By ANTHONY BOTTAN
According to village officials, the money was being used to pay bills, and would be repaid to the village in the form of a state grant.
Village Administrator John Giordano described the transfer of $341,861 in early November as a temporary advance, and said he was unaware at the time that advances needed to be voted on by the village board before being made. According to New York state law, temporary advances must be voted on in the same manner as any other budget transfer before being made. The advance was used to pay for fire department equipment, as well as a contractor's bill for recent roadwork in Lynbrook.
"I'm shocked and outraged," Trustee David Penso said of the advance. "Hopefully we can get someone from either the state comptroller's office, the New York state attorney general, or the Nassau County district attorney to give us an opinion on this. To me, it appears to be a misappropriation of funds."
William Reynolds, a spokesman for the state comptroller's office, referred to General Municipal Law 9-a, which states that "a municipal corporation may temporarily advance moneys held in any fund to any other fund of the municipal corporation. Any such temporary advance shall be authorized in the same manner as prescribed by general, special or local law for making budgetary transfers between appropriations." According to Village Law 5-520, "the board of trustees, during a fiscal year, by resolution, may make additional appropriations or increase existing appropriations."
Giordano said that during annual state audits of the village, auditors had never pointed out that the village was handling temporary advances inappropriately. "There have been numerous temporary transfers without board approval over the past 20 years," he said. "But we have corrected that procedure."
During a meeting on Dec. 3 with Peter Novak of the state comptroller's office, Giordano said, he was informed that the village bookkeepers - who, along with the village's deputy treasurer, had previously issued temporary advances - must notify him via e-mail that an advance is needed, and that e-mail is to be forwarded to the board. He added that the board will now vote on paying bills, and on temporarily advancing the money to do so, in the same resolution.
The temporary advance for the fire equipment and the contractor's services came to light at the Dec. 15 meeting, at which only four members of the board were present. The board split the vote on the transfer and the motion to move the money was denied.
The minutes of the meeting's work session, however, inaccurately reflected that Trustee Richard Clifford voted in favor of the motion. Clifford would have been the third vote required to approve the transfer. Giordano is responsible for recording the minutes, and Clifford said at the Jan. 5 board meeting that his vote was changed on purpose because approval was needed since the funds had already been transferred.
At the board's next meeting, on Jan. 5, Mayor Brian Curran refuted Clifford's claim that the minutes were in error, saying he recalled Clifford voting in favor of the transfers. Three days later, however, Clifford gave a videotape of the Dec. 15 work session to Giordano, who acknowledged that he had mistakenly recorded Clifford's vote.
Curran did not return several calls for comment.
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