Think of it: if you ran a company or municipal agency that was funded by other people’s money, would you do the following: let employees bill you for their own overtime without requiring a manager to sign off — and apparently not require them to even list the hours? Limit how much overtime they were allowed off the job, then routinely let them break the rules — even though their job was to enforce the law? Assume that when a contractor was caught billing you simultaneously for two different jobs it was an innocent bookkeeping error — even if it happened twice, for multiple days? And then continue to hire that person, no questions asked?
It will be months before we know the total amount of money Matthews allegedly stole from taxpayers in his scheme to simultaneously bill the city for police overtime and the school district for security work, in addition to the $9,000 he allegedly took from a safe at police headquarters. We can guess it might be a lot, given that the city detective, who was suspended in January without pay, earned nearly $60,000 as a security officer at the high school in the 2009-10 school year, in addition to his job overseeing the police department’s detective division, plus overtime. The State Comptroller’s Office, which first discovered the fraud while auditing the Kingston City School District, is examining the police department payrolls. The FBI’s separate investigation of URGENT, the narcotics-busting enforcement unit that Matthews co-commanded in 2008, might also bring to light further possible misappropriation of public funds.
But the accounting doesn’t stop there. Almost as disturbing as Matthews’ alleged thievery is the lack of oversight. He seems to have been given an extraordinary level of trust by Sottile, Police Chief Gerald Keller and Gretzinger. He was apparently untouchable: despite a procedure put in place by the Common Council in 2009 requiring the deputy chief of police to pre-approve all overtime requests, Matthews was somehow exempt, as reported in an article last week by Jesse Smith.
Comments in Smith’s article by Barry Rell, president of the Kingston PDA, give a hint of the lackadaisical attitude that apparently infuses the culture at the police department. Rell said that PDA rules restrict policemen working a second job to no more than 20 hours a week, but they aren’t followed. In fact, Rell dismissed the rule, acknowledging “it’s never been an issue.” But the Matthews case shows it certainly has been an issue. Using Rell’s logic, I guess it’s OK for me to run a red light now and then when no cars are coming, because having an accident at those moments “isn’t an issue.” How can people charged with enforcing the law be so loosey-goosey when it comes to following their own rules?
There were a number of red flags, such as the fact that from 2008 to 2010 Matthews, while working as chief of the city’s detective division, was regularly clocking in 50 additional hours a week as a security guard at Kingston High School. At his Feb. 23 press conference, Gretzinger said he was responsible for appointing Matthews head of the school security force and giving him the authority to do all the scheduling for the off-duty police officers’ hours at the school. Since the cops were off duty, didn’t he ever wonder at Matthews’ excessive hours, which far exceeded even a normal 35-hour work week?
More incriminating evidence about Gretzinger’s relationship to Matthews has been provided by Robert Pritchard, former assistant superintendent for business at the school district, who is now superintendent of the Mexico Central School District up in Oswego County. Pritchard told this paper that in 2009 he was called into Gretzinger’s office, after he had discovered that Matthews had billed the district twice for security services at two different places at the same time on two invoices he had submitted. Pritchard deducted the extra hours from Matthews’ pay. But Gretzinger, with Matthews sitting in the room, pressured Pritchard to pay him the extra money. Pritchard said he had refused.
At the press conference, Gretzinger characterized the discrepancies on the invoices as “booking errors,” thereby downplaying the allegation of double dipping. Furthermore, he said he could not recall the meeting with Pritchard and Matthews — a Watergate-style evasion that’s an unacceptable response to the taxpayers who fund his $182,804-plus salary and $45,883 in benefits.
Gretzinger needs to explain why Matthews was in his office. There are other questions. Why, for example, didn’t Gretzinger and Pritchard meet first to discuss the discrepancies, then confront Matthews? And if one believes Gretzinger’s assumption that the discrepancy was an innocent bookkeeping error, wouldn’t Matthews have gone to business manager Pritchard for the money?
“I believe that no … administrator has the right to attempt to damage one’s character based on their own personal bias,” Gretzinger said in response to Pritchard’s account. But Pritchard did not personally attack Gretzinger in his statements to the press; he simply described actions and conversations. In fact, Pritchard is reported as saying that he believed Gretzinger really did think Matthews had worked the hours he had billed the school district for.
The discrepancy needs to be cleared up immediately. If Gretzinger continues to refuse to explain what his role was at the meeting, he should step down. His silence raises the unpleasant specter of an administrative office governed by fear and secrecy.
Meanwhile, Gretzinger and Sottile said they have put in place new procedures, but they haven’t specified what they are. They need to explain what the measures are, how they will be enforced, who will be accountable. They need to bend over backward to win back the trust of the public. We need real reforms, with fresh leadership that takes its job seriously and recognizes the sacrosanct responsibility it has to us, the taxpayers.
You, madam or sir, seem to me to be one of those apologists for a member of the “Good Old Boys Club” who hides behind the anonymity the media allows for these comments. Cowardly, in my opinion.
