By Brian Massie, A Watchman on the Wall
Updated: Here are court documents we just received.
Mr. Bob Hill, President of the Career and Technical Association (CATA), sent us the following letter detailing the longest running lawsuit that a Ohio public school has been engaged in. The Courts have ruled in favor of the CATA employees. Auburn currently owes money to 43 people per the current judgment, and they have been patiently waiting over 12 years to receive what is owed to them.
I spoke to Mr. Brian Bontempo, Superintendent of Auburn’s Career Center, and I told him about our interest in getting more details about the lawsuit. Mr. Bontempo had the following press release sent to me.
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Here is the email we sent to the Auburn Career Center’s Treasurer:
Ms. Williamson:
Please find attached our public records request for information regarding the lawsuit between Auburn Career Center and CATA.
We need to know how much has been paid in legal fees for the 12 years of this lawsuit. We are appalled that the taxpayers’ hard earned money has been wasted when the original settlement was approximately $150,000.
With the judgment amount of $1,486,045.78 against Auburn Career Center, and with the legal fees on top of that, we must conclude that there has been either nonfeasance, misfeasance or malfeasance by Auburn’s management team. We will let the Lake County taxpayers decide!
“Nonfeasance is defined as the intentional failure to perform a required duty or obligation. Misfeasance is when someone performs an action incorrectly or a legal act performed in an illegal manner. Malfeasance is when a party causes injury to another party on purpose.”
The taxpayers are no longer going to sit back and let the taxing authorities price them out of their homes that they have worked all their lives to achieve. Any tax that, if unpaid, causes a citizen to become homeless is immoral.
From the Lake County Auditor’s Schedule A, detailing the property taxes funding Auburn, we see that Auburn receives approximately $4,025,523 per year from the Lake County residents. The settlement amount of $1,486,045.78 is 36.9% of the property tax revenue received annually.
We will make all Lake County officials and taxpayers aware of this untenable situation. A cavalier attitude with the taxpayers’ hard earned money is not acceptable.
If you have any questions, I can be reached at (440) 479-7061
Thank you,
Brian Massie
Here is the Lake County Auditor’s A for 2022 – 2023 detailing the revenue received by Auburn from the taxpayers:
We just received the Schedule A’s for 2023 – 2024 and the Tax Revenue Estimation has grow to $4,114,616 and increase of $89,093 (2.2%) over 2022 – 2023.
We will update this report when we get the legal fees paid by Auburn Career Center.
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