The following letter came to us via email.
Speaking of corruption, it is interesting to see how corruption affects other personnel that work in NYCHA...as in trickle down economics. I have witnessed Mike (the thing that wouldn't go away) Mastriano, the Supervisor of Electricians for ManhattManhattan South, steal money from Housing as his superiors at Manhattan District turn the other way.
For example, Skilled Trades personnel make moves with their privately owned vehicles. At the end of every month the drivers of their vehicles fill out move sheets. The skilled trades personnel get back $7.50 each day and tolls are reimbursed if a receipt is presented. Mike Mastriano has himself chauffeured around town by the employees he is supposed to be supervising. He has a car but doesn't use it. That's fine. He's being frugal, as the reimbursement does not cover the expense of using your own vehicle. However, he still fills out a move sheet every month and submits the fraudulent figures and accepts the NYCHA check for his phony "moves." That is blatantly stealing money from Housing!
Let's look at Mike Mastriano in a different scenario. Often, overtime is necessary to complete a job.
The Skilled Trades person handling the job calls Mike Mastriano to apply for the overtime. Mastriano wants the overtime for himself. So without asking to see if any of the other personnel want to perform the overtime, Mike decides to take it for himself. His excuse is that no one else wanted it.
But if one checks around the following day, one finds that other than the original person who reported on the need for overtime, none of Mr. Mastriano's other employees were offered the opportunity.
Times when Mastriano does show up to share the overtime with his men, he'll sit in the maintenance shop and read his stock reports and make phone calls to his broker as his men are in the field producing for Housing.
Realize that when Mastriano "captures" the overtime that should be performed by a Skilled Trades electrician he costs NYCHA more $, as his overtime is computed at his own salary rate. Of course, that rate costs NYCHA more dollars than needed. And although those above Mastriano at Manhattan District are aware of this Housing rip-off, they do absolutely nothing about it. What does this tell you about the level of corruption that exists in NYC Public Housing today? It tells us in the field that corruption, both big and small, permeates Housing.
Where is the example in all of this for the rest of us? Do we follow in the supervisor's footsteps, or do we take action to stamp out corruption no matter how petty it is? These acts of corruption, no matter how small, jeopardize our jobs. In a time when HUD wants to cut funding because of waste, why give them another reason.
Mastriano often talks of being a team player. My question is: what or whose team is he talking about?
Night Moves!
The employees that enter the fire trap at 90 Church may soon have even less room in which to move around. (If you don't understand us calling 90 Church a fire trap, speak with any of the employees there about the recent fire drills. I'm told that Hollywood couldn't create such a 3 ring circus!)
According to one of our sources, NYCHA was served with eviction papers at Bush Terminal yesterday . As the $100,000,000 Long Island City warehouse is still structurally unable to hold the weight of our people and materials, NYCHA will need to come up with another scheme for now.
Large scale Federal
Corruption Investigation?
Shh!
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