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Tag: unpaid

  • No ELEC reports, late rent and an unpaid steakhouse bill: Financial woes lead to Somerset GOP tumult

    No ELEC reports, late rent and an unpaid steakhouse bill: Financial woes lead to Somerset GOP tumult

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    The bill was eventually paid, according to Somerset GOP Chair Tim Howes and former Sen. Christopher “Kip” Bateman, who said he interceded to get it done. But the episode shows just how far the party has fallen.

    As recently as 2017, Republicans completely controlled the wealthy suburban county, where they had dominated for decades. The county produced Republican Gov. Christie Whitman and even the Republican gubernatorial nominee in 2021, Jack Ciattarelli. They also had one of the strongest fundraising operations in the state.

    Now, Somerset County Republicans hold no county-wide offices and there isn’t a single Republican from Somerset County in the Legislature.

    The party’s financial woes didn’t end with the steakhouse bill. They were months late on rent for their Somerville headquarters and, most alarming to Howes’ critics, the party hasn’t filed a legally-required campaign finance disclosure with the Election Law Enforcement Commission since January 2021, when it reported just shy of $12,000 in the bank.

    The lack of disclosure risks major fines for the cash-strapped committee. And some party officials say there’s even less of an excuse for that under the leadership of Howes, an election attorney.

    A group of Somerset Republicans including Bateman is now attempting to get Howes to resign and, failing that, to get a detailed accounting of the party’s finances. But Howes, who was easily reelected chair in 2022, plans to stay in office until his term is up in 2024, leaving his critics to see if there’s a way to force him out.

    “My interest is just making the Republican Party relevant again in Somerset. It hasn’t been for a lot of reasons. You can’t blame the chairman for everything, but we haven’t won an election in years,” Bateman said in a phone interview with POLITICO.

    On April 4, almost two dozen current and former party officials, as well as several former elected officials from the county — including Bateman and former Gov. Donald DiFrancesco — outlined their complaints in a letter to Howes calling for his immediate resignation.

    “Your failure to comply with the mandatory legal requirements set forth by ELEC, as well as your utter lack of transparency and your denial surrounding this failure, are indisputable and indefensible,” reads the letter, which accuses Howes of “financial malfeasance and deception.”

    The letter claims that the party’s fundraising has dropped to “historic lows,” that it’s six months behind in rent payments for its Somerville headquarters, and notes that all eight countywide Republican candidates during his tenure have lost “by record margins.”

    “If you refuse [to resign], we will call a special meeting of the SCRO to remove you from office,” they wrote.

    Years of decline beginning with Trump election

    Howes, who took on the chairmanship in 2020, can’t be blamed for the drastic political shift in Somerset county. Republican losses there started before Howes took the reins, with the GOP going from holding every county-wide office in 2017 to none by 2021.

    “I came in the sixth inning. I was the middle relief pitcher,” Howes said in a phone interview.

    Howes said party officials had a “difference of opinion” with Char Steakhouse on how many people attended the holiday party and that “once we settled that, I dropped off the check.”

    Howes also said that the party’s rent has since been paid and that he’s “working on perfecting” the overdue ELEC reports now that he has a new treasurer in place, but declined to say why the party has gone two years without filing them.

    “As far as an explanation, I’m not there yet,” Howes said. “As far as what happened, we’ll get to that. At some point we’re going to hold a meeting so that everybody’s questions can be answered. I think the committee’s questions need to be answered before they read it on the internet.”

    The effort to oust Howes was first reported by New Jersey Globe.

    The Somerset County Republican Party’s downfall coincided with the presidency of Donald Trump, whose gains for Republicans in formerly competitive blue collar areas were offset by stunning losses in middle-class and wealthy suburban counties like Somerset, and whose continued presence on the political stage has allowed Democrats to cement their control.

    “Can he just go away?” Bateman said. “He’s the gift that keeps on giving for Democrats, unfortunately.”

    But Howes’ critics within the GOP don’t believe the party will be in position to stage a comeback under his leadership. The party’s former treasurer, Robert Damiano, resigned on March 30 over the filings with ELEC, according to a letter he sent to Howes.

    “You and I have had conversations regarding the accuracy of the records that I need to file correct ELEC reports. Each time, I was told that I would get all the information that we needed. However, that never happened,” Damiano wrote.

    Howes did not explicitly blame Damiano, but said “we got back control of our records from the former treasurer.”

    “At this point, I took the steps within 24 hours of accepting his resignation of getting a new treasurer with a good reputation, very ethical, hard working and we’ve begun the process of going back to making sure everything was filed.”

