they have closed the barn door after the horses have escaped.  But at least they've done something, which is more than our mayor Jack Martins has done about a situation he has known about for years:  the relationship between Mineola's Building Superintendent and one of his secretaries.

Office romances are common and many people meet their significant others through work.  But it becomes extremely problematic when a relationship occurs between a supervisor and his subordinate; never more so than in a municipal setting.  The opportunities for abuse are rife and that is why both the federal government and our county government discourages it.

You have to be a complete idiot to not see where such a relationship can lead:  workplace lovers covering up each others mistakes.  Raises and bonuses being given out based not on the merits of a person's office performance, but on their performance between the sheets.  And of course, there is always the potential post-breakup sexual harassment lawsuit.  Thus it behooves every employer - but most especially municipalities - to have a strict conflict of interest policy in place and to enforce it.

The Village of Mineola does address conflict of interest issues in Chapter 4 of the code and this has been brought to the Mayor's attention.  The mayor received several complaints about Dan Whalen's relationship with Karen Calabro, but nobody ever said anything publicly.  People wanted to give him the chance to do the right thing by transferring her or firing him, but he never did.  Ultimately, Mayor Martins was questioned directly at the public sessions as to whether he had ever received complaints about ANY relationship between a supervisor and a subordinate. (NO names were mentioned at the time.)  He absolutely lied, right on TV, to all his constituents by saying he had not.  Well Jack was caught with his pants down and at a subsequent meeting he was reprimanded very loudly and vehemently by a taxpayer who had met with him privately years prior to complain about the relationship.  Soon after this very public spanking the meetings were yanked off the air for six months until the board could figure out a way to try to keep the lid on things.

In shutting down the Channel 18 broadcasts, Martins expressed concern that village employees were being slandered on TV.  Well in order for something to be slander it has to be untrue.  The fact of the matter is that these two have been involved in a relationship for several years.  They go out on vacation at the same time.  They work out at the same gym.  She spends weekends at his house.  Now would this be a problem if they worked in different departments?  Not at all.  But she reports to him.  And it has created problems within Village Hall for years.  Problems that are beginning to surface more and more, and ultimately the taxpayers - we who subsidize the salaries of Whalen, Calabro AND the mayor - will be paying for it in spades.

Payback's a bitch.

THE MANY USES OF FOIL

FOIL - it's not just for wrapping leftovers.  Why, everybody knows a foil hat is the best way to protect yourself from alien mind control. If you don't believe me, just ask Mr. Whiskers and his owner.

FOIL also allows people like us the Freedom to Obtain Information by Law. It's an important tool we can use to keep our governments and big corporations honest. When you utilize the Freedom Of Information Law you can educate yourself and get all your facts together before you start tilting at windmills.  Or talking out your ass.

Of course, just because you request info from your government doesn't mean they're going to hand it over - even if they know you're entitled to it. Say you ask to see the employment history of one of your village's workers. Whether a civil servant is a street sweeper or an office manager, their work record is open for review. Certain information such as social security numbers, home addresses and phone numbers may be redacted, but access to a civil service employee's educational background and employment history must be provided upon written request. And New York State's Committee on Open Government offers many opinions to that effect on their website. (See http://www.dos.state.ny.us/coog/foil_listing/findex.html )

But for some reason, if you submit a FOIL request to the Village of Mineola to review the curriculum vitae and salary history of their Building Superintendent or Secretary to the Board of Zoning Appeals, you'll be denied. And when you go the extra step to file an appeal citing numerous opinions from the COG that back you up, your appeal will be ignored - which is the same as a denial. You see, certain members of Mineola's Board of Trustees are very arrogant and clearly believe they are above the law. We've already seen that in the cases of Jack Martins and Tom Kennedy who don't think the Building Code regulations apply to them. So why not deny a citizen access to information they're entitled to?  Especially when that information is going to make the mayor look bad?

It's all part of the same strategy (if that's what you want to call it) that lead them to take the public meetings off the air for six months.  It started with folks questioning the double standards with which the Village Code is applied.  Why DID Building Superintendent Whalen issue a permit for an illegal fence to a contractor when he routinely denies other fence applications for corner properties?  (This is even more questionable considering he fined that contractor for having placed a "For Sale" sign on the same property.  Fences are big and permanent.  "For Sale" signs are not.)  Why did Mr. Whalen allow an already non-conforming house on Wellington Road to be expanded without requiring a variance hearing?  Why did he permit another behemoth of a house to be erected on Horton Highway in violation of the height restriction without calling for a variance hearing?

Ask for an intelligent explanation from this village official and you won't get one.  Because there is none.  And instead of having Mr. Whalen stand up and explain his decisions for himself at a January 2009 Work Session, the Mayor tapped the Village Attorney to cover Whalen's derrierre - at taxpayer expense of course.  Why are we paying Dan Whalen $100,000 a year to sit like a potted plant at a work session while we simultaneously pay John Spellman hefty consultant fees to spin tall tales about the way the building regulations are interpreted and enforced?

Ask the mayor if he's ever received complaints about a relationship between a Village official and a secretary who reports to that official, and first the mayor denies he ever received ANY complaints, then two weeks later he says he never received any "formal" complaints.  Then the Board votes to stop broadcasting the public meetings using the rationale that these employees were being slandered (they weren't - in order for something to be slanderous it must be false).  Then they blame it on people talking too long about things that aren't village related.  Then they go back to the slander defense.  And while the mayor avers that the board "agonized" over their decision to pull the plug, his second-in-command Larry Werther states that they didn't need to think about it at all. (In other words, for Larry it was a "no-brainer!")

Wow!  Either the right hand is completely ignorant of what the left hand is doing, or these guys are trying to play some serious brain games with the taxpayers.  Maybe they're in cahoots with some alien space invaders to take control of our minds.  Or maybe, just maybe, they ARE the alien space invaders hoping to turn us all into obedient pod people.  Or perhaps the spirits of the spooky season are getting the better of me.  But in any case, it may just be time for us all to break out the Reynolds and put our tinfoil hats on.  After all, a mind is a terrible thing to waste:    http://eclectech.co.uk/mindcontrol.php

WHAT'S IN AN ADDRESS ?

Well if you live at 340 Beebe Road at the corner of Florence Road, a $2000 fine is in it when you do what lots of other people in this village have done and you put up a fence in violation of the village code.  If, on the other hand, you own the property at 323  1st Street, you'll only have to pay a $300 fine for putting up an illegal fence.

Now if you live at 223 Wellington Road and if you're a village trustee who has taken an oath to uphold the village code on three different occasions, you can put up an illegal fence AND an illegal pool and never pay a fine.  You see, that's a special address where the Village Code doesn't apply.  It's a magical corner sprinkled with fairy dust.  The people who live there are very, very special and because of their special nature, the rules don't apply to them.

There's another magical house in Mineola at 200 Banbury Road.  It's even more special because a very, very important man lives there - a mystical man.  He lives there even though you never see him there.  He's kind of like God that way.  He's called "Mayor" and he too has taken an oath to uphold and defend the laws of the Village not once, not twice, not thrice.  He has taken this vow four times.  But he can pick and choose the laws he's going to obey because he's a mystical man with magic hedges around his magic house.

He has "magic" hedges that are really only 3 feet tall even though they look 6 feet tall.  Now if they were really six feet tall those hedges would be in violation of the village code that the Mayor has promised to uphold, but because they are "magic" hedges they only give the illusion of being too tall.  Just like the Mayor gives the illusion that he actually lives in his magic house.  And that he's honest.  And law-abiding.  And not at all a hypocrite.

Welcome to Mineola.  It's a Magic Kingdom ~ at least for some.