BY ELAINE VAN DEVELDE
Staff Writer
Edison residents who have questioned how much money is in a trust fund to repair the Edison Memorial Tower are making “political hay in a political season,” Mayor George A. Spadoro said.
“These are just a few people raising issues because of politics,” the mayor said recently. “They are outspoken and they have a right to be, but no one else is complaining.”
A number of residents have demanded to know how much money was raised for the Edison Tower Trust Fund, how much is left and what it was used for.
Spadoro said he has “no idea” how much is left in the trust fund and said residents could file requests for public records with the township clerk.
A late-1990s campaign to “Buy a Brick, Save the Tower,” was described in a brochure with Spadoro’s name prominently displayed.
“Mayor George A. Spadoro has assembled a team to secure all the necessary funds so that people can continue to enjoy this magnificent tribute,” the brochure stated.
The campaign solicited donations from $50 to $250 for the purchase of brick pavers to be placed at the foot of the tower on Christie Street with donors’ names affixed to them.
Some pavers are at the site, but township officials have no answers about how much money was donated or how much is left.
The information residents want is “simple” and should be readily available, said resident Joseph Petrocelli, who is also a certified public accountant.
“People contributed to a fund,” Petrocelli said. “They made checks payable to this Edison Tower Trust Fund, yet the fund doesn’t seem to exist. People ask, and they hear, ‘Your request is too vague.’ What is vague about ‘Where is the fund and how much is in it?’ ”
Resident Anthony Russomanno said he filed a request for the information but was told his request had to be more specific.
“Like what date the fund was created and what account it is in,” Russomanno said. “If I knew all of that, I wouldn’t have to be filing a request for them to open the records so that I could look for it.”
Russomanno is a known adversary of the mayor, who is also a fellow Democrat.
He led an initiative to oppose the November ballot question seeking to use 25 percent of the township’s 1-cent per $100 of assessed value property tax to fund tower repairs. The questioned was defeated.
Spadoro said he cannot be expected to memorize the contents of every bank account in the township and fire off answers whenever someone asks where certain money is.
“If a client of mine set up a similar account, then sometime later said they needed a status report, I’d look it up and have the report ready within half an hour,” Petrocellis said.”
A non-profit corporation with citizens serving on a board of directors was formed to advance the funding initiatives to protect the “source of pride for the township,” the mayor said.
The Edison tower and museum complex didn’t attain non-profit status until September 2004, said Art Browne, museum and board president, in an e-mailed message.
“Previous attempts to gain this status all failed,” Browne said. “Getting it was one of my goals for that calendar year. The status though is retroactive to 1998. This issue is on our radar screen and is something the Board of Trustees is intending to discuss with the administration by the end of the month.”
Browne did not know how much might be left in the fund.
“There was a total changeover in trustees a year ago, and these funds accumulated in a time frame that predates us,” Browne said. “Henceforth, our interest in determining what is there.”
Browne clarified the history of the museum and tower site, and why, as a monument in a state park, it is leased back to the township for $1 a year.
“The immediate grounds, around 37 Christie St., were bequeathed to the state by Henry Ford, circa 1929, and the rest of the parcels of land were bequeathed to the state by Electrical Testing Labs of NYC [defunct] in 1925 and the Edison family in the 1930s,” he said. “Edison government has no alternative but to lease it back in order to have some degree of control over the most historic site within its boundaries.”