State government officials are all about transparency, except when they’re not. Tuesday, city and state reported that despite running for office three times since 2018, Bronx Assemblywoman Amanda Septimo has not filed campaign finance reports since her first campaign. And no one on the State Board of Elections, whose job it is to enforce the rules, marked it.
It’s not just elected officials and the BOE who flout their responsibilities. The State Authority Budget Office has just released a list of state and local entities that have failed to make the disclosures required by law. State and local authorities must submit annual reports and budget reports within 90 days after the end of the fiscal year; local authorities must also submit budget reports 60 days before the start of the fiscal year.
Between many scoffers who have missed their 2022 mandated deadlines and are behind schedule are the New York State Agriculture and Horse Breeding Development Fund, Nassau Health Care Corp., the Mount Vernon Urban Renewal Agency, the Building Board of Yonkers Joint Schools, Finger Lakes Regional Telecommunications Development Corporation, Hoosick Local Development Corporation, Catskill Local Development Corporation, Sleepy Hollow Local Development Corporation, New York City Mayor’s Fund for Advancement , New York City Educational Construction Fund, New York City Land Development Corp., New York City School Bus Umbrella Services, Inc., NYC Neighborhood Capital Corp., and New York City Energy Efficiency Corp. (De anyway, energy efficiency isn’t very important to anyone these days).
We counted 147 negligent entities, all of which (wink, wink, nod, nod) are undeniably essential to the people of the state. All said in New York, there is there are more than 1,000 state and local public authorities spending more than $78 billion per yearbureaucratic mazes that even the most sophisticated modern GPS application could not navigate.
Is it too much to ask that they keep the public that pays their bills informed of their activities once a year?
