Poloncarz blasts Brown for hiring Steve Casey at OTB

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The elected official with the greatest sway over Western Regional Off-Track Betting is “incredibly disappointed” that former Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown has brought a controversial former deputy with him to his new post as head of the troubled public gambling corporation.

“Former Mayor Brown committed to the Board of Directors that he would move Western Region OTB towards transparency and accountability,” Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said in a statement to Investigative Post.

Hiring Steven M. Casey — “an incredibly toxic force in Buffalo City Hall for decades,” according to Poloncarz — “moves Western Region OTB in the complete opposite direction,” he said.

Brown last Tuesday formally resigned as mayor and the next day began his job as OTB’s new president and CEO. He’ll earn a $295,000 base salary. 

The state comptroller’s office confirmed Casey began working part-time for OTB in September. OTB did not report a job title to the comptroller but projected his annual part-time wages would total $49,920.

A gaming industry source told Investigative Post Casey is applying for a full-time management post, which would require a different license than the one the state Gaming Commission granted him in August.

Casey, whose political consulting firm three years ago pleaded guilty to a felony wire fraud charge, “has no place managing any public entity, much less a gambling operation,” Poloncarz said.

Federal investigators in 2015 raided Casey’s home in East Aurora. In the years that followed, it was widely reported that Casey was cooperating with investigators in probes related to City Hall and former Erie County Democratic Committee Chair Steve Pigeon.

LSA Strategies, one of Casey’s now inactive consulting firms, in 2021 pleaded guilty in federal court to wire fraud — a felony. Prosecutors said Casey’s company conspired with a direct mail firm to overbill the 2012 campaign of state Senate candidate Chuck Swanick, with Casey keeping the difference between actual charges and inflated invoices presented to Swanick’s campaign.

The company, solely owned by Casey according to the plea agreement, had to pay $8,283.59 in restitution to Swanick, $400 in court costs and a $69 fine. 

The state Gaming Commission told Investigative Post in a statement Monday that there was nothing in Casey’s license application “that would reasonably prevent his participation in the licensed activity pending final determination.” 

State law permits the Gaming Commission to license people with criminal offenses in their backgrounds to work in the gaming industry, unless the offenses are tied to the job they’re seeking or their employment “would involve an unreasonable risk to property or to the safety or welfare of specific individuals or the general public.”

OTB has been beleaguered in recent years by allegations of malfeasance. Critical audits by the state comptroller targeted the offering of free health insurance to part-time board members, as well as the misuse of free tickets to Bills and Sabres games and other high-priced entertainments.

Last year then state Sen. Tim Kennedy and Assembly Member Monica Wallace, both Democrats, sponsored legislative reforms to the governance of OTB, which for decades has been controlled by Republican interests. The new governance structure weighted the vote of the 17 board members — one each from the two cities and 15 counties that own OTB — according to the population of the municipality each member represents.

That afforded more voting power to populous Erie and Monroe counties, as well as to the cities of Buffalo and Rochester — all controlled by Democrats — at the expense of rural counties where Republicans hold sway.

Under the new rules, Erie County’s representative has 24 percent of the vote; Buffalo’s, 10 percent. Monroe County has 20 percent; Rochester, 8 percent. 

In effect, the change transferred power over OTB from Republicans to Democrats.

Kennedy, now a U.S. congressman, did not respond to a request for comment.

Casey served as Brown’s deputy mayor from 2006 until 2014, when he left to lead an ultimately fruitless effort to redevelop the former Seneca Mall property. Before following him to City Hall, Casey was a member of Brown’s state Senate staff. The two also worked together in the mid 1990s for then Erie County Executive Dennis Gorski. 

As deputy mayor he was Brown’s gatekeeper, chief political advisor and enforcer who routinely dressed down commissioners and department heads during performance reviews. 

Crystal Rodriguez-Dabney, who was appointed by Brown last year to represent Buffalo on the OTB board — and another of Brown’s former deputy mayors — said she was not aware of Casey’s hiring until press reports were shared with her yesterday.

She said the board was not informed of Casey’s hiring because he is not currently in a management role. The board is typically only notified of “officer level” hirings.

“I would like to have more information and I hope that more becomes clear,” Rodriguez-Dabney told Investigative Post Monday. 

In the event Casey seeks a management position, she said, “We would have to be notified at some point.”

Tim Callan, Erie County’s OTB director, declined to comment. So did his boss, Erie County Comptroller Kevin Hardwick, who has been critical of OTB’s management.

Paul Bartow, who represents Schuyler County on the OTB board, told Investigative Post he hopes the organization will “transcend the provincial and perverse politics of Buffalo,” noting that he and his fellow directors represent a quarter of the state. 

“My hope is that we can put WROTB back on a good track and I’ll always be a proponent for transparency, trustworthiness, and fairness,” he said. 

Casey on Friday quickly ended a call from an Investigative Post reporter seeking comment, saying he would call back later. He did not call back, did not answer subsequent calls, and did not respond to an email or a text inquiring about his new post.

Neither Brown nor Henry Wojtaszek — the former president and CEO who accepted a contract buyout in June — responded to requests for comment. 

Neither did Monroe County Executive Adam Bello, whose representative on the OTB board has the second greatest weighted vote, after Poloncarz’s. Rochester Mayor Malik Evans also did not respond. Rochester’s OTB representative, Board Chair Dennis Bassett, likewise ignored an inquiry from Investigative Post.

Buffalo Acting Mayor Christopher Scanlon declined to comment. So did Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes, a longtime political ally of Brown, other than to say she “wishes the former Mayor well.”

Brown’s arrival at OTB coincides with a departure: Livingston County Director Thomas Wamp resigned Monday, just days before Brown’s first board meetings as president and CEO.

Wamp told Investigative Post that it was the end of Wojtaszek’s tenure —rather than the start of Brown’s — that caused him to step aside. He’d served on the board for 22 years.

“With Henry leaving, I thought it an appropriate time to allow Livingston County to find a replacement,” Wamp said. “End of story.”

Geoff Kelly