In a shocking turn of events, on Friday, February 14, 2025, Christine Gillmett-Brown, Saratoga Springs’ Director of Finance for some twenty-nine years, abruptly gave two weeks notice and will soon be leaving that post.
Christine Gillmett-Brown’s position is one of the most important in the city. In effect, she is the city’s comptroller, with a central role in managing the city’s money. Her responsibilities include, among other things, overseeing all cash accounts, including incoming and outgoing cash, finance accounts receivable and payable, property tax payments, bond matters, debt limit, accounting for fund balance, and audits. In addition, she plays a crucial role in crafting the city’s budget.
As Finance Commissioner Sanghvi does not return my emails, I am not privy to what precipitated Ms. Gillmett-Brown’s departure with so little notice. The position will be vacant on February 28, 2025, and Finance Commissioner Minita Sanghvi appears to have no plan in place to replace Gillmett-Brown let alone train a replacement. The Department of Finance is a small office. One has to wonder how uninvolved Sanghvi is with her staff that the resignation of the most critical person under her has come as a surprise.
A Troubling Advertisement For Gillmett-Brown’s Replacement
According to this exam announcement, a person currently employed by the city is eligible for the position of Finance Director if they have “Two consecutive permanent full-time paid years as Payroll Administrator with the city of Saratoga Springs.”
Only one employee who works for the city meets this qualification.
This person enjoys a special status with Sanghvi as she has repeatedly promoted him while in office and given him related pay raises.
The individual maintains no presence on social media. In particular, he has no LinkedIn page, so there is no information available regarding his qualifications for this job other than his payroll experience. He began his employment with the city at age twenty-seven as a clerk.
Under the best circumstances, a FOIL request for information on him would require a month. We know Gillmett-Brown has an accounting degree from Clarkson University.
Readers should also know that as Payroll Administrator, he played a key role in the on-call scandal.
I find it shocking that the Civil Service Commission considers a person who has served two years as the manager of the city’s payroll qualified to be the city’s Director of Finance.
Problematic Audits
I have written extensively about the shoddy, poorly crafted city budgets Commissioner Sanghvi has produced. City audits since her election indicate additional problems with how she has carried out her responsibilities as Finance Commissioner.
The city’s audits were consistently favorable before Minita Sanghvi took over as Finance Commissioner. Here is just one example from 2023 of critical audits under her administration. It is important to understand that the term “material” conveys that the item is serious.
This next page contains a statement asserting that the audit has found records that are not reliable.
Here, the auditor declares that the city’s management ( Sanghvi) “does not have processes and controls in place to ensure complete and accurate reporting of capital asset balances.”
The Reviews Of Sanghvi’s Teaching Are Less Than Flattering
Given Sanghvi’s imperious and rude behavior at the Council table, I suspect her behavior toward her staff could be problematic as well and may have contributed to Gillmett-Brown’s abrupt exit with little notice.
I was curious about her interactions outside of City Hall. Below are comments from her students at Skidmore on a website called Rate My Professors. Most are highly critical of the manner by which she dealt with them. Of the 26 reviews of her teaching, eight are positive, and sixteen are negative. Oddly, five of the eight positive reviews were submitted on the same day, which is unusual given the random pattern of the dates of the other reviews.
It is worth noting that surveys like this use the computer’s IP address when doing the review, so it is easy to skew the results by entering reviews using different devices.
Most strikingly, these reviews consistently focus on how she interacts with her students and echo the character traits that are often observable at the City Council table.
Saratoga Springs Politics 
How do you know that the resignation (with two weeks notice) was a surprise? And other than character assassination, there is no reason for you to post Rate My Professor reviews:
“A frequent criticism of Rate My Professor (RMP)is that there is little reason to think that the ratings accurately reflect the quality of the professors rated.” “Another criticism is that ratings have been shown to reflect gender bias toward the professors evaluated. Furthermore, at RMP, “easiness”, “clarity”, and “helpfulness” are the only components taken into consideration and are not considered well-designed evaluations. Edward Nuhfer argues that both Pickaprof.com and RMP “are transparently obvious in their advocacy that describes a ‘good teacher’ as an easy grader.”
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Dear Anonymous-as to how JK knew the resignation was a surprise he seems to have some pretty reliable sources. Aside from that, though, if he’s wrong that would mean that Minita knew and had plenty of notice and did nothing to get a suitable replacement ready and trained in time to make the transition of Gillmett-Brown’s departure go smoothly.
As to the student evaluations, I would be skeptical too except they so clearly attribute to their professor the very unpleasant characteristics I see on display every time I watch her behavior at a City Council meeting.
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I have to agree on the topic of teacher evals. While, it wouldn’t surprise anyone that I have been critical of Mintia more than once, I also know that when not required and anonymous, a majority of the evals are from students who are dissatisfied. I also know that many of the dissatisfied are unhappy with their grade yet choose not to take responsibility for the low grade. I can often tell from the comments which student is complaining and it is most often one who has not done the work, has not paid attention to feedback or has simply not attended to the instructions. So, I’ll give Minita a pass on that part.
PS: I don’t ask my better students to remember to fill out the eval. Maybe I should start.
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Christien Gimmett-Brown’s service to the City began in 1996 when Democrat Ken Klotz, who upset the Republican stronghold on City government that year with his election to the position of Commissioner of Finance, appointed her to serve as his deputy. Despite Ken’s defeat in 1998, Christine continued to serve under Ken’s successor, Republican Mike Lenz. Eventually, the position of Director of Finance was established. Christine was given that role and has served in that capacity since then.
It was recognized early on that Christine was well qualified to serve in our Finance Department. She brought consistency and comprehensive knowledge to her roles. Her oversight responsibilities were exercised in a manner that made possible the successful navigation of our City’s financial challenges through good times as well as the more difficult years. It will be difficult to find a suitable replacement for Christine Gimmett-Brown.
Chris Mathiesen
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Why would anyone want to work for this pay level to receive the level of ignorant scrutiny in this article? Good luck hiring your Director of Finance from fantasy land. It amazes me the level of stupidity seen above. Truly awe inspiring levels of stupid is required to not understand someone who starts a civil position in 1996 might retire someday.
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This post is very thought provoking. The public should consider the following:
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To Call me concerned:
Sanghvi’s incompetence has finally been brought out into the open.
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What company did the audit.? And what does her teaching have to do with city finance? Let’s keep it to city business.
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