HOBOKEN – The ongoing conflict between Hoboken Housing Authority (HHA) Executive Director Carmelo Garcia and Chairwoman Dana Wefer took a new turn on Friday when HHA employees found that they were unable to deposit their paychecks. According to a statement released by Patrick Guaschino, the vice president of Teamsters Local 97 that represents the workers, the savings and checking accounts of all HHA employees at the Hoboken Police Federal Credit Union have been frozen due to non-payment.
Guaschino said he was told by Garcia that Wefer had held all vendor checks, including payments to employees.
In a phone call on Friday, Wefer denied that any vendor checks had been held. Wefer said she signed the checks, but that banks were not accepting them because the checks still list the previous HHA chairperson as the signatory.
A resolution is required to update the signatory on HHA checks. According to Wefer, one such resolution, which would make Garcia, Wefer, and Vice Chair David Mello bank signatories for HHA and would have given Garcia the authority to affix any of their signatures to checks, was tabled earlier in June.
Wefer said Garcia left the meeting early, preventing the board from asking questions on the matter.
Garcia did not respond to an email and phone call on Friday afternoon.
Wefer took over as chair of the HHA Board of Commissioners last month during a reorganization meeting. She is an ally of Mayor Dawn Zimmer, whose allies assumed a 3-4 board majority in May. They are at odds with Garcia, who is suing Zimmer for alleged discrimination against him.
The HHA manages the 3,100 units of low-income federally subsidized housing on the city’s west side. Garcia is a paid director whose full-time job is to manage the agency, but he is overseen by HUD and by a local seven-member unpaid board of commissioners, which Wefer heads. – Carlo Davis