Government should answer to it’s citizens but who’s there to ask these days? Newspapers have cut back on local coverage as budgets get tighter and readers scarcer. Investigative reporting now exists primarily in old journalism textbooks. With many government meetings at inconvenient times or places and many government records hard to access who will tell us what is really going on?

We can find out the positive news easily enough as laudatory resolutions and ‘good’ news get disseminated by public information departments but who is there to dig up the ‘dirt’ these days?
There are some on this board (Bill Wolfe on the DEP primary among them) but the future of representative government rests on taxpayers finding out what politicians and their cronies don’t want you to know. The lawsuits. The paid committees that produce nothing. The no-bid contracts. You’re supposed to know about all this but if nobody asks, they will stay hidden.

Fighting city hall can be daunting for the would-be activist. How do you ask? How much will it cost? Who do you ask? How long will it take?

Anyone interested in the answers will get a good start this Wednesday evening at the Rutgers Student Center in New Brunswick when three such activists, Guy Baehr, Tina Renna, and John Paff, share their knowledge and experience at a free session on the Open Public Records Act (OPRA). Come and find out what you’ve been missing.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact Tina Renna, President
Union County Watchdog Association
Phone: 908-709-0530
Email: tinarenna@unioncountywatchdog.org

Walter Lauers, esq.
Phone: 908.453.2147
Email: wluers@luerslaw.com

UNIOIN COUNTY WATCHDOG ASSOCIATION FILES RECORDS COMPLAINT SEEKING TO VIEW $64,624.96 IN IMPROVEMENT AUTHORITY’S LEGAL BILLS

The Union County Watchdog (“UCWA”) announced today that it has retained attorney Walter Lauers, to file a complaint with the states Government Records Council against the Union County Improvement Authority (“UCIA”).

This action has been brought because the Records Custodian of the UCIA, Charlotte DeFilippo who is the Executive Director of the UCIA as well as the Chairman of the Union County Democratic Committee, has violated the Open Public Records Act (“OPRA”) by redacting nearly all of the information in law firm invoices totaling $64,624.96 for UCIA’s legal work and by not providing a specific, legal basis for doing so.

The Union County Watchdog Association routinely obtains the UCIA’s bills lists and posts them on their website for free public access. “We ordinarily don’t ask to review legal bills, there are so many of them, but these two submitted at the end of the year caught my eye” said Tina Renna, president of the UCWA. “The amounts $28,529.66 and $36,095.30 respectively for a total of $64,624.96 seemed rather high to be marked “general file” and not assigned to a specific UCIA project.”

“Given the knowledge that the taxpayers are footing the bill for DeFilippo’s lawsuit, which was brought by a county employee who alleges DeFilippo routinely intermingles her political business as the Union County Democratic Chairman (She prefers to be called Chairman) with the management of county government, I thought a closer look at these legal bills was in order” Renna explained.

Records obtained from the UCIA through the Open Public Records Act show that the law firm DeCotiis, FiztPatrick, Cole & Wisler was paid $1,306,634.35 in 2007 and $1,085,552.68 in 2006. This includes $41,879.40 to defend Charlotte DeFilippo in the employee lawsuit which is ongoing.

Complaint:

On March 10, 2008, the Union County Watchdog Association, acting through its President Tina Renna, requested certain legal bills from a UCIA law firm, DeCotiis, FiztPatrick, Cole & Wisler. On March 17, 2008, the UCIA records custodian responded to the request, and provided two heavily redacted invoices. Specifically, the “Date,” “Description,” and “Hours” fields were completely blotted out. Other information may have been blotted out too, but that is impossible to determine. In a rather obvious violation of OPRA, the Records Custodian did not say why the records were redacted, she merely stated that “You will note that information has been redacted.”

Presumably, if the UCIA had given a specific, legal reason for its redactions, it would claim that such information was redacted pursuant to the attorney-client privilege exception in OPRA.

Only communications between a lawyer and client “in the course of the relationship and in professional confidence, are privileged[.]” N.J.S.A. 2A:84A-20. The privilege is limited to “those situations in which lawful legal advice is the object of the relationship.” In re Gonnella, 283 N.J. Super. 509, 512, 570 A.2d 53, 54 (Law Div. 1989). Therefore, not every communication between a lawyer and her client is privileged; rather, only those communications that are in confidence and where lawful legal advice is given.

