Financial abuse at Queens Library was so out of control that city Controller Scott Stringer is urging the IRS and local prosecutors to launch criminal probes against both Thomas Galante, the library’s ousted president, and his successor, Bridget Quinn-Carey, the Daily News has learned.
Stringer’s 18-month audit of the library has concluded that Galante and Quinn-Carey, the library’s former chief operating officer and now interim president, racked up more than $310,000 in prohibited personal expenses on their library credit cards over a three-year period ending June 30, 2014.
Those expenses include about $115,000 in purchases “that appear to be taxable, undeclared income, in circumstances suggesting a significant likelihood of fraud and/or embezzlement,” Stringer wrote in a special 22-page report produced by his new investigative unit, a copy of which The News obtained.
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The audit confirms much of what was revealed in a series of columns by The News last year.
Stringer found that both Galante and Quinn-Carey used their credit cards for lavish meals, personal gasoline bills and other costs that are not regarded by the IRS as deductible business expenses and that also violated the library’s own prohibition against using the organization’s credit cards for personal expenses.
In addition, Galante also appears to have been doubledipping on numerous occasions — getting paid from a Long Island school district for work as a consultant at up to $200,000 a year during the same hours he was working for the library at more than $400,000 annually — the report found.
In addition, Stringer said, Galante, who was fired in September, made “false statements” on his sworn annual disclosure to the city, failing to report he was a principal executive of three other private businesses while also working as library chief.
“For years, Tom Galante used the Queens Library as his personal piggy bank,” Stringer said in a statement. Galante was fired in December after Mayor de Blasio and Queens Borough President Melinda Katz removed the majority of trustees that had backed him.
“Mr. Galante has not violated the law or been involved in any improprieties with respect to any matter,” said Joseph Martini, an attorney for Galante.
“As is common knowledge, the library authorized Mr. Galante to continue his consulting work for the Elmont school district while he was employed by the Queens Library, and there were no time restrictions on when he could perform that consulting work,” Martini said.
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But some of Galante’s spending was truly mind-blowing.
It included $18,900 between 2012 and 2014 just for his personal gas expenses. That’s more than $500 per month. Meanwhile, Quinn-Carey spent more than $4,000 on her personal gas expenses, or about $100 per month.
Most of that was not reported by the library as income to the IRS, which it should have been, Stringer concluded.
Then there were the amazing meal and liquor expenses.
On July 22 and 23, 2013, for example, Galante charged nearly $5,000 on his credit card for a dozen hotel rooms, and food and beverage for a “management planning session” for his senior executives near his home in Connecticut. Among those bills was $366.17 for Zaccagnini Pinot Grigio, Jose Cuervo Tequila Gold 7, Hiram Walker Triple Sec, a six-pack of Newcastle Brown Ale, a six-pack of Brooklyn Pale Ale and other beverages.
All this occurred while Galante was cutting the hours of branch libraries for the public, and reducing the number of library employees. Yet top executives around him kept receiving fat raises and bonuses.
Between 2008 and 2014, library hours dropped by 9.4% and salaries for branch employees by 2.4%, but management salaries rose by nearly 7%, Stringer found.
Even more astounding, the audit found that while Galante reported to City Council each year deficits of between $5 million and $8 million annually, he never revealed that several library bank accounts with unrestricted funds contained as much as $20 million in surplus funds. “Even some of us on the board of trustees didn’t know how much money was in those accounts,” one board member said.
“The newly restructured board has undertaken sweeping changes to address concerns raised by the controller and other public officials, including opening the library’s books to stricter outside scrutiny, demanding greater internal accountability, and ending excessive, unquestioned overexpenditures by management and staff,” library spokeswoman Joanne King said in a statement.
The new report is a big blow to Quinn-Carey, who has been praised for trying to repair the library’s image.
“I urge the current board to have a serious discussion about whether someone who was a party to so much malfeasance can effectively lead this organization going forward,” Stringer said.
