PATERSON — Seven city employees owed Paterson about $2,200 for Atlantic City hotel bills from the League of Municipalities conventions in 2019 and 2018, according to public records.
Three of the employees settled their debts with the city on Tuesday morning after Paterson Press contacted them about the delinquent payments.
“We’ve been in a pandemic,” said Danny Inoa, a supervisor in the Paterson recreation division, when asked about the $381 he owed the city for three nights at the Tropicana Casino Resort Hotel in November 2019.
“I’m not trying to get over, not at all,” added Inoa, who paid the city within a couple of hours of being interviewed by a reporter.
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Business administrator Kathleen Long said the city clerk’s office has worked diligently to collect the payments. “For all of these employees, we are providing them with a final payment date deadline of October 16, and if not paid by then, it will be deducted from their October 30 check,” Long said.
After reporting that three current and former council members owed the city for Atlantic City convention hotel bills, Paterson Press obtained additional documents about employees who were in arrears.
Crainysha Rutherford, an assistant recreation supervisor, owed the largest amount, $477, for three nights at the Tropicana. She did not respond to a message seeking her comments for this story. Another employee in the recreation division, Tamika Wiggins, a clerk stenographer, owed $318 for two nights at the Tropicana.
Wiggins questioned whether the money owed by city workers was newsworthy, brushing aside the information as “gossip.” Wiggins declined to say why she hadn’t paid her hotel bill from last November, but noted that city employees must settled their debts prior to the next convention if they plan to attend.
Chief sanitation inspector Octavio Aguilar was the only one among the seven whose bill dated back to the 2018 convention. Aguilar said during a phone interview that he never used the room at the Tropicana that the city had reserved for him that year, and instead stayed at a hotel nearby using a “comp,” or free room, that he said was provided by a friend of his who frequents Atlantic City. The records say he owes the city $366 for three nights.
“I don’t mind paying for one night,” Aguilar said. “But I object to paying for three nights.”
The other two employees who paid off their hotel room debts after being contacted by a reporter were health and human services director Oshin Castillo and cultural affairs director Marcia Sotorrio, both of whom owed $254.
Castillo said she recalled getting notified by the city clerk’s office about the delinquent payment shortly before the COVID-19 crisis started. “I just lost track,” she said, noting that she has been busy with Paterson coronavirus response efforts.
Paterson’s recycling coordinator, Juan Hernandez, had the smallest hotel room balance — $181. City records show Hernandez had owed $381 for three nights at the Tropicana, but paid $200 of that total on March 6.
About 10 years ago, the city picked up all expenses for council members and employees who attended the annual convention, including meals, gasoline and multiple nights at the host hotel. In fact, one year, taxpayers picked up the tab for then-Mayor Jeffery Jones' $1,200 suite.
But about eight years ago, fiscal monitors from the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs cracked down, so that the city could cover the hotel cost for only one night's stay in Atlantic City. Eventually, the state decided that the city could pay only officials' registration fees for the convention and that the attendees would have to cover all other costs themselves.
The organization plans to hold a virtual convention in November 2020 because of COVID-19.
Joe Malinconico is editor of Paterson Press. Email: editor@patersonpress.com
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