"Beyond Reproach" or Caught Rewriting TIF Agreements?

I keep hearing that we should not question the motives, righteousness, virtue, honor, etc of Ken Fiola, executive vice president of the Fall River Office of Economic Development. To reiterate some points I have made in the past:

RECAP

• Ken Fiola should not be the treasurer of his wife's campaign because he is functionally/constructively a municipal employee and that is a violation of campaign finance law.
• Ken Fiola, as treasurer, should have recused himself from reviewing and making recommendations in favor of Peabody, where Peabody is a regular contributor to his wife's campaign funding. It is my contention that it is a violation of state ethics rules.

"BREAKING NEWS"

Fiola was clearly pleased to "break the news" on wsar yesterday that Burbank had a potential funding source from a "corporation" that wasn't yet incorporated. Despite the fact that this is legal business practice and that Burbank made no false representations about the fact that their funding was not yet incorporated, the wsar program yesterday with Ken Fiola and Alan Amaral hinted that there was something fraudulent afoot.

So here is my (old) "breaking news" on Mr. Ken "beyond reproach" Fiola who recently recommended the awarding of a TIF (tax increment finance) agreement to yet another company that contributed to his wife's campaign which could result in approximately $240,000 in tax benefits.......He was caught by the city council in 2000 REWRITING TIF agreements AFTER the City Council approved the specific wording of the agreements. Fiola, who gets paid handsomely for his duty of getting "Jobs for Fall River (the actual name of FROED)" rewrote one particular TIF agreement, among others, granting Quaker a 20 year TIF. The council approved of a TIF agreement with Quaker in May 1999. The agreement granted Quaker a 20-year TIF exemption. In return Quaker pledged to build a roughly 358,000-square-foot facility on Jefferson Street, and also to hire 700 new employees. According to Councilor Brian Pearson, the language in the Quaker TIF the state received and approved greatly differed from the TIF agreement the council had authorized earlier. Fiola's erroneously altered wording in the agreement removed the wording the Council had inserted in the agreement stating its "preference" that Quaker use local contractors "who have registered apprenticeship programs with the commonwealth of Massachusetts to encourage the training of a skilled work force." JOBS FOR FALL RIVER ........FAIL

According the the councilors in the same Herald News article, SEVERAL TIF agreements had been changed. Is Ken up to his old tricks again???????????? Nah, he is BEYOND REPROACH

RELATED ARTICLES TO KEN FIOLA REWRITING TIF'S

http://www.zwire.com/site/index.cfm?newsid=1171001&BRD=1710&PAG=461&dept_id=99784&rfi=8

http://www.zwire.com/site/index.cfm?newsid=1166953&BRD=1710&PAG=461&dept_id=99784&rfi=8

Save 64 Durfee Rally !!Today!!

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT-PASS IT ON

Tune in today, Monday, February 23, 2009, WSAR 1480 and call at 508-673-1480.

Al Lima and Ken Fiola will be on the Mike Herren show to discuss 64 Durfee Street.

Any and all who can call to support Al will be helpful and then, join us and bring others to the RALLY at 64 Durfee Street to Save the Arts Overlay District!

64 Durfee Street - Audio from the RDA/FROED meeting

An audio copy of the RDA/FROED meeting from 1/21/09 recently came into my possession, unfortunately the sound quality isn't very good. The only person that comes across clearly on the audio is John Almeida and a small portion of Nick Christ.

Email me ( shamrockblogger@gmail.com ) if you would like a copy of the original and I will try to get one to you as soon as I can depending on the demand. Maybe you have louder speakers than me and can hear it better. There are some great comments that are kind of discernible by Steve Camara, Jeff Carpenter, Ray Hague, and a very fierce Cathy Ann Viveiros giving John Almeida 'the bizness.'

A summary of the "best of" John Almeida

“Since I’m really not frankly an art buff”

“What other communities and cities and towns have had the opportunity to do, isn’t necessarily going to be happening here although some wish that it could”

“When I showed up to my first meeting of the redevelopment authority I saw on the conference table a big bag and all that was in that bag was crap; and they said put your hands in, pull some out, put it in the bag and deal with that bag one at a time”

“I don’t want to be here a long time because I don’t want to stay here a long time, cuz I honestly don’t think it’s necessary to be here a long time, maybe I’m dead wrong ‘kay? It’s not the only item on our agenda and when you look at our agenda”

“I didn’t require [RA] members to, in writing, evaluate the proposals, we had no previous discussions amongst ourselves about the proposal, we were to meet, vote, THEN discuss”

“If I gave you the impression that time is of the essence here that isn’t necessarily the case because we cannot afford to do this wrong, we cannot afford to do this wrong.”

“What else do we [RA] own that we have had for 20 years? [someone answers ‘the City Pier’] “We’re going to have Glow Ring Manufacturing developed on that site…….but I don’t mean to make light of it”