The Update Desk: Grains of Salt (v50)

Back in September, I did a Grains of Salt post on an audit done by Matt Beadnell, then the Onondaga County Comptroller, on the work habits of the County's Democratic Elections Commissioner. The gist of the audit was that Dustin Czarny, the commish, was in effect stealing from county taxpayers by working as an Uber or Lyft driver on our dime.

Beadnell says the Elections Commissioner job calls for at least 35 hours a week; Czarny is paid $98,753 per year, so the 94 hours of driving he's accused of doing during work hours in the past 18 months would have been worth around $5100 in county pay - and those hours would have been credited towards his pension.

Czarny had a difference of opinion, as might be expected, noting that he worked well over the required hours, that his part-time work didn't impact his county work, and he maintained that he had done nothing wrong.

Beadnell, for his part, made of mess of things, by letting the cat out of the bag about a big press conference, involving a "high level County Official" and making sure that folks had all weekend to play a guessing game on which official might be in trouble.  Well, most people were playing the guessing game, but not all.

Beadnell inexplicably briefed the Onondaga County GOP Chair, Tom Dadey, before making his announcement.

Fast forward to October, when we heard from DA-for-Life Bill Fitzpatrick on the result of his criminal investigation into the matter. There was no collusion, there was no obstruction... 

No, what he said was that Czarny would not be charged; he really only worked about 14 hours, not 94; Czarny often works more hours than required, and under the law, he's not required to work set hours anyway; and most of the rides were late in the day or on Czarny's way home from work. In the end, 

This is not an elected position. There’s no set 9-5. He doesn’t punch a time card. He felt in light of the disclosures that it looked bad and he already indicated that so there’s just no thievery there. Things that don’t look good aren’t crimes.

Czarny issued a statement saying, in part,

I have maintained throughout this process that I did not do anything wrong and that Mr. Beadnell was mistaken in both his reading of the law and analysis of the data. I am grateful to District Attorney Fitzpatrick and his team for doing this investigation and uncovering the truth. Mr. Beadnell’s gross exaggeration of the hours spent ride-sharing, whether on purpose or through incompetence, was a direct result of him never truly investigating the matter...

Czarny was correct in stating there was a gross exaggeration of his hours: they were based on estimates, some of which were doubled; Beadnell did not understand how ride-sharing works; he didn't speak with either company; and, as noted, did not talk to Czarny either. In a nutshell, it was a mess. 

Beadnell admitted to the editorial board of the local paper that he was wrong to have notified the party boss about the audit, and said he's "gone back and forth" on whether he erred by not talking to Czarny - but making it look political was worse. He got the endorsement of the paper anyway, but Syracuse City Auditor Marty Masterpole won, becoming "the first Democrat elected to a major countywide office since 1991."

This is all behind us now - fortunately - and I hope that during his tenure, Masterpole will manage the Comptroller's office in a non-partisan way. That's as it should be, and we should accept nothing less.