The following is an email I received from John Ogilvie regarding the attempt to oust Kevin Zurrin from the Finance Committee.  My responses to John are interspersed throughout his email to me, in smaller typeface.  At the end of his email is the email he got back from Charlie Flynn (via Mary Brazie) outlining the BOS position.
 
Sorry this is so messy, but it so clearly lays out the whole situation that I thought it important to publish it regardless.
 
On Thu, Mar 28, 2013 at 9:59 AM, John Ogilvie <jogilvie@earthlink.net> wrote:
Good morning:
I’m sending you a copy of the email I just received from Charlie Flynn in the name of the BOS.
I would be interested in your general response to Charlie’s reply.
 
He's just CYAing.
I also have a couple of specific questions/comments. They are:
1. Charlie assets that the BOS action is partly in response to “complaints received from members of the Finance Committee”.

Is this true? If so, who has complained and what is the basis of their complaints?
Several members of the FC have complained about Kevin, to his face at a FC meeting. The complaints are that he goes off on his own without prior agreement/consultation with the FC, making the FC look bad. I have told Kevin that he needs to reassess his role as a committee member, focusing on whether he is a cooperative member who furthers the work of the committee or a maverick who impedes it. The FC could, I think, discuss that with him and work out a protocol, for him and all members, as a matter internal to the FC. But the selectboard is not urging that, they're just trying to get rid of him because they don't like what he says. That's the real First Amendment matter.

2. Charlie asserts that “the elected Water Commissioners are responsible for the billing and collection” of EWC.

This appears to contradict directly what I have heard from you and Kevin. One of you has said that it’s Jack Muskrat who has this responsibility and the other has said that it’s Mary Brazie. Where does the truth lie, please? And what, specifically appears to be the involvement, if any, of Mary Brazie in the EWC’s problems?
There are 2 employees: Jack Muskrat does the billing and paperwork, Jim Olmstead the leg work. For reasons too complicated to explain briefly, payments go through Mary rather than directly to the treasurer.

I don’t mean to question that it may ultimately be the Water Commissioners who have an oversight responsibility for this. But I doubt very much that they actually do the work. Somebody else sends out the bills and effects/manages the collections. Somebody else does the bookkeeping. Who are these people?
See above.

Don’t the Water Commissioners ultimately respond/report to the BOS? Is the BOS relieved of any responsibility, even oversight, for the EWC?
Under MA law, the commissioners are in control. They aren't legally required to report to the BOS, but the BOS should, in my view, exercise oversight because the buck should stop with the BOS on all town affairs.

3. Charlie asserts that “there is a mechanism in place to monitor the Water Company and it apparently has not been utilized properly. That is the Finance Committee.” He goes on to state that the FC has been asked no less than 3 times this year for a list of questions and concerns regarding the EWC that could be passed on to the Town’s auditor and that the FC has yet to respond.

What is the “monitoring responsibility of the FC with regard to the EWC? Has the FC been living up to its responsibilities on this point?
Charlie quotes a provision of the Bylaws that says the FC has a duty to investigate the cost of maintenance of town departments. The problem with the Water Department is not cost, it is revenues, which the Bylaw wisely does not mention. Furthermore, it is unrealistic to expect the FC to act as town auditors, nor would I as a citizen want them to. No one would volunteer to serve on the FC if it were its responsibility to ferret out collection problems. The FC is basically a check on the spending proclivities of the BOS, not an auditing group.

Is it true that the FC has yet to forward to the BOS the list of questions and concerns regarding the EWC that has been requested? If so, why?


