Monroe's Tiny Dictator Looks To Limit Your Ability To Access Information
On Monday, April 15th, Town Supervisor Cardone is going to try to restrict the speech of your elected officials, and the ability of residents to get information they're entitled to under the law.
The Monday, April 15th, 2024 Town of Monroe Agenda has an interesting item. And it’s one that needs to be brought to your attention immediately. So, I’m sending a second post to you this weekend.
That agenda item deals with the Freedom of Information Law. You might be asking yourself why this item was intentionally left blank by Supervisor Cardone (pictured below) and why the Supervisor wants to make it harder for Town of Monroe residents to get information.
I’ll explain. And I hope some of you will be in attendance for the April 15th meeting on Monday at 7pm to share with Herr Cardone that we do not live in a fascist dictatorship.
At least, not until the Fall 2024 presidential election anyway …
Pictured Above: No information is provided concerning the Freedom of Information Law agenda item or proposed resolution. This is done to intentionally limit the public’s knowledge of what their elected officials are discussing and voting on in advance of the meeting. Town of Monroe residents should ask 2024 State Senate Candidate, Dorey Houle, why she supports such action, and whether or not they can expect the same behavior if she’s elected to the New York State Senate.
What We’ve Learned Using FOIL
FOIL is an incredibly powerful tool available to all residents of New York State to request records and other documents created by their elected officials. This includes requests for communications sent on personal devices and personal emails by elected officials if those communications were associated with Town business.
Put another way, everyone loves FOIL, except your elected representatives.
Thanks to New York State’s Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) we’ve learned the following about Town of Monroe Supervisor Tony Cardone:
That Supervisor Cardone knowingly made willfully false statements at the December 5th, 2023 Meeting concerning my reporting in The Photo-News. We also learned that he threatened to withhold advertising from the paper as long as I was a reporter for that paper, which is a potential violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and opens the town up to a lawsuit.
That Supervisor Cardone, despite receiving a stipend for travel related to his duties as supervisor, is ALSO submitting invoices to the Town to get reimbursed for his travel to and from WTBQ for his weekly radio show. And that those invoices were not appropriately signed by other council members. This opens up the Town to a potential investigation by the New York State Comptroller’s office.
We learned that, at no point has the Town of Monroe Ethics board ever made a ruling against Supevisor Cardone, proving them to be ineffective at protecting Town residents from the Supervisor’s tinpot dictator behavior. This includes an incident involving Village Trustee John Karl where the Supervisor was harassing him where no action was taken by the ethics board.
We learned that the Supervisor makes an annual salary of $80,739.36, making hime one of the highest paid Supervisors in the Southern Orange County region.
We learned that the Supervisor was made aware of complaints from neighbors of 649 Lakes Road, despite later declaring he had no knowledge of those complaints at a town board meeting when 649 Lakes was on the agenda. These records also showed the continued and repeated failure of the Town of Monroe Building Department to do much of anything concerning these complaints (to say nothing of all those garbage complaints the Town also gets.)
We learned that, according to the Town of Monroe, there are no liaison assignments, even though Supervisor Cardone has claimed that there are, and that Councilwoman Richardson cannot engage in any sort of activity that she hasn’t been assigned to be the liaison of.
FOILs currently pending …
That’s what we’ve learned so far. But as you might have guessed, Supervisor Cardone is eager to foil pending FOILS which include:
Records related to claims that Supervisor Cardone and 2024 State Senate Candidate Dorey Houle attempted to cover up a sexual harassment case filed against Highway Superintendent Patterson by a former employee.
Records related to Cardone and his interactions with Neil Gold of Dinosaur Park fame and development on Rye Hill Road, which is what led to the creation of Preserve Monroe.
Records related to developer Lipa Deutsch and Monroe Commons, and other matters concerning Cardone’s intervention on behalf of Lipa Deutsch in matters concerning zoning in the Village of Monroe.
