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From Albany, this is the legislative gazette, a weekly half-hour review of New York State
government and politics. The host is political scientist and syndicated
columnist, Dr. Alan Sharton, of the State University.
Hello and welcome to the Legislative Gazette. This week we'll look at organized crimes
role in the solid waste industry and what measures can be taken to prevent the violation
of environmental conservation laws. We'll hear about the latest state effort to alleviate
the overcrowded prisons and we'll discuss some proposals for cutting down on corruption in the
construction industry. The Board of Trustees has agreed to raise the salary of the state
university chancellor as well as 32 other top officials in the SUNY system and we'll look at
Governor Cuomo's future in politics. That's all coming up on the legislative gazette.
Maurice Hinchey, you're always tilting with very dangerous windmills. There's the question of
the garbage barge and garbage barges and its relationship to what we call
enigmatic figures. Is there a mafia connection or a mob connection with our garbage
hauling industry and specifically with the barge industry? Well there's definitely a organized
crime connection in the solid waste industry as a matter of fact. It's pretty clear that the
organized crime people dominate the solid waste industry in downstate New York in the metropolitan
area on Long Island and at least the lower Hudson Valley. So how dangerous is this? In other
words what are the implications for the citizenry if in fact the mob gets control of our garbage
hauling industry? Well there are some obvious environmental dangers. We know for example that
over the years a lot of toxic waste has been mixed with ordinary refuse and disposed of in
ways in which groundwater contamination can occur and people's health and safety can be put at
serious risk. We're seeing the closing of beaches in New Jersey now. There's a certain
contaminants that are appearing in Long Island Sound. Now there's a good possibility that at least
some of that is a result of illegal dumping of waste out in the oceans and there's a suspicion that
some of the dumping at least the dumping that resulted in the closing of the New Jersey beaches
was from barges illegally done and it could be that these same or similar people are behind that.
So there's a real and serious danger associated with their involvement in this because they don't
frankly have to give a damn about anybody's public health and safety. All they're concerned about
is the bottom line. So they don't really then these are not responsible citizens who are most likely
to obey the rules. Well that's the point exactly and the more stringent the rules become and
they're going to become more stringent with regard to solid waste because they they have to given
the dangers associated with handling it improperly. The more likely they are to try to get involved in
it and to dominate the industry which is what they do in major parts of the state right now.
Well you're a legislator how are we going to put a stop to this? Well first you know the main
part of it is it's a law enforcement problem and we know that law enforcement is looking at
these people in various ways now but there are things that we can do here to tighten up on the way
in which local government gets involved with these people. We know for example with regard to the
Islet barge that the town of Islet did not step to the general municipal law. They put the project
out for bid but they never awarded it to the responsible bidders that sent in bids. Instead of that
they negotiated a contract with the private sanitation industry in Nassau and Suffolk County which
is dominated by organized crime. Now they knew that. In fact the man that they were
negotiating with at the time was under multiple indictment from a special grand jury which was
empaneled by the New York State organized crime task force. So there's a lesson there for any
municipality in the state that when you're dealing with solid waste and you involve yourself in
the contractual relationship with somebody who comes along and tells you that he can take it off
your hands you have a responsibility to know where he's taking it to and whether or not it's going
to be done in the right way. Responsibility to your own citizens and a larger responsibility to the
other people of the state. Now what about bonding? Well that's another requirement that was not
adhered to in that particular instance. Normally what is required is that whenever someone comes in
and takes a contract like that that there is a bond and the bond guarantees the contract
performance so that if the contractor is unable as they were in this particular case to carry out
the provisions of the contract then the municipalities protected by that bond. There will be some
money there which they can use to have the trash taken away by some other this time hopefully
responsible party and in the case of the ice libarge the bonding requirements were not adhered to
either. There was no bonding there so that the community had nothing to fall back upon.
