| It was freezing cold the day of the vote with Mr. Oury trying to shoo us off the steps at the Middle School. It was quite clear that at this point Dennis was definitely carrying water for Boss Joe.
Based on the fact that Ferriero & Oury tried to destroy any semblance of democracy in Bergen county, we wrote a little letter to Senator Weinberg asking her to do the unthinkable - run OFF THE LINE.
The LD37 Team agreed to do just that.
Governor Corzine actually stepped in to support Loretta after a good chunk of the County Committee - fed up with Ferriero and Oury's antics, boycotted the BCDO convention and celebrated at Loretta's new campaign HQ opening with Howard Dean's brother as a special guest. (Reports came it it was pretty lonely at the BCDO HQ that very same night.)
It wasn't Chris Christie that put the first chink in Boss Joe's armor or Dennis Oury's for that matter. It was Loretta Weinberg and all the Bergen County DEMOCRATS who supported Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Huttle and Gordon Johnson. We didn't mind ticking off Boss Joe, and WRITING about it publicly.
Then Mr. Oury and Ferriero attempt to get Loretta back on the BCDO line because now they no longer have official BCDO LD37 candidates. They try to legally FORCE Loretta onto the BCDO line instead of the Real Bergen Dems line, which was created as a reform slate. Boss Joe is TERRIFIED that his local minions will not be re-elected if Loretta heads OUR column instead of his. Oury figures prominently in all the legal wrangling by Boss Joe.
More about Loretta's team resisting pressure from the Oury and Ferriero to disband their Real Bergen Dems reform slate.
Let's recap so far.
Due to the AGs office curiously allowing the ballot switch and accepting Oury's very late paperwork, Oury and Ferriero succeed in splitting Loretta's team from the reform slate she helped create.
Meanwhile in my hometown of Bergenfield, a fiesty WWII veteran and Real Bergen Democrat takes on Dennis Oury and Joe Ferriero's flunkies. These are DEMOCRATS mind you, who took action because Christie's office was too slow - it took 3 whole YEARS to investigate the forgeries that nearly prevented Senator Weinberg from becoming Senator in the first place.
By this point, Oury's peeps have found out about Blue Jersey and start blogging in opposition. They realize that it is the blog here at Blue Jersey that is informing Dems about the battles going on and how we are able to mobilize an insta-protest the very SECOND Ferriero and Oury plot something.
At the Primary, thanks to Loretta's team letting voters know where to find us, Dem voters in LD37 gave "the old politics the old 1, 2" and voted for us in column 1 and Loretta, Valerie and Gordon in Column 2. We won some real local victories that day - especially in Bergenfield and Englewood.
Getting bolder, the Real Bergen Democrats make very public attempts to have our concerns addressed and to examine the BCDO finances. Oury refuses to let Robert Gulack and I have any infomation and Boss Joe DENIES us a convention even though we have the required signatures to get one.
Ferriero and Oury appear to break the law in their attempts to prevent the County Committee members from having any say over the way the organization is run.
Meanwhile, Loretta, Valerie and Gordon run as Clean Elections Candidates. While the public assumes that it was easy, I was there and know the team came by each and every vote the hard way - by meeting and talking with the voters on the street. The LD37 team showed they not only did not want Boss Joe's financial help, they did not need it.
SEVEN Months since I had tried mightily to get the newspapers to pay attention to the BCDO corruption centered around Ferriero and Oury and they FINALLY respond. Blue Jersey was the ONLY place to follow news of their antics for half a year. But Mike Kelly thinks it is news.
Oury is getting carried away and starts to believe his own press. He tries to SUE to keep Pay to Play in place. Loretta's team give Oury a very public smack down.
My letter about the craziness never did get printed in the newspaper, because it happened BEFORE Ferriero and Oury became the darlings of the Front Page of most NJ newspapers.
This is when the Record finally started to cover the story - they mention the protest we planned over the BCDO deciding whether or not to have Dennis Oury sue the state of NJ to KEEP Pay to Play. The funny thing is Bill Maer talks about protestors intimidating elected officials, but the folks who were usually alongside me protesting Ferriero and Oury ARE elected DEMOCRATIC officials like me from Tenafly, Teaneck, Englewood and Bergenfield.
Due to us finally publicly scaring the wits out of Boss Joe, he cancels the meeting to avoid the protest. Not a single sign needed to be waved in his face.
Apparently we even scared Ferriero flunkie Lynn Hurwitz when we threatened to protest sending Oury to Trenton push his Pay to Play lawsuit:
The LD37 team then gave a press conference about NJ's "shadow governments" - our Utilities Commissions, like the ones that kept Joe Ferriero and Oury employed and extremely wealthy all these years. It is probably no coincidence that the Republican member of GGC was head of one of these Commissions. This digging by the LD37 team unearthed a lot of information which weakened Joe Ferriero and Dennis Oury further.
