Bloomberg: The Wizard Of Accountability

Charges are being leveled at the Mayor of Accountability over the CityTime payroll project scandal that saw crooks steal $80 million dollars from the city.

Bloomberg has suspended Payroll Administration Director Joel Bondy (seen above living the life of Hemingway on the high seas) without pay.

But he hasn't admitted to any mistakes himself.

Of course Bloomberg never admits to any mistakes, so this shouldn't surprise.

But Bloomberg's fingerprints are all over this scandal - he urged City Controller John Liu to agree to a contract extension for the CityTime consultants just this September, saying he would delay paying city employees if the extension was not granted.

Again, I ask - why was the mayor so adamant about throwing more dollars at the CityTime project long after it became clear there was something amiss with it and why didn't he have more oversight of Joel Bondy?

Others are asking the same:

Critics said Bloomberg shares the blame for not cracking down earlier on CityTime, despite a year of revelations in The News that its budget had ballooned to 10 times its original size, with hundreds of contractors earning an average $400,000 a year.

"To the mayor of the City of New York, who basically said that he wanted a third term because he was a wizard, well, where is your wizardry, Mr. Mayor?" asked Brooklyn Councilwoman Letitia James, who grilled Bondy about CityTime at a hearing a year ago.

"Joel Bondy was part of the problem. He's related to a number of individuals who have been arrested," James said. "He has been friends with them, and in fact, previously worked with them in another administration. Joel Bondy needs to be arrested."

Joel Bondy DOES need to be arrested.

And given the criminal lack of oversight the mayor exhibited over Bondy and the CityTime payroll project, the mayor ought to at least acknowledge he isn't so much of an accountability wizard after all.

But in addition to that, the City Council, the City Controller and the Public Advocate all need to hold investigations into this scandal to see how it happened, why it happened and why Bloomberg didn't do anything about it even though it was obvious something was wrong.

And at the end of the investigations, we may discover that just as Dorothy found a little old man who was full of shit behind the curtain in the Great City of Oz, investigators may find that the Great Wizard of Accountability is just an arrogant, clueless old man who allows his deputies and political allies to run wild.

Remember, this isn't the first time this year Bloomberg has had money stolen from either him or the city.