Not getting it in Carmel | lohud.com | The Journal News
From: Not getting it in Carmel | lohud.com | The Journal News.
Not getting it in Carmel
If it wasn’t clear before, it should be crystal clear now: Carmel town officials are making up the rules as they go along for use of taxpayer-funded cell phones. The result has taxpayers being unfairly stuck with the tab for personal-use calls. During a time when many school districts and local governments are at least trying to demonstrate that they “get it” that finances are tight, town Supervisor Kenneth Schmitt & Co. demonstrate that they are deaf to such concerns.
Those conclusions follow a startling representation by Schmitt in an affidavit dated March 17. He now claims that it has been town policy for “at least the past three years” to let officials and staff use town cell phones for personal calls. “There were no restrictions on the use of cell phones for personal calls,” Schmitt stated in the sworn statement, filed in connection with a lawsuit filed by The Journal News in a bid to make the town’s cell phone records public. Schmitt said that Town Board members relied on this policy “to use their town issued cell phones for all aspects of their personal lives.”
