PASSAIC'S DOUBLE DIPPING DUO

Schaer and Colon-Montanez Grab Benefits

With Both Hands, But Can’t Be Bothered

To Vote For The Taxpayers

Passaic, NJ - 36th District Assembly Candidate Carmen Pio Costa today applauded the deluge of citizen complaints and the scathing editorials in the Bergen Record and Herald News over the Passaic city council health benefits debacle. The pressure has forced embarrassed double-dipper Passaic Council President/Assemblyman Gary Schaer to reverse course and vow a “special meeting” to try a second time to rescind a resolution that enriched himself and the council members with cushier health benefits.

“Gary Schaer failed to deliver the vote this week and was about to throw up his hands and walk away, but the good citizens of Passaic wouldn’t let him,” said Pio Costa, a Nutley businessman. “But why did the first resolution to rescind fail at all? Because Schaer’s hand-picked protégé, Maritza Colon-Montanez, abstained saying she ‘didn’t understand’ the resolution! Couldn’t Schaer explain it to her, his own legislative aide?”

Councilwoman Maritza Colon-Montanez was elected just this past May to the Passaic council, from which she collects $25,000 a year. Colon-Montanez has also enjoyed, since 2006, a position in Assemblyman Schaer’s office that nets her $32,760 a year. Colon-Montanez’s campaign for Passaic council received $4,500 from Gary Schaer, over one-third of her entire budget.

“Perhaps Schaer couldn’t explain it because he didn’t understand it either. Maybe that’s why Gary Schaer himself abstained on the Assembly vote to ban dual-office holding this year,” surmised Pio Costa. “It seems he and his legislative aide both have difficulty understanding bills that relieve taxpayers at the expense of politicians’ perks.”

“In Trenton we don’t need self-serving representatives that refuse to vote for the interests of our struggling taxpayers. We need people who will stand up and demand the government stop treating the people’s treasury like a private purse,” said Pio Costa. “Schaer and Colon-Montanez are just as wrong for the 36th District as they are wrong for Passaic , and it is time for them to go.”

###