From the campaign of Bruce Paterson
Candidate for Union County Freeholder

Tuesday, August 31, 2004

In-your-Face Conflict of Interest

"Outrageous and a major conflict of interest", states Bruce Paterson, republican candidate for Union County freeholder. "And what's more is they did little to nothing about it". Because the Union County Freeholders, who are considered only pseudo-democrats, are becoming so arrogant, they willingly act against the concerns of the county residents. It was bad enough that Freeholder Nick Scutari was switched on the ballot last November and was elected state Senator, but when it came time to appoint someone to fill Scutari's open slot on the Freeholder board in March of this year, the political bosses in control selected John Wohlrab to fill the position.

What is interesting is when they introduced Mr. Wohlrab by press release; they would not divulge what company he worked for, instead just saying "a private company". It later came out that he works for Waste Management, Inc. Then it later came out that his title at the company is "Director of government and municipal relations". Not only does he now lord over the municipalities as a freeholder, he is also the direct contact that these same municipalities have to call if they have problems or conflicts with their waste disposal. How can one argue with their boss affectively? Especially when Wohlrab holds the purse strings of county grant money at the same time protecting the profits of the waste disposal company he works for? You may not be aware of this, but total waste disposal costs in this county runs in the range of $100 million dollar a year. Waste Management is now a major player in this county. By freeholder mandate, certain waste disposal from all towns in the county must now be funneled thru waste Management, Inc. This put the local waste haulers in an uproar since they are given no choice. It is now a monopoly and you, the taxpayers have to pay for the Freeholder created "In-your-face conflict of interest". Bottom line, this man, John Wohlrab should not be sitting on the Freeholder board!

Another questionable item that John Wohlrab and the Freeholder board did this year is the way the county contracted out the municipal bulk waste disposal through the county. Shortly after they appointed John Wohlrab to the board, they went out for bids on county bulk waste removal. After the contract was supposedly let out, the resolution was suddenly tabled two times on the freeholder agenda. Who knows what they were trying to get around. When it was finally introduced, the contract stated that Waste Management, Inc. was the winning bidder. In public questioning, it was found that, lo and behold, there was only one bidder: Waste Management! I asked why only one bidder, and they stated there were others that came to the pre-bid meetings. Then I asked why they did not contact the other pre-bidders to find out why they did not bid. After all, this is approximately $25 million of the taxpayer money that is affected. They had no answer. Then they voted, with John Wohlrab sitting the vote out, as if this disavows any conflict of interest. At that same freeholder meeting, it was found that the bulk waste disposal costs went from $80/ ton to $105/ ton, a 30% increase. This increase, which is made up of the new waste costs and additional administration costs, is nothing more that another hidden tax on the hard working families and seniors in the county. Enough already!

One last item to add: in normal business it may be standard for a company to encounter minor fines and lawsuits. However, based on non-compliance fines, corruption judgments and lawsuits, Waste Management, Inc. had to pay out $360 million from 1991 to 2000! Quoted from the Internet website Stopwmx.com, "Waste management is the world's worst lawbreaker". This is the company the county connived to do business with. This is the character, John Wohlrab, a Waste Management bureaucrat, who they gladly appoint to the freeholder board.

I am Bruce Paterson, candidate for Freeholder of Union County. My fellow candidates, Joe Renna, Patricia Quattrocchi, Frank Arena, and Mike Panagos would bring honesty and ethics to the county government to lessen the burdensome taxes on the seniors, hardworking families and taxpayers. Please vote for all of us in November. If you have questions or want to volunteer or donate, you can contact us at unioncountygop.org or call 908-789-0200.