Passaic County RR Chair Scott Rumana Opens Mouth, Inserts Foot

THE STATE’s favorite Passaic County Regular Republican Chairman, Scott Rumana is clearly suffering from foot-in-mouth disease as chronicled by the Record’s Charles Stile.

Seeking to curry favor with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Rumana has become a vocal opponent of the excessive salaries paid to employees at the Passaic Vally Sewerage Commission. Unfortunately for Rumana, it turns out that his Godfather, a one Robert Roe, works at PVSC as a consultant with a $10,000 a month MINIMUM retainer.

Flashback to 2008, Assemblymen Alex DeCroce, Thomas Giblin, John Wisniewski, Robert Gordon and State Senators Nicholas Sacco, John Girgenti and Shirley Turner sponsored legislation to name State Highway 23 after Robert Roe. Seemingly DeCroce and others forgot (or, more likely, in true sleazy fashion just did not care) that Roe had seriously injured a 15 year old and her mother when he plowed into their minivan driving while intoxicated on that very same Route 23:

The driver of the minivan, Julia Worosila, then 47, suffered a fractured pelvis and other internal injuries. More seriously wounded was her 15-year-old daughter, Jodi Worosila, who was asleep in the back of the van. She suffered a lacerated spleen, fractured ribs and numerous broken bones, requiring multiple surgeries.

In a deal that seemed to be tailor-made for a congressman, Roe was allowed to enter pretrial intervention, a program that resulted in the charges being dismissed. All in all, things worked out pretty well for Roe, but in the words of John Worosila, whose wife and daughter were injured, “This guy caused a nightmare for us.”
http://blog.nj.com/njv_editorial_page/2008/02/an_undeserved_honor.html

Stile: Rumana attacks panel that employs his close ally

Assemblyman Scott Rumana leapt headlong into last week’s pile-on of the Passaic Valley Sewerage Commissioners.

Spurred by Governor Christie’s public flogging of the patronage-larded agency, the Wayne Republican proposed a state takeover of the agency to halt the “waste and out-of-control salaries.”

But Rumana’s zeal is shaded by a personal and political irony: Rumana’s godfather, Robert A. Roe, the former Passaic County congressman-turned-lobbyist-consultant, has been paid handsomely as a $120,000-a-year grant writer for the PVSC since 1999, officials confirmed Friday.

In an interview, Rumana said he was generally aware that Roe, a longtime political ally, had a contract with the agency, but said the hiring of lobbyists, consultants and grant writers was “not my angle” — or put another way, not the primary target of his takeover proposal.

“My focus … is the employee roster, the titles they have, the amount of salaries that they are receiving. You are looking at over 80 people [each earning] over a $100,000 a year,” said Rumana, who is also chairman of the Passaic County Regular Republican Organization. “It is far, far out of control from where it should be.”

Roe’s contract, he said, “wasn’t even on my radar.” Rumana also said he had no role in helping Roe win the PVSC grant-writing gig.

Christie has repeatedly laced into the agency as a haven of patronage and waste. The commission includes some of the state’s highest-paid public employees, including 82 staff members with pensionable salaries. Bryan Christiansen, the $313,000-a-year executive director, has borne the brunt of Christie’s wrath.

Christie, who wants the power to veto the minutes of the commission’s meeting, has also taken aim at the authority’s spending on contract lobbyists, including those hired to “get me to tone down a little bit.” The jab at lobbying is of a piece with a Christie transition team report which singled out the commission’s prolific use of outside consultants.

The hiring of lobbyists and consultants like Roe would certainly come under scrutiny if the state were to take over the commission. It would come down to a basic bang-for-the-buck analysis — did they justify their monthly retainers (Roe’s is $10,000 a month)?

Any review, Rumana said, would have to “look at how many millions of dollars that were applied for and received and compare that to their salaries.”

Richard Ambrosino, a lobbyist hired to handle flak from the Christie attacks, argued that Roe has been worth the investment. Roe has nabbed $40 million in grants, the only federal money poured into the PVSC since its secondary treatment plant was built in 1981, Ambrosino said in an e-mail message. Roe has brought in $34 for every $1 paid for his work, Ambrosino wrote.

An attempt to reach Roe late Friday was unsuccessful.
http://www.northjersey.com/news/politics/political_stile/83744147_Assemblyman_attacks_panel_that_employs_a_longtime_ally.html

Share