To the Editor:
I must disagree with former Supervisor Charles Shoemaker who recently asserted that “[t]here is no crisis in Kennett Township.” I assert that there is a critical crisis of credibility, performance, transparency and integrity, by the current Supervisors. While it is true that I have been provided some of the documentation that I requested, the guts of it has been denied me. It is in the individual transactions, and not the bucket accumulations, that the truth is found. I am not interested in the personal information of the employees, all of which can easily be redacted by the Township.
Both the elected auditors and the allegedly professional accountant urged the Supervisors to use segregated accounts but the Supervisors continue to refuse to do this. I want to know how much money the Supervisors siphoned off to themselves under the pretext of “health care reimbursements”, an act that is in clear violation of the law. At $10,000.00 a year, did it go on for more than the 4 years we know of, is it still going on, and was any of that money paid back? The Supervisors won’t divulge that information.
I want to know how much money has been taken in for open space use and where it is deposited. It certainly hasn’t been used in the community since early 2008. Currently the Township bank coffers have 11.4 million dollars stashed away. How much of that is for open space? And why do we need to pay the highest taxes in the area when we run a surplus every year in the hundreds of thousands of dollars (one year recently, over one million dollars)? This hardly reflects “a balanced budget.”
The elected auditors urged, in 2003, that the Supervisors use professional accountants to perform the annual audit. 97 residents petitioned the Supervisors to use professional auditors in 2007. Finally, in 2009, the Supervisors allegedly did so. The process was fatally flawed, failing to follow the State statute requirements.
At the Board of Supervisors’ meeting, held on Oct. 17th, Mr. Falcoff admitted that he “doesn’t know what the State requires for a Township audit”, and “doesn’t know whether the credentials were checked.” Incredibly, in reference to the audits for 2009 and 2010 produced by the allegedly professional accountant, Mr. Falcoff acknowledged that he “doesn’t know why it was accepted since it was not signed.” The fact is that they were not signed, the company that produced them does not exist, and the allegedly professional accountant does not exist as a registered accountant in the states of PA or DE, all of which is required by law. Everything about these two documents, and the circumstances underlying their creation, shouts out “sham” and “fraud.”
The Supervisors could exercise transparency by making the financial information of the Township available for viewing on its website, as do others. Rather than inform the residents, they prefer to suppress this information, at the price of $20,000.00, to date, fighting my Right-To-Know requests. And when they lost this fight over the financial database, they chose to appeal to the Courts of Common Pleas to stop the disclosure before the election on November 8th, further wasting the funds of the Township in an effort to hide their financial dealings.
No, Mr. Shoemaker, I disagree with you. Kennett Township is in a momentous crisis. I call on the voters to turn out and help to correct this crisis by voting for me as Supervisor.
Scudder G. Stevens
Candidate,
Township Supervisor,
Kennett Township.
The accusations by Brian Gore (Our town Manager/Treasurers boy friend) are laughable and show the desperation of the Falcoff campaign. So funny how Falcoff can try to use the accomplishments of the DuPont Company to give him credibility but in the same breath try to say the family eases land for self-serving purposes. It is common knowledge that the Dupont family is one of the most generous families in the area. Giving millions to area schools, YMCA’s and almost every cause in the area…..how self serving!! Kate duPont is following in the families tradition of philanthropy by giving 100′s of hours of her time and 1000′s of dollars so that EVERYONE can have the opportunity to enjoy open space.
Have any of you been on eased land on Mike Elling’s, Allan Falcoff’s or Tom Nales property? All three current supervisors received over $100,000.00 in compensation for the eased land in their back yards which is used ONLY by them…..The two preserves near our home are used by hundreds every week and are maintained by volunteers including Kate and I. We have no regrets supporting the Land Conservancy and will continue to donate our money and time no matter who is supervisor in Kennett…..because it is the right thing to do for Kennett community. We have received $0 in compensation.
