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Council member questions $50,000 public-works appropriation; memo omitted a separate property
Summary
Councilman Lofredo told the Jan. 5 Middletown workshop that the $50,000 appropriation listed Odd Fellows Playhouse and 17 Miller Street but did not disclose that part of the $7,720 line covered work for a separate Dripps Road property (cleaning crew, storage, video). He asked the council to amend the appropriation to $43,480 and account for Dripps Road at the next meeting.
Councilman Lofredo raised a procedural and transparency concern about a public-works appropriation listed as $50,000 on the Jan. 5 questions-to-directors workshop agenda (agenda item 7a).
Lofredo said the appropriation memo breaks the $50,000 into $42,280 for repairs at the Odd Fellows Playhouse and $7,720 under the 17 Miller Street line, but that the $7,720 includes work performed at a separate Dripps Road property. He summarized the breakout: $1,200 for electrical work at 17 Miller Street and three Dripps Road items — cleaning crew $5,500, storage $720 and video recording $300 — for a total of $6,520. "What's not mentioned in here is that there is another property that the city did sell... and we did put it out to bid and we sold it as is," Lofredo said, urging the council to account for the parcels separately.
A staff member confirmed by reading an email that the detailed breakdown came from Rohan Manning in a Dec. 3 email to the mayor and Councilman Lofredo; another council member said she had not received that email. The discrepancy left the agenda line unclear as published: the agenda did not explicitly identify Dripps Road as a property covered by the appropriation.
Lofredo proposed reducing the active appropriation on the table to reflect the Odd Fellows and Miller Street work ($42,280 + $1,200 = $43,480) and bringing a separate item for Dripps Road to a future meeting so the council can properly account for that expenditure. Attorney Smith and other staff indicated that the council can decrease but not increase appropriation amounts during a public hearing and that the item could be adjusted and returned.
Why it matters: councilors said the published agenda should accurately reflect which properties are being charged to a municipal appropriation so elected members and the public can review expenditures tied to specific parcels. The council agreed in principle to amend the accounting and to place the Dripps Road appropriation on a future agenda; no final appropriation vote was recorded during the workshop.
The council expects to revisit the appropriation at a subsequent meeting with corrected item descriptions and accounting details.
