Council President Patel,It was somewhat perplexing and, quite honestly, disappointing to read your responses about the Tower Trust Fund in the Feb. 16 edition of the Sentinel.
It’s perplexing because Kevin Duffy and I have met many times with you and pointed out a simple way to report the fund’s activity to the public and it’s disappointing because you deny this by stating, “None of these people has asked council specifically about this.”
It seems you have forgotten that the goal here is to inform the people, not confuse or mislead them.
What purpose does it serve for you to meet with us to discuss this and then turn around and pass on disingenuous comments to the press?
It has always been our goal to work together in an open and shared environment to make it easier for the public to understand the financial side of the township’s business. It has never been our goal or wishes to engage in political banter with you. We are not politicians.
As a tax attorney, you are well aware of the concept of surplus and the lack of detailed information provided in the financial statements.
Further, it’s misleading to tell the public that “audit reports residents received account for all the funds” when you know full well that those are just totals and the details asked for do not exist in that audit report. Please remember that you are a tax attorney first and a politician second.
As we indicated to you any number of times, in order to understand the trust fund activity, we are simply seeking for each year of the fund from its inception, the detail information.
That would include the bank account in which the activity takes place and the analysis of the activity flowing through that account, as follows; opening balance, the amount of contribution made by date and name, the amount of disbursement made by date, check number and name and the closing balance.
If “the reality is that council has nothing to hide,” then why is it that after we asked you to assist us in getting this detail information from the administration supporting the trust fund accounts in the financial statements, you refer back to the financial statements in the press by saying “there is no ambiguity … the reports are very clear?”
You can’t have it both ways. You can’t say the details of the trust accounting is very clear and available and then refer people to the financial statements. The financial statements are just the summarized end result of the accounting.
It’s the detail information that’s important to understand and that which you are preventing the people of Edison from seeing by engaging in such political double-talk. But, of course, you know all this.
Please take the time to rectify the incorrect and misleading statements that you have made to the press. If, as you claim, you have seen the information in the format described above, then please produce it so we can all share in what you have.
In the meantime, stop saying you will help anyone who asks. We did ask and you didn’t help.
Joseph Petrucelli
Edison