James A. O’Neill of C.W. Augustine Inc., Housing Administrator for the Ogdensburg NSP Housing program, touted his accomplishments yesterday, or at least that’s the headline on the story. What is immediately apparent to anyone who knows how Mr. O’Neill operates, is a clear pattern of shifting the blame and making excuses anytime his work is called into question. He did the very same thing years ago during our case against him for shoddy construction. He’s all smiles and charm while the money’s hanging in the balance, but after he has received his payment if anyone starts to question the quality or sense of the work done, he gets angry, arrogant, and willingly throws his former clients, colleagues,  and anyone else available under the bus, in an attempt  to cover up his own failings.

Yesterday, Mr. O’Neill not only called out the Ogdensburg City Council, but also the whole city of Ogdensburg, when he stated, “In  Ogdensburg,  however, not only do you not get the credit, you take the blame if something happens.” and “We’ve  tried to do  right  by  the city, but they let their petty politics and their personal crusades get in the way.”

Looking back at the documents of our court case against Mr. O’Neill, its hard not to notice similarities in the statements he had for us when we called his work into question. I’d like to give you a quote now, from his sworn deposition, “Before this case was formally initiated, I have been under fire from these clowns, and upon advice from my attorney, I included the corporate name on all letterhead.” Sound familiar?

Listen friends for the “jimmys”, statements like “boots on the ground,”  “excellence and value,”  “typically, what we do in this situation,” and the clincher: “that’s a non-issue!”. He is the king of bluster (further evidenced by his use of the royal “we”), and apparently thinks he’s the king of the North Country as well… Such a benevolent king too, doing all that work for Ogdensburg pro bono! Why, I am sure he didn’t receive a cent for his valiant efforts to fix what (he claims) was screwed up before he got there, and his excellent budget work allowed him to only spend $200,000 of our tax dollars on houses now worth less than $100,000.
God save the king!