DE BLASIO’S $184G BOZOS
Housing bigs axed, demoted over lead-paint scandal
2 OUT, 1 DEMOTED AFTER NYCHA LEAD SNAFU
THE CITY Housing Authority late Friday forced the resignations of two top managers and demoted a third — all making between $148,000 and $184,000 a year — who were at the heart of the growing lead-paint inspection scandal.
NYCHA Chairwoman Shola Olatoye announced the shakeup in response to a city Department of Investigation report released Tuesday that found NYCHA had falsely certified that they completed required inspections for lead paint.
The explosive charges triggered calls for Olatoye to resign and a request for Gov. Cuomo to intervene. Mayor de Blasio called the failures “unacceptable” but has backed Olatoye all the way.
The DOI found that several “senior managers” were aware that NYCHA was not in compliance with lead inspection requirements as far back as early 2015, and said nothing when NYCHA certified to the federal government that they were.
The three managers involved in Friday’s shakeup were all part of NYCHA’s effort to bring the authority into compliance — an effort triggered by a federal investigation into the Housing Authority’s practices.
Two of the three were among the highest paid managers at NYCHA: Brian Clarke, a $184,782-a-year senior vice president for operations, and Luis Ponce, another senior vice president who makes $184,609 a year.
Clarke resigned and Ponce was suspended without pay for 30 days and demoted to a $88,499-a-year job as a building superintendent.
During the DOI investigation, Ponce told investigators that he was aware early on that NYCHA was not in compliance with the lead-inspection requirements, a source familiar with the investigation told the Daily News.
The DOI report doesn’t name Ponce, but a source confirmed that it was Ponce who told investigators he was ready to sing like a canary.
“If asked, he would have answered that NYCHA was not in compliance with applicable lead laws — but he was never asked,” the DOI report read.
A third executive, Jay Krantz, the $148,000-a-year director of technical services, also resigned.
NYCHA General Manager Michael Kelly was also implicated in the DOI report as knowing the agency was in noncompliance while falsely certifying that it was. He managed to keep his $216,429-a-year job.
“Our residents deserve better and we will continue to implement changes at every level of the authority,” Olatoye said.
The “sweeping changes” include hiring a new chief compliance officer who will report directly to the chair and make sure NYCHA follows all city, state and federal laws and regulations.
The DOI report found that for years NYCHA was in violation of Local Law 1, which requires landlords to annually inspect apartments suspected of containing lead paint that house children 6 and under.
NYCHA had also been violating a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) regulation requiring annual inspections of all lead-paint apartments, with or without children. Councilman Ritchie Torres, chair of the public-housing committee, questioned NYCHA’s choice to keep the oversight inhouse. Since DOI’s report was released, he has been pushing for an independent monitor. “Calling these changes ‘sweeping’ hardly makes them so,” he said. “An internal compliance department is no substitute for an independent monitor. NYCHA’s failure to recognize the need for third-party accountability will only deepen the damage to its credibility.”