“ I'n happy there's an outlet for your angst in the willing media however the seemingly constant drumbeat of convenient twisting, spinning, oversensationalizing, and insinuative speculating without evidence is more than getting on my nerves at this point.”
I suggest you stop reading. There is evidence that Mr. Gretzinger had a long term social relationship with Det. Matthews. It is plain as day that he gave Matthews complete and unsupervised authority over scheduling. Either he thought it was prudent for Matthews to work 50 plus hours for the school while working for the KPD full time or he didn’t bother to know how many hours the man booked for himself. Either way it causes causes me to doubt his judgment and his professional abilities. This is a small example of facts in this case. Not spin, not sensationalism, not insinuation. There is more, much more, to call his leadership into question.
“We have met the enemy and it is the media and those who feed into its lazy and destructive penchant to see scandals everywhere and embellish and magnify everything in every little detail in a strident and incessant search and recover operation--- not for accuracy but for gossip and innuendo, after first raising a wimpy wet finger to the wind like the pols the media covers, being passed off as absolute fact! I'm sick and tired of this general approach!!”
Madam/sir, you have a way with words, I grant you that. Obviously you and I disagree on the accuracy of much of the reporting on this scandal. Superintend Gretzinger’s response to this fiasco has been little, late and unsatisfactory, in my opinion and in the opinion of others. Still is.
Lynn Woods’ commentary was well written and justified. She didn’t hide behind some made up name, neither did Matthew Ryan. You did not use your fanciful word play to criticize her commentary, but rather choose to take personal potshots at Mr. Ryan as a springboard to your rant against journalists and the media coverage of this scandal. Your lack of facts, regarding Mr. Ryan, is glaring. Your choice of words in describing his community activism speaks volumes to me about your personal prejudices. You use innuendo and insinuation rather well for someone who is “sick & tired” of it. Your slimy tactics, which are part of the “Good Old Boys’ Club” apologists’ tactics in this town, make me sick. Not sick and tired, just plain sick.
Amy Murphy
However you of all people Mr. Ryan--you who danced and pranced at every chance of community activism against crime which was the nexus of the hiring of officers in the school district in the first place--so easily pile onto the tackle of Gretzinger after the bullies at the Freeman, notably the "usual bully suspect Kirby", gang up on the fellow. And that's precisely what it was--a bullying tactic and tackling someone who was already down. In football you get a penalty for doing that;in the local media it is a treasured trophy type behavior. That The Kingston Times would seem so "brotherly" in this article with the ridiculous Freeman on this one is truly disappointing as well. I'n happy there's an outlet for your angst in the willing media however the seemingly constant drumbeat of convenient twisting, spinning, oversensationalizing, and insinuative speculating without evidence is more than getting on my nerves at this point.
It is said that hindsight is 20/20 and it seems to me we have a case of that here. Certainly it is reasonable to question anyone's salary who works in the public sector, especially in these days of a very tight if not harsh economy. That is an issue that stands on its own merit without having to twist it into the accounts of the missed opportunity to squelch a budding scandal(as this article does). Quite obviously there is a learning curve as a result of this matter that will kick in as a result--quite likely moreso had the scandal been less odious than it was(perhaps a scant silver lining if any but reasonable to think this may be true). So why can't to some extent the media wags and the critics in this community start to put this matter behind us in some way and focus on the ongoing issues(which are numerous and sufficient in themselves), which we hope and should expect don't include regular malfeasance in law enforcement? And what about the "dipping" that an appointee of the Mayor did some years back, which didn't happen to get quite this much ink? No one made a big deal out of that it seems to me, and it seems to me there was more a valid tracing of appointer to appointee applied in that case. What double, triple, and quadruple if not quintuple standards exist in such matters! Seemingly no end to the layers of the mechanisms of obfuscatory baloney in this community!
Of course, those who took major impetus in activism against crime in Kingston now would not deign to take a modicum of responsibility for a good intention gone awry as an overarching thematic issue in this story of anti-crime activity. But... of course it is never ever about blaming oneself for anything, but rather, about incessantly, repeatedly, and obsessively blaming someone else--no matter how illogical and overarching the hunting of all the "witches and warlocks" may become. Were it otherwise we would see a complete rewrite of human nature.
We have Kirby-ized this entire city(and I don't mean a product from Scot Fetzer & Co!!).
We have met the enemy and it is the media and those who feed into its lazy and destructive penchant to see scandals everywhere and embellish and magnify everything in every little detail in a strident and incessant search and recover operation--- not for accuracy but for gossip and innuendo, after first raising a wimpy wet finger to the wind like the pols the media covers, being passed off as absolute fact! I'm sick and tired of this general approach!!
One of the best editorials I've read this year! dares to ask the main players the questions that us taxpayers have been talking to our neighbors about for weeks, and points out the lack of following rules and proceedures that were set in place but ignored, and how our leadership, the mayor our police chief and our school superintendent failed all us taxpayers and the need for new leadership to regain our trust.