Author: John Kaufmann

Thoughts on Police Officer Psychological Exams

Reference is made to your June 8 entry titled Commissioner Montagnino: More Bad Ideas, in which you opine about the commissioner’s comments on the Guidelines for Police Officer Psychological Exams and their application to Saratoga police officer and firefighter candidates.

It appears that your entry was prompted by a May 31 story in the Albany Times Union headlined

“Montagnino says city considering overriding psychological tests for police, firefighters” and a linked editorial published in the June 5 edition of the same newspaper.

The comments attributed to the commissioner of public safety, the initial TU story, and its subsequent editorial seem shot through with substantive errors and misinformed judgments.  The June 5 editorial, titled  A blown judgment call: Police recruits should be able to pass a psychological evaluation, is predicated on a false premise, and produces a false conclusion.

The referenced May 31 story begins thus:

            “After experiencing ‘a remarkable spate of psych eval failures,’ the city’s public safety commissioner wants to be able to override the psychological exams that recruits to the police and fire department are now required to pass.

            “Commissioner Jim Montagnino said psychologists are determining who he can hire and that several provisional hires have been cast aside because they passed all the benchmarks but failed the psychological exam determining mental fitness for the stressful job.

            “ ‘We sat down and reviewed what the law said,’ Montagnino said. Applying that strictly gives a psychologist veto power over that appointment. The law seems to suggest that there is some discretion involved.’ ”

            “Montagnino said he would like the psychological exam to be just a consideration, not a determining factor.

The factual errors in the story – which we will get to shortly – were then carried forward, further misrepresenting the statutory and regulatory guidelines and misleading a credulous public.  To be sure, the commissioner seems to have sown this brouhaha by his own intemperate statements. 

Background

On April 19, 2021, the “New York State Professional Policing Act (PPA) of 2021” was signed into law effectuating revisions and updates to numerous statutes in relation to the policing profession. Among several statutory changes, the PPA included amendments to Executive Law directing the Municipal Police Training Council (MPTC) to establish psychological minimum hiring standards for all new police officers.

As a result, changes to the State codes, rules, and regulations put in place new requirements for police employers related to psychological standards.

Pursuant to these new regulations, a psychological assessment is required as a screening tool in determining if a candidate can perform the essential functions of a police officer. The assessment will provide agencies with additional information for determining selection or non-selection of police officer candidates.

To help local governments, police agencies and appointing authorities understand and administer these new requirements the State Municipal Police Training Council prepared Guidelines for Police Officer Psychological Exams.  Pertinent sections of those Guidelines are referenced below.  I have presented verbatim and highlighted in bold those parts that address how.

Intention

            “The Guidelines for Police Officer Psychological Exams is intended to allow for the individual needs of each of the police departments in New York State regardless of size or resource limitations. Law Enforcement are encouraged to customize these protocols to meet their regional needs, while being mindful of the intent of the guidelines and regulatory requirements for conducting police officer psychological exams. As with all best practices guidelines adopted by the Municipal Police Training Council (MPTC), these guidelines are non-binding upon agencies, outside of any statutory or regulatory requirements, within New           York State. The guidelines are meant to serve as a guide to be used when conducting police officer psychological exams.”

            Purpose

            “The following guidelines are designed to serve as a resource regarding the considerations involved with psychological screening of police officer candidates appointed full-time or part-time and in competitive or non-competitive class positions…”

Psychological Assessment Procedure

              “Psychological assessments will be used as a component of the overall hiring process for police officer candidates in conjunction with other regulatory requirements such as medical screening, background investigations, physical fitness testing, or other methods.”

Interestingly, the Guidelines devote several pages not on how to access the psychological health of perspective police officers, but rather the competency, experience, training and expertise of the psychologist or psychiatrist selected to administer and interpret the examination. 

For example, to determine if the examiner has a true understanding of the duties of a police officer, the Guidelines suggest that the appointing authority consider using a psychologist or psychiatrist with:

 Prior experience working as a police officer
Knowledge of Police Officer Job Task Analysis reports
Interviews of police officers
Surveys of police officers
“Ride-alongs” or job shadowing of police officers
Board certification in police and public safety psychology awarded by the American Board of Professional Psychology
Familiarity with police psychology literature regarding pre-employment assessments and interviews of police officer candidates, and
Board certification in police and public safety psychology awarded by the American Board of Professional Psychology.

Neither the commissioner nor the Times Union tell us if those administering these tests are so credentialed.  Nor do they tell us if a pass/fail test is used.  Since the commissioner uses “failure” in his remarks we must assume so. 

But the Guidelines make abundantly clear:

            “That if specific cut-off scores are used, there needs to be clear statistical evidence that the scores are valid and have been cross-validated in research studies by the test developer or the agency where the test will be used. The specific cut-off scores and the rationale for using the specific cut-off scores shall be documented.”

And are the tests used specifically validated for police officer candidates?

