Guest Column
Gov. dropped ball on pay-to-play
Harry S. Pozycki
Guest Column
Gov. dropped ball on pay-to-play
Now that the dust has settled after the assembly Democrats passed, and the governor signed, the much-ballyhooed "reform" package, it’s worth assessing the results.
Citizens who applied reform pressure by passing over 100 local reform laws and good government groups, which generated significant media pressure on the pay-to-play issue can take some satisfaction in the fact that a legislature and governor who offered nothing but lip service on reform for over two years finally produced some good initiatives. These include a pilot public financing program for legislative elections, enhanced political contribution disclosure, a "revolving door" law prohibiting ex-legislators from taking jobs as lobbyists, and a ban on political fund raising on state property. These reforms are all proposals that have long been advocated by Common Cause and other good government groups.
However, in a cynical move, Gov. McGreevey and the Democratic leadership used these initiatives as cover for a sham pay-to-play law that will do little, if anything, to stop politicians from extracting political contributions from government contractors in return for high priced, government contracts.
Among the major loopholes in the new pay-to-play law is that it exempts most government contracts from its provisions. The law does not apply to government contracts currently subject to public bidding requirements. In other words, this legislation does not cover contracts such as the one awarded to Parsons Infrastructure and Technology Corp.
In the Parsons case, hundreds of millions of tax dollars were wasted on a failed auto emissions system, largely as a result of pay-to-play influence. Furthermore, the distinction the law attempts to make between contracts selected under competitive requirements and no-bid contracts fails to recognize that the postcontract selection phase provides fertile ground for pay-to-play because contracts are often adjusted.
And for those few public contracts that are likely to have the contribution restrictions in the law actually apply, unlimited back-door party contributions will still be able to be made. For example, state contractors will still be able to give unrestricted amounts to county and local party committees.
Contractor cash is the crack cocaine of career politicians, and it is now clear that Gov. McGreevey and the Democratic legislative leaders are incapable of breaking their addiction. Only an "intervention" by the citizenry can cure their pay-to-play habit.
The good news is that citizens are stepping up their intervention by passing more and more real pay-to-play reforms in their hometowns. Having scored multiple victories by lobbying their mayors and councils, citizens are now mounting initiative and binding voter referendums for adoption of strong pay-to-play laws in major communities throughout the state, including the governor’s hometown of Woodbridge.
The bad news is that the governor and Democratic legislative leaders passed a pay-to-play bill, which "preempts" strong municipal pay-to-play laws in 2006, when the state level sham reform goes into effect. They claim the pre-emption was just an oversight and that they will correct it, but then again they promised real reform of our government contracting system for years and delivered nothing.
That is why it is important for citizens all across New Jersey to join the fight for passing strong pay-to-play laws in their hometowns now. This will make it difficult for the governor and Democratic legislative leaders to go back on their promise to lift the preemption of strong local pay-to-play laws and add to the momentum of a statewide citizens movement capable of breaking the pay-to-play addiction at the state level as well.
Harry S. Pozycki is the chairman of the Metuchen-based Common Cause New Jersey