Under New Jersey law, “the attorney-client privilege . . . does not apply to insulate billings from disclosure.” Hunterdon County Policeman’s Benevolent Association Local 188 v. Township of Franklin, 286 N.J. Super. 389, 394, 669 A.2d 299, 302 (App. Div. 1996) (affirming trial court’s holding that billing records are not privileged and are, therefore, accessible under former Right-to-Know law). Rather, legal fee invoices are only privileged if they reveal client secrets or would reveal strategy. Mundane statements that appear in typical invoices, such as “conference call with client” or “review and digest Smith deposition” are not privileged. “In the experience of this court, [attorney billings] will contain a few word description of the general category of the work performed, the number of hours required to perform the work, the date of the performance, and the total cost to the client.” Id. (quoting lower court). In addition, no privilege would attach to the dates on which work occurred, who performed them, or the time spent on those tasks.

Therefore, the Records Custodian violated OPRA because she did not give a specific, legal basis for redacting the records she produced. In addition, assuming that the basis for the redaction is the attorney-client privilege, that privilege does not apply to legal billings unless they reveal client secrets or reveal legal advice or strategy. Therefore, we request that the GRC review the redacted documents in camera to determine whether the redactions were proper.

Redacted Bills HERE

Travisano lawsuit HERE

Very interesting inside view of the players in the Union County Courthouse View Travisano change of venue request HERE

On January 31, 2007 the Union County Watchdog Association announced that it will be posting complete video coverage of Union County Freeholder’s meetings on its website. A press release stated: “Union County government accounts for 1/4 of our property tax bills and constituents have a right to see and hear what goes on during local government meetings,” said Tina Renna, president of Union County Watchdog Association.

In January 2008 we announced that we would be lobbying towns to show freeholder meetings on their local cable access channels. The freeholders stopped distributing meetings to towns a few years ago. We have been very successful and most cable viewers can now access freeholder meetings on at least one channel.

Our website has always been a model of which we would hope that county government would want to emulate. When we started obtaining public records and posting them on the Internet the county did not post any public documents on their taxpayer funded site. The county now posts their meeting minutes and past meeting agendas on their site.

Big whop-de-do and I’ll tell you and show you why I believe that.

The county controls what is recorded in their meeting minutes. The last meeting I tagged for our Veotag account, a video enhancement service, was a good example of how the county twists words made by residents who are critical of them. As with everything we post on our website, it is hoped that the county would get the message and use their million dollar public information department and post this information themselves. This will never happen because even if they spent a hundred million dollars on public information they can never spin a live performance.

Here is two examples how the county is dis-informing the public with their meeting minutes.

Union County Freeholder meeting March 13, 2008:
The official meeting minutes state: Tina Renna, Cranford, New Jersey, does not support the idea of the Board sponsoring and attending the African Heritage Parade and other Parades. She also commented on the Presentation to Mr. Lynch and said that although he is a great guy, he should not be honored at Freeholder Meetings.

THIS IS WHAT I REALLY SAID

The official meeting minutes state: Tina Renna, Cranford, stated that she is the President of the Union County Watchdog Association and commented about the audio equipment for Freeholder Meetings, she spoke about the proposed budget and quoted County Manager Devanney who stated that the increased budget is due to mandated expenses, such as health insurance, pensions and increase in salaries for the Union County Sheriff and Police Departments.

THIS IS WHAT I REALLY SAID

From: Nicole Dirado [mailto:ntedeschi@ucnj.org]
Sent: Friday, April 11, 2008 2:09 PM
To: tinarenna@unioncountywatchdog.org
Subject: RE: Open Space

Pursuant to OPRA, kindly submit a request form for the audit report which you have requested below. Thank you.