    Damiano declined to comment.

    Howes isn’t up for reelection as chair until 2024, and he says there’s no mechanism to remove him. His critics acknowledge it’s not in the party bylaws, but believe that state laws provide a way to remove him.

    Howes said that under his leadership Somerset County Republicans have gained 14 seats at the municipal level and noted that they have performed better in off-year elections, when federal candidates aren’t on the ballot.

    “It’s not your mother’s Somerset County. In a D+10 county we still outperformed both by way of margin and by percentage the deficit,” Howes said. “I’m here to win county races. I didn’t come here to be the nice guy that runs good campaigns but we still don’t win. We came very close in 2021 — very close. We intend to win this year and we’ve been moving forward despite this distraction.”

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    #ELEC #reports #late #rent #unpaid #steakhouse #bill #Financial #woes #lead #Somerset #GOP #tumult
    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Vendors sue Twitter for thousands of dollars in unpaid bills

    Vendors sue Twitter for thousands of dollars in unpaid bills

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    San Francisco: Elon Musk-run Twitter has been sued by a group of vendors who allege that the micro-blogging platform has failed to pay tens of thousands of dollars in unpaid bills, the media reported.

    White Coat Captioning, YES Consulting and public relations firms Cancomm and Dialogue Mexico alleged in the proposed class-action lawsuit that Twitter is yet to pay bills ranging from around $40,000 to $140,000 for their services, reports CNN.

    The lawsuit has been filed in the California Northern District Court.

    MS Education Academy

    Shannon Liss-Riordan, who has also filed four proposed class-action lawsuits and hundreds of arbitration demands on behalf of laid off Twitter workers, said that “Musk told Twitter vendors that, if they want to get paid, then sue”.

    “He is now getting his wish. Businesses, like employees, should not have to sue to get paid what they are owed,” Liss-Riordan was quoted as saying in the report late on Tuesday.

    Meanwhile, Twitter has also been sued by laid off contract workers who allege they should be treated at par with regular employees.

    The proposed class-action lawsuit claims that Twitter in November laid off numerous workers employed by staffing firm TEKsystems Inc without any advance notice.

    The micro-blogging platform is also facing a lawsuit from a landlord in San Francisco claiming the company has missed rent payments, along with a couple of other lawsuits since Musk took over.

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    #Vendors #sue #Twitter #thousands #dollars #unpaid #bills

    ( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

  • Delhi HC issues summons to Ashneer Grover in BharatPe co-founder’s case of unpaid shares

    Delhi HC issues summons to Ashneer Grover in BharatPe co-founder’s case of unpaid shares

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    New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Friday issued summons to BharatPe’s former Managing Director Ashneer Grover in connection with a case filed by fintech company’s co-founder Shashvat Nakrani over claims of unpaid shares.

    Representing Nakrani, senior advocate Neeraj Kishan Kaul contended that in case filed by co-founder Bhavik Koladiya on the same lines, the court has issued summons and has asked Grover to not create any third-party rights in respect of the shares in BharatPe.

    The High Court had, on January 18, told Grover to file an undertaking in a week’s time and restraining him from creating any third-party rights over the shares.

    Appearing before the bench of Justice Sachin Datta, Kaul said that it is Grover’s stand that he has paid for the shares in cash.

    The court noted that the case was filed about five years after the shares were stated to have been transferred while Kaul argued for an interim relief.

    Lawyer Giriraj Subramanium, Grover’s counsel, was questioned by Judge Datta if he was prepared to make a statement that no third-party rights would be created over the shares.

    To this, Subramanium said that he has instructions not to make such a statement.

    Justice Datta then listed the case for the next hearing on March 28, on the issue of interim relief sought by Nakrani.

    “Plaintiff has been heard at some length in the interim relief application. Counsel for the defendant says they don’t want to file a response to the application. List on Tuesday for further arguments,” the court ordered.

    The judge also issued notice on Nakrani’s application seeking to file some documents in a sealed cover.

    Koladiya’s suit seeking to reclaim trasferred shares remains pending before another bench of the High Court.

    In the Koladiya’s case, when the court had earlier asked Grover to not create any third-party rights over the shares, he had informed the court that subject to further directions from the court, he will not make any third-party interest in the 16,110 shares that Koladiya transferred to him and in any rights that accrue to him as a consequence thereof.

    A single-bench judge Justice Prateek Jalan had ordered that Grover will be bound by his statement and directed him to file the undertaking.

    The court had also served summonses on Grover and the fintech company, giving the former four weeks to respond to the application for an ad interim injunction and two weeks for a rejoinder to the same.

