Lower MUA Board Votes to Abolish Positions

VILLAS – Lower Township Municipal Utilities Authority (MUA) Board of Commissioners voted unanimously at a special meeting Friday Oct. 16 to abolish the jobs of two employees.
MUA employees Kathy Armbruster and Dawn Cottrell were given 90 days notice their positions were being “abolished,” and Friday’s meeting sealed the deal.
Earlier in the week, Wayne Weismann resigned from the Board of Commissioners.
Commissioner Thomas Brown left before the meeting started. The votes to abolish the positions were cast by Chairman Pete Bitting and Commissioners Ed Butler and Nels Johnson.
On Oct. 7, a standing room only crowd of MUA employees, family members and United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union bosses and members filled the authority’s meeting room protesting a proposal to abolish the position of two long time employees. No decision was rendered and a special meeting was scheduled for a Friday night.
At issue, the MUA is creating a new position of chief financial officer (CFO). MUA employees 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.
At the Oct. 7 meeting, DeMarcantonio said a CFO would be a certified public accountant and a certified municipal financial officer. He said MUA has a $9 million budget.
DeMarcantonio said the budget was getting to be more than in-house staff can handle.
A standing room only crowd also attended the Oct. 16 meeting. Before the vote, Kathy Armbruster said she has worked at MUA since she was 18 years old and is now 49 years old, not yet at retirement age. She said her work record was excellent.
Armbruster questioned DeMarcantonio’s claim that abolishing the two positions would save ratepayers money. She said the rates are being raised and two employees were promoted and the MUA is paying two attorneys when it previously used one.
Armbruster said she has been working in a hostile environment where she faced harassment. She said she was not informed that her position was being abolished by either the executive director or office supervisor.
Lower Township Councilman Glenn Douglass asked if there was the possibility to share the Township’s CFO with the MUA. He said he was opposed to the layoffs and suggested the two women be placed in other positions at the MUA.
In a written statement, Dawn Cottrell said there was no possibility that a CFO could do the work of the two women. She said she believed the layoffs were for “personal reasons.”
Cottrell said Armbruster was being punished for bringing in a labor union.
Claire Galiano, vice president/director of the professional division of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 152, participated in part of the 90 minute closed session.
MUA Conflict Attorney Jeffrey Barnes offered a statement that confused the audience. He said MUA would continue to negotiate with the union pertaining to any type of alternatives to save one or two positions and to find other types of savings beneficial to MUA and its ratepayers.
Barnes said MUA would proceed with the abolishment of the positions but with the understanding will continue to negotiate with union representatives.
Robert Fothergill, former executive director of Lower Township MUA, said he has offered to undertake the CFO position at no cost to the MUA. He said he served as executive director of the MUA for 10 years and during one of those years, was also Township Manager.