We pay the town auditors something like $5,000 a year. The FC correctly concluded that they would not do any sort of forensic audit for that price, and requested that the BOS request and fund a thorough audit. The BOS declined. Therefore, the FC concluded to conduct its own investigation even though it is not the responsibility of the FC to do so, but because it otherwise was not going to happen. The list of questions will, I believe, be presented, but they are pretty useless under these circumstances. Charlie is just trying to pass the buck.
Charlie gives the impression, at the end of his email, that “others in the community were working diligently” (I guess he’s trying to suggest the BOS is responsible for all this year’s activity) to get to the bottom of the EWC’s troubles while Kevin has been doing nothing other than blogging and pointing fingers. I find this a bit hard to swallow given the fact that the problems with the EWC have been sitting there in plain sight for the past several years and it’s only now that some attention is being given to them. But where do you all come out on this, please?
Politicians never want to take responsibility for anything. If you believe that this matter would have been "outed" without Kevin's efforts, I have several bridges to sell to you.
It’s going to be fun at the upcoming meeting. I assume you’re both going to be there? All the best.
John
P.S. This may be asking too much, but it seems to me that it would be helpful if at least some preliminary numbers were available at the time of Monday’s meeting on the size of the billing/collection/abatement problem and the extent to which this accounts for the EWC’s deficit. As you know, my suspicion is that it will only represent a portion of the deficit (probably well under 50%) and that, therefore, rates to the EWC users will have to rise if the deficit is to be eliminated.
The "meeting" is a "hearing" to consider Kevin's removal, not a session on the water department.
From: Town of Egremont [mailto:tegremont@yahoo.com]
Sent: Thursday, March 28, 2013 8:27 AM
To: John Ogilvie
Subject: response to your March 24 email
John: Below is a response to your March 24 email to the Board of Selectmen.
Please let us know if there is anything further we can do for you?
Thank you.
Mary Brazie
Office Administrator
Town of Egremont
413-528-0182 x10
413-528-5465 fax