Wanted to take Maurice Hinchy and Assemblyman to blow the whistle on this as opposed to our
governmental apparatus which is the Department of Environmental Conservation why aren't they the ones
who are yelling and screaming about this? Well we have a responsibility here and that responsibility
is within the context of the legislative commission on solid waste management. I happen to be the chairman
of that commission and so when the barge incidents occurred we thought that there might be an illustrative
message there and we wanted to find out exactly how it happened and when we began to look at it we
discovered all of these facts the fact that the law wasn't adhered to and the fact that the
town unfortunately got itself involved with some shady characters who ended up giving them the
short end of the stick. Now these are very serious allegations. Do you ever get afraid on any level
either physical or lawsuit wise in terms of people coming back at you? Well I must admit the thought
across my mind occasionally but I think that you really can't allow those things to influence
your behavior. You have to look at everything objectively and based on the facts act accordingly.
That's my job as a member of the legislature and to find out things to engage in legislative
oversight to see the way these problems are being handled and when they're not being handled
properly to let people know about it and to let the other members of the legislature know about
it so that we can collectively make whatever changes are needed in the law to try to ensure that
these things don't continue to happen. Assemblyman Murray Sinci.
Overcrout of prisons has been a problem for quite a while but recently the problem has reached
crisis proportions with local county jails retaining over 2,000 state-ready prisoners waiting to
be transferred to state facilities. Corrections Commissioner Thomas Coglin has taken a major step
towards alleviating some of the burden from the county jails. The legislative gazettes
Rendemic Man reports. New York State Corrections Commissioner Thomas Coglin has ordered 1,000
state-ready prison inmates who are currently in local prisons to be moved into state facilities
immediately. For the past several months local jails have been housing prison inmates who are
required to be transferred to medium and maximum security prisons but due to overcrowding the inmates
were kept in the county jails. Jim Flattau spokesman for the Corrections Commission.
There are inmates out in the counties who by the nature of their crimes and length of their
sentence belong in maximum. They will go to maximum. The space is being created in medium security
facilities and will house medium security inmates either those in the system today in a max who
will move to a medium or people who are coming into the system who are qualified for medium placement
but people who are state-ready out in the counties who belong in a maximum security institution
will indeed go to a max. Although there were three possibilities for housing the prisoners two
alternatives were rejected by the commissioner and the state's watchdog commission of corrections.
The two ideas were doubling cells and tenting prisoners outside the facilities.
The third alternative would consolidate dormitory bunks putting them closer together and filling
in the recreation areas. This was not the most popular plan says William McMahon chairman of
the commission of correction but it was a necessary step. Well there's no question it's a very good idea
because we're trying to balance the whole system. The reason I did not come out with a complete
endorsement was because I have not seen the locations or staff has not been able to evaluate the
facilities that they're going to be using and I just was reluctant to make an endorsement until we
had an opportunity to to appraise them. A future alternative for housing prisoners is the much
discussed prison barge. Fletto says New York entered into the competitive bidding process but the
award has not yet been announced. McMahon says if New York gets the barge which houses 700 prisoners
it could be used for prisoners making a transition into the community. Well the commissioner
Cagwin has also been given the opportunity to become involved in her indeligibility and work
release. The work release program for the Department of Corrections has been expanded from
one year to parole board to the qualified candidates being two years to the parole board that'll
give them a pool of candidates that he can move into the barge that will be transitioning out of
the system so that he'll be able to use work release people for that barge. Commissioner Cagwin's
original order to move 1000 inmates came after the number of state-ready prisoners in local jails
reached over 2000 for the first time ever. The state facilities are already 9.4% above capacity and
Cagwin's move will put the prison to 12 to 13% above capacity. Even though these statistics are
shocking McMahon says Cagwin is doing a good job and the state's prison overcrowding issue could
be alleviated in as few as six weeks. He says this is also a result of Governor Cuomo's efforts
over the years. Governor Cuomo took the initiative when he first came into office the voters voted
down a prison bond issue and then he used some very good things to build 10,200 beds from 1983
until the present time. This present legislative session he proposed on the 4800 beds that he's
building in addition to 1400 that they're building for the city of New York so that the state
administration has been addressing the overall prison problem with a massive building program
Governor Cuomo is building tremendous amounts of bed space and now we have to get
the locals to do the very same thing. I think that we will be able to handle our populations at the
state level very adequately within the next six weeks and if we can encourage the locals to
continue to look at alternate sites and do building as needed then we'll be able to handle the
local system as well. The 1000 prisoners are expected to be moved into the state prisons by the
end of the week. This is Brennemic Man Reporting.
