Meaghan M. McDermott

@meagmc

County Executive Cheryl Dinolfo's husband Vincent Dinolfo and former Rochester Police Chief James Sheppard are among the hundreds of people granted potentially improper fee waivers when Cheryl Dinolfo was County Clerk.

The legality of the waivers is a contentious point between Monroe County Clerk Adam Bello, a Democrat appointed to the position earlier this year, and Cheryl Dinolfo, a Republican who has been Monroe County executive since Jan. 1.

On Monday, Bello announced that as many as 668 people had been given potentially illegal waivers on passport and pistol permit fees since 2008. Dinolfo led the clerk's office from 2004 through the end of last year.

Bello, who is seeking to be elected to the clerk's job in November, said he could not identify those who received waivers due to confidentiality restrictions. He said he has asked the U.S. State Department to waive those rules and let him release the names. He has charged that the waivers violated state and federal law.

In response to media inquires Dinolfo on Tuesday released a receipt that shows her office waived the $20 Notary Public license renewal fee for her husband in 2009. At the time, Vincent Dinolfo was a law clerk in Monroe County Surrogate's Court and an Irondequoit Town Justice. He is now a Monroe County Court Judge.

County Spokesman Brett Walsh also provided an opinion from County Attorney Michael E. Davis saying that waiver was authorized by state law.

And, Cheryl Dinolfo demanded Bello apologize for insinuating she had used her office to grant her husband a favor.

"Yesterday, Mr. Bello made an accusation that one Notary Public Renewal was improperly waived and that was for my husband, Vincent Dinolfo," she said in a written statement. "By law, the County Clerk may not charge a fee to a person operating in an official capacity, including a Law Clerk of the Monroe County Surrogates Court where my husband was employed. Mr. Bello owes my husband an apology for making false accusations."

But Bello charged back, saying Dinolfo is both wrong about the law and wrong in her application of the law.

"Otherwise the County Clerk's system would not need to have been manipulated so that her husband would be the only individual in Monroe County to benefit from this waived fee," he said. "If she had been correct in her interpretation, she would owe many other people in Monroe County an apology for treating them differently."

Also on Tuesday, Sheppard, a former Rochester police chief and current Monroe County legislator, disclosed that he had been granted a waiver for his local passport fee in February 2012.

"I did not question when told my passport fee was waived due to my profession," he said.

Sheppard, a Democrat, said he went to the clerk's office on Tuesday and paid the fee.

"Whether or not it was legally waived, it's important to me to pay the fees," he said. "It is in everybody's interest as residents and taxpayers of Monroe County."

Federal law does provide for some exemptions to passport fees, including for federal officers on official business, American seamen and family members of a deceased service member attending funerals overseas. But, the law disallows waivers of the $25 execution fee unless the passports are executed before a federal official.

Bello has turned his findings over to law enforcement officials and has asked the county attorney to try to recoup any wrongly waived fees.

MCDERMOT@Gannett.com