If you see state Rep. Francine Del Monte, remember to thank her very much.
Really.
After nearly nine years of sitting like a bump on a log in Albany, stirred into motion only when Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver needed something in his gentrified, lower Manhattan district, Del Monte has finally done something for the people she's being paid to represent.
She's embroiled them in a lawsuit.
It all started after Silver told her to give the reserve held by the state Power Authority -- more than $500 million -- to Gov. David Paterson to help cover the $18 billion state budget hole.
It made no difference that the bulk of the money had been earned right in her home district at the Robert Moses Power Plant; Silver told her to give it to Paterson, and give it to Paterson she did.
Silver's district includes Wall Street, see? And after the crooked bankers and brokers who regularly donate money to his campaign fund nearly bankrupted the state of New York and much of the rest of the country, they need all the help they can get.
Some here, Democrats and Republicans alike, were outraged by the money grab. The $500 million was being held in reserve, after all, to protect them from rate increases.
So when the authority announced a rate increase the very next day, people got upset. One of the people who got upset was Niagara County Legislature Chairman Bill Ross.
Ross went up to Albany to testify about how he thought that the state taking the authority's money was linked to the authority's decision to raise rates in hard-hit areas like Del Monte's district, which includes Niagara Falls, Lewiston, Wilson and some places that don't even have sidewalks.
Del Monte went ballistic.
Confronting Ross in a public area with innumerable witnesses milling about, she gave him the dressing down of his life.
He would pay, she told him. She would make sure that Niagara County would never see one more thin dime of the Seneca Niagara Casino money the state doles out in drips and dribbles whenever it's feeling especially generous.
Since the casino opened in 2002, the county has received less than $1 million in casino money from the state.
The city of Niagara Falls has gotten another $50 million.
The state -- which does nothing whatsoever for the casino and does not have to deal with the problems having a casino creates -- has received around $500 million.
And guess where that $500 million has gone?
With Del Monte's help, much of it has gone straight into the pockets of New York City subway riders, who are subsidized by about $3 every time they ride the thing. The $2 fare they pay at the turnstile amounts to less than half of what the ride actually costs.
Think about that: The people of Niagara County make it easier for people in New York City to get to and from work each day, even as deterioration of the streets and roads here makes getting to work more difficult.
Anyway, when Del Monte issues a threat, she sticks to it.
She enlisted her clueless counterpart in the state Senate, Antoine Thompson, to co-sponsor a bill with her that would strip all of Niagara County except the Falls of any casino funding whatsoever.
The bill allots the county's tiny portion of the revenue to the city, a cunning ploy on the part of its sponsors, who generally avoid Niagara Falls like the plague unless there are television photographers nearby.
Bill Ross got to thinking. This year, the state will receive more than $60 million in casino cash, all of which is generated in Niagara Falls and, by extension, Niagara County.
The cost to run all of county government for a year currently stands at $66 million.
"If we had that money," Ross thought. "We could eliminate county taxes altogether and still provide the same level of service to the people!"
The chairman discussed this with his colleagues, and they were enthusiastic.
"If we eliminated all county taxes, and publicized that, people and businesses would beat the door down to get in," said Legislator Clyde Burmaster. "Niagara County would become a business mecca."
So they came up with a plan.
Last week, they announced that the county intended to sue the state Comptroller, the state Commissioner of Taxation and Finance, the state itself, and "any and all necessary parties," not once but twice. First to get the county's original share of the casino money back, and second to take back the state's share of the millions it has nothing to do with creating.
The lawsuit will be costly. And that cost will be borne by Niagara County taxpayers, all because Francine Del Monte -- in a fit of pique -- decided to play petty politics, to pander and seek revenge at the same time.
Del Monte has done nothing, nothing whatsoever for the city of Niagara Falls during her nearly nine years in office. She herself once joked that the opening of the Starbucks coffee shop on
Third Street constituted the biggest economic development she'd seen in the city.
Her reign has been marked by political dirty tricks, slavish loyalty to Silver and the downstate interests, and a win-at-any-cost mentality. Like a selfish, spoiled child, she has used her position to enrich herself -- the first thing she did was get the hell away from Niagara Falls and move to a mini-mansion in Lewiston -- and to punish enemies and reward family members and flunkies alike.
She defended and continued to take money from labor racketeer Michael "Butch" Quarcini and his infamous "Goon Squad" right up until the day they were indicted by the U.S. Justice Department.
And she stood side by side with indicted former Niagara Falls mayor Vince Anello until he'd sunk so low that he even failed to garner enough signatures to get on the ballot in the 2007 mayoral contest.
Now she's embroiled the people of Niagara County in a lawsuit.
If the county prevails, its citizens will finally receive their fair share of the millions of casino dollars that have previously disappeared into the gaping maw of Albany, a place where Del Monte has more friends than she has here.
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | April 14 2009 |