The Philadelphia Parking Authority is coming under fire for allegedly changing their compensation time records after the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News requested to see them.
According to Philly.com, two high level executives asked the agency to eliminate hours owed to them. Modifying information after receiving a Right-to-Know request is a violation of state law punishable by court fines.
Emails obtained by an unnamed source and provided to the newspapers reportedly showed that Richard Dickson and Dennis Weldon, both deputy executive directors, asked the payroll department to remove their comp time. That request came just four days after the newspaper filed its Right-to-Know request, Philly.com reported.
The debacle started in mid-January when the newspapers requested comp time information from PPA after former executive director Vincent Fenerty collected $227,000 in paid leave, compensation time and 15 years of free health care.
Fenerty was forced out of his job in September following sexual harassment allegations.
PPA initially told journalists they didn’t collect comp time data but then turned over documents showing the opposite. Records obtained allegedly indicated more than one dozen high level PPA employees had accrued large amounts of comp time, which can be cashed out.
PPA said timing of emails were coincidental and not as a response to the newspapers’ inquiry.
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“It kind of backfired on us,” Weldon told Philly.com
According to PPA spokesman Marty O’Rourke, Dickson and Weldon “gave back their comp time” in October 2016.