—–Original Message—–
From: tinarenna@unioncountywatchdog.org [mailto:tinarenna@unioncountywatchdog.org]
Sent: Friday, April 11, 2008 11:49 AM
To: Nicole Dirado
Cc: union@starledger.com; jcasiano@starledger.com; dwalsh@starledger.com; union@njnpublishing.com; editor@goleader.com; press@goleader.com; subnews@njnpublishing.com; letters@thnt.com; ipeditors@njnpublishing.com; cnletter@c-n.com; editorial@thelocalsource.com; Jersey@nytimes.com; letters@thealternativepress.com
Subject: Re: Open Space

Dear Mrs. Dirado,

Please forward this to your freeholder board:

My comments were in response to Freeholder Chairman Angel Estrada’s comments to John Bury who inquired, forgive me for not recalling the exact words “what has the open space trust fund accomplished to date”. This is the second meeting where Mr. Bury asked this question and Freeholder Estrada replied ,if not word for word than it was implied, “I will be happy to get you that information”.

I am requesting Freeholder Estrada hold true to his offer to Mr. Bury. Asking me to now place an official OPRA request in which I now have to fish for this information is disingenuous and business as usual for a one party ruled freeholder board who has proven time and again that it answers to no tax-payer.

I respectfully request that Freeholder Estrada keep his word and not waste any more of my or Mr. Bury’s time. Since this fund has spent millions of tax-dollars, as well as created dozens of new county jobs, there should be some form of audit that accounts for every dollar. As to how much came in, and how much went out, how much debt has been incurred and how Green Acres funds intermingle with the funds expenditures.

I refuse to waste my time on playing these unprofessional if not outright childish games in my quest for how approximately ¼ of county taxpayers property taxes are spent. I am also tired of the outright lies that are told during freeholder closing comments to dispel any questions the public asked during their alloted 5 minutes speaking time. Freeholder Sullivan surely remembers every election where at least one candidate not on the power broker appointed Democrat party line suggests that this fund be put on hiatus as well as the complaints that this fund is being used for brick and mortar projects rather than open space. There has been numerous letters to the editor written about this as well as public comment during freeholder meetings. There has also been numerous editorials written about such things as using this fund to purchase the Arts Center as well as to hire employees is not in keeping with the meaning of the fund.

If there is no documentation to which Freeholder Estrada eluded to than that would be an answer as well. More lies and smoke and mirrors, I’ve come to expect nothing better of this freeholder board and I will not allow them to lie to the public without speaking out.

Sincerely,

Tina Renna
President
Union County Watchdog Association, Inc.
cc: UCWA Member list
——Original Mail——

From: “Nicole Dirado”

To: “Tina Renna” ,

“Opra”

Sent: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 10:04:17 -0400

Subject: Open Space
Mrs. Renna:

As per your comments last night, kindly submit an OPRA request for the

documents you seek relative to the Trust Fund.

The county has proven again that it is awash in disposable tax revenue and disinterested in their constituents needs during this dire budget climate when the Union County Manager had his office drastically renovated during the start of the 2008 budget season recently.

During public comment at the last freeholder meeting I had a good laugh when I asked about Senator Raymond Lesniak’s newly renovated management wing and Freeholder Chairman Angel Estrada responded “I take exception to your use of the word renovation. This was done for security purposes”. I asked if he bothered to walk back there recently.

The county put a 1.3 million dollar atrium addition on the administration building a few years ago, they claimed this was also for security purposes.

Despite the Star-Ledger occupying an office on the 3rd floor of the same building there was only a slight mention of the renovations in the Westfield Leader.

As long as Union County can enjoy operating out of site of the public our county taxes will continue to sky rocket so the politically connected can feed at the trough. What mayor in Union County could escape media scrutiny over these recent events?

On February 13, 2008 employees began clocking in overtime to complete a total renovation of Union County Manager George Devanney’s office. The center point being a new royal entranceway.

On February 14, 2008 Devanney proposed the 2008 county budget with a projected increase of 6.5% that would raise taxes in every municipality but Winfield.

On February 26, 2008 Gov. Corzine proposed the 2008 State budget which drastically reduced municipal aid.

On February 28, 2008 an email shows that a county employee promises the Deputy County Manager that renovations will be completed by Monday morning. The county manger was out of town at the time, he was allegedly in Colorado on a ski trip with county vendor USA Architects. Most likely in celebration of the Arts Center 1st phase renovation completion. USA was given 700,000 in contracts for the Arts Center alone.