Discussions between Sal Scancerlo and the Supervisor concerning the relocation of Somni to 15 Lake Street, negotiations with Village Mayor Neil Dwyer concerning the relocation, as well as ownership and management of the property and Somni. For some reason. Supevisor Cardone does NOT want people poking around into this transaction and has called any reporting on this matter “false and misleading.” When asked by Photo-News editor, Lisa Reider, what was false and misleading about this story in particular, the Supervisor refused to answer.
Communications with IBEW Local 363 President Frank Perugino, IBEW Local 363 Business Manager, Sam Fratto, and other associated IBEW members by the parties concerning William Brown Jr. and elimination of the role of Deputy Highway Superintendent.
Communications with the Town Historian concerning coercion to reverse a declaration of Pine Crest as a historic site by the Supervisor and the passage of Local Law 3 of 2023 which led to a federal lawsuit against the town.
Whether or not Supervisor Cardone disclosed that he owns this home, and why he didn’t recuse himself from this vote concerning a drainage district that impacts the home.
We’ve also learned that the Town of Monroe either half-completes FOIL requests by leaving out files, fails to acknowledge receipt of other requests, and often gives nebulous reasons for denials such as “The requested records are being withheld from disclosure as FOIL exemptions. They constitute intra-agency materials between the Town Supervisor and Board of Ethics Supervisor” for example.
Except, this isn’t an appropriate, nor legal, FOIL response.
I spoke with the Deputy Director of the New York State Committee on Open Government. They stated that the Town of Monroe can withhold intragency communications from FOIL request, but are not required to do so.
That means, if the Town wants to withhold these documents they have to clarify that they are CHOOSING to withhold that information.
In addition, there are exceptions to intra-agency exceptions. If the instructions to the staff affect the public for example.
Of course, once you tell the Town of Monroe that, they simply stop responding to you, which is not how the FOIL law works.
Because if they don’t reply to you in 5 days, you’re allowed to follow-up with an appeal. And that appeal must be copied to the New York State Committee on Open Government, so they can’t pretend like they didn’t get it.
Failure to comply with a FOIL appeal opens the Town up to an Article 78 lawsuit, which they would have to pay for if it is filed successfully.
This is yet another opportunity for the Town to be hit with a lawsuit. I’ve lost count at how many lawsuits Cardone’s behavior has opened the Town to, but it’s important to stress that for someone desperate not to raise anyone’s taxes, the costs of these lawsuits will require exactly that to help pay for them.
Why Am I telling You This?
Because on Monday April 15th, like at April 1st’s meeting below, you’re going to hear a longwinded, borderline psychotic, Harley Doles-like reinvention of the truth. We know this is fact because It’ll look and sound exactly like this:
People elected Cardone to replace Doles because they thought Cardone would bring some sense of stability to the Town of Monroe. That he would end the corruption many felt Doles was responsible for during his tenure as Supervisor. But all that really happened was that we replaced one bad supervisor with another, and there’s virtually no daylight between Cardone and Doles anymore.
Tony Doles. Harley Cardone.
So, on Monday, you’ll hear Cardone say FOIL is being abused. That it’s onerous. That it’s taking up valuable time and resources. That it’s being used to “attack” him. But the truth of the matter is, if not for FOIL, we wouldn’t know what we know today about Supervisor Cardone.
And if not for FOIL, we wouldn’t know a hell of a lot more that’s coming our way.
Since there is no functional ethics board in the Town of Monroe, there’s not much anyone can “do” to the Supervisor aside from engage in VERY expensive lawsuits. And some have! There’s a settlement conference this month for one for one of them.
In my case, it’ll take $100,000 (yes, that’s a real quote from a real lawyer) to sue him over a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claim. I don’t have that kind of money. Many Monroe residents don’t either.
That means, you and I have 569 days left between now and Election Day 2025.
And they’re going to be a long 569 days, because Town residents can expect Cardone to do every small, petty, venial thing he can think of to take out his anger and frustration on your elected representatives that oppose him, and the Town residents that have had enough of a decade plus of corrupt Town Supervisors.
The kind who don’t want to solve any of the problems residents consistently bring up at Town meetings.
I don’t know about you, but if it was me? I’d be demanding he resign.
But we’ll see what you have to say on Monday evening.