In the final analysis the statute and the Guidelines vest significant discretion with the appointing officer.  We do not know how the Guidelines have been used by the City but there is something flawed with a methodology, testing instrument and interview process that according to the commissioner has produced ’a remarkable spate of psych eval failures.’

Finally, the law and the Guidelines vest the final authority with the appointing officer: 

            “The appointing authority (i.e., police agency), after careful consideration of the available facts, makes a determination whether or not to select the candidate for employment,”

and,

           “Based upon the recommendations of the qualified psychologist or psychiatrist, the local police agency wishing to employ the candidate shall render the final decision …”

We are told that after these recent spate of failures a review of the statute was conducted.  The time to review and fully understand the entire process, including its limitations, was before implementing the mandates of the 2021 law and its 2022 Guidelines.  Perhaps it was, but we do not know.

Here in Saratoga Springs, psychological testing of police officer candidates was initiated over 30 years ago.  This is not to suggest that such testing was as rigorous as now but it does suggest that the city recognized the benefit of such examination in making hiring decisions and was ahead of its time.

Now, however, it would seem a review of the current city protocol is in order.

Lew Benton

June 15, 2022

I wasn’t going to write about the Saratoga Springs Democratic Committee and Ron Kim’s complaint to the NYS Board of Elections alleging attacks on Kim, including a petition calling for his resignation on social media, violate state election laws, but this editorial taking them to task is better than anything I could have written.

EDITORIAL: Politicians must let citizens take their shots

In a campaign mailer and a statement during the June 12 League of Women Voters candidates forum, Saratoga Springs Mayor Ron Kim has presented himself as the champion of transparency in government. In both instances, he bizarrely gives as evidence his involvement in what he falsely describes as the unauthorized use of residents’ email addresses by individuals in the prior administration.

A Little History

Mayor Kim has an unfortunate history of embracing baseless allegations unsupported by fact and law. He obstinately holds to these despite copious evidence of their groundlessness. One only has to recall the city attorney fiascoes that marked his very first days in office. He obstinately and falsely claimed he could appoint a city attorney who lived outside the city. When that failed, he was reprimanded by both city court judges for trying to represent the city himself in city court.

Nowhere was Kim’s untethered relationship with facts better demonstrated, though, than in his crusade to “protect” these emails he refers to. His battle over the email addresses goes back to May of 2022. This makes it all the more bizarre that now, more than a year later, he has highlighted these events in his campaign mailer and mayoral debate.

Here is his mailer.

For those wondering what Kim is talking about, I offer a post from last year with all the details of this loopy business.

POST SCRIPT: As of June 14, 2023, there is no record of any “authority” being notified by Kim or any authority finding wrongdoing.

The Blog Post: Mayor Kim Hypes Faux Email Scandal–May 18,2022

Saratoga Springs Mayor Ron Kim issued a press release alleging wrongdoing regarding the management of the email addresses maintained by the city’s Recreation Department. The story was picked up by multiple media outlets, including WNYT, the Daily Gazette, the Times Union, and the Foothills Business Review.

What is woefully missing from the Mayor’s release is supporting evidence of the possible wrongdoing he only hints at. Yet again, he demonstrates his ignorance of New York State law.

I am from the old school. Before I would go to the media with allegations that damage someone’s reputation, I would need to have gathered clear and compelling evidence that supported my claims. Mayor Kim did not do this.

Mayor Kim’s Poorly Documented Allegations

Basically, this whole fiasco began with a press release from Mayor Kim alleging that some persons, who the Mayor declined to identify, had alleged they had received emails from an unknown source (not identified). These alleged complainants (we do not know how many) claimed that the only way the unknown source could have gotten their email address was from the Saratoga Springs City Rec Center’s email list.

Subsequently, the person first identified in the media as making such a complaint was Gordon Boyd. Foothills Business Review (FBR) reported that Boyd made the allegations at a City Council meeting during public comment. Gordon Boyd played a leadership role in Ron Kim’s campaign last November. As the wags say, “he has a dog in this race.”

The fact that some persons claim that their email address was secure and that the only time they ever used it other than with family members was as a contact for the Recreation Department has to be viewed with some skepticism. It may indeed be true, but nothing has been offered to establish it as fact.

I have been a computer consultant for several decades. I would be a rich man if I were paid for all the times users claimed that they could not have done something like share an email address when later investigation proved this false.

Nevertheless, for the purpose of this post, let’s assume what they say is true. The next question is who used this email list and for what purpose(s). Here again, Mayor Kim’s statements are full of contradictory and vague assumptions, and he colors his statements to add to the atmosphere of illegal clandestine shenanigans.

His press release asserts that there is evidence that a Rec Department email list was sent to “several employees outside the Recreation Department.” Yet, he told the Gazette that “he is not making the connection between the release of the Recreation Department database and the unsolicited emails.” In fact, he stated, “We don’t know who is using the email addresses and what they are using them for.”

This doesn’t stop him from then telling the Times Union that “he is learning the email addresses have likely [JK: my emphasis] been used for political purposes.”

