Crane business finds resistance at tax hearing
The Ulster County Industrial Development Agency will need to sort out points raised by union activists against an application to waive $975,200 in sales taxes that contractor 2-4 Kieffer Lane LLC would pay on the purchase of eight large cranes costing a total of $12.9 million.
At a public hearing Thursday at the Russell F. Brott Memorial Senior Center on the grounds of Ulster Town Hall, opponents said the company provided false information on the waiver application and also claimed owner Thomas Auringer has a felony conviction of filing false business records.
“Mr. Auringer answered ‘no’ to the [county IDA application] question ‘Has any person listed above ever been convicted of a criminal offense other than a minor traffic violation?’” wrote representatives for the New York City Community Alliance for Workers Justice. “In 2003, Cavalier construction, of which Thomas Auringer was then president, was debarred for five years because of a plea of guilty to a felony in Kings County Criminal Court for filing false business records with the New York City Construction Authority.’”
Information provided by the New York City Community Alliance for Workers Justice cited a state Supreme Court ruling and determinations from the state Department of Labor. It notes that five other companies run by the applicant also were barred from working in the state, including Kingston Trucking and Rigging and Port Ewen Trucking.
The union told agency officials that a 2013 class action case by “70 employees of Auringer companies were party to a class action lawsuit for unpaid minimum wage and overtime against five Auringer companies.” They said that case was settled, as was a 2008 case with similar complaints against three related companies.
Another complaint raised against Auringer is that he allegedly failed to list four companies on the county application even though he “personally signed the settlement agreement for each company acknowledging his primary responsibility for each company.”
Auringer is seeking to buy cranes that cost between $695,000 and $3.1 million and have a telescopic reach of between 98 feet and 229 feet, with the ability to lift up to 350 tons.
Mike Ham, a representative of International Union of Operating Engineers Local 825, said providing the tax breaks would be “subsidizing with a tax abatement” and be unfair to competing companies such as Costanzi Construction.
Auringer responded that Costanzi would not be able to “facilitate the volume business that I do. Even if they had the same high-technology cranes that I have, they would have to triple their fleet.”
From an audience of about 35 people, some 25 spoke at the hearing, many saying they live in the New York City area. It appeared there were slightly more people attending who worked for Auringer than there were union representatives.
Following the meeting, Auringer referred questions about the cases to 2-4 Kieffer Lane LLC attorney Timothy McColgan, who called the information “fake news” and said the agency board has agreed to meet in a closeddoor meeting to discuss the legal cases. He said the cases could not be discussed in public but that the lawsuits were settled to keep legal costs from rising and not as an admission of improper practices.
“Not only were the cases settled, the cases were settled tremendously in our favor,” he said. “Each and every plaintiff signed a confidentiality agreement; each and every plaintiff signed off on our companies not assuming any liability.”
Auringer said the unions have been harassing his efforts to build a business.
“These guys from New York have been chasing me for 25 [to] 30 years, trying to shake me down, call up on every little thing trying to make money and ... stop the people from working,” he said.
Auringer contends having the business at 2-4 Kieffer Lane, off U.S. Route 9W, is part of an effort to create jobs in the community he grew up in.
“We’re local guys,” he said. “We were born and raised in Kingston. I went to Anna Devine [Elementary School], I went to MJM (Myron J. Michael School) in Kingston . ... I come back up here after [15] years in the city, and I bought Miron Lumber in a bankruptcy ... and we built the concrete plant, and then we created all these ... jobs, and we’re going to double it.”