At long last, Plainfield has a new chief finance officer - and yet another director of Administration, Finance, Health & Senior Services.
The City Council approved hiring Ron Zilinski, a highly regarded certified CFO with decades of experience, to fill the post that has been empty since the retirement of Peter Sepelya at the end of 2007. Both the mayor and council faced daily $25 personal fines from the state Division of Local Government Services if no one was hired by the end of this month.
Zilinski, recently retired from service in Trenton, will receive $15,000 annually as CFO and another $65,000 as city treasurer. The latter title and salary will kick in Jan. 1, as the council also passed a salary ordinance for that post last night. Zilinski will work 28 hours a week .
Al Restaino, who served the city as director of Community Development, is the new director of AFH&SS, the largest of three departments mandated by the City Charter. The department received one more division last night as the council passed an ordinance creating the Division of Information Technology and Media within AFH&SS. Technology Manager Chris Payne had been reporting directly to the mayor since being hired earlier this year, a technical violation of the charter.
Restaino as department head will receive $110,000. One of his main initiatives, as suggested by the Citizens Budget Advisory Committee, may be to find a way to reduce the number of social service functions under the city's wing. As reported by Mark Spivey, a two-year transition of a substance abuse program from city aegis to non-profit status has just been completed.
Restaino is also heading the city's anti-poverty agency, Plainfield Action Services, one of the divisions under his control as department head.
Monday's City Council meeting was crammed with many other items, some of which Plaintalker will report later.
--Bernice Paglia
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That is a very generous salary for a very part-time job. Where do I sign up? I'm glad to see Plainfield is doing so well. I guess you have to work for government to get such a good retirment and other deals.
ReplyDeleteBernice,
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry you didn't cover the part where Mr. Restano continued to plead for payment of the Incubator Grant. It made me and others feel as if there is a lot more to this fiasco then we know. Let the contractor show what work was done and I doubt it even qualifies under the Training Provider Eliligibilty list of recognized activities. That would be the Councils first act before allocating a penny. If anyone gets sued it will be for malfeance and perhaps misappropriation. They should let this turkey go away, while they can. As head of PAS, and reviewer of the grant; Mr. Restano has a conflict because I seem to recall the original submission had a cover sheet with the Incubator name listed as the agency providing the services but Plainfield Action Services submitted an old grant with filed with DCA in 2007 as back up to the budget and as lead consultant including suppling employees. Those were the only documents, one page Incubator and seven pages Plainfield Action Services. You think that's why he's still trying to fund both entities; please follow the money trail on this grant. It smells to high heaven.
Puh-leez! There were many, many stories to tell from last night's meeting - Dan lists five to start with. I was falling asleep at the meeting and went to bed immediately upon returning home. This morning, I posted the beginning of a long list of possible stories. I think you summed up the issue pretty well in your comment. Please don't expect instant coverage of all issues raised at a four and a half hour council meeting from this elderly blogger! Or even from the whole pack of council bloggers!
ReplyDeleteLet's see
ReplyDelete$65k + $15k = $80K
28 hrs/wk. x 52 weeks = 1,456 hrs.
Comes to $54.95 an hour
Not Bad!
Bernice:
ReplyDeleteI apoligize if you thought that I was saying you were remiss in not noting Mr. Dunn's and the Councils attempt to intimidate Alan for his efforts in communicating the issues surrounding the awarding of this grant. I have already indicated if needed I will assist in everyway to detail what is an eligible activity under the School Approval Unit and Mr. Goldstein has nothing to fear as he is correct in his assertions. He is more correct then he knows as the training provided under Mr. Dunns' activity is not a qualified services for eligible training under the Department of Labor, school approval unit, training provider eligibilities. In short the Counsel is wrong, Mr. Dunn is wrong and ignorance is no excuse when it comes to allocating funds for needed services. I could get 100 people to say I helped them but the question remains: Am I approved to help them.