Burlington County Democrats 
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Mon Mar 15, 2010 at 06:48:30 PM EDT
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We've written about the Burlington County Bridge commission before here at Blue Jersey. When we last left them, lobbyist Bob Stears was pleading guilty saying he got sucked into a "corrupt group of people."
The Philadelphia Inquirer had an in depth piece yesterday on the agency talking about how despite the notion they want people to believe that they are a model that has learned from past mistakes under the new leadership of John Comegno, they are still a prime source of business for many of the GOP donors and the game continues: The commission and its staff have a number of Republican ties. Comegno's law firm, the Comegno Law Group, is a GOP donor. The executive director is the son of a Republican political action committee treasurer. And the new chief financial officer is a former GOP councilwoman from Riverton. Comegno is the current chairman of the bridge commission and despite all of these ties to the county party, he described "the commission as a model of transparency and accountability, saying political relationships and donations are not related to agency operations in any way." This "model of transparency" still has deep ties to the county party:The law firm Capehart Scatchard, an influential backer of the Burlington County Republican Party, has received $2.2 million in legal fees since 2007. That's the equivalent of billing 13 hours a workday over the last three years. Capehart Scatchard is GOP party boss Glenn Paulsen's law firm where he is a partner. His neighbor is Bill Layton, the current chairman of the Republican party Burlington County. Follow me below the fold for more.
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Sun Mar 14, 2010 at 02:10:28 PM EDT
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We wrote about the heat the new Burlington County Freeholder administrator Paul Drayton has been taking since his selection by the Republican Freeholder board the other day. Now the board is coming under greater scrutiny because of the choice, a close friend of Party boss Glenn Paulsen. Their unwillingness to be forthcoming and inability to admit they made a mistake has led the Courier to offer this take on what they are doing:The Republican majority on the freeholder board appears to be ignoring what's in the public interest in favor of what's in their partisan interest. The Courier wants the Freeholder board to cut their losses and let Drayton go, but the Republican Freeholders haven't been willing to take that step yet. The editorial called the selection of Drayton a "highly partisan pick, and a bad one given some of what we know." Not only is the selection questionable, but the process by which he came about deserves further scrutiny. The Republican Freeholders have been unwilling to make public the names of the people who interviewed for the position and the finalists only met with the Freeholder Director and Deputy Director. That's far from the transparency they promised the voters.
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Sat Mar 06, 2010 at 02:01:04 PM EST
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 So my Mayor has switched teams again. Evesham Mayor Randy Brown initially managed the campaign of the former Republican Mayor, Gus Tamburro in 2003, but then ran against Tamburro as a Democrat in 2007 and won. It was a big pickup for the Democrats at the time to win all 3 seats and take a 4-1 majority on council for the largest municipality in the county.
Since that time, Republicans have retaken control of the council. Both the Burlington County Democratic Chair and Treasurer were forced to resign in scandal, which seriously undermined the charges of corruption the Democrats hurled at the Republicans, and the Party's still struggling to get back on track. The party has seen a fight over the Chair position, which after many stops and starts, will be chosen in June. In the mean time, Brown has used the divisions in the party and the shifting political winds as a chance to switch teams again.
The funny things is, the GOP ran ads against the last Democratic council candidates accusing them of being just a continuation of Brown's policies. They even attacked Brown in a mailer, calling him a liar (click to enlarge the mailer to the right). Chris Russell, spokesman for the County Republicans and defender of Brown's switch, still touts the mailers that he produced on his business website, though I doubt the'll be posted there for long. The GOP spent the last 3 years trashing Brown. But now that he's one of them, they're all good to keep him around.
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Mon Aug 24, 2009 at 11:35:00 PM EDT
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Responding to building pressure for him to resign as Chairman of the Burlington Democrats, Rick Perr tonight stepped down effective September 1:Burlington County Democratic Chairman Rick Perr has resigned. In an e-mail sent at 10:09 PM to Alice Furia, the Vice Chair, Perr said simply: "I am resigning as Chairman of the Burlington County Democratic Committee effective 12:01 am on September 1, 2009." Furia will become Acting Chair. The public calls began after this story in the Burlington County Times ran on Sunday:Democratic Chairman Rick Perr and former committee treasurer Jeff Meyer previously had denied any involvement with the Medford-based New Frontier Committee, but numerous e-mails obtained by the Burlington County Times show the two corresponded with New Frontier's treasurer Jack Senechal on fundraising, campaign contributions and committee finances. Meyer had already resigned and a county committee meeting was scheduled to select a new Treasurer this week. But following the article, a steady stream of releases came out throughout the day on Monday calling on Perr to go. Follow me below the fold for more.
