Coda
Who wouldn’t want
a nice no-show job?
If you’re looking for the personification of nearly everything that can be wrong with local government in New Jersey, look no further than Anthony Palughi.
Palughi, who was arrested and charged with corruption by the FBI in December 2004, was the state’s key witness in the recent trial of Raymond O’Grady, a former mayor of Middletown and the former director of the Monmouth County Central Motor Pool. On June 8, a federal jury found O’Grady guilty of five corruption charges and set sentencing for Sept. 12.
O’Greedy was only one of a slew of Monmouth County politicians and hangers-on caught up in U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie’s Operation Bid Rig sting, which culminated in the arrest of 10 other alleged miscreants in February 2005. Many of those charged have since pleaded guilty. Keyport Mayor John Merla – currently free on $50,000 bail and facing a maximum of $2 million in fines and 120 years in prison if convicted – is scheduled to go to trial in October.
But while Palughi’s testimony against O’Greedy was damning, just as damning was his account of his history in county government, an account that illuminates a disgusting system of patronage and criminal waste of taxpayer dollars.
Palughi, a man who never completed high school, went to work for Monmouth County in 1986 as the director of the motor pool, the same job later held by O’Greedy.
“How did you get the job?” asked defense attorney Kevin Roe.
“Like everyone else before me got it,” Palughi said. “Through the political system.”
“Is that dishonest to taxpayers?” Roe asked.
“Yes,” Palughi said.
In 1990, Palughi was moved from the motor pool to a new position as assistant highway supervisor, again a promotion not based on qualifications, but on political connections. His next promotion was to the $92,000-a-year position of superintendent of bridges.
“That job, I’d assume, requires some knowledge of bridges,” Roe asked.
“I knew what a bridge was and what it was used for,” Palughi replied, admitting his lack of expertise.
Before assuming the position, Palughi said, he met with former county freeholders Thomas Powers and Harry Larrison Jr., and former county Administrator Robert Collins. Palughi said he was told that another man would actually run the department and that his real job would be to “take care of Harry (Larrison).”
In essence, that meant he would act as Larrison’s driver and apparently as a bagman for various corrupt enterprises.
“I was doing what my bosses told me to do,” Palughi said, “whether it was right, wrong or indifferent.”
“But you went along with the scheme?” Roe asked.
“A nice scheme like that, I think anyone would,” Palughi replied.
And Palughi makes a good point. Who wouldn’t want a $92,000-a-year no-show job and a pension upon retirement?
Well, an honest person, that’s who.
Palughi’s real job, by the way, was no secret in Monmouth County. Lots of people knew what Anthony Palughi really did, and for two decades, no one had the will or the righteous indignation to pull the plug. The whole system of county government, it now appears, was rotten at the core.
Larrison died in May 2005, just weeks after being charged by the U.S. Attorney with taking $8,500 in cash bribes from developers. Palughi retired shortly thereafter and began collecting his pension, ending a 20-year career as beneficiary of a corrupt patronage system.
But you have to wonder: How many more spectacularly unqualified people like Anthony Palughi are still out there, still drawing a paycheck in this “nice scheme”?
Too many, I suspect. And they’ll stay there until honest people step forward to expose and boot them out, or until taxpayers get so fed up they demolish the freeholder system and create something less conducive to patronage and corruption.
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Speaking of honest people, a few weeks ago when I heard that former Monmouth County Undersheriff Adam Puharic was thinking about throwing his hat in the race to succeed Fredrick P. Niemann as chairman of the Monmouth County Republican Party, I called to ask if he had gone insane. The party, beset by scandal and factional infighting, is a mess, and it will be a monumental task to pull it back together.
“Do you want me to come to your house and do an intervention?” I asked. “How could anyone hope to unify that bunch of disparate nincompoops?”
Puharic laughed. Honest, idealistic and absolutely altruistic, he actually believes in the notion that good people can make a difference and that public service is an obligation for those who want to make their communities better and give something back. He didn’t expect to win, he said, but if he became a candidate, at least he’d have a chance to put some of his ideas into the political forum.
I worried he’d be chewed up in the meat grinder of divisive county politics, eaten alive.
Turns out, I was wrong. On June 13, Puharic was elected chairman of the party by a wide margin over former Red Bank Republican Municipal Chairman Jim Giannell and former Monmouth County Freeholder Edward Stominski.
It was a surprising victory. Puharic faced stiff opposition from Giannell, whose candidacy was supported by lots of GOP heavyweights and anonymous Republican bloggers who fancy themselves king makers and take some credit for Niemann’s departure after a single term. But 61 percent of the people who voted in the election apparently saw the same thing in Puharic I saw when we met a few years ago – a humble and generous man of integrity, in politics for all the right reasons.
Monmouth County Republicans made a good choice in Adam Puharic, and if anyone can unify the party, it is he.
I just hope his idealism survives the ordeal.
Gregory Bean is executive editor of Greater Media Newspapers. You can reach him at [email protected].