Culture of Corruption: Part 2 - Capo's Grifting Service
The revelation that former code enforcement officer and borough councilman Nick Capobianco charged taxpayers nearly $8K for COVID cleaning services after he spent months bragging about doing it for free is just the tip of the iceberg. As a reminder he said in December 2020, January 2021, February 2021, March 2021, April 2021, May 2021, and June 2021 that he was sanitizing the borough building and police vehicles at his own expense, saving taxpayers $1,000 each month. The Parkside GOP continued to say he did it for free, long after he’d cashed the check. In fact, I’m sure it would be a tenet of his current council campaign if this invoice had never come to light. They had no intention of ever telling Parkside residents the truth.
The initial excuse the Parkside GOP offered for why this was okay, despite being a blatant violation of state ethics laws? The Democratic council members voted to approve the payment. But did they?
Let’s look at the timeline:
March 2020
Borough council voted in March 2020 to hire a cleaning company for sanitation at a cost not to exceed $550.
Nick Capobianco stated that he volunteered to sanitize the borough building twice that month, saving taxpayers $1,000.
January 2021 - June 2021
Nick Capobianco continued to state each month that he had sanitized the borough building, and the police vehicles biweekly, saving taxpayers $1,000 each month.
July 15, 2021
Check #3375 was issued to Nick Capobianco with the memo “Reimbursement - CoVid Cleaning”
July 19, 2021
The check image shows Check #3375 for $7,941.99 was cashed on July 19, 2021.
The borough council never discussed hiring or paying this fake company, despite requiring a council vote to pre-approve any expenses over $500.
July 21, 2021
Borough Council held a special meeting to discuss how to spend the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) municipal funds of $121,939.63 granted to Parkside Borough. Nick Capobianco was present in this meeting. Council voted on various projects to spend these funds on. Not one person mentioned paying Nick Capobianco for sanitizing the borough building and police vehicles and Nick Capobianco did not mention he’d already been paid.
July 28, 2021
The regular meeting of the Parkside Borough Council was held on July 28, 2021. Page 5 from the July 2021 Financial Report from Possenti, the Borough Treasurer at the time, titled “Monthly Bills and Deposits List - Sharon Bank” showed “the bills” given to council members that were voted on under the motion to pay the bills. Capo’s Handyman Service was not listed in these bills. Instead it listed “Reimbursement - CoVid Cleaning” paid to Nick Capobianco. This meeting also marked when Nick Capobianco stopped stating in the meetings that he was sanitizing the building for free.
October 21, 2022
Shirley Purcival stated repeatedly in the October 2022 council meeting that the payment was a reimbursement for cleaning chemicals (Spoiler Alert: it’s not). Let’s not forget her doting over Capobianco paying for the chemicals out of his own pocket in the December 2020 meeting.
These invoices are clearly for “disinfecting services”, not supplies. He would’ve had to be bathing in Terg-o-Cide to run up supply costs this high.
First They Said It Was a Reimbursement
If it were a reimbursement for supplies, why did Nick Capobianco create an invoice for a fake company instead of submitting his receipts? I submitted a Right to Know Request for the expense reimbursement form and receipts associated with this payment, among others, and to the surprise of no one, they don’t exist.
I asked Council President Anna Guy what the process is for submitting expenses for reimbursement. She could not speak to what the process was before her tenure, but clarified that currently, all reimbursements require an expense reimbursement form, receipt(s), and the approval of the council president before they are submitted to the treasurer for payment.
Since this payment was logged as a reimbursement despite clearly not a reimbursement, I sent Shirley Purcival an email, asking what the expense reimbursement process was under her leadership, to which I got a vague, nonspecific answer. Shirley states she’d never seen the Capo’s Handyman invoice when it was submitted, insinuating that reimbursements were handled by the borough secretary (Linda Higgins) and the Chairman of Finance (Doug Bull). You can read that exchange here.
She confirmed two signatures are required on all checks issued by the borough but I have yet to receive a response as to where the second signature is on the check issued to Capobianco for his COVID cleaning services.
Nick Capobianco would have been aware that two signatures were required, but still cashed a check that seemingly only contains the signature of Linda Higgins. Was Doug Bull aware of this check or invoice? I couldn’t tell you, because he is also not answering my emails.
Then They Said It Wasn’t Wrong Because the Dems Voted For It
Except they didn’t. Someone logged the Capo’s Handyman invoice as a reimbursement, and someone signed off on it so the check was issued. Nick Capobianco took that check straight to the bank. The Dems on Council and Shirley herself stated they hadn’t seen the invoice until I obtained it with a RTK request.
Did Nick Capobianco and Linda Higgins conspire to push this payment through as a reimbursement? Was Doug Bull involved? I can’t tell you because no one will answer me. It certainly looks to me like Linda Higgins was in on it, given she likely received the invoice and submitted it for reimbursement/payment per Shirley Purcival’s own vague response about the expense reimbursement process. Linda was even on Facebook claiming the Democratic councilmembers approved this payment knowing full well she was the one who signed the check almost 2 weeks prior.
Now They’re Saying It’s Ok Because It Came Out Of the COVID Funds
Seems like a convenient excuse except I’m not buying it. Nick Capobianco cashed that check on July 19th, and just two days later, council held a special meeting to discuss how to spend ARPA funds. They even voted on which projects to pursue. There was not one mention of paying Nick Capobianco for sanitizing borough property. I filed a RTK request for the SLFRF Projects & Expenditures Reports required to be filed with the U.S. Department of Treasury to explain how the ARPA funds were spent - still pending response.
Not to be deterred, I found this website hosted by the federal government that will tell you how the ARPA funds have been spent so far. When you type in Parkside, you can see the borough was awarded $244,650, and they’ve spent $0 of it.
Everyone, including GOP Candidate Sarah Haynes, who is telling you Nick Capobianco was paid with ARPA funds is completely full of crap.
It’s interesting to me that Sarah Haynes didn’t bother to verify this lie before she started spreading it, but then again, she can’t seem to grasp the definition of a reimbursement.
Speaking of reimbursements, because the nearly $8K payment to Nick Capobianco was processed as a reimbursement, it also calls into question the validity of some of the other outrageously high “reimbursements” processed through the borough council led by Shirley Purcival at the time.
There are no expense reimbursement forms or receipts to verify that any of these payments were legitimate. I don’t understand why Parkside Borough hasn’t decided to join the 21st century and digitize their records, but I guess it’s more convenient for them not to keep any records. You’re supposed to just take their word for it, even after they were perfectly content with never telling you the truth about paying Nick Capobianco for sanitizing the borough property.
They say they want to go back to normal. Back to “transparency.” This isn’t the kind of transparent governing I want to go back to. Please, vote for all 3 Democrats on November 7th so we can keep moving forward.
These views were not coordinated with or approved by the Delaware County Democratic Committee or the Pa Democratic Party.