By October 17, 2007, Tom Moran writes about The Real Bergen Democrats "Merry Band of Reformers". It is now 9 months since we really started publicizing the BCDO battles with Boss Joe and Dennis Oury.
The Bipartisan Party Democracy Act, finally makes the news. Sponsored by Loretta Weinberg and Diane Allen, it was the Loretta's legislative cure for the antics of Oury and Ferriero.
To which the Party Bosses promptly freak out.
In the meantime, Bergenfield kicks Dennis Oury, Esq. out of his appointment there. The moment is savored by the Real Bergen Dems who made it happen. Folks not content to wait for Chris Christie to ride in recklessly on a white horse.
Two steps forward - one back as we attempt to use the convention to bring forth our complaints and speak to the Committee. We are reminded that the BCDO is not a very democratic organization as BCDO attorney Dennis Oury, Esq. lets Joe do whatever he wants.
The Real Bergen Dems file another primary challenge against Ferriero and Oury's buddies.
Only THIS time I am on the ballot with a full slate of activists.
Ferriero then bankrupts the BCDO by outspending us 13 to one. We still pick up 25% of the votes in the primary but we win more County Committee seats than Ferriero's candidates.
And now my all time favorite Dennis Oury diary. The one with the posters of how the Pay to Play cycle works in NJ - with pictures and everything!
Finally, the FEDS are getting Ferriero and Oury to cough up some info.
The net begins to close in around Ferriero and Oury as it becomes a daily news story, while we are busy campaigning.
More bad news for Joe and Dennis.
It took bad press and an investigation by the Feds but FINALLY we got a semblance of a civil BCDO convention when Boss Joe was up for re-election. Unfortunately, he still won - temporarily.
Then the Governmental Grants Consulting (GGC) story breaks. Compared to our complaints about Oury and Ferriero for years now, the GGC story pales in scope, but knowing that gangsters usually got convicted for tax evasion rather than murder and racketeering, the Real Bergen Dems were relieved justice was finally coming - even if it was a small consolation.
Oury steps down from several of his many political appointments - including his stint as BCDO attorney in fall - immediately after the indictments come out.
By November, 2008, Joe had worn out his welcome at the BCDO. The party elders decided, Joe was now a liability.
At a first baby step attempt at democracy while trying to decide what to do about the Ferriero "problem", the BCDO members show they have a little trouble remembering how to have a civil debate.
Around this same time, with a little help from a far away place called Illinois and a strange guy with the name Rod Blagovovich, and a newscaster named Chris Mathews, the public now understands what Pay to Play means, and that it isn't good.
With Dennis gone Joe has to go, but just how is the very real question.
To recap so far.
Then, Boss Joe hits the Big Time.The New York Times shines a bright spotlight on him and how Tweedlike he is.
Finally, nearly 2 full years after we first started blogging about Ferriero and Oury right here, Boss Joe announces his resignation and an election to find a replacement.
Then he UNSTEPS down so he can fire the temporary Oury replacement.
After some wrangling Joe is no longer in charge and his replacement promises more civility.
Things are much much better in Bergen without Dennis Oury and Joe Ferriero running the show now. We now have more democratic primaries in towns across the county and the relief expressed by many county employees is evident.
Much of this transpired without the help of Mr. Chris Christie who will try to take all the credit for the next month, but I was THERE and remember how this all went down - and now you know the ACTUAL story.
Would it have been easy to get rid of them WITHOUT the indictments? Perhaps not, but we had been fighting these guys for YEARS before the indictment came down, and we defanged them long before a jury was even chosen. The Real Bergen Dems had kicked Oury out as Bergenfield Borough Attorney an entire YEAR before Councilmembers Rabbit and Mulligan were indicted for the forgeries that almost derailed a State Senate election.
The victim of those forgeries - a fiesty WWII veteran took matters into his OWN hands rather than wait for Chris Christie to save him, and RAN for office where he is now the Mayor of Bergenfield - the very place where Oury met his Waterloo.
The fact that Loretta Weinberg tirelessly fought the corruption of Dennis Oury and Joe Ferriero long before the Republicans chose to use it as political fodder is not lost on the voters of Englewood, Bergenfield, Tenafly, and Teaneck who know Loretta well and are deeply grateful.
Now that Oury has pled guilty, and Ferriero is standing trial without his former bestest buddy, lets get out the popcorn - this trial should get interesting...... |
