Mayors making effort to keep expenses down
Ted Luciani’s home is only about five kilometres from regional headquarters.
It’s so close that “half the time” he doesn’t bother submitting mileage claims for attending Niagara Region meetings, said Thorold’s two-term mayor.
That’s a big part of the reason that Luciani has by far been the least expensive member of Niagara Region council — at least for the current term.
In 2015, his annual expenses amounted to $497.54, and his bill a year later amounted to $554.33, according to detailed regional councillor expense reports dating back as far as 1997 that were posted on the Region’s website Tuesday afternoon.
Although the Region has yet to release full expenses for 2017, Luciani’s mileage costs only amounted to $184.14 from January to October, while the bill for his Region-issued iPad was $17.25 a month.
Luciani said that’s just the way he is.
“A lot of guys take lunch at the Region. They just flash their cards and it’s billed to them. Maybe in seven years had lunch three or four times,” he said.
“Definitely, I’m a person who likes to watch the dollars … I pay taxes, too. I don’t like my taxes going up,” Luciani said.
Although his expenses were the cheapest of all 31 members of regional council, his frugal approach to tax dollars was shared by most of Niagara’s mayors.
In 2016, for instance, only Pelham Mayor Dave Augustyn, Welland Mayor Frank Campion and Lincoln Mayor Sandra Easton filed expenses that exceeded the average of about $6,800 that year — and they were within a few hundred dollars of that mark.
But the mayors are also reimbursed for their expenses by the municipalities they represent.
Niagara Falls Mayor Jim Diodati, who claimed $3,505 in 2016 and $3,023 a year earlier with the Region, said it’s sometimes difficult to determine whether to claim an expense against the city or the Region.
“Some things, like conferences … we represent both (the Region and city),” he said.
When attending conferences such as those for the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, or Association of Municipalities of Ontario, he said he tries to divvy up his costs evenly between the Region and lower-tier municipality.
“First and foremost, I was elected to represent the city of Niagara Falls. But it depends,” Diodati said.
Even when he’s specifically representing the Region, he said he is still representing Niagara Falls, because it’s part of the Region.
“My philosophy is I try to balance it. I try to share the expense,” he said.
Campion, who claimed $7,718 in 2016, said it’s sometimes difficult to differentiate between the two levels of government he represents.
“Because it’s the same thing. What’s good for the city is good for the Region,” he said. “Both are benefiting.”
Campion said he is happy to finally see Regional expenses posted.
“It looked like it was going to take forever to get it out there,” he said. “I think it’s a great idea.”
He said he’s working on doing the same thing in Welland — posting the expenses he and city councillors charge the city on its website, too.
In a Sept. 15 article in The Standard, Regional Chair Alan Caslin — his expenses were consistently the highest among regional councillors — said politicians who have large expense claims within the records could demonstrate hardworking councillors.
“Quite frankly, how many conferences have they gone to, have they gotten anything out of it, had meetings with constituents and businesses?” he said in the story. “A lot of that is implicated in the expenses that are submitted, because some councillors do a heck of a lot more than others in terms of effort for their position … I can’t stress that enough. There are some councillors who are fully engaged and actively promoting Niagara in a business sense, a community sense, that participate so much more than other councillors.”
But Niagara’s mayors who spoke to The Standard Wednesday feel they’re doing a lot of work on behalf of taxpayers — and keeping their costs as low as possible.
And they were eager to defend Luciani.
Diodati said Thorold city hall is across the road from regional headquarters.
“Ted could throw a snowball and hit the Region,” he said.
“In that regard, he’s not going to have the mileage that someone driving in from Grimsby … or Fort Erie does. I also know Ted to be really frugal. He makes every dollar count. He works hard, but he is also really respectful of taxpayers’ money.” abenner@postmedia.com twitter.com/abenner1