Consultant Says Councilman Didn't Pay Up

A design and construction consultant says he drafted architectural drawings for Southampton Town Councilman Jim Malone’s Hampton Bays house, but was then fired and never paid for the drawings, putting him out $3,850.

The accusation comes on the heels of a contractor going public this week with a story claiming Malone refuses to pay him for $8,000 worth of labor at the same Anderson Road house and when he served Malone with a lien.

Paul Cataldo, a consultant from Sound Beach in the middle of becoming a licensed architect, said Wednesday he was Malone’s 203k loan consultant on the home renovation. A 203k is a Federal Housing Administration loan for rehabilitating a house that has fallen into disrepair, bringing it up to community standards. His job was to inspect the work on the house and make sure everything was up to snuff before telling the bank to release money from escrow to pay the contractors, he said.

But according to Malone, Cataldo tried to also be his project manager, a service he had no need for. “I didn’t need someone to pick out tile and paint color and hold my hand,” Malone said. “I’m not the average Joe who is a lawyer who doesn’t know how to put a light switch together.”

Their ideas for the project were not consistent, so he exercised his right to pick another 203k loan consultant to act as an intermediary between him and the bank, Malone said. "Some of them want to enhance their livelihood by going to the homeowner and getting a little extra," he said. "I didn’t want to be a part of that. I didn’t need it."

Malone said Cataldo drafted a host of different sketches, like anyone bidding for a job would, but his home renovation did not require architectural plans.

Malone had bought the house after it was damaged in a fire, which is why it needed renovations. Cataldo said Malone enlisted him to draft plans for raising the pitch of the roof — an idea Cataldo says he suggested in the first place — and putting in a dormer on the second floor. “His exact words were, ‘I authorize you to go ahead with the drawings,’” Cataldo said.

Cataldo said he handed over the plans before receiving payment, expecting Malone was good for it. “He’s a town councilman; I figured he wasn’t going to be a scofflaw,” he said.

But after proceeding to use the plans, Malone never paid up, Cataldo said.

Patch viewed the plans and Malone’s building permit at the Southampton Town Building Department Wednesday, and verified they were Cataldo’s drawings.

Cataldo said he was happy to resign, but he had to write the $3,850 off as a loss. He said he would normally charge $4,500, but he wanted the councilman’s business.

Malone said that it is curious that Cataldo would claim now, several months later and in the midst of another accusation, that he is owed money.

Cataldo has not filed a lien against Malone.