The Martin Chronicles has learned that the more than $150,000 in police department overtime squandered by Villa Hills Mayor Mike Martin may only be about half of the story. Well-placed sources indicate that the City is trending to finish the fiscal year over-budget somewhere in the range of $300,000. That is an incredible amount of red ink for a City the size of Villa Hills.
Given the fact that the City has been operating under an old budget-because Martin was unable to produce a budget for this current fiscal year-it should shock readers if the City doesn’t finish the fiscal year with a substantial surplus.
Why? Because the old budget the City is still operating under includes funding for the unfilled City Clerk position and two open police officer positions. Not funding these three positions should have saved somewhere in the range of $200-$250K when salary, benefits and retirement obligations is added up. So what happened?
We also don’t remember much road work being done over the past twelve months. In fact, we really don’t remember any significant work being completed in 2011. The City collected the $40 per car sticker in 2011. Why wasn’t it spent on the streets? Since much of the road tax money went unspent, shouldn’t that mean there will be an even larger surplus at the end of the fiscal year? What is going on?
The Martin Chronicles reminds you that we have had a very mild winter. No overtime for hours of snow plowing. No extra fuel costs for trucks running for hours on end. No purchase of additional salt. Shouldn’t the taxpayers see huge savings from the mild winter as well?
Martin has also eliminated community events like Fire in the Hills and the Haunted Trail. While the City never spent a great deal on these events, they spent nothing on them this year. Where has that savings gone?
It certainly hasn't helped that City Council has been stonewalled on financial reporting. Council consists of some very talented individuals who would have lent a hand to help. If their help had ever been requested, that is. The decision to stop asking for Council's close scrutiny and approval of monthly financial reports has proven to be a huge, costly mistake.
At this point, Martin’s wild spending and shocking cost-overruns simply reveal an individual who isn’t capable of running this or any other City. But massive incompetence isn’t a crime. What Special Counsel Phil Taliaferro reveals in the weeks ahead may just tell a different story.
