Without Creative Accounting, County in the Red
(Long Island, NY) After failing to meet the July 31st deadline required under the Nassau County Charter for filing a mid-year financial report, today George Maragos released yet another misleading and political statement of the county’s finances. The report uses creative accounting to mask Nassau County’s serious financial woes. The intended purpose of the report is to assess whether the county is running a surplus or deficit at the year’s mid-point.
“With a record of three bond downgrades and the highest debt in county history, George Maragos’s creative accounting cannot hide the truth that the county’s finances are in crisis,” said former Nassau County Comptroller Howard Weitzman. “This report is late and laughable. George Maragos is putting election year political spin on the sober reality that Nassau County is running a deficit and he and other county leaders do not have a plan to right the ship.”
The assumptions contained in the mid-year report ignore hundreds of millions of dollars in property tax refund liabilities. The creative accounting used by Maragos is consistent with a pattern of misleading financial statements released by his office. In 2011, Maragos’s projections were off by $50 million and in 2012 his projections were off by $90 million.
About Howard Weitzman, CPA
In 2001, Howard Weitzman became the only CPA ever elected to the office of Nassau County Comptroller after a 30 year career as a healthcare financial executive. He was subsequently re-elected to a second term in 2005. During his eight years as Comptroller, Howard Weitzman played a central role in the financial rescue of Nassau County. Under Howard’s leadership, the office of Comptroller became a national model for transparency and accountability while at the same time developing a reputation for groundbreaking audits, independence and integrity. A graduate of Brooklyn Technical High School and Queens College, Howard is the former Mayor of Great Neck Estates, where he and his wife resided for 35 years and raised three children. He is currently a resident of North Hills.
