His insider dealing and development debacles have bankrupted the city, while his city hall minions are spending their final days looking to cash out at the taxpayers' expense one last time through obscene levels of unneeded overtime and vacation scams. So much for the public good.
His Loyal Defender has stopped paying bills a long time ago so that Team Cicchinelli can ride out of Dodge with clean hands and the self satisfying knowledge that they are dumping an unconscionable mess on the incoming mayor.
But, as it is said, All Good things must come to an end.
And so will the Cicchinelli era in Massillon City government conclude.
Finally.
While even we acknowledge that there may have been well intentioned moments in the Cicchinelli regime, the truth is that our Dear Leader's plan to deal with budget shortfall after budget shortfall was to ignore them.
And the truth is that his well touted development accomplishments were nothing more than castles built on sand, propped up with taxpayer dollars. When the music finally stopped, we were stuck with the bills.
While hotel developers, real estate moguls, financiers, merchants of debt, and out of town scammers prospered, the taxpayers were taken to the cleaners.
Even a simple voter passed income tax increase to fix and maintain our parks was perverted and hijacked as part of a golf course expansion/housing scheme.
The city is broke.
To state that the next mayor is inheriting a monstrous financial black hole is a gross understatement.
But the current mayor is leaving.
And, contrary to the belief of some, he will not becoming back.
Because as Mayor Elect Catazaro-Perry's team, led by Budget Director Ken Koher, an extremely respected financial professional, peels through the city's books, like layers on an onion, and exposes the past shenanigans of city government to the disinfecting light of the sun, our extraordinary soon to be former mayor will be politically unable to come back.
It is over.
And the citizens of Massillon only have to ride this train for five more days.
No, cleaning up the mess will not be easy, nor will it be pleasant.
But it needs to be done.
And it starts in less than a week.
"We'll be able to pay for these increases," Cicchinelli said. "I'm not concerned about it. We will be there. I feel confident the dollars will be there to make it through this year and we'll have the dollars to make it through next year" (The Independent, July 6, 2010).
