Published: March 08, 2009 09:11 pm      

POLITICAL NOTEBOOK: We hear the words, we need more action

I am growing more and more convinced that true reform will always elude New York state’s massive system of governments.

Everyone — Gov. Paterson included — is talking a good game as our state and our country face some of the worst economic conditions in history.

Actions speak louder than words.

During his stop in Niagara Falls this week, Paterson addressed the now-infamous $200 toaster purchased by his office for the governor’s executive mansion in Albany.

He said the item, along with several other mansion upgrades, was approved by the Office of General Services before the state entered into its current fiscal crisis.

That’s the problem.

Evidently, the Office of General Services, which oversees purchases made by state departments, is buying $200 toasters.

The people over at OGS should be shopping on sale at Wal-Mart like the rest of us.

Politicians like Paterson often view such things as “symbolic” gestures and usually remind everyone that such savings don’t really amount to enough money to make much of a dent in the gaping budget holes.

They say the same thing whenever asked about cutting their own pay.

Let’s keep tabs on how long it actually takes him to follow through on that commitment.

As audit after audit conducted by the state Comptroller’s Office shows, governments in New York haven’t been exactly efficient when it comes to handling the people’s money.

Power point

The new head of the state Power Authority left a message on my answering machine this week to remind me that the authority’s board does include several representatives from upstate New York, including one from Erie County and another from Rochester.

The message from Power Authority President Richard Kessel followed a series of recent articles in which Niagara County lawmakers discussed their push to give our county a permanent seat at the NYPA table.

The authority situation illustrates yet another problem with government in New York state.

Most — and I do mean most — boards that govern villages, towns, cities, school districts and, yes, authorities, are filled with members who are appointed more based on relationships than on merit.

Rarely do aggressive, no-nonsense, non-establishment types get those jobs.

The result is the kind of cozy relationships that produce a lot of back-patting for the people who are hired to oversee the operation and not enough true oversight when it comes to spending.

A good example is another of Western New York’s least favorite authorities — the New York Thruway Authority.

Last year, a spot opened up on the Thruway Authority board.

In a just world, our region’s representative would have been Grand Island activist Rus Thompson, a guy who has learned quite a lot about the inner-workings of the authority over the years. Thompson’s a fighter and he’s not shy. He speaks up and out and tried desperately to get Paterson to commit to finding a way to tear down the Grand Island tolls.

Quick quiz: Who currently represents Western New York’s interests on the Thruway Authority’s board?

Her name is Donna Luh. Her term expires in 2017.

In a related matter, Falls Legislators Dennis Virtuoso and Renae Kimble spoke briefly with Paterson following his visit. Their discussion focused on permanently adding a county resident to the NYPA board and the possibility of setting up a fund that would turn authority resources into economic development projects within a 30-mile radius of the Robert Moses Power Project in Lewiston.

Ourselves included

While am I at, I don’t want to forget two groups of people who deserve some criticism for the mess that is New York state — the press and the public. A big part of our job is to keep tabs on elected officials and make sure they are doing an effective and efficient job in office. For whatever reason, we seem to have drifted away from one of our core missions as the so-called Fourth Estate.

A lot of people like to knock newspapers, but keep in mind, if not for a reporter digging up Paterson’s expense accounts, few outside of the confines of the governor’s mansion would have known that the $200 toaster even existed.

As for you — all of you out there — good government requires a lot of active participants.

There’s a reason why public unions so often get what they want from elected officials. The politicians are scared of them. They are scared of their unity and their votes and their fancy ad campaigns. Paterson basically admitted as much on Wednesday.

Maybe the taxpayers should start buying ads and hire a lobbyist of their own.

You say tomato

Mayor Paul Dyster was one of the few people at the Doris Jones Family Resource Center who could truly understand what it was like for Paterson to sit on the hot seat in the Falls.

As a gesture of good will, Dyster presented Paterson with a local product that was symbolic of the type of industry Niagara County could benefit from in the future. The mayor offered Dyster a bag full of tomatoes grown by H2Grow, the Youngstown company that grows its products using water from the cooling of engines at an energy plant that converts gas emissions from Modern Disposal’s landfill into electricity.

Wisely, Dyster didn’t bring any for the crowd.

“We have very tight security, so the governor is the only one in the room with his own bag of tomatoes,” Dyster said.