At one point, he suggests in a TU article that Moving Saratoga Forward is using the Rec Department list. He tells the TU he is hearing from people who are getting unsolicited emails from Moving Saratoga Forward and that they are telling him that “the only way [their email address] could have gotten into the hands of MSF was through the Rec Department.” After putting that out there, he tells FBR that he has no evidence to make that connection (FBR 5/17/22).

Likewise, he disingenuously suggests to the TU, again without offering any evidence, that the Rec Department email was used “first in 2020 to oppose a city charter change referendum and more recently to push school board candidates.” This contradicts his earlier statement to the Daily Gazette that he doesn’t know what it was used for.

Mayor Kim Slimes Mayor Kelly

While Kim attempts to use this email issue to achieve a number of his political goals–discrediting the integrity of the previous officeholders for instance–he seems particularly focused on attacking his predecessor, Meg Kelly.

According to his statement, multiple people accessed the Rec Department address file. He told the Gazette:

“Commissioner [Minita] Sanghvi’s department reviewed digital records and did in fact discover that on or about October 21, 2020, the Recreation Department email list was sent to several employees outside the Recreation Department, who would not normally have access to this information,” Kim said in a statement. “In addition, there is also digital evidence that the email spreadsheet was directly sent to former Mayor Meg Kelly’s Gmail account. It may also have been released by other elected officials, and we are continuing to investigate that possibility.” Daily Gazette May 16, 2022

So of all the people –we still don’t know how many–who received this email list, why do Kim and the TU focus on Kelly?

Here’s the headline of the TU article “Saratoga Springs Investigating If Former Mayor Accessed Resident’s Emails.”

In fact, Kim and the TU know the name of at least one other elected official who received the email list–Michele Madigan. And if Sanghvi’s supposed forensic search of the city server was properly carried out, Kim knows the names of the other “several employees” he alludes to.

So in the tradition of most good detective stories, there are multiple suspects, but this did not keep Mayor Kim from gratuitously naming only the past mayor.

Mayor Kelly told me she did not provide the email list to anyone outside of city hall. Even if she did, as I will point out below, it was within her authority to do so.

Mayor Kim, Apologize to Mayor Kelly

A person of character would feel chagrinned over having impugned the character of someone on such a dubious basis. They would have acknowledged to themselves that they took liberties with the facts that impugned the character of someone without having properly established the basis of such accusations.

Mayor Kim, you could redeem yourself and recover your reputation for fairness and accuracy by apologizing to Meg Kelly.

Mayor Kim Fails To Carry Out Due Diligence

Mayor Kim has added to the drama by stating that he is “turning this information over to the proper legal authorities to determine if there were any criminal violations.”

At the same time, Kim, a lawyer, admits to the TU that “he is still trying to determine if the breach is illegal.” And he told FBR that “It is unclear at this point whether any laws or even government regulations, were broken in the release of the email.”

In the May 20, 2022, edition of the Times Union, Mayor Kim stated that the mailing list was not accessible under the state’s Freedom of Information Law (FOIL). In effect, he is alleging that the information is privileged, which would make its release to the public improper. He didn’t offer a legal citation for this claim. This feels unpleasantly like his steadfast pronouncements that the City Attorney was not a public officer, which turned out to be false.

Whether out of malice or slothfulness, Mayor Kim does not appear to feel the need to do the required research before issuing such statements. This recklessness makes for greater drama, more news coverage, and dubious ethics.

As it turns out, he is wrong about the law. According to the New York State Committee on Open Government, the court ruling in Livson v. Town of Greenburgh established that mailing lists such as the one maintained by the Recreation Department are public documents available to citizens. It confirmed that, notwithstanding Mayor Kim’s claim, the Rec Department’s mailing list is accessible under FOIL.

NYS Committee on Open Government’s FOIL AO 19703 from January of 2019, “In Livson v. Town of Greenburgh [141 AD3d 658 (2016)], it was held that a list of email addresses of residents used to inform them of events occurring in the Town is public. In short, it could not be demonstrated that disclosure of an email address would rise to the level of an unwarranted invasion of privacy. Many individuals, purposefully or otherwise, share their email addresses as a matter of course.”

I have FOILed for the email list. I have also emailed Mayor Kim asking about the legal basis of his claim. I do not expect an answer, but he deserves the right to defend himself, and I would publish his response.

Kim colors his statements to add to the atmosphere of lawbreaking and clandestine shenanigans by alluding to unknown organizations whom he plans to refer the matter to.

The city is in the process of turning over its information to the proper legal authorities to determine if there were any criminal violations, said Kim.Daily Gazette May 16, 2022

Kim said the city is now investigating if any laws were violated and, if so, who would investigate the violation.Times Union May 17, 2022

I will be interested to see if we hear from Mayor Kim should an investigation determine no criminal violations.

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I misnamed the employee who is bringing suit against the city. I named Kelly Magnuson as the complainant. In fact, the name of the employee suing Moran and the city is Carrie Schermerhorn. Her lawyer is Kelly Magnuson.

