Guest MINDSETTER™ Kenney: Elorza & Pare - Make ‘em an Offer They Can’t Refuse
Saturday, April 29, 2017
In accordance with their elected and appointed duties, Jorge Elooza and Stephen Pare respectively, seem to have taken a chapter directly out of the mafia’s extortion playbook. These guys are so good at this approach to doing business that to most of the state their shady dealings never make the radar. For the sake of transparency and good, ethical government this needs to change.
Mayor Elorza’s administration has been dealing with a mass exodus of city employees ranging from his administration’s COO, department heads and many of his political appointees for a number of reported, and some not reported, reasons in a shockingly rapid manner. Some have been exposed as having received a special deal in severance or compensation. Many have not been reported. Thus is the way of doing ordinary business with this administration.
In a shockingly similar manner Commissioner Pare uses these same extortion-like deals to rid his Public Safety Department of those employees he has personal issues with. He wields his power like a saber as he threatens to take away the hard earned pensions of those who find themselves in his office on a disciplinary matter, most times a fairly minor first offense. He regularly crafts deals with these individuals to circumvent the collective bargaining agreements of their respective unions, signing away their contractual rights.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLASTIf the individual signs the agreement he allows them to walk away and file for retirement. If they refuse to do so he promises to fire them and strip them of their pension. While this might seem like an idle threat to someone who has had a spotless record for over 30 years service and a single minor infraction the commissioner will undoubtedly attempt to do just that. The member, with the backing of his/her union, would almost certainly prevail after a lengthy fight in the court system. This, however, is exactly the problem. These members would be fired from their jobs, even if only during the judicial process, with no income during this entire time. Most members simply cannot afford this process even if the outcome is almost certainly going to be in their favor…and he knows it.
In the past couple of years he has done just this to at least 3 Fire Captains of which I am aware (sometimes these things are secret deals that no one ever talks about). Two had over 30 years service with no previous infractions in their personnel file and the other with 25 years of spotless service. He, Pare, has had many firefighters and officers sign away their union rights in deals that have stripped them of their rank, forced them off promotional lists and forcing them out of their rightful positions on the department. This has become an ordinary occurrence on the PFD.
Mr. Pare has also engaged, as Mayor Elorza has, in using promotions and raises as payoffs for employees who they believe will act in the manner in which they (Pare & Elorza) approve. At least three Battalion Chiefs have been promoted to the highest office of the department, Chief of Department, under this Commissioner who the commissioner believed would be a rubber stamp for his decisions. When these men made it clear that there were lines they would not cross they were unceremoniously told to retire. I have absolutely no idea what type of threat Pare used to force them out but I am sure that they didn’t want to leave when they did.
Recently a Providence Police Officer with over 20 years of faithful and spotless service on the job made a politically incorrect mistake at call and was called to the Commissioner’s office for reprimand. He was told what the Commissioner expected him to do as a punishment. I don’t have the details but it was not a punishment that would normally be handed down under union contract. Once again Pare attempted to coerce a member to a written agreement outside the context of the CBA under threat of stripping this member of his pension. The officer refused and, instead, chose to file for the pension and walk away from the department.
For two meetings in a row of the City’s Retirement Board Commissioner Pare went before the board requesting that this officer’s pension be denied. The members of the board criticized the commissioner for attempting to strip this employee of his pension for such a minor incident after twenty-some spotless years service and reminded him that he had offered to allow this member to remain as a member of the Providence Police Department if he went along with Pare’s original punishment. The board saw right through his personal attempted abuse of power and denied his request to stop the pension.
In the situation of Captain Joe Fontaine being denied a rightfully earned promotion to Battalion Chief on the PFD which I wrote about earlier here on GoLocalProv, Commissioner Pare took it on himself to attempt to cut deals with two captains taking the test. Both deals were outside the realm of what is the covered rules and regulations of the PFD or the context of the union CBA. One captain signed away his rights and was allowed to take the test and be sworn in as Chief right away. He agreed, however, to voluntarily retire (sound familiar) the very next day with no compensation for this rank. This captain is going to do just that come this Friday.
The other captain, Joe Fontaine, signed no deal with Pare. He took the test because there was nothing in the rules and regulations that prohibited this and passed it high enough to be sworn in right away with the first group from the list – this Friday. Not surprisingly, since Capt. Fontaine didn’t play ball with him, the commissioner had Joe’s name dropped from the list.
This is all in the name of business as usual in the Elorza Administration and the Stephen Pare commanded Public Safety Department.
Sound like it’s transparent and ethical?
Tom Kenney
Captain, PFD – Retired
Author of “Working Class Hero: Memoirs of a Providence Fireman”
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