Saugus FinCom eyes greater authority following DPW pay discrepancies

SAUGUS – Saugus Town Accountant Joan Regan said as many as five employees from the Department of Public Works were being paid inappropriately out of the sewer and water enterprise accounts, and had to be reclassified back to the town?s general fund to the tune of $238,000.Regan said the employees had been paid that way since around 2009 and were only supposed to be working on sewer or water issues, but actually were not.Finance Committee member Louis Rossi said he feels like the committee is “irrelevant” and pointed to a situation last year where he said the DPW Director requested moving one person into the water enterprise account.?We were all present when we heard the arguments of, ?These people don?t touch anything but water? and, ?These people don?t touch anything but sewer,?” said Rossi. “We didn?t believe it then? We told them that we didn?t think that was appropriate and my feeling is that we were ignored. We were just told, ?It is what it is.? And now it isn?t what it is.”Rossi acknowledged the committee could have done a better job of insisting on evidence to support the spending, but said there has to be a “trust factor” at some point in the budget process.?We could have tailed them, and drove around and watched what these guys do and take pictures,” said Rossi. “My gut told me that some of these people could not have been working all these hours in water and sewer, but short of following these people around taking pictures, I don?t know what else we could have done.”Finance Committee Chairman Robert Palleschi said he wants to see the committee have more authority and develop better means of keeping track of accounts.?I want to see this as a transition from one that?s being stonewalled to one that?s going to have some veracity, and I hope we can make that happen,” said Palleschi.Palleschi also said he was disappointed with temporary Town Manager John Vasapolli for not appearing at the last three Finance Committee meetings.Matt Tempesta can be reached at [email protected].