Scott Stringer says his government experience makes him best suited for the job of New York City comptroller, an office that oversees the city’s bond program and pension funds and conducts city audits.
“You audit city agencies, you investigate, but you also make sure that you’re making government work better. And that’s why it’s so important to have government experience in this job, because you have to understand the agencies and the bureaucracy,” Stringer said during an interview in The Bond Buyer’s newsroom.
“You can’t just be an auditor but you have to be an auditor that understands government,” he said. “And that’s why my 21 years in government is so important.”
Stringer, the Manhattan borough president since 2006 and before that a 13-year state assemblyman representing the Upper West Side, overcame a huge polling deficit during the Democratic primary to beat former Gov. Eliot Spitzer, 52% to 48%. The race was tabloid-intensive, given the political comeback attempt by Spitzer, who resigned as governor in 2008 amid a prostitution scandal.
“It was crazy,” said Stringer, shaking his head. “It was a unique situation, given who was running. But we were able to make a case for why my record was better situated for this job. Editorial board support was very compelling.”
On Nov. 5, Stringer, 53, will face Republican John Burnett in the general election. Burnett, in his first try for public office, has touted his 23 years of experience on Wall Street. Democrats, who have controlled the office since 1946, outnumber Republicans six to one citywide.
Green Party candidate Julia Willebrand and Libertarian Hesham El-Meligy are also running. Incumbent Democrat John Liu vacated the office to run, unsuccessfully, in the mayoral primary.
The comptroller oversees a 750-person agency, monitors the city’s $76 billion budget and safeguards five municipal pension funds valued at about $140 billion that affect about 650,000 people.
“The portfolio is vast and large,” Stringer said. “We have to make sure we have a strong audit function in the office because with a new government and new agency heads [coming in], it’s important that the comptroller continues to be the person who roots out waste and fraud, saving money so we can invest in schools, day-care centers, quality of life more police officers.”
The race for mayor between Democrat Bill de Blasio and Republican Joe Lhota is open-seat, with term-limits preventing 12-year Mayor Michael Bloomberg from running again.
Liu endorsed Stringer, who in turn praised the current comptroller. “I think John Liu’s audit bureau was very extraordinary, especially for the work he did on CityTime. I don’t think he got enough credit.”
Two weeks ago, the trial began in Manhattan Federal Court for three men accused of stealing tens of millions of dollars from the city while building the CityTime payroll modernization project, which ballooned to a $700 million cost from an originally estimated $63 million. Liu, a month after taking office in 2010, rejected additional contracts related to CityTime and initiated an audit.
Last year, consulting firm Science Applications International Inc. agreed to pay the city $500 million to settle the city’s claims against it.
“You have to have two skill sets,’ Stringer said of the comptroller’s job. “On the one hand you have to work with the mayor, you have to go to the rating agencies to speak to the city’s four-year financial plan. And at the same time you’re working with the mayor, going to the agencies, marketing bonds with the [Office of Management and Budget] and the mayor, you also have to be independent.
“You have to have a real sense of how you can tell City Hall when they’re going off in the wrong direction, that we have to rein them in and we have to hold agencies accountable.”
Moody’s Investors Service rates the city’s general obligation bonds Aa2, while Fitch Ratings and Standard & Poor’s assign AA ratings.
Stringer grew up in Manhattan’s Washington Heights neighborhood and while in high school became the youngest member to serve on a community board, a district-based citizen advisory council whose members the borough president appoints.
He is a distant cousin of the late Bella Abzug, the combative feminist and antiwar activist who served three terms in Congress. Stringer fondly recalls working for Abzug during her first election, in 1970.
“She was really smart, and a great activist. Some would say she was uber-liberal and in-your-face, but U.S. News and World Report named her the third-most effective politician. She knew how to bring home the bacon,” he said.
Stringer, who graduated from John Jay College of Criminal Justice, was a protégé of now-Congressman Jerry Nadler, serving a legislative assistant to Nadler when he was a state assemblyman. When Nadler succeeded the deceased Ted Weiss in Congress, Stringer won election to Nadler’s seat.
“Jerry Nadler was a tremendous mentor. He taught me to be honest and stand firm without showboating. I learned the real value of hard work from him.”
As borough president, Stringer oversaw a policy unit that issued 50 reports over nearly eight years, calling out city agencies for waste, notably the New York City Housing Agency for a plethora of broken elevators in projects and the Department of Education for spending $900 million in outside consultant contracts, “money that should be better spent in the classrooms.”
Stringer wants to reduce expensive Wall Street fees by building out the comptroller’s asset-management unit in-house. The New York City Pension Funds are the sixth-largest institutional investors in the United States and 14th largest worldwide.
“We’re spending some $400 million a year for outside money managers and consultants. That’s way too much money,” he said.
Stringer also favors taking steps to consolidate the five pension funds, a major talking point for Burnett. But Stringer said negotiating is essential.
“I think I can work with these trustees to come up with a common agenda,” he said. “John Liu and Mike Bloomberg thought about doing pension consolidation but we have to consult with all the trustees. You can’t just walk in as comptroller, put your hand on the table or put your fist down and say This will be so.’ You have to have a skill set to work with people.”
Stringer also wants to establish a special Hurricane Sandy audit bureau to oversee an estimated $15 billion in Washington money for reimbursement to the killer storm that struck New York one year ago. “This is a huge amount of money, and we should have special focus on where that money is going, so we don’t have another Katrina after the fact.”
Scams and bureaucratic mismanagement associated with Hurricane Katrina, which struck the Gulf Coast in 2005, cost taxpayers up to $2 billion, according to estimates.
“Lessons learned from Katrina underscore the importance of the oversight function,” said a report the Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Task Force issued in August at President Obama’s behest. U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan chairs the committee.
A federal Government Accountability Office report issued in 2007 said inadequate oversight on contracts in several housing programs may have led to billions of dollars in fraudulent charges by contractors.
“It’s not just the Sandy audit, but how we look at contracts, how we could create the audit function of the office,” said Stringer. “Part of the audit to me is not just to play gotcha’ or to get your name in the paper. Part of the audit function is to change policy, make the bureaucracy better, and where you find fraud you certainly refer to the appropriate parties.”
Stringer was noncommittal on whether city employees should receive retroactive back pay. Unions have been working on expired contracts for three to five years.
“I believe for the new mayor everything should be on the table. This is of the defining issues that will face the mayor,” he said. “The mayor and the comptroller, we have to go to the rating agencies, Fitch, S&P and Moody’s.
“We have to make a case for the city’s four-year financial plan and there’s no doubt in my mind that those rating agencies are going to say where are these labor contracts?’ How can you plan and forecast a budget if you can’t get that whole? So I believe this is incredibly important for labor, for our workers and for our city.”