My apologies to them both.

The June 5, 2023, edition of the Times Union reported that an employee fired by Saratoga Springs Accounts Commissioner Dillon Moran has filed a notice that she is suing Moran and the city. This is not the only case of an employee bringing an action against Moran.

Carrie Schermerhorn, the fired employee, had been the Assistant Assessor in Moran’s office. She alleges that she was fired after she refused to perform duties she claimed were illegal. She claims that Moran hired a firm,GAR, to perform work for the city that involved ethical conflicts at “greatly inflated rates.” She also alleges that he ordered her “to grant tax privileges for his friends.”

Usually, in cases like this involving personnel issues and litigation, elected officials decline to comment. Not so with Commissioner Moran. After telling the TU he denies Magnuson’s charges, asserting that they are “100% false,” he goes on to publicly attack her in the harshest terms.

“She has absolutely no standing on anything,” Moran said. “She is trying to grind an ax because she lost her job. This woman was horrible at her job. … Anybody can file a lawsuit.”

TU

CSEA, the union representing many employees at City Hall, has filed a grievance asserting that the hiring of GAR by the Accounts Department was for work that would normally have been assigned to city staff. This violated the union agreement.

The Ribis Case

Another employee of the Accounts Department, Lisa Ribis, has also filed a grievance against Commissioner Moran. Ms. Ribis serves as the Secretary for the City Council. In this capacity, she takes the minutes at Council meetings. As the readers of this blog know, the Council meetings are often marathon events these days under the current Mayor, lasting late into the evening.

Ms. Ribis has always received compensation for this work. For some reason, Moran and his Deputy, Stacy Connors, decided they would no longer remunerate her for this work. As Ms. Ribis’ husband has been a vocal critic at recent Council meetings, there is some conjecture that this might have contributed to denying her compensation.

The New York State Employees Relations Board ruled against Moran and Connors, asserting they must allow Ribis compensatory time for her evenings recording city meetings.

Moran told the Times Union that the conflict with Ribis predated him. Ms. Ribis told the TU that this was false and that she did not file her claim until 2022.

A Toxic Environment

The regional president for the Civil Service Employees Association, of which Ribis is a member, has written to Mayor Kim alleging a toxic work environment in City Hall.

Given Moran’s angry outbursts at Council meetings, one can only imagine what it is like to work for him.

Where Is The Human Resources Department? (HR)

One has to wonder what role, if any, HR has had in all of this. Unfortunately, HR reports to Mayor Kim. In a better world, the Council would insist that HR come before them to get their assessment of the environment in City Hall and what can be done to address it. In their defense, HR is in a vulnerable and untenable situation, as reflected in the recently revealed emails and videos of Mayor Kim. Worse, there is no one on the Council willing to be an advocate for our city employees.

At the June 6, 2023, Saratoga Springs City Council meeting, Accounts Commissioner Dillon Moran falsely alleged that the police slammed Black Lives Matter activist Lexis Figuereo up against a wall when he appeared at the Saratoga Springs Police Department to be fingerprinted in response to a summons. The summons was related to an incident where Figuereo disrupted a Council meeting and seized the microphone from Democratic mayor candidate Chris Mathiesen who was attempting to address the Council.

Moran has repeatedly made heated and intemperate accusations against Public Safety Commissioner Montagnino at Council meetings. The police are now the collateral damage in his feud with Montagnino.

Here is the actual body cam video of the police processing Figuereo. Remember to turn on the sound when viewing this.

The Times Union is reporting that Saratoga Springs Public Safety Commissioner James Montagnino is considering discontinuing a psychological test designed to determine if police and firefighter recruits are suitable for employment.

I assume that Montagnino approached reporter Wendy Liberatore to do this story. It is odd that there would be a news story about a Commissioner who is simply contemplating an action that he might take. It demonstrates Commissioner Montagnino’s success with his obsession to constantly be in the news. It must have been a very slow news day.

Montagnino told Liberatore “a remarkable spate of psych eval failures” of candidates for the police and fire department prompted this.

Montagnino complained:

“We sat down and reviewed what the law said,” Montagnino said. “Applying that strictly, you are basically giving a psychologist the veto power over that appointment. The law seems to suggest that there is some discretion involved.”

Times Union

Noting that the recruits who were disqualified passed the written psychological tests but not the psychologist interview, Montagnino characterized the psychological interview as “a subjective analysis” for things like impulse control, judgment, and the ability to tolerate stress.

This blogger wonders why Montagnino accepts the written psychological exam as acceptable while dismissing the interview process as “subjective?”

It would seem obvious that when it comes to people armed with guns, the more rigorous the screening, the better. Overriding an opinion that an officer might have a problem with impulse control does not seem prudent.

Maybe The Problem Is Montagnino?

Montagnino is clearly having a problem attracting recruits to the department. While, in general, nationally, there is a problem filling police positions, Montagnino is not considering that his management is exacerbating the problem here in Saratoga Springs.

