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Health & Fitness

It's time for non-partisan approach to city government- Vote for a Clean Slate!

While people struggled through a bad economy, SuperStorm Sandy’s devastation, astronomical flood and homeowners insurance increases and a 16% City tax increase — here’s what City Hall politicians have been doing! And here's what city hall doesn't want you to remember on election day! 


MORE TAXES

  • Taxes are up 16% and more are on the way.
  • City debt has more than doubled from $48 million to $112 million
  • Golden parachutes/termination payouts of up to $500,000.00 of your tax dollars for retiring employees and no money or plan to pay for it other than more borrowing.
  • Police pay raises of 26%. The City did not budget for the raises and will now have to borrow the money to pay for them.
  • Taxes raised three times in two years. More tax increases on the way
  • Increased water and sewer rates, bus fares and other fees increased.
  • City's road, water pipe and sewer infrastructure continues to deteriorate.
  • No Transparency- The City Council has shut down the public's ability to ask questions and receive answers at council meetings, making it nearly impossible to hold elected officials accountable for their actions. Decisions are made in secret.
  • This administration regularly violates the Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) by refusing to acknowledge, answer, and or grant appeals for requests for public documents

MORE CRONYISM
  • Fired Judge Tepper's opponent, Assistant Corporation Counsel Ted Hommel days after he announced he was running for City Court Judge.
  • Fired the City's long time public information officer so they could put Judge Tepper's son in charge of Public Relations.
  • Forced out long time professional Director of Youth and Family Services and replaced him with a personal friend of a council member. Result: Long Beach was cited for eight violations, including the use of corporal punishment, by the state Office of Children and Family Services in July.
  • Fired long time Recreation Commissioner and appointed a political patronage employee with no experience administering recreation programs.
  • Appointed as Police Commissioner, the husband of Democrats legislative candidate and current school board member, despite a pledge not to hire family or friends.
  • According to publicly available records, the Police Commissioner’s 2012 W-2 form states that he made $302,000 last year. How is that possible since his base salary was supposed to be $185,000 per year. Is he a paid civil servant employee — or is he retired and also collecting a salary and a pension and a partial termination payout? Nobody’s talking! 
  • After the PBA worked long and hard to elect the current administration two years ago the former PBA President was awarded a lucrative settlement that gave him huge retroactive raises, two promotions and placed him as the head of the detective division, leading criminal investigations, despite the fact that he was not a detective and now he is leading all investigations and other detectives! 
  • Hired, promoted and or gave taxpayer funded raises to over 25 family and friends at a cost of over $1.3 million despite a specific campaign pledge not to hire any family and friends.
  • Campaign donors and clubhouse cronies appointed to Zoning Board, Civil Service Commission and other commissions and boards.
  • Patronage - created new high salary positions so they could hire political cronies from Tom Suozzi's previous administration, and former Town of Brookhaven political cronies.
  • Pay to Play - rewarded political donors with hiring, promotions, contracts and raises. • Hired high priced consultants and contractors, who in turn became big political contributors.


MORE MISMANAGEMENT
  • City Hall continues to allow over development in the Canals, President Streets, West End and elsewhere in our community.
  • Dumbing down of professional qualifications - City Hall reduced professional and educational credentials for key administrators. Long Beach no longer has a professional engineer as Commissioner of Public Works or a Comptroller who is a CPA.
  • Real Estate agents free parking- allowed real estate agents to park in no parking zones while the rest of the public had to fend for themselves to look for a parking spot. Only ended after public outrage. 
  • Spent tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars on self-serving public relations campaign disguised as newsletter, mailers and robo-calls. 

It’s time for a non-partisan approach to City government that includes leaders with real financial and business experience not tied to past or present City Hall politics.


If elected we will:

  • Freeze taxes for 2 years
  • End City Hall friends and family hiring policy 
  • Bring transparency to City Government
  • Cut wasteful spending and borrowing
  • Improve road, water pipe and sewer infrastructure 
  • End City Hall mismanagement of Long Beach 
Visit us at www.votecleanslate.com 
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