Although some bills and costs are obviously missing, an OPRA request for the costs of this renovation revealed:

Materials cost: $7,975.61
Employee overtime labor costs: $2,637.39
Employee regular hours labor costs: ?

Total: $10,613

The documents obtained through OPRA do not show the labor and materials costs of the furniture that was made in the county carpenter shop in late Summer/early Fall and stored on the 6th floor of the county jail. It appears that county management didn’t want Devanney’s new office to become a campaign issue so they waited for Freeholder Adrian Mapp, who fell out of favor with the democrat machine and was running as an independent democrat in the general election, to leave the board before renovations commenced and the furniture was installed.

The documents also didn’t show bills for the couch and chairs in the lounge area. These may have been old and not purchased recently from Devanney’s sister-in-laws furniture company.

Although work hasn’t been completed yet and plans didn’t show up in my OPRA request, I’ve been told that a sink area in the county management wing is also slated to be renovated. This is needed because the present sink is too small to wash dishes. The new sink will eliminate the need to walk a few feet into the freeholders conference room where a full kitchen complete with a dishwasher is at their disposal. By the way, have I reminded you lately that freeholders cater their board meetings to the tune of $250 - $350 per?

The public isn’t barred from walking into the public area where the county manager’s wing is located, so I walked right on in before the start of the last freeholder meeting. The royal nephew scampered away while I took some photos. I didn’t venture into the interior of the office uninvited. That would have been rude.

I thought of making an appointment to see the updates to the interior offices, but what is the point? I doubt I would be shown the secret button that would cause the fully stocked bar to flip out of a wall and the caged go-go girls to drop out of the ceiling as it does in the Springfield Mayor’s office.

Devanney has always reminded me of Mayor “Diamond Joe” Quimby of the Simpsons. Aside from the physical resemblance, Mayor Quimby is known to be an “illiterate tax-cheating, wife-swapping, pot-smoking, spend-o-crat”. In his defense Quimby maintains that he is no longer illiterate.

But seriously, this letter was sent to all Union County Mayors and council members today asking them to help raise awareness of Union County government’s waste, mismanagement and corruption.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Contact: Tina Renna, President
Union County Watchdog Association
908-709-0530 Email: tinarenna@unioncountywatchdog.org

Walter M. Luers, Esq.
Law Offices of Walter M. Luers, LLC
105 Belvidere Ave., Oxford, New Jersey 07863
Phone: 908.453.2147 Email: wluers@luerslaw.com

Union County - Attorney Walter Luers has filed a complaint with the state’s Government Records Council on behalf of the Union County Watchdog Association in response to the county’s refusal to turn over documents responsive to the UCWA’s request seeking records that would show what individuals donated to a county sponsored fund-raiser in which the county manager was personally involved in and profited from and politicians used as a campaign whistle stop free from Election Law Enforcement reporting guidelines.

(l-r) Assemblywoman Linda Stender, Governor Jon Corzine, Assemblyman Joseph Cryan, Freeholder Chester Holmes, Sheriff Ralph Froehlich, Freeholders Daniel Sullivan and Angel Estrada

Background:
• Senator Raymond Lesniak’s nephew, who is the appointed Union County manager, used the 2007 Musicfest as a backdrop to raise money for his friend’s organization. “Over a couple of beers in Wales, we put together a structure to make Musicfest ’07 a pilot music festival in which the Love Hope Strength Foundation would be a part.” Stated George Devanney in a blog on the LHSF website.

(l-r) Freeholder Chairwoman Bette Jane Kowalski, Senator Raymond Lesniak’s newphew-Appointed Union County Manager George Devanney, Freeholder Alexander Mirabella

• The Co-Chairs of the event were Assemblyman Neil Cohen, Assemblywoman Linda Stender and Freeholder Chairwoman Bette Jean Kowalski.

• The county manager’s wife listed on her website that she was the treasurer of the Love, Hope Strength Organization.

• County resources, including the website and employees, were used to organize, facilitate and raise the money for the event.

• For raising in excess of $25,000 the county manager got to go on the organizations free trip to Mt. Everest in Nepal.