Consider that his idea of establishing standards for his officers was to make them subject to termination on the basis of adultery. What does that tell you about his skills as a manager? For that matter, what does that tell you about his skills as an attorney? In order to fire someone, the city must go through arbitration. It is unlikely that an arbitrator would support terminating someone because, in their private life, they have indulged in adultery, not to mention to the problem of proving this in a court of law.

You can imagine the comic relief that police in other departments must enjoy when they hear about this standard in Saratoga Springs.

The police community is a rather small one in the capital district. The police department under Montagnino has lost some highly respected officers. Montagnino’s abuse of the men and women serving under him is no secret. The forced retirement of Lieutenant Laura Emanation, the highest ranking female officer in the department, the de facto demotion of and retirement of Lieutenant Bob Jillson, and the early retirement of Chief Shane Crooks have sent a message to anyone thinking about working for him. In fact, the department is experiencing a general exodus as other members of the force are seeking employment with other departments.

Based on discussions with multiple members of the force, morale in the department is at an all-time low and both Montagnino and his deputy, Jason Tetu, enjoy little respect.

Small wonder that of those interested in working for the department, many are unsuited.

Times Union Editorial Slams Montagnino

It is fairly unusual for me to be on the same page as a Times Union editorial, but the June 5, 2023 editorial hit the mark. In their editorial, they point out the absurdity of Montagnino’s proposal.

Montagnino’s Overreach

In what seems to be yet another example of Montagnino’s continued pursuit of media coverage, the Commissioner placed an announcement on his agenda for the June 6, 2023, City Council meeting stating that prior to any request for a no-knock warrant from a judge, either the Commissioner or the Deputy Commissioner must approve the request.

This sets another bad precedent. The Public Safety Commissioner is not supposed to involve themselves in the operational aspects of the police department. Montagnino is not a trained law enforcement professional. The responsibility for a decision to seek such a warrant is the purview of the Chief of Police. One of the reasons that morale is so low in the department is that Montagnino has a history of inappropriately involving himself in operational matters. He routinely bypasses his Police Chief.

The most disturbing example of this was his interference in the case that ended up with Laura Emanation resigning. He insisted on involving himself in an ongoing investigation. He decided that an individual should be arrested over the objections of his Lieutenant handling the case.

Think about it. Do we want a person whose only basic qualification is that they were elected to an office to be deciding who should be arrested and whether a no-knock warrant should go to a Judge or not? This is an invitation for abuse of power.

I am a fan of the video show Saratoga Podcast featuring Robin Dalton, Dan De Federicis, and Adam Israel, but I do have a caveat.

I have been a guest on their show on a number of occasions and have posted links to their shows routinely. Their podcast has been quite critical of the current Saratoga Springs City Council, at times harshly but deservedly so. The three of them have very different perspectives on the local political scene, and it makes the show quite lively. I continue to recommend their podcast to the readers of this blog, but these three are missing an opportunity to better serve the community.

They have had Commissioners Minita Sanghvi, Dillon Moran, and James Montagnino as guests on their show. These interviews could have been valuable educational opportunities for the community by seeking answers for many of the most troubling actions these Council members have been involved in. Instead, Robin, Adam, and Dan have squandered these opportunities by engaging in the most banal conversations. To characterize their questions as timid would be an understatement. Assertions made by these politicians that were false or exaggerated went unchallenged, and there were no questions asked that might make these Commissioners even slightly uncomfortable.

These are just a few examples of questions they might have asked.

Someone might have asked Montagnino why he has made adultery by the police the basis for employment termination.

Dillon Moran might have been asked something as simple as why it has been months since his announcement that barriers for outdoor dining were going to be deployed, and for better or for worse, they have still not appeared. This is an over two-month mystery, and he has said nothing, and not one of his colleagues on the Council has had the temerity to ask why.

It would have been interesting to ask Minita Sanghvi how links to her Facebook campaign site appeared on the city website, something that the city Ethics Board recently ruled violated city policy.

Some might defend the podcast’s approach as civil dialogue. This would be a disservice. I frequently watch British Broad Casting (BBC). They have excellent reporters who show no reluctance to ask tough questions, but they do so in a professional and dignified manner. They do not let the politicians they interview filibuster, and they have no qualms about doing follow-up questions when their veteran politicians resort to dodging answers.

Thoughtful, tough interviews can be done civilly if the goal is to make elected officials accountable. Otherwise, why bother?

I expect that our politicians may not agree to appear on this podcast, though, if they fear they would be asked questions they would prefer to avoid.

I would welcome a post on this website by Robin, Dan, or Adam explaining why they do not ask tough questions of our elected officials when they invite them on.

I leave it for the readers to decide whether it is better to eschew probing questions in order to get Saratoga Springs politicians on the Saratoga Podcast.

The behavior of Saratoga Springs Mayor Ron Kim, Public Safety Commissioner James Montagnino and Accounts Commissioner Dillon Moran has overshadowed equally troubling problems with other members of the Saratoga Springs City Council.

