The Dover Township Council adopted two resolutions to pay an extra
$45,300 for two law firms that exceeded their service contracts.
It was embarrassing to watch as the Republican council members tried
to waltz around the responsibility for handing additional payments to
the law firms of Secare, Delanoy, Martino and Ryan; and Goldshore,
Cash & Kalac.
Secare Got $21,000 Extra; Goldshore Got $24,500 More
Council members even prevaricated about the "excessive" and
"prohibitive" cost of a fee arbitration if they protested the
overcharges, $21,000 extra for Secare, and $24,500 extra for the
Goldshore firm.
Fee arbitrations are provided free by a committee set up by the county
bar association, so the "prohibitive" cost would have been zero.
In the end, the council did not even want to spend enough to buy two
37¢ stamps to send a letter asking to sit down and negotiate
reasonable compromises in the bills with the two law firms.
Lawyers Handing Taxpayers Money to Other Lawyers
|
Fiure
Sold Out The Taxpayers For A $90,000 County Job |
|
Gilmore |
The council is led by its president Gregory McGuckin, a partner in the
second largest pay-to-play Republican law firm in the county; and
another lawyer, Michael Fiure, is the proud possessor of a $90,000
county job obtained for him by GOP county chairman George Gilmore,
also a lawyer who presented bills to the township that exceeded the
terms of his original contract agreement for $90,000 to make "changes"
to the township administrative code.
McGuckin's Law Firm Took In More Than
$1 Million From No-Bid Contracts In 2004
|
McGuckin |
The Dasti-McGuckin firm took in more than $1 million in 2004 from
public no-bid contracts obtained as a result of political influence,
second only to Gilmore, whose firm got no-bid contracts of more than
$1.3 million in 2004.
|
Haelig
|
Haelig: "Money Totally Wasted"
Former Dover Township Republican leader Robert K. Haelig Jr. said the
extra money for Secare and Goldshore was "totally and completely wasted
because the work should have been done by the full-time law
department."
Haelig challenged township attorney Mark Troncone after Troncone
claimed the Secare overcharge was the "only overcharge among the
original contracts" awarded on January 2, 2004 when the Republican
council organized.
Troncone Overcharge On $60,000 Contract
Haelig said he recalled "another overcharge that was a lot larger than
the $21,000 Secare overcharge on their $30,000 contract" and asked
Troncone to clarify his claim and "tell us the name of the firm that
got a $60,000 contract, which was overcharged by more than $51,000."
Troncone confirmed that the $60,000 contract, overcharged by more than
$54,000 for a total of $114,000, was Troncone's own law firm, King,
Kittrick and Troncone.
"Contracts Shouldn't Have Existed In The First Place"
"None of these contracts should have been exceeded, because they
shouldn't have existed in the first place," the former legislator
said.
"The bulk of the money spent on more than 40 lawyers was wasted
because you didn't need forty lawyers; the money was squandered to
discharge political obligations," Haelig said.
"In my opinion, this work should have been handled by the full-time
law department," he said.
Haelig noted the full time law department, headed by Troncone,
has three full time attorneys.
Haelig: "Full Time Law Department Should Be Enough"
"If you factored their time at $135 an hour, and they were spending
most of their time providing legal services, a reasonable expectation
for lawyers, you will get some idea of the money you should be
saving," Haelig said.
|
Bob Silva |
First Ward Rescue Dover Township council candidate Robert M. Silva
noted the Republicans promised to cut spending when they were
candidates, "and yet they gave us the largest spending increase in
township history and a big tax increase."
Silva: "Where I Worked Somebody Would
Have Been Reprimanded Or Dismissed"
Silva said of the Secare and Goldshore charges that exceeded their
contracts: "if this happened where I worked, somebody would have gotten
a reprimand, or passed over for a pay raise, or maybe have been dismissed."
"You folks are wasting a lot of taxpayers money and the taxpayers are
getting next to nothing in return," Silva said.