"The Secretary of State's office has determined that most e-mails to and from municipal offices and officials are public records. Consequently, confidentiality should not be expected."
--- Forwarded Message -----
From: John Ogilvie <jogilvie@earthlink.net>
To: Town of Egremont <tegremont@yahoo.com>; Town of Egremont <selectboard@egremont-ma.gov>; Kevin Zurrin <kevinzurrin@aol.com>
Cc: RMAllenCSM@aol.com; Laura Allen <lallencm@aol.com>; Richard Burdsall <RPburds@aol.com>; Hebert Abelow <abelow@mindspring.com>
Sent: Sunday, March 24, 2013 3:24 PM
Subject: Kevin Zurrin and the EWC
Dear Selectmen:
I am writing to express my concern over the BOS’s apparent efforts to remove Kevin Zurrin from the Finance Committee. The issue being addressed regarding Mr. Zurrin is a result of complaints received from members of the Finance Committee, members of the Community, and members of the Board of Selectmen.
I have never met Kevin Zurrin; I know him only through emails and his blog. But as far as I can tell, Kevin has been acting correctly. It seems to me that he has made it clear that he has been expressing opinions as a private citizen, not as a member of the Finance Committee. Isn’t he entitled to do this? Mr. Zurrin has every right to exercise his right to free speech and appears to be doing exactly that. However, as a member of the Finance Committee/Appointed Town Official, Mr. Zurrin stated the following, 1. In an e-mail dated Thursday, February 7, 2013 5:50 PM, Mr. Zurrin appears to accuse town employees of possible theft. Specifically, “Follow the money trail. The bill goes to the user, the user sends the payment to the town administrator (Editor’s note: There is no town administrator in the town of Egremont) , the administrator gives the money to the town treasurer, and the town accountant accounts for the money. Somewhere in that triad much of the money disappears. These facts are indisputable and the problem is not brought to light with the annual audit. Perhaps, as someone suggested, an independant forensic audit should be requested.” 2. Mr. Zurrin states the following, calling into question the integrity of the Town Auditor Firm of Scanlon and Associates: “POE I wouldn’t say that the BOS was being deceptive when they told us that we are hiring a new audit company to do our annual audit because technically it is a new company. However, don’t be fooled into thinking that a new set of eyes are looking at the town finances. What they didn’t say is that this so called new company they have retained, Scanlon & Associates, purchased the previous audit company Hirbour & Haynes P. C. Contrary to their claim, there won’t be a new set of eyes looking at the town finances because the auditor assigned to the account is none other than Daniel Haynes. This is the same Daniel Haynes of Hirbour & Haynes P. C., our former auditor.
This firm has been auditing our books for about the last decade. One of the partners, Daniel Haynes, is now working under a new flag, Scanlon & Associates. I have to wonder if the town did a search on this person. The guy has been in the Inspector General’s crosshairs since 2007; you might think someone responsible for hiring him would have heard a whisper of this. It seems to me that we have to look into the town’s hiring policies. If this has escaped the notice of those in charge of hiring, I have to wonder what else may have slipped by.
If you look into Daniel Haynes you’ll find he has a very questionable past. He was the town accountant for the town of Barre Massachusetts who had to resign under a cloud of suspicion. You’ll read that as an auditor he was accused of many improprieties and may even be indicted for crimes committed while in that position of trust. Don’t take my word for it, start with these articles and go from there.
Given the fact that this company has audited our books for many years and we are just now starting to question our own figures, we have to ask ourselves, do we want this man to continue auditing our books? I mean if he hasn’t found the glaringly obvious discrepancies in the water fund’s figures what about the rest of the town's departments? I would think that any auditor would scream foul if he found that tens of thousands of dollars were unaccounted for. Unless of course it is not just simple incompetence. Regardless, we don’t need a fluff audit with softball questions; we need to do a complete colonoscopy on the towns finances.”
A. My question to Mr. Zurrin is, “What is the factual basis for your accusation? Or because Mr. Zurrin writes in a blog and purports himself to be a private citizen is he immune from accountability while he insinuates that others should be held accountable?
B. I checked the links Mr. Zurrin supplied for substantiation and found no reference to Mr. Haynes being in the “crosshairs of the AG”. Further the first two references are blogs and the third reference is a newspaper article that appears to be quite neutral and contains no accusations. So here we have a town official stating he is a private citizen making accusations regarding a professional CPA’s character. Will he still be a private citizen when he is sued or will the Egremont taxpayers have to indemnify him?
Kevin has, correctly in my opinion, expressed concern about the repeated annual deficits that the EWC appears to have been running. Is the BOS opposed to this? Are not you also concerned about these deficits? What efforts have you made to address this issue? Kevin, you, and a number of others in the town have expressed concern regarding the Water Company deficits. There have even been attempts by former commissioners to make changes to the billing structure to address this issue only to have the problem get worse. There was a water study committee formed last year to study the Water Company operations in order to identify possible management issues. I will discuss this further below. Suffice it to say that I sat on the committee and we missed what ultimately was a problem identified recently by a number of officials and residents. Mr. Zurrin was not one of those who ultimately pinpointed the problem.
There are rumors circulating that the EWC failed to bill its customers for significant amounts and for significant periods of time. Are these rumors true and, if so, how much of the EWC deficits does this failure to bill account for? Who is the person responsible for the EWC’s billing and collection? Who does this person report to? It seems to me that we, the citizens of Egremont, are fully entitled to this information. They are not rumors. Mary Brazie, the Selectman’s Office Administrator, Bruce Turner, the Selectboard Chair, Michael Bandzierz, Finance Committee Member, Ralph Noveck, Finance Committee Member & Water User, Ray Palmucci, Water Commissioner and Water User, and Steve Agar, Water Commissioner, all discovered on their own that the billing was inconsistent. Because of this inconsistency there is clear evidence of lost revenues. See response to your last question below. The elected Water Commissioners are responsible for the billing and collection.
Lastly, if these rumors of failure to bill are correct, what does it say about the Town’s auditor? It is not the responsibility of the auditor to examine operational procedures unless they are asked to do so. The focus of municipal audits is proper accounting procedures. What is disturbing about the Water Company problem is that there is a mechanism in place to monitor the Water Company and it apparently has not been utilized properly. That is the Finance Committee. See the below two sections of Bylaw 3 of the Egremont Bylaws. Further guidance is published in the Finance Committee Handbook published by the Association of Town Finance Committees. Please note that the Finance Committee was asked on 3 occasions this year to develop a list of questions and concerns regarding the Water Company so the Selectboard could forward them to the Auditors to be included in the Audit. We are still waiting for those questions.
Section 2: It shall be the duty of the Finance Committee to investigate the cost of maintenance of the different departments of the Town, and they shall recommend in detail the amounts to be appropriated for each department for the ensuing year.
Section 3: The committee shall have authority to summon before it for such information and investigation as it shall deem necessary, any of the Town officials and reports, for such examination considered by it necessary to the proper discharge of its duties.
I urge you to reconsider your apparent plan to remove Kevin from the Finance Committee. It seems to me that he has been working in the Town’s best interest. As you can see, that while Mr. Zurrin was blogging away and pointing fingers, others in the community were working diligently to identify what appears to be one of the major problems with the Water Company. Further, at a recent Board of Selectmen’s meeting a possible solution was proposed and is now being investigated. Therefore, it is the intention of the appointing committee to hold its public hearing on Monday, April 1st.
Charles Flynn
Vice Chair
Egremont Board of Selectmen