BUFFALO, N.Y. — 2 On Your Side has confirmed that the county received a complaint alleging that the County Executive Mark Poloncarz used his influence to direct funds to the Centro Culturale Italiano di Buffalo (CCI).
The complaint was filed one day after County Executive Poloncarz was named in a domestic violence incident report filed by the Buffalo Police.
2 On Your Side has also confirmed that the person who filed the ethics complaint also filed the police report.
The complaint alleges that County Executive Poloncarz maintained a personal relationship with a staff member at the Italian Cultural Center. According to the allegations, Poloncarz and this staff member had been seeing each other since early 2022. The complaint goes on to say that the County Executive lived a "double life" and that it was an "open secret among Democratic party leaders."
The complaint was sent to the Deputy County Executive, Comptroller and members of the legislature.
A spokesperson for the county executive provided 2 On Your Side the following statement:
“The Italian Cultural Center of Buffalo is a well-established nonprofit that has won awards for its cultural programming and is a Western New York institution. The truth is that Democrats and Republicans came together twice to approve this capital funding. First, the bipartisan Capital Projects Committee unanimously approved funding to 36 arts and cultural organizations – including the Italian Cultural Center, which was among the smaller awards made. Next, the legislature unanimously approved contracts for these awards.”
But according to a memo circulated by the Erie County Comptroller obtained by 2 On Your Side, there is a question of $15,000 that the County Executive's statement doesn't address.
Since 2019, the Italian Cultural Center has received $162,500 from the county.
$152,500 was approved unanimously by the legislature.
$15,000, according to the Comptroller's memo, was "executive requested appropriations in 2019 and 2023.
Each of those two years, the CCI received $7,500. According to the comptroller, the cultural center did not request the funds in 2019.
In 2023, the CCI only requested $2,000, but the county executive increased it to $7,500.
The comptroller's memo, however, does not indicate that those two requests made by the executive were inappropriate, as Poloncarz does have the authority to make such requests and the legislature did approve them.
Republican candidate for County Executive, Chrissy Casilio, says that Poloncarz should haven't have considered the funds for the CCI.
"He should have recused himself or been honest about any and all sexual relationships he was having with any vendor," Casilio said. " In no way should a sexual relationship determine who, what, where, when gets grants from our Erie County taxpayers, but you need to be transparent and you need to be honest in what you're doing and who you're with."
It's unclear, at this time, whether the Erie County Ethics Board will review the complaint. Multiple requests to members of the board went unanswered.
According to their website, their regular meeting is the first Monday of each month, but with the first Monday of September being labor day, the website isn't clear when the next meeting is.
2 On Your Side also reached out to the Italian Cultural Center for comment, the organization said in a statement:
"Since 2018, the Erie County Cultural Funding program has been supportive of the Centro Culturale Italiano di Buffalo’s mission to promote Italian culture in Western New York. We meticulously and properly followed all guidelines and procedures in the application process under then-Executive Director John Vecchio and look forward to Erie County’s continued support of our work."
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