It must be a very slow news week. Race riots in Oakland, Ca. Obama wants an $800 billion stimulus. Unemployment hits 7%. Corzine announces $812 million in deferrals, calls them cuts and goes to Iraq. Chris Christe enters the governors race and Tom DeSeno spends another morning on the FoxNews website. Not much happening.
Among the most newsworthy items of the week is that Joe Oxley got a job.
The Asbury Park Press had two articles and an editorial about the Monmouth County GOP Chairman being appointed as the township attorney in Wall.
The APP seems to be trying to make a point that politics determined the appointment. Duh!
Why was there no article or editorial about Oxley losing the borough attorney job in Highlands last week when the Democrats took control? Was that any less political?
Is there any municipal attorney position anywhere that is not determined by politics?
Oxley's firm lowered the hourly rate being charged Wall Township. They also pledged to give up a $300K county job when Oxley became county chairman, which they were under no obligation to do. Is there any other law firm in New Jersey systematically seeking work by offering lower fees and forsaking work due to apparent conflicts? That ought to have been the focus of the APP's coverage.
Oxley's critics and the APP are trying to make a point that Oxley is not the most experienced municipal attorney and got the job because of politics. Well, Joe isn't the most experienced municipal attorney in Monmouth County. That would be John Bennett. I wonder what the headline would have been if Bennett got the job.
Oxley is a former mayor of Middletown and has been designated a Diplomate in New Jersey Municipal Law. He is qualified and his firm was apparently the lowest bidder for the job. You would think the APP would like that.
The Legacy of Thomas Lifson
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Maybe they're still feeling the burn from when he pulled the Sheriff's Dept. advertising and threw it all to the weeklies. Just a thought.
The APP didn't want him to be GOP county chairman, either.
What was APP's reaction when Vic Scudiery got the DMV in his development, and got one of his associates as supervisor with a pretty good salary?
In Howell, we have done away with the political appointment of a municipal attorney. On January 1, we went to an in house attorney position.
Over the past 6 years the municipal attorney averaged over $300,000.00. The in house position including support staff will realize us an annual savings of over $100,000.00.
Maybe other towns will look at our model, see the savings and choose to go this route removing politics from the appointment.
Mike Howell
Mike,
That could be a great cost saving measure if it works out. I hope it does.
But how can politics play no part in the selection?
Art,
Instead of the the attorney being appointed by the council, it becomes a direct hire position.
The manager did all the interviews and then brought the two finalists to the council. The manager had the final choice in the hire.
It is still, by statute a year to year position but the council in our form of government only has the ability to hire or fire the manager not any other employee.
Subsequent council majorities could go back to the old method, but would have a hard time explaining why a campaign donor and outside professional who would command at least three times the taxpayers money was put back in place instead of keeping the position in house.
Mike,
Well done.
Does the savings you quote also account for employee benefits, court costs, law library/research costs and office space?
In the case of malpractice, I guess the township is on the hook with no recourse to an attorney's insurance company
To Matawan's credit, Mayor Buccellato appointed Pat Menna, Esq., Borough Attorney. Mr. Menna, by the way, is the Mayor of Red Bank and he is a Democrat. Mr. Menna is also the best attorney for the job and gave Matawan a flat fee rate.
Scudiery lost his hold on Matawan in the last election. Interesting how the Democrats did nothing to keep the DMV in Matawan. Scudiery also influenced the Democrats of Matawan not to re-appoint Menna when the Democrats had the majority. This cost taxpayers more money on legal fees.
Scudiery also make campaign contributions of $7500. to try to re-elect Aufseeser in the Mayoral Special Election. Other towns and boroughs in Monmouth County never received such financial support.
We don't recall the APP reporting on any of these tidbits. We in Matawan are proud we can say, WE CAN'T BE BOUGHT!
The APP is not a legitimate newspsper and continues to demonstrate their inability to separate news from editorial style writing. The paper is virtually "un-readable". The double standard is beyond belief and anyone interested in just getting the news is forced to buy the Star Ledger (you just have to skip the editorial pages). Just imagine if a Republican controlled Freeholder board tried to create a trumped up patronage job like an inspector general; the headlines against it would rival the font size of the D-Day invasion. The best course of dealing with the APP is to encourage advertisers to stop buying ads. At the same time we have to encourage people to stop buying the paper at all. This is obviously happening to a degree now anyway. For example, at my WaWa later in the evening there is routinely a large stack of that day's APP still there while the Ledger, Wall Street Journal and other legitimate papers are long sold out. Perhaps continued declines in circulation and drops in advertising will force a change in management or perhaps their becoming defunct all together.
Joe DiBella
Holy Moly! The former Mayor of Howell is here!
I won't buy the overpriced APP. I read it online.
Let's all encourage our Chair to hire a good writer now, to start BLASTING these hypocrites in the papers and on your blogs, and call them out for it: Dems are just so phony: running, (with the stupid, lazy, and failing APP parroting all of "Maddog Mangan"'s Hudson-style street-tripe), to supposedly "wipe out the old-boy network" in Freehold, all the while creating their own new one, right from day-one!..we need to let all the folks know that they made a mistake in a bad year, and that the Rep's built county,and simply run it better.. also, to call on "Flippy" to just tell us how many, and whom, are on his list of "pay-backs", for the last $300,000 Cryan wheeled into Monmouth for them, these past 3 yrs!..
But Howell still has a bunch of special counsel. Employee benefits are expensive and cost for many years after they are gone. Howell will not save any money in long term--in fact-- it'll probably cost more even though I am sure they'll make it look like they save money the first year. And don't kid yourself, politics did play a part in the selection. And look who the special counsel are too.
Art,
The savings included all the things you mentioned and also included the cost of malpractice insurance. Since the attorney works for the township and can only work for the township (no outside practice of law) we must provide the insurance. And as the attorney becomes more familiar with the workings of the township, more responsibilities will fall to that office thus requiring less need for outside counsel.
As for the last post concerning the special counsel positions. Just because a firm is named as a special counsel, doesn't mean that they will earn a penny, it just allows the manager and the council the flexibility to use them should the need arise. And the employee benefits costing for years, maybe you could expound on that? And I'd really like to hear more about how politics played any part in the managers decision of who to hire.
everybody hates the lawyers, until THEY need one!..no gov't. knows how many times they'll be sued in a year, and the pool sits, no meter running, until a specific assignment is given, and, again with the "job-class" warfare:it's still America,(for a few more days, at least), so nothing stops anyone from heading to law school and becoming a lawyer ,or anything else, if they really want to..
Regarding the in house legal situation in Howell, give it a shot before you are critical of it. There is no way to determine if this works until it gets tried. I suspect the un-named people critical of it on this site are just sour that perhaps they did not get their way on something else. I say this as someone not involved in the process but who has high hopes for solid outcomes.
Joe DiBella
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