Minita Sanghvi, as the Commissioner of Finance, is supposed to be the watchdog of city spending. She is also in charge of the IT department and is supposed to manage the city’s website. “Supposed to” are the key words here.

Unfortunately, Commissioner Sanghvi, in spite of her self-promotion for allegedly planning the city’s finances into the future, has yet to demonstrate this pledge. She also has routinely dismissed concerns over the chronic problems with the functioning and design of the city’s website, which is her responsibility as well.

How Will The City Find The Money To Pay The New Firefighters?

At the beginning of 2022, when the current Council members took office, the city applied for and was awarded a federal “Safer Grant.” This grant was for $4.1 million dollars to pay for sixteen new firefighters for three years. The catch is that the grant requires the city to support these new positions for an additional two years following the end of the grant. The cost to the city for those two years will run over $3,000,000.00.

At the time the grant was awarded over a year ago, I expressed great concern over how the city would absorb these future costs. This post went into the issues in some detail. Of particular note were comments by past Commissioner of Finance Michele Madigan, who argued that the city would need to start immediately to put aside money to help address the issue before the inevitable crunch in 2026 when the grant ran out. This is advice that Commissioner Sanghvi has apparently ignored.

I wrote to Commissioner Sanghvi in 2022 when she was preparing the 2023 budget, asking what she was doing to prepare the city to be able to meet this enormous looming financial obligation. When she did not answer, I asked to meet with her. This time she responded but told me that she would meet with me in two months after the budget was adopted. That delay was convenient because it meant that she did not have to address the issue when she could actually begin to do something about it. In fact, I do not consider it unfair to speculate that she did not want to discuss it because she had no answer. Just maintaining the existing budget required her to raise taxes and it would have been more than inconvenient to have to explain where another $3,000,000+ would come from if they had to be paid that year. To date, she has yet to acknowledge the threat this represents to the city finances and cope with the need to immediately take steps to address this.

Ms. Sanghvi recently went to the media about the city’s finances. In the article, she went on at some length about how she was busy establishing long-term plans regarding the city’s finances.

This prompted me to write her about how she was planning to pay the millions of dollars she would need to comply with the requirements of the Safer Grant for firefighters.

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From: john.kaufmann21@gmail.com
Sent: Monday, April 17, 2023 12:10 PM
To: ‘Minita Sanghvi’
Cc: ‘ron kim’; james.montagnino@saratoga-springs.org; jason.golub@saratoga-springs.org;
dillon.moran@saratoga-springs.org
Subject: Fire Fighters

The cost for the city to maintain sixteen firefighters for two years after the grant for them runs out will run approximately $3,000,000.00. What actions have you taken, and do you plan to take to prepare for coming up with this money to cover these costs?

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After several weeks of silence, it was apparent that Commissioner Sanghvi was not going to answer my email, so I attended the May 6, 2023, meeting to ask her in person.

In this clip, Commissioner Sanghvi asserts that she is working hard on a plan. I noted to her that her predecessor, Michele Madigan, was quite concerned about how the city would deal with this. It is hard to see in this video clip, but at this point, Commissioner Sanghvi shook her head and smiled in an unfortunate manner that documented her dismissal of both myself and Madigan. People watching this video will note me saying at this point that I am happy I am amusing her.

She then asserted that she had spoken to Madigan, who she claimed had said nothing about it. She went on belittling Madigan by going on about this is a democracy, and everyone has a right to their opinion. She also said she would contact Madigan.

Sanghvi did contact Madigan, but rather than solicit her advice on the implications of the firefighter grant, she simply told Madigan, as she did me, that she was working on a plan.

It is also worth noting that she observed that she has not yet even begun working on this year’s budget.

She doesn’t seem to grasp that she should have considered how the city would handle maintaining the firefighters as required by the grant before she supported and accepted it.

I am deeply worried about the city’s finances, and the fact that she refuses to even acknowledge simple questions about how she plans to handle the costs of the firefighters is truly chilling. I believe that this city is headed toward a real fiscal crisis.

Commissioner Sanghvi Unable To Properly Manage City Website

The Commissioner of Finance also oversees the IT department, which is responsible for, among other things managing the city website. The city’s website is an important window into city hall. Unfortunately, on Sanghvi’s watch, the city website has experienced numerous problems, from simply being inaccessible to links that don’t work and documents and videos of meetings that are not posted on a timely basis, if at all.

I have repeatedly documented problems with the IT department under Sanghvi:

Here, here, and here.

Most recently, in this post, I documented that the IT department failed to include the resolution establishing the fee schedule for outdoor dining that was supposed to be linked to the agenda. In spite of her failure to provide the resolution and in spite of the fact that both Mayoral candidate Chris Mathiesen and I complained during the public comment period about the missing resolution, the entire Council voted to adopt it anyway.

Confusion Over No Knock Warrants On City Website

The problems that arise when the website is not properly updated were apparent at the April 18 City Council meeting when considerable confusion arose over the proposal initially put forward by Mayor Kim to ban “no-knock warrants.”