Clarence D. Rapp-Rapplié, the minority leader of the New York State Assembly,
that the Republicans have a way of preventing corruption in our construction industry.
But not really preventing it totally. I'm sure that there's always as we've gone through this
period of ethical reform I've said on many occasions somebody isn't trying to be a crook. They're
probably going to be one no matter what we write but I think some of the recommendations we've made
over the past couple of legislative sessions especially in the area of public contracts would
help minimize that. Okay let's take it very simply and put it this way. I am a guy who is corrupt
and I am entitled to award contracts in my hometown for constructing highways. A guy comes to me
and I say and offers me a kickback and I take it. How would you stop there? The rule of the standards
we've got right now governing public procurement are so diverse and so happy that they
end light corruption and conscientious public officials simply don't have the tools to police,
the bidding process and fighting fight abuses. So first and foremost we've got to establish
some uniform statewide standards for public contracts that I don't think that's so difficult.
Right now it's so diverse it's such a patchwork it lends itself to it and to corruption and corruption
gravitates to public works projects as I say for the same reason will he sudden rob banks because
that's where the money is and that's why we keep hearing about it. Okay now specifically how do you
do that? Well they say establishing uniform statewide standards is one thing there are items also that
we could we've got a recommendation that would permit the disqualification of potential bidders.
We've got people in the process now that have a bad record for technical performance and we've
even got some bidding that have been convicted of thawnings. So these would be grounds for disqualification.
Now but that would address the contract tours but how about the corrupt public officials and
after all remember the FBI said that they knew who these guys were because they had had a reputation
of corruption. Well no question about that but I'd have to think that some of these people
have gotten themselves into trouble most public officials who were in this have gotten themselves
into trouble because of the structure of the system and I think that by the same token you know
as they're going to do in this case I'm sure they're going to have to be cuff on the penalty side.
But up to now a lot of these practices are practices that that have gone on because of the
haphazard structure. Does it scare you rap that and you may be well be right about this but does
it scare you that the fact that they went to every one of these people and every single one of these
people took the money that was offered except for one guy who said it wasn't enough? I'm sure it
frightens everybody because it indicates that it's a lot more it's I mean what if they had I offered
that money to everybody who was in the construction business. Since the beginning of the New York City
corruption scandals has been clear to me that we should be working on contract reforms because
this is the fertile area and far too little attention has been to this area of reform in the
current wave of ethics laws that we've had yet it's obviously an area that needs a whole lot of
work and I think contract reform is a priority I think that both for the municipal officials who
may be indulging in something that probably has been commonplace over the years because of
the system in place and because of people working with them who know that structure very well and
know how haphazard it is that if we do the reform in the contract area I think it'll work both
sides not just the contractors that are working with public officials but the officials themselves.
