Mount Vernon Mayoral Candidate Weighs In On Repossessed Printers

MOUNT VERNON, NY – Shawyn Patterson Howard who is challenging incumbent Richard Thomas for the post of mayor of Mount Vernon, issued a statement Tuesday about the recent repossession of printers at City Hall due to non-payment.

Mount Vernon City Hall had both of its main printers repossessed Monday, Thomas posted on Facebook, "These printers were responsible for handling all the day to day printing needs of more than ten departments and now they are gone."

Here is her statement:

Today’s crisis at City Hall is just another symptom of our broken city government. Almost every week we see another fight, another controversy and another crisis that incapacitates our city. Garbage collection, broken equipment, repossessed copiers, broken sewers, memorial field, snow removal, bond rating and potholes everywhere. This all leads back to a lack of leadership, cooperation and competence. It is just another episode in the sad reality show that is our Mt. Vernon elected leaders at work.

It’s one more week that proves that our system is broken. It will not be fixed by participants who have demonstrated that they cannot and will not work together.

As proud Mt. Vernonites, we do not want to watch the dysfunction of our city government played out publicly on the news and social media. This drama demoralizes the staff who work there, depresses all of us who live here and scares away businesses and investors who want to do business with the City of Mount Vernon.

I call on our Mayor, the City Council President and the Comptroller to set their egos aside and get to GOVERN THE CITY.

Mount Vernon deserves more and we expect more. On June 25th, we must usher in a new standard of leadership at City Hall. Mount Vernon must heal. More importantly, we must aspire to collaborate and put the interests of the residents and welfare of Mount Vernon first.

We can no longer ignore the dysfunction. We can no longer excuse the incompetence. We must govern our City in a way that is responsive and responsible. The time for change is NOW.