Erie County Executive Chris Collins has placed one of his campaign finance chairmen in an important county job related to law enforcement. But did Collins follow the rules?

Collins was to follow a process in selecting the commissioner to oversee Central Police Services, a nearly $4 million department that provides dispatching, training, crime lab analysis and other administrative functions.

County Comptroller Mark C. Poloncarz says he doesn’t care that Collins calls Peter M. Vito the “acting” or “interim” commissioner. In a letter to Collins, Poloncarz said Vito should not be collecting a county paycheck, because the rules were ignored.

“He is not legally able to serve in this title or receive compensation,” Poloncarz wrote.

Poloncarz explained that before installing Vito, Collins was to turn to the Central Police Services board of trustees, a seven-member panel representing police agencies, local municipalities, the County Legislature and the county executive. The trustees would give Collins a list of the three best applicants, and Collins could hire one of the three. His new hire could be called the “acting” commissioner while awaiting Legislature approval.

But the trustees have not given Collins a list. They were still awaiting the applicants’ resumes from Collins’ staff when they read in The Buffalo News on March 27 that the post was already occupied by Vito, a Niagara County resident who registers to vote in Buffalo. The Legislature was not consulted.

“I actually got a phone call from a few of the chiefs of police from suburban towns,” said Legislator Timothy M. Wroblewski, D-West Seneca, who heads the Legislature’s Public Safety Committee and represents the Legislature on the Central Police Services board.

“They were asking if the interview process went through,” Wroblewski said. “I said no. And then they asked, ‘Why did Mr. Vito get appointed?’ And they referred to the article in the paper.”

The Collins camp Monday fired back at Poloncarz by saying it’s the county attorney, not the comptroller, who determines whether the County Charter has been followed.

“Rather than playing petty politics, the voters of Erie County want their elected leaders to take action to solve the major challenges facing county government,” said Collins spokesman Grant Loomis. He said Poloncarz should join the county executive’s effort to hire “the best and the brightest,” rather than “interfering with the county executive’s effort to reform County Hall.”

Vito has served on the Collins campaign finance committee and the GOP team that last year selected Collins as a candidate for county executive. Then he helped lead the Collins transition team on public safety.

“Nobody is trying to shortcut the system,” Vito told The News. “But you needed somebody with management experience to come in and run the department day-to-day.”

Central Police Services had been without a commissioner since Kevin J. Comerford left last October for a job at Erie County Medical Center. Vito said he helped out in the department without pay from Dec. 20 to March 11, when he was placed on the payroll.

During that time, Collins also named him his representative to the board of trustees — which Poloncarz calls a conflict of interest. Vito, who remains in contention for the permanent job, said he will play no role in assessing the other candidates.

Wroblewski said the board still intends to give a list of the best three applicants to Collins.

Collins said he believes that he is following the County Charter and the process that requires him to involve the trustees and the Legislature.

“I can assure you that I have great respect for both parties, for the established process, and that we are fully complying with the Charter,” he said in a letter to a legislator who raised an objection, Daniel M. Kozub, D-Hamburg.

For years, Vito ran a private investigation firm from a building he owns in Buffalo that provides his voting address. It wasn’t uncommon for “Peter M. Vito & Associates” to work for Erie County. For example, when then-County Clerk David J. Swarts sued the government to protect his office from mass layoffs in 2005, Vito’s firm examined the auto bureaus to see if the lines were being slowed deliberately to create a problem.

Vito has turned over the daily functions of his investigative firm to his daughter, and the firm will not work for Erie County, he said.

Meanwhile, Personnel Commissioner John W. Greenan said no rule bars Vito from being appointed to a county post, even though he says he lives in Niagara County.

mspina@buffnews.com

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