And it'll take the temptation out of the whole thing. Exactly. Do you see that there'll be some
people who will object to what you're suggesting? I mean you've been in the legislative process
a long time you can tell me right now I'm sure rap if you have a mind to who is going to be
objecting to this schedule of reforms that you have. I'm not so sure anyone well I think it's
sort of like young people they kind of like to know guidelines we all went through that period of
time when the the Dewey philosophy was in progeny you know everybody could do whatever they wanted
for a breakthrough when those it was a former self expression but that's not true I think young
people want to know where the lines are and I think people in government and in the contracting
world might very well welcome this because I'm not so much convinced that it's intentional
as it is it's accepted practice so I think that really what we need right now is
and I think the irony this whole thing is that the public works procurement system is so over
regulated that it's under managed and I really I don't think we got a total panacea we never do
but I just think some of these recommendations which are rather simplistic on their face
would help to bring some order out of chaos making it more more difficult or less likely for
people on either side of the fence to to get themselves in this but okay last last question rap
and that has to do with your fellow republican Rudolph Giuliani the specially prosecuting attorney
in the in New York City now he says New York State seems to be more inviting to corruption than
other places in the country do you do you think he's right well certainly based on the papers we've
been reading over the past few weeks it started in the city in New York and with some things that
I don't think have even begun to analyze or or gotten into the depth of but beyond that now
this thing operation that goes statewide it certainly would appear that we've got a whole lot
bigger problem than that than they want to anticipate it as to how that squares where the states
I'm not really in a position to say but I'd I'd have to think that a whole lot of things in the
society whereas right now are are mandating that we go back and rework the rules and the procedures
and everything else because they are inviting it I'd have to think that maybe because we're one
of the biggest and one of the most complex that we're more fertile but I've got to think that
it perhaps goes everywhere in this country Clarence Rappelier is the republican minority leader
in the New York State Assembly
The resignation of former state university chancellor Clifton Wharton who left his position to
accept a job with TIA CREF a retirement system for a reported $500,000 a year plus perks
has spurred debates about the low salary of that position. Billing the chancellor's post became
a difficult challenge and six months later it is still vacant many people believe this is because
the salary of the university's leader did not reflect the compensation needed to attract the
first rate manager. This week the board of trustees reversed that notion by raising the
chancellor's salary as well as many others in the SUNY system. The legislative Gazette's
Brenda McMahon has more. The board of trustees of the state university of New York approved a
salary plan this week which would increase the salaries of 32 senior positions in the state
university system. The plan was proposed after the legislature passed a bill which formally gave
the board of trustees the power to set salary levels for its top officials. Among the salary
increases proposed was that of the chancellor post which was vacated by Dr. Clifton Wharton
this past February. Since Dr. Wharton resigned filling the post has become increasingly difficult
and many have said it's due to the low salary. Jerome Comissar acting chancellor and executive
vice chancellor says the approved salary will be higher than the current $93,000 but a limit has
not yet been set. The plan approval by the board of trustees did however specify the chancellor's
salary should be quote higher than any other administrative position in the university system.
The highest SUNY salary is currently $135,000. Hugh Tuey spokesman at SUNY Central says the
plan's approval will open up the interview process which was stymied by the insufficient salary.
Comissar agrees but adds that the position would not be filled for salary alone.
Oh it certainly will help but no one accepts a position like the chancellor's
ship for salary alone but the salary that was being paid to the chancellor was really
considerably below market and far below would is paid to people in comparable positions so it
really was necessary to have a change. Several other SUNY officials will be receiving raises
ranging from $80,000 to $135,000 a year. The 29 presidents of the state campuses and the
four SUNY university presidents will be included in the raise. Several of these individuals as well
as Dr. Comissar will be receiving raises above Governor Cuomo's $100,000 salary. We asked
organizational behavior expert David Crackard of Cornell University School of Business if this
was an unusual phenomenon for appointed official salaries to surpass the Governor's salary.
But Crackard says the market economy and demand in the profession are in part responsible for
the increase. The reason they make more is because the market demands that is they can quit,
go off and get a job elsewhere and make a lot more money. There are two senses of equity.
There is the equity. There is the sense of equity within the firm and that is one that creates
problems when you have management that makes less than subordinates. But you also have the
sense of the equity that when you compare your own salary to that of other firms and people
who do the same kind of work in other places around the country or wherever. And that is the one
that usually wins because that is the one that the person can leave and go and get another job.
That is what determines the market price. So it does create problems but it is not heard of.
