Laid Off Lower MUA Employees Question New Hiring

VILLAS — Lower Township Municipal Utilities Authority (MUA) Board of Commissioners approved the hiring of two laborers which was immediately criticized by members of the public after two long time employees had their jobs abolished late last year as a cost saving measure.
MUA Commissioners voted unanimously at a special meeting Oct. 16 to abolish the jobs of employees Kathy Armbruster and Dawn Cottrell.
Rancor has ensued at MUA meetings for the past four months. At issue, the MUA created a new position of chief financial officer (CFO). MUA employees have accused MUA Executive Director Mike DeMarcantonio of eliminating two office positions to fund the $75,000 to $90,000 salary range for the new CFO position.
Cynthia Oster was hired for that position.
At a Feb. 3 meeting, newly appointed MUA Commissioner Kenn Mann cast the only no vote to hire two laborers. MUA Commissioner Thomas Brown said two part time MUA laborers were being upgraded to full time.
Cottrell questioned the lay off of herself and Armbruster and the hiring of two laborers and two engineering firms.
“How is that efficient, how are you saving any money?” Cottrell asked.
Newly appointed Board Chairman Nels Johnson said one of the engineering firms was finishing a project that it had begun.
On the topic of the two employees laid off and the two hired, he said there was a “significant difference.” Johnson said MUA needed workers “out in the street.”
Cottrell asked if Oster was a Certified Financial Officer. Johnson said she was a Certified Public Accountant.
Cottrell commented that Oster was not a Certified Financial Officer. She asked if Oster was a Qualified Purchasing Agent (QPA). Johnson said Oster was not a QPA.
“When you laid Dawn and I off, I thought it was to hire a Certified Financial Officer that was going to do both jobs,” said Armbruster.
Johnson said an employee had the right to fill a job and have time to get training to finish their education.
Armbruster said MUA already paid to train one QPA, Dawn Cottrell.
MUA Executive Director Mike DeMarcantonio said it took Cottrell five or six years to become a QPA and Oster would accomplish it in six months.
“But you already paid someone to get the QPA” said Armbruster.
Claire Galiano, director of the professional division of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 152, said the two jobs were abolished based on efficiencies in operations and economic reasons.
“Now under the guise of abolishing those positions and hiring a Certified Municipal Financial Officer, you have a financial officer/CPA, so I think this board was duplicitous in their actions and perhaps maybe misfed information and based a decision to put two people out of work in these economic times based on misinformation and half-truths,” she said.
MUA held its annual reorganization appointing Johnson was chairman, Brown as vice chairman, Pete Bitting as treasurer and Joseph Mento as assistant treasurer.