I find it very interesting that 2 out of 3 local newspapers REFUSED to run Brian Gores and Allan Facoffs latest add. When asked why they refused to run the add they said ” It was obvious the statements were false and with absolutely no merit” When Randy Lieberman owner of the Chester County Press was asked why he ran an obvious false advertisement he response was ” THIS IS HOW WE MAKE OUR MONEY” enough said….The paper is usually very unbiased so the fact that he took the advertisement just for the money was very surprising.
Helping to preserve land for EVERYONE and very proud of it !!
Alfred duPont
Allan Falcroff has tried to lie about Kate DuPont saying she made the supervisors buy land around her home so that her property values would increase….Is that really what a Republican wants? High property values so that they can be taxed more. Still not sure how a volunteer with the Kennett land Trust could demand the supervisors buy land around her home. The land Trust has absolutely no control over the “purse strings” in Kennett, the money only goes where the Supervisors want it to go. Mrs DuPont must have some serious DIRT on the supervisors to get them to buy a few million dollars of property for her benefit! I can’t wait to find out what it is! Looks like the paper is doing a fantastic job uncovering the truth without Mrs. DuPonts help! This was a desperate attempt by Falcroff to divert attention and try to sway the people who do have the facts. You are the fringe of the real Republican Party…..the very few who believe that republicans can do no wrong…..how ignorant
And I heard the Easter Bunny did a leveraged buyout of Santa, too. In fact, I have it on good authority, it was on TEH Inturwebs, that the Easter Bunny and Obama are working to create a Socialist One-World Government, so they can, in turn, turn it over to the Romulans and Klingons and enslave us all! Really! It’s true…there’s even a group on The Face Book about it.
You’re talking about lawn signs and the other side is talking about broken laws, faked audits, and lots of missing cash.
Is that really the best you can do? If half of what Stevens and his crew suggests is true, forget the election, Falcoff, Moore and co. better hope they have “winter” homes in a country without extradition. On the bright side, I hear $3 million really goes far in some of those countries.:)
Actually you are proving your ignorance once again….If you look around you can find Scudder signs on the majority of the Republican homes in Kennett. A real republican votes on the issues not just with a party. You give the real republicans in Kennett a bad name. Republican proud of it and VOTING for SCUDDER STEVENS!
Is this information from the phantom auditor? The Republicans in the area are embarrassed to have Falcoff representing us. Don’t be fooled the only smart choice is Scudder Stevens.
I heard that Kennett Republicans have had to remove Scudder signs from Republicans’ properties where no permission was given to put them. Then the Scudder Campaign claims that their signs are being stolen! In addition I heard that Mr. Yetter had someone arrested for removing a Scudder sign from a fellow Republican’s property.
Is this the kind of integrity and honesty we can expect from Scudder Stevens as Supervisor?
Chester County Republican….you give Republicans a bad name. Even with all of the hard facts you stick your head in the sand and use hearsay to back up your claims. As a Republican, I am voting for Scudder Stevens. This is not a Republican/Democrat issue. It’s about the truth. Scudder Stevens has the truth/facts on his side. You are relying on a financial report on the township website….really??? Knowledge is power….get the facts!
Danby lumber yard does not support Scudder and I do have the facts and so does the State Police. I do not believe for one second that you are anything but a pawn of the Kennett Area Democrats, even if you are a registered Republican.
Yes you are correct! You might be slightly more observant than your post suggest. Yes I am a registered Republican! Yes I support the Democrat party in this election. I have always said that I VOTE ON THE FACTS and NOT with a party. People like you give us the opportunity to prove it !!! You make us fellow Republicans look ignorant by sticking with a party instead of the Truth. Luckily you are in the extreme minority.
Danby lumber?? Aren’t they neighbors to Tom Nale and Lisa Moore. No pressure there……State Police?? Oh thats right our Supervisor Appointed Police Chief can’t drive after his HIT AND RUN incident. Why was he in such a rush to leave the seen before the State Police arrived???
I can hear the desperation in each post….keep going.
You can find the financial report on the kennett website:
http://www.kennett.pa.us/documents/comprehensiveFinancialReport2010.pdf