• For donating certain amounts of money contributors, including county employee’s and county vendors, got to rub elbows with elected officials while attending a private party at the county manager’s home in which county vendors performed.

• Politicians connected to the Union County Democrat machine got to use the fund raiser as a campaign whistle stop free from Election Law Enforcement Commission rules on campaign spending and contribution reporting.

“The fact that Senator Raymond Lesniak’s nephew is now trying to keep the details of this publicly funded and facilitated event out of public view after being so intimately involved and had personally gained from is despicable beyond words,” stated Tina Renna, president of the Union County Watchdog Association.

“This was a shameless exploitation of what may very well be a worthy cause, for personal gain and political grandstanding,” continued Renna. “County concerts have been used as campaign whistle stops for the one-party ruled county government since their inception. Vendors have been donating to these supposed “free concerts” in which campaigning pols are given top billing over the acts who are paid by the taxpayers to perform. The addition of a fund raiser at this year’s Musicfest was turned into more backroom dealings that cross the line between public resources and the practice of Union County Democrat Committee politicians campaigning at the taxpayer’s expense. The UCWA has vowed to shine a light on this abuse of the public trust wherever it rears its ugly head.”

The complaint and exhibits can be viewed in its entirety HERE.

“It’s all about getting elected baby!” Senator Raymond Lesniak’s nephew, appointed Union County Manager, George Devanney - 2007 MusicFest

500 and 99 yesterdays ago …..

On July 7, 2006 Senator Raymond Lesniak’s nephew, who is the appointed Union County Manager, was quoted in a Star-Ledger article headlined “Board Heads back to TV” …. “This investment in our sound system, PA and taping system will ensure that the public, our constituents and all entities that do business with the county will continue to receive information about our meetings in a timely and accurate manner,” County Manager George Devanney said yesterday….

The article went on to quote me as the President of the Union County Watchdog Association “…$78,000 seemed like an extraordinary amount to pay for new equipment …. “For 80,000 she said, “I would hope they would be Webcasting meetings too.” …. “Actually, the county is looking into that” said Delia (county public information officer).

The county replaced their equipment in 2006 but they never distributed the meetings to the local cable stations, nor did they ever Webcast their meetings. The bills the UCWA eventually obtained through OPRA show the county spent $110,000 for the new equipment.

The UCWA has been Webcasting freeholder meetings as well as county budget hearings since January 2007.

One 2008 Union County Watchdog Association initiative is to have freeholder meetings broadcast on the local cable channels. Many towns have already moved to request these meetings and will begin to air them shortly.

Channel 26 programming is controlled by Comcast and is broadcast to most Union County towns. The UCWA will routinely request the meeting tape from the county through OPRA (pay $15.00 for it) and drop it to Comcast. The Dec. 20 meeting will be the first (the one the county claimed didn’t exist until the UCWA asked the Prosecutor’s office to investigate) it will be aired on February 28th @ 9:30 pm.

Things that make you go Hmmm…..

In response to the UCWA’s recent efforts to return freeholder meetings to the public cable viewing audiences throughout Union County the county’s extensive office of public information has revamped their efforts to distribute the freeholders taxpayer funded infomercial and have begun dropping off their ½ hour “Freeholder Forum” shows to cable stations – BUT not their meeting recordings.

The county has been promoting this show, which usually features a freeholder who is up for re-election, steadily on their website since approximately a million yesterdays ago.

____________

Freeholder meetings are avialalbe on the UCWA Veotag account

Board heads back to TV - Star Ledger 7/7/06

Freeholder Forum Show county website promotion

County Watchers “What were they trying to keep from you?”

Earlier we reported that after the county claimed that the Dec. 20th freeholder meeting wasn’t recorded, despite the camera’s visibly rolling, the UCWA issued a press release and asked the prosecutor’s office to investigate. The county then changed their script and the Clerk emailed “Please be advised that the response form I faxed to you on December 28, 2007 stating “No recording to provide”, was inaccurate. A VHS tape is in fact available ….”

What were they trying to keep from you?

See for yourself at our Veotag account HERE.

Last Friday the UCWA asked the Union County Prosecutor to investigate why a copy of the Dec. 20th freeholder meeting wasn’t available through the Open Public Records Act. We also sent a press release to local media.

