CityTime Scandal Widens To DOE

There is a NYCDOE connection the CityTime payroll project scandal that saw six people arrested, four of whom were on the city payroll as consultants, for stealing $80 million dollars from the city.

The Daily News has the story:

On Wednesday, prosecutors charged consultants Mark Mazer, Scott Berger and four others with running a scheme to rip off millions in kickbacks and overcharges on CityTime, which was supposed to computerize paper payroll records to eliminate fraud and waste.

Mazer had free rein under Bondy, the feds claim, and used it to hire companies run by conspirators Dimitry Aronshtein and Victor Natanzon - who billed the city $76 million and kicked back one-third to Mazer.

Mazer's lawyer, Gerald Shargel, said his client denies wrongdoing. "He's a talented and hardworking computer programmer who enjoys a very close and decent family life," Shargel said.

...

The Department of Education also launched a probe into a Woodside, Queens, preschool owned by Mazer's wife, Svetlana, who was charged with money laundering.

The agency has paid ABC Preschool to provide prekindergarten classes since 2005. The city has paid ABC $237,126 since Jan. 1.

Svetlana Mazer declined to comment as parents brought children to the preschool.

You can be sure that the DOE is awash in scandal as well.

There have been many no-bid contracts handed out, lots of money exchanging hands down there at Tweed, and as we learned yesterday, Chancellor Klein was not exactly the brightest manager of the agency.

How much would you like to bet that some of the "consultants" hired by Tweed were stealing money from the city just the way the consultants hired by Director of Payroll Administration Joel Bondy were stealing money from the city as part of the CityTime project?

Given the blatant stealing that was going on as part of the CityTime project, and given that Bloomberg did NOTHING about it despite critics like John Liu and Leticia James telling him he ought to be doing something about it, I think ALL city consulting business needs to be looked at closely so we can see just how Bloomberg is spending the taxpayer dime

This especially needs to be done BEFORE the Mayor of Accountability announces layoffs.

The $80 million dollars stolen by the CityTime crooks right under Bloomberg's nose would keep a lot of teachers in classrooms, wouldn't it?