Dusseldorf a Hot Destination for Dorf like Niagara Falls' DeSantis
By Mike Hudson
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| Dusseldorf burns their own garbage and gives the electricity to the people. |
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| During various planning meetings and public hearings, why did De- Santis never once ask Covanta Ni- agara to do something for the people who breath the air they pol- lute? Instead he worked for the people to support Covanta...Curious... |
When the 97th Division of the U.S. Army captured Dusseldorf, Germany, on April 18th, 1945, they had little clue that their efforts would ultimately benefit a Niagara Falls bureaucrat named Tom DeSantis.
But benefit him they did.
Today, Dusseldorf stands like many formerly enemy cities. Millions of American tax dollars have gone toward eradicating any trace of the Allied bombing, which culminated on a single night in April, 1943, when Britain's Royal Air Force deployed more than 700 bombers over the Nazi stronghold.
Dusseldorf has become an international business and financial center. Renowned for its fashion and trade fairs, Dusseldorf claims to organize nearly one fifth of all the world's premier trade shows.
And that's just the sort of thing that attracts a mover and a shaker like Niagara Falls' own Tom DeSantis. A traveling man, DeSantis has spent nearly $13,000 of your money on various junkets over the past couple of years.
Dusseldorf is also home to the famous Dusseldorf furnace, which burns garbage, converting the energy created into electricity in a way that makes sense in Europe. It makes little sense here, where coal, flowing water and other natural resources make the generating of electricity a relatively minor matter.
But DeSantis' interests may be piqued by more than mere practical matters.
He ramrodded the city's efforts to get the county Industrial Development Agency to subsidize the Covanta waste-to-energy facility to the tune of $8 million for the company's $10 million expansion project.
What prompted his advocacy is unclear. What is clear is that he takes little regard of city ordinances. He recently had his house remodeled to the tune of $36,000 without even bothering to obtain a permit before he was uncovered by this newspaper.
The last time Tom DeSantis was in Dusseldorf he didn't tell anyone. Niagara Falls taxpayers only found out about it when he asked for credit card reimbursements.
This time, who knows?
Tom DeSantis, traveling man, will continue his European vacations at your expense for as long as you let him. He will then continue to bill you for sweetheart deals to local companies.
He will eat and drink and party for as long as you continue to pay for it. Why do you continue to pay for it? That is the question. What kind of moron are you?
You can be guaranteed that, as Mayor Paul Dyster's best man at City Hall, DeSantis will not have the breaks put on him from above.
Since Dyster was overwhelmingly re-elected and given the City Council majority this past fall, the educated minority might venture to guess that DeSantis' shenanigans won't attract much attention from below, either.