Karen (left) and Laura Slabinsky doubled-billed on $8.40-a-day car expenses. (
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Two sisters with a combined 56 years working at the city’s Finance Department have been sacked after being found guilty of ripping off $8.40 a day, the price of a lunchtime sandwich.
Laura and Karen Slabinsky got the ax for claiming separate auto allowances on 53 days that they traveled together to work assignments in the same car, according to public records.
Their total haul between September 2010 and September 2011: $445.20.
Their combined salaries as tax assessors: $151,010 a year.
Neither woman had a prior disciplinary record and recent performance evaluations described their work as “superior.”
But Administrative Law Judge Kevin Casey still imposed the harshest penalty.
In cases of fraud or misappropriation, he wrote, “Even where the amounts improperly taken were relatively small, termination of employment is generally imposed.”
Casey noted the sisters tried to cover up their petty crime by submitting “fictitious odometer readings to create the illusion that they were using separate cars.”
The Finance Department reimburses 142 employees who use their personal vehicles for work at a rate of 28 cents a mile, with a minimum payment of $8.40.
Laura Slabinsky testified that she usually commuted to work with her sister. When they were assigned to inspect properties, she said they would travel together in one car so they could cover a greater area, with one reviewing tax maps while the other drove.
Laura, 54, was a supervisor, hired in 1983, and earning $87,467. Karen, 52, was an assessor, hired in 1985, earning $68,623.
Stephen Hans, the sisters’ lawyer, said they had been submitting dual auto expenses for years with the approval of supervisors.
The sisters have appealed to the Civil Service Commission.
Additional reporting by Ikimulisa Livingston