By Caitlin Murray<br><a href="mailto:murrayc@gnnewspaper.com">E-mail Caitlin</a>
Niagara Gazette
May 07, 2008 09:26 pm
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State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli’s statewide investigation into fraudulent pension arrangements has landed in the Niagara Falls School District.
DiNapoli has revoked retirement system enrollment for school district attorney Maria Massaro after determining she was incorrectly classified as a full-time employee rather than a contractor.
“We sent auditors in there to review the records,” said comptroller spokesman Dennis Tompkins, “and we discovered that, although she was being reported as a full-time employee, she didn’t meet the criteria.”
Among the allegations, DiNapoli said the district paid the firm of Angelo Massaro, Massaro’s father, $95,000 as an independent contractor. Massaro works at her father’s firm as a private employee. In the audit, the comptroller also wrote that “Massaro did not maintain an office at the district, but instead worked out of a private law firm.”
“If she’s an employee (for the school district), as they said,” the DiNapoli spokesman said, “why is there this relationship with her firm?”
District officials maintain she is a proper full-time employee and her father’s firm was under contract separately, according to Superintendent Carmen Granto.
“The appearance looks like it, I can understand,” he said, “but to make it perfectly clear, now she’s in her own office and she reports directly to me.”
She moved into the district’s new administration building in February.
The audit also wrote that Massaro reportedly worked 260 days in one year, but did not submit time sheets, providing no evidence of the time the district said she had worked.
Philip Mohr, human resources administrator for the district, said as a full-time employee, Massaro did not have to submit time sheets as only hourly employees are required to do so.
“We don’t believe anything is improper and we certainly don’t agree with the comptroller’s decision,” Mohr said. “... We provided documentation to the comptroller offices and we’re not sure that they reviewed it adequately in making a decision.”
Massaro said she is planning to appeal the comptroller’s decision.
“I was hired in 1999,” Massaro said, “and I’ve acted as district attorney for the past nine years. I believe the comptroller made a wrong and improper decision.”
She denied further comment as they would relate to her appeal.
If the comptroller’s decision stands, all money paid into her pension by the district will be reimbursed by next year, although the exact amount that will be collected is still being investigated, the comptroller spokesman said.
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