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Tue Mar 31, 2009 at 06:03:31 PM EDT
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The speculation about two open seats on the Freeholder Board was confirmed yesterday:Long-time Freeholders Bill Haines and Jim Wujcik announced during a press conference today that they would retire at the end of their terms.
Haines and Wujcik submitted a formal letter to Burlington County Republican Chairman Bill Layton. You can view the full letter they submitted to Layton. The County Republican Committee plans to meet this Saturday to nominate candidates for freeholder and other offices. Last cycle, County Democrats picked up big wins with two freeholder seats and the clerk's office. This year, they're looking to gain control of the board and are running Mount Holly Councilwoman Kimberly Kersey and Cinnaminson labor leader Jim Bernard:Kersey, an in-house attorney for Manalapan-based CMX Engineers, was elected to the non-partisan Mount Holly Township Council last May. Bernard, a member of electrical union IBEW 98 in Philadelphia, ran unsuccessfully for Cinnaminson Township Committee in November. I wrote last week about the Assembly candidates and the changing playing field of the 8th district, which makes up a large part of Burlington County. We'll see who the Republicans put up to compete this weekend, but they don't have the State Senators or incumbent Congressman for help on the ballot anymore and now they don't have incumbent freeholders either.
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Mon Mar 02, 2009 at 02:40:16 PM EST
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The stars could be aligning for the Burlington County Democrats. I have speculated in a few posts about rumors that at least one of the two sitting Republican Freeholders set to stand for re-election this year would not be running again. Now comes public speculation along the same lines. First, Freeholder James Wujcik last week, with a name everyone will recognize as a possible replacement:There is speculation among Republican insiders that Burlington County Freeholder James Wujcik will not seek re-election this year. Wujcik has been a Freeholder since 1997. One possible candidate to replace him is former Medford Mayor Christopher Myers, who won 48% of the vote in his bid for Congress last year. Myers, sources say, is involved in a project at Lockheed Martin, where he is a Vice President, and has not made any decisions regarding his political future. Chris "the economy is basically strong" Myers would be one of the few names already known on a county level from his unsuccessful effort against Congressman Adler last cycle, but that may just be a GOP dream as he doesn't seem to be committed to running. Myers is up for re-election this year in Medford, so if he ran for Freeholder, he would have to give up his local seat. He also lost the Burlington County part of the Congressional District and that was without many of the more Democratic river towns. At the time of that story last Friday, they said it was expected Bill Haines would seek re-election. Now today, comes quotes on the record from Freeholder Bill Haines:"I'm still trying to decide what I'm going to do about freeholder," said Haines, who this year finishes up his fifth term.
[snip]
"I probably would have made the decision a long time ago if Aubrey Fenton and Stacey Jordan had won the last time, but with control up it makes the decision more difficult," he said. I wonder who wanted the word to get out about Haines's decision. Fenton and Jordan lost to Democrats Brown and Reinhart this past November. I bet Haines is getting a ton of pressure to run again from the party. The internal dynamics of the Burlington County Republicans these days, makes this news even more interesting. There is still talk of rifts within the party between Senator Diane Allen and leadership. They spent over a million dollars losing two seats on the Freeholder board last cycle, lost the County Clerk seat, lost the Saxton Congressional seat and still carry an outstanding debt. The incumbent Republican State Senators are not on the ballot to lead the way and the incumbent Congressman of the same party, which they used to depend on is no more. Given the snow on the ground today, the perfect storm could be forming for Democrats in Burlington County this November.
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Sat Feb 14, 2009 at 04:31:25 PM EST
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Some of the largest gains in the 2008 election for Democrats were seen in Burlington County. We saw a great many firsts for the party. Congressman Adler became the first democrat elected for the NJ3 in over 100 years. Two democratic freeholder and County Clerk were also elected on the county level for the first time in over 20 years. Now we look to this election year, where control of the freeholder board will be up for grabs. Rumors abound that at least one Republican incumbent is not planning to seek re-election. That served as the backdrop to a visit this morning before a packed house for the County Committee breakfast by Governor Corzine and State Chairman Joe Cryan. Also in attendance were the new Democratic County Freeholders and the Assemblymen from the 7th District, Herb Conaway and Jack Conners. 