The County Clerk’s office sent the following email yesterday:

Dear Mrs. Renna,
This e-mail is a follow-up relative to your OPRA request of December 21, 2007 for a DVD copy (VHS if DVD not available) of the 12/20/07 Freeholder meeting. Please be advised that the response form I faxed to you on December 28, 2007 stating “No recording to provide”, was inaccurate. A VHS tape is in fact available and the cost to purchase same is $15.00.
Please accept my apologies for the error. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Office of the County Manager
Union County Administration Building, 6th Fl.
10 Elizabethtown Plaza
Elizabeth, NJ 07207

ORIGINAL POST

Meeting can be viewed HERE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The Union County Watchdog Association has requested an investigation by the Union County Prosecutor’s Office into the malfunctioning of the recording equipment during the December 20, 2007 freeholder meeting. The county recently spent $110,000 on updating and installing new video equipment.

The UCWA routinely requests a copy of the meeting recordings and then has them converted to be available to the public on the Internet. An Open Public Records Act request for a copy of this meeting was returned “no document to provide”. Also not available to the public is a written statement which was read by the County Manager regarding the county’s response to the recent prisoner escapes.

During this meeting there was input from the public on many important subjects both on and off the agenda. It is the county’s habit of taking care of messy business such as retroactive pay raises at their end-of-the-year meeting. This meeting was held 5 days before Christmas.

Although the announcement hadn’t been made yet regarding the done deal of Richard Childs becoming the new County Public Safety Director the freeholders were asked repeatedly what qualifications Childs had for this position considering he was currently a part-time investigator in the County Counsel’s office and why a national search wasn’t performed to fill this position as was being done to fill the Jail Director position. The new Jail Director will be reporting to Childs.

No explanation was given or public statements made regarding this all-important position of public safety. There is no record of this position being discussed during public or closed session meetings of the freeholders.

Consider that Childs will now be in charge of a department with about 400 employees, including 74 County Police. The Public Safety Department also includes the operations of the county’s Divisions of Correctional Services, Emergency Management, Medical Examiner, Weights and Measures, and Health. Childs will also be responsible for the supervision of the Bureaus of Domestic Preparedness, Hazardous Materials, the Fire Training Academy and Fire Investigations Task Force, and the Office of Consumer Affairs.

The UCWA is requesting an investigation because we believe there may have been statements made during this meeting that could aid the current investigation into county management’s role in the prisoner escapes as well as past practices in the jail. Namely, prisoner health care, politically connected prisoners being given preferential treatment and the lack of cameras inside the facility.

Other important business during this meeting was the creation of 6 new captain positions in the Sheriff’s Department. This will bring the total number of captains to 11 and will allow for 6 Sergeants to be promoted to Lieutenant including the Union County Democrat Chairman, Charlotte DeFilipo’s daughter-in-law. Sheriff Ralph Froehlic’s step-son will be promoted to Sergeant. There are also 7 Lieutenants and 10Sergeants under 1 Sheriff and 3 Undersherriffs (one undersheriff is an assemblyman and another is the son of an assemblyman).

The main function of the Sheriff’s department is to guard the Courthouse which doesn’t include the prison. The freeholders were asked why six new Captains were needed. No explanation was given. These new captain positions and the other promotions will cost approximately $300,000 annually. Also created were 3 new lieutenant positions in the County Police Department.

Raises for the County Manager, who is appointed by the freeholders and is Senator Raymond Lesniak’s nephew, and the freeholders were also on the agenda and voted on as well as raises for all constitutional officers - including the prosecutor and sheriff.

The county allows citizens 5 minutes to speak. Freeholder Chairwoman Bette Jean Kowalski repeatedly tried to keep me from speaking on all of the above, and I repeatedly asked her why I wasn’t allowed to speak the truth. Kowalski eventually had me escorted from the meeting by a county police officer. Now the recording of the meeting isn’t available. hmmmm

Union County government takes approximately ¼ of our property taxes and can not be held accountable to the public. Citizens of Union County should be very concerned about their public safety as well as their Democratic freedoms as dictated by the county freeholders.

View OPRA response HERE