The city posts the upcoming City Council agendas on the Friday before City Council meetings. On the day of the Tuesday, April 18, meeting, Public Works Commissioner Jason Golub met with Kim to discuss his objections to a resolution that had been crafted by Kim on no-knock warrants and posted on that night’s City Council agenda. Kim’s resolution called for a complete ban on no-knock warrants as originally called for by the Task Force on Police Reform. Golub supported the general concept but argued that there are circumstances where the target of the warrant could be armed and dangerous, so knocking on the door puts the police at risk. Kim agreed to change his resolution to limit warrants to these situations rather than propose a total ban.

Granted, the change occurred on the same day as the meeting. Still, it made a mockery of properly informing the public of impending city action, i.e., the adoption of the resolution. Unfortunately, the IT department did not post the revised resolution on the City Council’s agenda to properly inform the public as to what the Council would actually be voting on. People addressing the Council during the public comment period had no idea that they were commenting on the wrong resolution. Mayor Kim, for some reason, did not bother to advise speakers that the resolution they were addressing had changed.

I expect there were people who wanted a complete ban and would not have been happy with the revision, but they were not informed of the change before they spoke during the public comment period.

Sanghvi should have either:

1. Seen to it that the change to the agenda was updated before the meeting or
2. Insisted that the item, which was not time-sensitive, be tabled until the next Council meeting so IT could ensure the public could be informed of the change. She should also have informed the entire Council that in the future, she would call for tabling any changed resolution that the IT department had not been given sufficient time to inform the public about.

When the Council reached the point in the agenda to discuss Kim’s “No-Knock Warrant,” Commissioner Montagnino protested that the public was unaware of the change. Sanghvi was silent, and she, along with Kim, Moran, and Golub, proceeded to vote as though there was no problem.

To this day, the agenda on the city’s webcast archive page has the wrong resolution still posted on the agenda.

Small wonder that the Daily Gazette headline inaccurately stated, “City bans no-knock warrants,” as it apparently drew on the obsolete agenda item for the story. BLM apparently did not understand the changes that were made in the resolution at the meeting either, as they continue to boast that they got no-knock warrants banned in the city when they didn’t.

The only way anyone can find out what was actually in the resolution that passed is to wade through the minutes of the meeting or listen to the video to hear Ron Kim read the amended version.

Sometimes The Whole Website Is Inaccessible

On April 29, 2023, the city’s website was down, a problem that has repeatedly occurred. Clicking on the city’s website URL resulted in this:

Broken Links

On April 30, I tried to look up an item on the city’s website. The search produced a relevant item, but when I clicked on it and tried to read the document, I received the following error (a broken link):

“We are sorry there is not a web page matching your entry. Pleases use the search option to help locate this information on our redesigned site.” As the search function produced this error, it wasn’t very helpful.

I then randomly did more searches, and every one produced this error.

Lost Video

As recorded in a previous post, the March 8, 2023, meeting of the Design Review Commission was apparently lost or never recorded, never to be retrieved. It should have been possible to reconstruct what happened at the meeting and at least put up minutes so the public could be informed as to what transpired. It is now over two months later, and Commissioner Sanghvi has taken no action to get something up.

Commissioner Sanghvi’s cavalier attitude toward these continued breakdowns belies her repeated self-congratulations on how transparent she and her office are.

Missing Videos On The City’s “Web Archive Page”

I made my living as a computer programmer, building interfaces that were easy to understand and navigate. The city’s website suffers from a classic design failure. It duplicates the locations of important data without rigorously ensuring that the information is always synchronized.

For a more thorough explanation of this, along with the fact that Commissioner Sanghvi has been repeatedly advised about the problem but has not taken corrective action, these are links to the relevant posts here and here.

The Failure To Maintain The Website Just Keeps Going On

Several people have recently put up comments on this blog asking, “Where are the videos?”

I checked the website, and sure enough, the video of the April 14 pre-agenda council meeting had not been posted on the “webcast archive” page when I checked on April 29, 15 days later, even though it was available to Sanghvi’s staff for posting the day after the meeting. This is in spite of sending her the following email.

Commissioner Sanghvi:

Can you explain why the IT department continues to fail to update the video link on the archive page to be in synch with the “Live Meetings Page.”  This has been brought to your attention repeatedly but it seems to have no effect.

JK

April 20, 2023 email

On April 25, 2023, Sanghvi responded as follows:

Dear Mr. Kaufmann,

You may find agendas and videos from all city meetings here: https://www.saratoga-springs.org/2637/Live-Meeting-Menu

This automatically uploaded page cited above is the quickest way for the public to view meetings. Other parts of the website are updated regularly; however, our staff must wait for the vendor to provide the recordings that are manually posted. Our staff strives to be diligent about these uploads but there are times when they must attend to cybersecurity programming, equipment maintenance, staff training, and other tasks. It is for that reason we’ve relied on the link above, so that we can ensure the highest level of transparency.

