City Councilors Rip Medford Housing Authority
Housing Authority's board of commissioners will meet Wednesday.
Embarrassing. Horrid. Disgusting. Boondoggle.
Those are a few of the words used by city officials during Tuesday night's city council meeting to describe some of the findings of a recently-released federal audit report on the Medford Housing Authority.
Even though the city has no control over the housing authority -- it operates autonomously from the municipal government -- the council discussed the audit during its meeting Tuesday night and unanimously approved a resolution asking for the housing authority to distribute letters to all its residents notifying them of the report.
The discussion was prompted by Councilor Robert Penta, who also wanted to ask the federal government to put the housing authority under receivership, and to call for the housing authority's board of commissioners -- who are appointed by the mayor and approved by the council -- to fire the authority's executive director Robert Covelle.
The audit report, which was made public last week, said the authority distributed nearly $8 million in aid in 2010 and 2011 without properly following federal guidelines, and shelled out $1.3 million in procurements under questionable practices.
Penta said the results of the audit report were a "boondoggle."
"They are an embarrassment to our city, and to me a borderline scandal of which the like our city has never seen before," Penta said.
The resolutions calling for receivership and personnel changes failed by 5-2 votes, with Breanna Lungo-Koehn being the only other councilor to support the measures.
Still, other the other councilors expressed concern over the audit report.
Council President Robert Maiocco has seen many audits in his years as a financial advisor, he said.
"This audit is one of the worst audits I have read in my 40 years in finance," Maiocco said.
Councilor Paul Camuso said the findings in the audit report were disgusting.
“This is important stuff," Camuso said. "People are concerned because they believe their quality of life is at stake.”
City Solicitor Mark Rumley, who provided copies of the report and related correspondence to the council, attended Tuesday's meeting to make clear that the housing authority was autonomous from the Medford municipal government.
“This audit is horrid, that’s the truth,” Rumley said.
The housing authority is expected to respond to the audit report by April 30. Its board of commissioners is expected to hold a meeting Wednesday night at 5:30 p.m.
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Joe Viglione
12:58 am on Friday, May 11, 2012
What I find troubling is that the City Solicitor claims "the housing authority was autonomous from the Medford municipal government" yet the Mayor failed to appoint all the board members that oversee the MHA...and there's no doubt in my mind that Mayor McGlynn intentionally kept a person off of the board (a man had applied over a year ago) because a)McGlynn has a track record of doing exactly this thing b)the reason he does it, he likes to control all the boards and commissions and make decisions that impact the entire organization... especially when they can (falsely) claim "the housing authority was autonomous from the Medford municipal government." When Deval Patrick appointed the Mayor's uncle, Eugene J. McGillicuddy, the Mayor had total control of the votes...and a lot of sway over the policies. So the Mayor's secretary's brother-in-law gets the big job, the Executive Director, and the Mayor's friend John Lonegran gets the other big job, and it is cronyism installed by McGlynn, manipulated by McGlynn, and concocted by McGlynn. So why aren't there cries for McGlynn's resignation? McGlynn recommends the Board, then he has FOUR VOTES on the City Council that rubber stamp his requests, most notably the notorious "Uncle" Bob Maiocco and his nephew, Sheriff Department employee Paul A. Camuso, along with Fred Dello Russo. All they need is one additional vote and they have 4-3, if need be. The Mayor is the architect of this Medford Housing debacle. Do the math.
Jarret Bencks
9:11 am on Tuesday, May 22, 2012
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lee
12:18 pm on Friday, June 8, 2012
Embarrassing. Horrid. Disgusting. Boondoggle ...
That is exactly how I would describe the Medford City Council meetings !
Just remember it only takes one to sink a ship !
Public Access Producer
3:36 pm on Friday, June 8, 2012
we need more people attending the council meetings, Lee.