RUNAWAY COUNTY AGENCY FUELING CORRUPT BERGEN DEMOCRAT PARTY MACHINE

BERGEN COUNTY REPUBLICANS

Robert Yudin, Chairman

Improvement Authority Paid Over $4 million To Democrat Donors

Latest BCIA Loan: $3 Mill For Toms River School  

HACKENSACK, NJ  -- The Bergen County Improvement Authority is a runaway train whose primary purpose is to support the corrupt Bergen County Democratic Organization by making questionable loans in order to churn out millions of dollars in fees for major donors to the county Democratic machine, say the county Republican freeholder candidates. 

Over the course of the past six-and-a-half years, the BCIA has churned out over $4.2 million in fees to a list of lawyers, auditors and financial consultants who donate heavily to the BCDO and other Democratic organizations in the state. Republicans says the BCIA is part of a corrupt county government system that helps support the all-Democratic freeholder board that provides little oversight of the BCIA. 

“The BCIA is a key link in the chain of corruption forged by the Bergen County Democratic Party machine,” said GOP freeholder candidate Chris Calabrese. “These fees and contracts are what feeds the campaign war chests of freeholders David Ganz and Bernadette McPherson – the pawns of party bosses.

Despite the county’s claim that the BCIA is an essential agency that helps municipalities, research shows that of 22 loans made since 2002, 11 of them  have gone to either county government or various arms of county government, including two $65 million loans to the Bergen County Utilities Authority in Little Ferry.  Last week the BCIA made another questionable $3 million loan to the Toms River school district in Ocean County.  The freeholders approved that loan without discussion.

“There is nothing  indispensible about the BCIA – except to the extent that it uses county resources to pay large fees to firms that donate big money to feed the corrupt political machine of the indicted Democratic Party Chairman Joseph Ferriero,” said Freeholder candidate Chris Calabrese.    

Calabrese said the hunger for loans for the BCIA was on display earlier this year when Bergen County Executive Dennis McNerney harangued the Glen Rock School Board to take a loan from the BCIA.  “Pure and simple, McNerney was trying to strong arm the school board so the BCIA could generate more fees.”  

QUESTIONABLE ENCAP LOAN 

Besides the back-to-back $65 million loans to the BCUA in 2007 and 2008, the agency made a highly questionable $103 million loan to the now bankrupt EnCap Corp. As part of that loan, Dennis Oury the attorney for the Bergen Democrats, who was indicted by the federal government last month along with Mr. Ferriero, made a $50,000 fee on the EnCap deal and $138,000 in total from the BCIA since 2003. On the EnCap sale, $250,000 went  Parker McCay – a Camden County firm linked Camden County  Democrat political boss George Norcross.  The Camden County Democratic organization  routinely donates large money to the BCDO. Parker McKay also made an additional $45,000 on a $12 million BCIA loan to finance the Overpeck Park remediation deal To date Parker McCay has been assigned $355,000 in fees from the BCIA.   

A BCIA spokesman said in a published report earlier this year about the EnCap loan that the agency never bothered to ask EnCap what it was going to use the money for.

“There is no accountability and no county freeholder oversight of the BCIA,” said GOP Freeholder candidate Paul Duggan of Bogota.  “Why is the BCUA loaning money to EnCap for a highly controversial and now bankrupt state project? Why is the BCIA loaning money to Toms River?  These questions are never asked by the freeholders and never answered.”

CONFLICT OF INTEREST?  

The bond counsel firm of McManimon and Scotland of Newark made $293,000 in fees as a bond underwriter for the BCIA   The firm also is a consultant to the Bergen County Utilities Authority and advised the BCUA to take the $130 million loan package from the BCIA. McManimon  Scotland then was paid more than $200,000 by the BCIA from the BCUA bond sale.

Republicans say the BCIA must be investigated by the federal

government, which is probing Bergen County. “There seems to be conflicts of interest and abuse of power at the BCIA,” said GOP freeholder candidate Jeffrey Heller.  “I vow that if I am elected, the BCIA, will come before the freeholder board and open its books and explain its actions or it will no longer exist.”

GOP research into the BCIA shows that among those benefitting from the BCIA loans is Jersey City-based NW Financial which earned a total of  $1,326,350  in fees.  The company, which was and EnCap consultant, has donated at least $160,000 to the BCDO over the past decade and tens of thousand more to Democrats in New Jersey.

Another big winner under  the BCIA fee churning scam is  the firm of Ferraioli Weilkotz, Cerulla & Cuvai, which is also the county auditor. Weilkotz was paid $180,500 by the BCIA since 2003/

Municipal Advisor Partners of Montclair  MAP made $332,202 in fees.   Dorothy Blakeslee a MAP executive and a Wyckoff resident, is listed as a major donor to the Democrat National Committee ($10,000) and Democratic  congressional candidates in New Jersey. In 2006  Blakeslee, a delegate to the 2004 Democratic National Convention, left the Montclair company and formed   another firm Acacia from Marltom, NJ.  Since 2007 Acacia has been paid $200,143 by the BCIA.

“Apparently the objective of the BCIA is to reward Blakeslee’s firms so she can continue donating money to Democrats such as Robert Menendez, Albio Sires and Linda Stender,” said Calabrese.    

The Democrat controlled BCIA has given $84,000 to Royal Printing, the firm that does the Democrat Party’s political printing.  In 2005 the firm made a $5,200 donation to Freeholders Bernadette McPherson and David Ganz, when both were running for re-election.

During that same year, Ganz as mayor of Fair Lawn, engineered a $20 million loan between his town and the BCIA in which more than $197,000 in fees were paid out, including, $15,000 to Weilkotz and $10,800 to Royal. Weilkotz in turn donated $1,600 to Ganz’s campaign fund and $3,950 to the county Democratic committee that financed Ganz’s and Macpherson’s re-election.  

Also among the beneficiaries of BCIA largesse are the law firms of Willentz, Goldman, $114,576 in fees; Carella Byrne, $105,000 and DG&D Consulting,  $108,000. Paramus Councilman Frank Ciambrone’s law firm has been paid $293,000 in fees by the BCIA since 2004.