The Governor talked about everything from SCHIP and the stimulus, to transportation funding and veterans issues. He touched on the upcoming election and the opportunities Burlington County Democrats will have. 
He also took questions from the audience on foreclosure issues and received an invitation to participate in a debate during the general election from the Veterans for Education, who sponsored Adler/Myers and Andrews/Glading debates last cycle.
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Mon Oct 08, 2007 at 10:58:00 PM EDT
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Welcome to how not to run a government, brought to you by the Burlington County Republican Party. A few weeks ago, I posted about a scheme to create a slush fund under the control of the GOP Freeholder board with the help of their appointees at the bridge commission. At the time, the Burlington County Times called them on it and Freeholder Candidate Tom Bader kept the heat on. Today, the Burlington County Times recaps some of the highlights of the GOP run county government's fleecing of the taxpayers and calls them on their crap again with this editorial. A scheme to expand the powers of the Burlington County Bridge Commission has collapsed, which is the fate it should have met from Day One......The scandal-plagued commission needs to get its own house in order before it starts funneling money through a loan program that uses the county's good credit rating to keep interest rates reasonable.
This week, sentencing was delayed a third time for a commission lobbyist and spokesman who admitted in federal court that he deliberately over billed the commission for several years beginning in 1997.
By most accounts, the activities of Robert Stears resulted in up to $1 million in losses.
The state Attorney General's Office has also subpoenaed the commission to determine what work - if any - state Sen. Martha Bark, R-8th of Medford, performed as a consultant to the Palmyra Cove Nature Park project, this to the tune of $233,101.
The park is under the bridge commission's jurisdiction.
Equally troubling, the Tacony-Palmyra and Burlington-Bristol bridges came up short this summer when federal inspectors found them "structurally deficient" in the aftermath of the collapse of a highway bridge in Minneapolis.
With its less-than-stellar reputation, the commission has a way to go to regain public trust... ...Still, it's hard not to see this loan initiative as an opportunity for more pockets to be lined, more money to be doled out and more power to be wielded by commissioners who were never elected by the people they serve. This has all occurred under the watchful eyes of the GOP controlling nearly all levels of county government for years. A GOP freeholder board, who made appointments to the bridge commission while GOP boss Glenn Paulsen pulled the strings and awarded contracts through the family business. Stears, who is awaiting sentencing has been thrown overboard by his former employer, the Strategy Group, which is the firm of none other than GOP State Chair Tom Wilson. If you're confused, that's the point. They're hoping you won't notice that they're robbing you blind.
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Sat Sep 23, 2006 at 12:13:21 PM EDT
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So the other day, Junior called the moral high ground by asking Wayne Bryant to resign, who no one is defending here. Well, the Burlington County Democratic Chairman wants him to be consistent and ask for Martha Bark, the Republican Senator from the 8th district to resign as well...Democratic Party Chairman Rick Perr challenged Kean yesterday to take the same strong position against state Sen. Martha Bark, R-8th of Medford.
The state Attorney General's Office is investigating positions Bark held with two Burlington County government agencies that paid her a combined $330,000 from 1997 to 2003.
State investigators said they are trying to determine what, if any, work Bark did while employed by the Burlington County Bridge Commission from 1997 to 2001 and Burlington County Institute of Technology in 2002 and 2003.
The state launched an investigation in March 2004, a week after the Burlington County Times published a story that said the two agencies had no records that explicitly showed how much work Bark performed on those government jobs.
Kean, who also is a state senator, has called for a state investigation of Bryant, citing the report that questioned Bryant's job and the millions in state funds he helped steer to the university while he was its employee.
Bark has similarly been criticized for sponsoring legislation that granted improvement-authority power to the bridge commission while she was an agency employee. So that's the background on the story and after Junior's wondeful press staff declined to comment on whether Bark should resign as well, lets see what the chairman had to say...
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Mon Sep 04, 2006 at 10:02:07 PM EDT
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(That's two for South Jersey in one night. Come on North Jersey - you gonna let South Jersey kick your butt like this? - promoted by jmelli)
Until we have a Burlington County Blue Journalist, I figured I would do a little summary of what's going on. Here is a map of the municipalities in Burlington County which goes from south of Trenton, to the Delaware River, to Exit 4 on the Turnpike and then down to the border of Ocean & Atlantic Counties.
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