Viva Las Vegas: Argiro suspended after road trip
Published on November 10th, 2004
STONEHAM, MA - Shattering a shaky calm between entrenched Building Inspector Gene Argiro and town officials, controversy again erupted early last week after Town Administrator Ron Florino suspended the department head for three-days without pay.
While Florino refused to comment on the matter because personnel confidentiality clauses prohibit him from doing so, several Selectmen confirmed that Argiro received the suspension Tuesday morning because of a dispute around the Building Inspector’s time sheet.
According to Selectmen Chair Cosmo Ciccarello, Argiro decided to go to a seminar in Las Vegas the week prior to his suspension, a trip that Florino refused to authorize. However, Argiro then obtained a partial payment for the seminar through union funds and decided to personally pay for the airfare, hotel, and meals during his stay.
“You know it’s wrong and I know it’s wrong,” said Ciccarello of Argiro’s decision to go to the gambling wonderland. “Ron made it very, very clear that he wasn’t paying for it. [Argiro] was told that when he went to Vegas that he would use his own vacation time, pay for his flight, and for his meals. But when his time sheets came out, he put it down as comp time,” said Ciccarello.
Upon seeing Argiro’s time sheet for the week, Florino ordered the Building Inspector to immediately fix it and record the stay as vacation time, says Ciccarello. When Argiro refused, Florino issued the suspension.
Praising Florino for being the firm Town Administrator the town was looking for, Selectman Charlie Smith claimed Argiro deserved the suspension.
“Anybody who doesn’t listen to his boss or is insubordinate should be suspended, at least for the first time,” said Smith, who also characterized the trip as the wrong thing to do.
However, according to Argiro, his recent suspension fits a pattern on the part of Selectmen and town officials to treat him differently than other department heads and employees.
“They’re treating me differently than everybody else,” Argiro charged this Monday afternoon. “I told Ron this morning that you guys are hammering me and you’re not going to stop until you get rid of me.”
“I look at this as here’s a guy who calls a spade a spade. And if you feel aggrieved by my decisions, you can appeal it. But instead, everybody’s running to the Selectmen for help. And because I [refuse to do the Selectmen favors], now I’m the bad guy,” Argiro added, referring to his continual insistence that he’s being retaliated against for refusing the Selectmen’s requests for personal favors.
While Argiro agrees that Florino wouldn’t to pay for the costs of the seminar, the Building Inspector refutes the claim that he was also told he needed to take vacation time.
“In the past seven-years I’ve been working for the town, I’ve never had to take vacation time for a seminar. And I don’t think anybody else has to either. These seminars are mandated. I have to complete a minimum of 15-credit hours each year of continuing education or I lose my state certification as a building inspector,” Argiro said.
“In no point in time did I assume that I’d have to take vacation time because that’s never happened before. Now everytime I go on a seminar, which I’m mandated to do, I have to take vacation time? That’s not fair,” the Building Inspector commented.
While Argiro confirmed that Florino sent him an ultimatum to change his time sheet or face disciplinary action, he also disputes statements that he ignored the demands. Instead, the Building Inspector claims, he refused to change his time sheet after the Town Administrator snubbed his own request that the demand be put in writing.
“His exact words were, ‘you have 10-minutes to get up here and change your time sheet or face disciplinary action’. But he didn’t offer me a good reason other than saying that I agreed to take vacation time. So I agreed to do it if he put something in writing explaining why. And he refused. So I didn’t change my time sheet and he suspended me,” Argiro claimed, saying that he wouldn’t have attended the seminar if he knew he would have to use vacation time.
Attempting to prove that he’s being treated by a different standard than other employees, the Building Inspector said that other department heads travel out-of-state for seminars and charge the entire bill to the town – including seminar costs, airfare, hotel rooms, and meals. Specifically, Argiro pointed to a recent trip to San Antonio, Texas by one employee and a yearly trip to Florida by another. Argiro also called it hypocritical for the Selectmen to call his personally paid for trip to Las Vegas inappropriate when they regularly stay in Boston and Cape Cod hotels at the town’s expense after attending seminars for the Massachusetts’ Municipal Association (MMA).
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