Recorder News Staff
Once again, the lack of hard financial reports stalled a number of resolutions on the agenda Tuesday night as an alderman demanded information on the current budget.
Fourth Ward Alderman Dave Dybas continued to vote against the bi-weekly Amsterdam audit and any other resolution before the Common Council involving city finances until detailed information was released by the controller's office.
Amsterdam has yet to file its Annual Update Document with the New York State Comptroller's Office, that was due back on Nov. 1, to close out the 2010-11 budget.
The document details all of the actual expenditures and revenues in the city's budget, including the fund balance and that actual amount of cash on hand.
"It's called, 'I'd like to know where I am so I can write the check,'" Dybas said.
Controller Ronald Wierzbicki updated the Common Council and said he understands their frustration but hopes to have the situation he "inherited" rectified shortly.
"It seems like there's been one setback after another, it's really be a horrendous experience," he said of her tenure so far in office. "As God as my witness, I would like to have this behind me in the next several days."
When the issue came to bonding and what was actually being spent on what projects, and whether or not proposed projects were even eligible to be bonded for, Dybas and Wierzbicki went back and forth for several minutes over figures being reported.
Ultimately, the controller said he was reporting on numbers "to the best of my knowledge," but without closing out last year's budget nothing could be 100 percent certain.
Some of the resolutions being tabled due to questions or inadequate budgetary information drew the ire of 5th Ward Alderman Richard Leggiero after a resolution to replace a guard rail was held up.
Leggiero sponsored a bill to accept a $5,637.50 proposal by EMI Guide Rail LLC to replace the guard rail along Hover Avenue and the creek on the city's South Side.
When Dybas raised financial questions and Corporation Council Gerard DeCusatis stated the matter should be brought forth through the Public Works Committee the resolution, to Leggiero's disappointment, was ultimately tabled.
"This is just a stall, this needs to get done," he said. "I'm have to call a special meeting on this, mayor, because we have to move on it."
Leggiero voted against tabling the matter but was overridden by the rest of the Common Council.
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