    The bench had noted: “D1 (Grover) is bound to the aforesaid statement and is directed to file an undertaking to this effect within one week from today. Reply to application in four weeks, rejoinder in two weeks thereafter.”

    Nakrani and Koladiya founded the fintech company in 2017. In 2018, Grover joined the company as the third co-founder.

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    #Delhi #issues #summons #Ashneer #Grover #BharatPe #cofounders #case #unpaid #shares

    ( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

  • Women spend 7.2 hrs on unpaid domestic work compared to 2.8 hrs spent by men

    Women spend 7.2 hrs on unpaid domestic work compared to 2.8 hrs spent by men

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    Ahmedabad: Women in the working age category of 15 to 60 years spend 7.2 hours on unpaid domestic work compared to 2.8 hours spent by men, indicating they have “time poverty”, as per a research conducted by a professor from the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad.

    Even wage-earning women spend twice the amount of time on unpaid domestic work in comparison to wage-earning men in fulfilling basic needs of the household such as cleaning, preparing meals and caregiving, says the research which is based on the Time Use Survey (TUS) of the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO).

    Though it is a known fact that women spend more time in unpaid household activities, the research paper “Time Use Data: A Tool for Gendered Policy Analysis”, claims that it for the first time quantifies the time that women in India spend on domestic work.

    “The new thing about this survey is based on the first TUS by the NSSO, we can now point out the exact hours women in the working age category spend on unpaid domestic work. On an average, Indian women spend 7.2 hours of their daily time for such work while men spend 2.8 hours,” IIMA Prof Namrata Chindarkar told PTI.

    Over the years, time use data has gained significance as a tool to examine gender inequality. Studies based on harmonised time use surveys conducted in Europe reveal that time use data have been instrumental in understanding the allocation of time between women and men across various activities, she said.

    “These studies particularly find that, across countries, women spend more time on fulfilling basic needs of the household such as cleaning, preparing meals and caregiving,” Chindarkar said.

    “The TUS conducted by the NSSO in 2019 is the first national time use survey for India (with the exception of Andaman and Nicobar Islands). It collects data using a 24-hour time diary (4 am to 4 am the next day) on a normal day of the week,” she added.

    The paper has examined the TUS data to assess whether expectations from gender roles shape the allocation of time between men and women in India.

    It further finds out that “even wage-earning women spend twice the amount of time on unpaid domestic work in comparison to wage-earning men”.

    It also says that “men spend nearly 150 minutes more per day on paid employment relative to women.”

    “By itself, the average time spent on activities does not provide a sense of severity of the time burden. To capture the severity, we examine time poverty,” Chindarkar said.

    She said they measure time poverty in terms of overwork based on the OECD definition of working more than 50 hours per week.
    “We find that women are 24 per cent more likely to have less leisure time in comparison to men. In contrast, we find that wage-earning men are 72 per cent more likely to be overworked compared to wage-earning women. This could plausibly be because of the differences in the nature of jobs and occupations held by men and women,” the research paper said.

    The analyses highlight certain gendered patterns. A greater proportion of women’s time is devoted to fulfilling domestic responsibilities irrespective of their employment status. For women in employment, this often results in a “second shift”, it said.

    It is now a stylised fact that effective public services, such as access to electricity and clean cooking energy, can alleviate women’s time burden. However, the research paper finds that the magnitude of this difference is small.

    “The TUS data suggests that, on an average, women in households that use LPG or other clean cooking fuels spend less time on domestic unpaid activities, which includes meal preparation time, compared to those using traditional fuels. We observe that women in households that use LPG or other clean cooking fuels enjoy an additional leisure time of 41 to 80 minutes compared to those using traditional fuels,” the research said.

    Looking again at the TUS data, individuals who reported that electricity is the primary source of lighting for the household, reported, on an average, less time spent on domestic unpaid activities. For women, the time spent on domestic activities was less by around 20 minutes, it said.

    “In addition, the average time spent on leisure by women in households having electricity as primary source of lighting was about 35 minutes more compared to those not having electricity as their primary source of lighting,” it said. The research paper suggested that TUS can be used effectively to form government policies for women.

    “As observed from our analysis, by pointing to how women and men allocate their time on various activities, time use data can enhance our understanding of the effects of social norms and gender roles. The time use data can therefore form an effective feedback loop to strengthen policy design,” it said.

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    #Women #spend #hrs #unpaid #domestic #work #compared #hrs #spent #men

    ( With inputs from www.siasat.com )