The issue is how do you manage the perceptions so that the sense of inequity does not
dominate so that people feel like they are being treated fairly.
Professor David Crackard but the high salary is not an issue for Governor Cuomo who publicly
supported competitive salaries for educators after the board's approval. Cuomo said competitive
salaries are important even if those salaries exceed the salary of the state's top elected officials.
For the legislative gazette this is Brenda McMahon.
Fred Dicker of the New York Post recently returned from Nicaragua how good it is to have you back
Fred. Now that I am glad to be back I mean it was interesting down there but there is no place
like home. Fred let me start up and saying have they ever heard of Mario Cuomo down in Nicaragua?
Well a few people I think have I was wearing a Cuomo t-shirt a couple of days and it is warm down
there so I changed to shirt I had two of them and a few people mainly foreigners. Ironic me
enough in a way including the PLOs and mastered in Nicaragua. They say in the east they have diplomatic
relations with the PLO. Ask me about Cuomo they are mainly curious they don't know much about them
but they take him seriously and Nicaragua people though they don't know who he is they have their own
problem with the worry about. Even though he is a baseball player and they are baseball nuts.
They are baseball nuts but I don't think they remember the days of Glendiz Ladouk's.
Fred right now who clue us in right now Mario Cuomo sneezes he announces he's going to
start running again and it gets on what we call the A-wire of the Associated Press and we hear
it on our morning news show National News Show. No question Alan Sharfler made National News again
that was your break that revealed that story as I recall am I right? You're right he goes to
he goes to the Soviet Union in Poland in a little while I know you're going with him.
The question is what is up it seems to me on the one hand we have this announcement that he is
not running and he keeps telling us all he's not running and personally and privately he dismiss
all of those people that would have been helping him on that kind of a campaign and yet there is
this he's acting like a candidate. No question now look it's almost September I mean the fall
is going to be here and with the fall arriving we're almost to the No Hampshire primary things are
going to start speeding up very quickly but I think we have to do is keep our eye on the ball
eye on the mark and that listens so much to what the governor is saying. Right now Mario Cuomo
is probably the hottest Democratic prospect in the United States right now there's an overwhelming
consensus in Democratic circles that none of the seven dwarfs including the recently entered Snow White
from Colorado is really presidential timber at least the feeling now is that none of these people are
going to wind up being the candidate and there's no doubt that some of the people around the governor
and I dare say the governor himself are well aware of this and they're keeping their options open
hence the jogging hence getting into fighting trim and I think we'll probably start hearing an
increasing number of statements from the governor that he's not interested in the presidency which I
will take to mean that he probably is. Now play it out with us as you and I meet people in the
street they always say now how would it look if he actually did get into it he would have to go
into some primaries I would assume because the concept of a broker convention is almost impossible.
Well unless it's deadlocked I mean it's not impossible if it's deadlocked and if in fact you have
no clear consensus candidate who emerges as the choice of the Democrats then a deadlock is
possible but let me just quickly mention this possible scenario comes late February you have
the Iowa caucuses you have record low participation it's clear the voters don't care and no clear
emerging victor the next week you go to New Hampshire once again all of a sudden record
low democratic turnouts no clear winner what happens in a few days is then you have time magazine
in newsweek having on its cover none of the above as the winner of the two first democratic events
when that happens if it happens all of a sudden all bets are off and it's very possible that
there could be a groundswell of interest in Mario Cuomo who in many democratic circles nationally
is a very popular and certainly well regarded figure and that's when we could start seeing
the governor reconsidering Fred Dicker of the New York Post
and that's it for this week's legislative Gazette our show is edited and produced by Brenda
McMahon in the studios of WAMC Albany she had helped this week from Dave Galetli and Dan Antlec
if you have any comments about our program right is at box 13,000 I say thousand Albany
New York 1 2 2 1 2 we'll be back again next week and we hope you'll join us then for now I'm Alan
Shartock the legislative Gazette is a production of WAMC news Dr Alan Shartock is executive producer
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