Asbury Park Press Editorial, Saturday, May 10, 2008

If there were an Academy Award for political candor, James Crawford, former executive director of the South Jersey Transportation Authority, would merit strong consideration for an Oscar.

Crawford, who hired Ocean County Freeholder John Kelly as an airport analyst at Atlantic City Airport in 1999, admitted this week that it was a patronage hire - one of at least a dozen he made during his 11 years as the authority's chief.

The same candor was not forthcoming from Kelly, who is seeking the Republican nomination for the 3rd Congressional District seat being vacated by Rep. Jim Saxton. Kelly said he had no idea his political connections had anything to do with his landing the job. So much for whatever shred of credibility he had left.

"When I spoke to Jim Crawford, never did he say to me, "This is a patronage job.' " Kelly said. "If I had been told it was a patronage job, I would have said, "No thank you.' I certainly did not say, "I want a patronage job. Will you give me this job?' " He apparently left that to Ocean County Republican Party Chairman George Gilmore, the authority's legal counsel at the time, or to Ocean County Clerk and Stafford Mayor Carl Block, who was an SJTA commissioner. Crawford said it was one of those two who recommended Kelly for the job. Both deny having played a direct role.

Whether you believe their denials or not, one thing is indisputable: Kelly has become the new poster child for all that is wrong with New Jersey politics and the impact the tainted system has on taxpayers. His case has shined the spotlight on how little progress the state has made on political and fiscal reform. It has drawn attention to the need for further pension reform, particularly as it relates to pension padding, for reining in public employee health insurance costs and for reforming the hiring practices of independent authorities.

Kelly got his job at the airport through his political connections. He got the position without it being publicly advertised. In his five years at the airport, he was paid $327,000. He makes $30,000 a year as a freeholder - the most he ever has earned in government, other than during his days at the airport. After his tenure ended at the airport, he retired. His jobs there enabled him to more than double his state pension, which is based on the three highest years of a retiree's salary. Today, Kelly's part-time freeholder salary is supplemented by a pension exceeding $40,000 a year.

It gets worse: Despite having taxpayer-funded health coverage through his job as a freeholder, he is being paid even in retirement for "waiving out" of the SJTA health plan. In 2005, his last year as an SJTA employee, he was paid $13,772 not to enroll in the authority's plan. Since 1999, he has received $71,000 in waive-out payments. During that same period, taxpayers have contributed more than $100,000 toward his health premiums as a freeholder.

Kelly says he has no plans to return any of the waive-out payments or to stop accepting them unless the Legislature acts to make them illegal. Three Burlington County state lawmakers who support Kelly's opponent in the primary, Chris Myers, say they will introduce a bill that would make officials who hold two or more public positions ineligible for waive-out payments. That doesn't go far enough.

No part-time employee should be entitled to any benefits. No full-time public employee should be allowed to enroll in more than one health plan. No public employee should be paid for not enrolling in a health plan if they or their spouse are enrolled in another plan. If their spouse also is a public employee, they should be required to choose one plan. Lawmakers also should take another look at the manner in which pensions are calculated, with an eye toward eliminating pension padding, and pass legislation requiring that all government job openings, including those available at public authorities, be publicly advertised.

In defending his acceptance of waive-out payments, Kelly said they were "hard-earned benefits," warranted by his years of public service. In the end, his greatest service may prove to be inadvertently alerting the public to how much more needs to be done to transform New Jersey's corrupt political culture.