We have provided you this link in previous emails but you insist on finding meetings elsewhere. I can’t cure that. My professor often said, you can take the horse to the water, you cannot make it drink. 

Minita Sanghvi
Commissioner of Finance
Saratoga Springs, NY
518-587-3550
minita.sanghvi@saratoga-springs.org

This email is both troubling and indicative of how Commissioner Sanghvi responds to issues that are raised with her. Note that I was not asking her about where the video was but advising her that her office was failing to update the webcast archive in a timely manner. Her reply informing me that I could find the video on the city’s Live Meetings Page is astonishing in its irrelevance to my email. It is as though she never read my email or she wanted to deflect criticism from the legitimate problem with her website management.

Her assertion that her staff does not have time to update the site in a timely manner indicates that it is simply not important to her. It also exposes her basic ignorance of the IT operation. Updating the link on the webcast page takes only minutes. The fact that her predecessor, Michele Madigan, was able to properly maintain the webcast archive for ten years should be proof that it can be done.

It is inexplicable to me why Commissioner Sanghvi apparently is uninterested in establishing procedures to ensure timely management of the site. It raises serious questions as to what other activities for which she is responsible are being ignored.

Commissioner Sanghvi Is Oblivious To What It Means To Manage The City’s Website.

So it is no surprise that not only was she criticized by the city’s ethics board because links to her and Mayor Kim’s campaign pages were posted on the city’s website but that even after that, a link to her campaign site appeared yet again.

As has happened in the past, instead of taking responsibility, Commissioner Sanghvi posted on the city’s webpage a statement blaming a staff person for the error.

Sangvhi did not explain who was responsible for posts from her campaign page appearing before this on the city website.

While it is true that people make mistakes, the problems with the city website are so common and so chronic that it is a small wonder that she has a poorly trained staff member who does not understand the procedures they are supposed to follow. The essential problem is poor management.

Is The Public Served By More Media Coverage of the Petty and Foolish Conflicts Among Our Public Officials?

Saratoga Springs Finance Commissioner Minita Sanghvi went to WRGB TV in an apparent embarrassing attempt to polish her credentials as a staunch ally of Mayor Ron Kim and Accounts Commissioner Dillon Moran in their dispute with Public Safety Commissioner James Montagnino.

Commissioner Sanghvi shared with WRGB TV her criticism of Commissioner Montagnino over the presence of police standing by in the stairwell to the Music Hall as a raucous Black Lives Matters demonstration was disrupting the City Council meeting on May 2.

She felt the police presence at the May 2nd meeting was unnecessary use of police overtime.

“Seven or eight police officers in the back staircase, I don’t think they were needed, nobody seemed to be showing signs of violence,” said Sanghvi. “There were Kids protesting, but that’s what kids do, they protest.”

Channel 6 News May 16, 2023

According to Commissioner Sanghvi, the mayor’s office is requesting that Montagnino provide a report showing police overtime hours for council meetings.

channel 6 News May 16, 2023

Tone Deaf

With all due respect, Commissioner Sanghvi is no expert on risk assessment.

She appears somehow oblivious to the potential danger that exists when situations get out of control, as they did on May 2 when BLM demonstrators brought the City Council meeting once more to a halt. She ignores how other audience members might react to the protesters’ aggressive taunts and name-calling in this volatile situation.

Her dismissal of BLM’s behavior by saying, “They were kids protesting, but that’s what kids do, they protest,” sends an interesting message to Lex Figuereo who is in his mid-thirties and probably doesn’t see the BLM protests as a playful, somewhat frivolous adolescent experiment.

It is rather stunning that Commissioner Sanghvi does not see the potential for someone being hurt in this polarized world we now live in. It appears that for her, the events of May 2 were just innocent theater that no one should find upsetting. The idea that some disturbed person might be prompted to commit an act of violence against the public attending the meeting, members of the Council, or BLM is lost on her.

Her animus with Commissioner Montagnino seems to have blinded her to the fact that Chief Crooks deployed the men and women of the police department because he reasonably believed that the situation could put the lives of everyone, including Commissioner Sanghvi, at risk.

Making the situation even more strange is Mayor Kim’s contradictory behavior in all this. The now infamous epithet-laden confrontation between Kim and the Deputy Commissioner of Public Safety was over Kim’s allegation that he had been threatened in an email sent by an individual who, it turns out, routinely attends Council meetings. In fact, he was in attendance at the May 2 meeting. Given their fears (baseless or not), you would think that Sanghvi, Kim, and Moran would have been relieved to know that the police would be available.

Sanghvi’s alleged sudden concern with overtime expenses for police is also hard to take seriously when Sanghvi has repeatedly had no problem approving payments for all sorts of dubious additions to the city’s budget including additions to other Council members’ staff and her own staff, payments of all kinds of legal bills as the Mayor pursues frivolous lawsuits, and of course redecorating her office.

No, this TV appearance seems to truly be nothing more than a petty continuation of the alliance of Kim, Sanghvi, and Moran against Public Safety Commissioner Montagnino.