New councilman calls for pay-to-play reforms
John Schiels: Council awarded contracts without knowing cost
BY DANIEL HOWLEY Staff Writer
Councilman John Schiels got right to business last week at his first meeting serving on the governing body when he proposed a measure be adopted to enact play-to-play reforms in Eatontown.

The ordinance, proposed by the newly elected Republican councilman, was met with opposition by Mayor Gerald Tarantolo and the three Democratic members on the council at the Jan. 9 workshop meeting.

The measure was proposed after Schiels objected to the council seeking to reappoint several borough officials at the Jan. 1 reorganization meeting without verification of what the cost of the contracts would be, according to Schiels.

"At the reorganization meeting, I had objections to the appointments based on fee structures, which were not available at the time [of the appointments]," Schiels said last week.

"My objection was, basically, you are appointing people and you have not negotiated a contract for them," he said, adding, "Therefore, you don't know what it is going to cost taxpayers."

Schiels explained after the workshop meeting that while he was campaigning for office last year, residents of the borough told him that they felt unrepresented and were unaware of where their taxes were being spent.

Schiels won a seat on council in the November election, along with Republicans Theresa Forbes and Victoria Rau. The three Republicans beat out three Democratic incumbents on what was then an all-Democratic council governing body, along with a Democratic mayor.

The party makeup is now split, with three council people representing each of the parties, and a Democratic mayor.

Forbes and Rau also contested the reappointment of borough officials at the reorganization meeting and supported Schiels' proposal for pay-to-play reforms at last week's meeting.

Tarantolo said at the meeting that there were misleading statements about the borough made in the proposed ordinance.

"I don't know where you got this ordinance that you proposed," Tarantolo said at the meeting after Schiels explained the proposal.

"I assume that you got it from some other source and then you filled in the blanks and put Eatontown in there," he said. "When I looked at it, at least on the first page, I [took] exception to some of the stuff that was in there."

The proposed ordinance calls for prohibiting any "business entity," defined as any professional or provider of extraordinary unspecificable services, from being hired by the borough if they have contributed more than $300 to any candidate for borough office, their municipal political committees, party political committees or state political committees.

"Basically what I'm saying is [political] contributions should not influence our decisions," Schiels said at the workshop meeting.

"What [the ordinance] is trying to do is remove political contributions from the decision process," Schiels added.

Tarantolo said he disagrees with language in the proposed ordinance that "implies" that Eatontown has had a history of excessive pay-to-play issues.

"Never in all of my years as mayor has anyone brought up that issue [of substantial political contributions]," Tarantolo said at the meeting.

"The fact of the matter is, we have public meetings on every ordinance that we pass," he said. "We have public hearings on our budget. In fact, we have sessions leading up to the final adoption of the budget.

"We have open meetings to discuss it, which are generally very poorly attended by the residents of the town.

"In the introduction [of the proposed ordinance], it says, 'whereas substantial political contributions.'

"How do you quantify that?" Tarantolo asked, adding, "Never in all of my years as mayor has anyone brought up that issue. Even as a councilman, that issue has never been brought up about political contributions."

Tarantolo further explained that the proposal implies that there is a concern of substantial political contributions in Eatontown

"I think that's unfair and I take exception to it," he added.

Tarantolo also said he disagrees with a section of the proposed ordinance that says there has been a history of "problematic" contributions made to Eatontown politicians by various contractors.

"Where is this history of contributions?" Tarantolo asked. "Is that something documented somewhere?

"Everything that was done in any political campaign that I have ever been involved with, we ensured that we reported all political contributions.

"We did it firmly, in accordance with the law on political contributions," he said.

Although he had issues with several components of the proposal, Tarantolo said he did agree with Schiels' concept for the ordinance.

"What I have a problem with is, do we look at what we are currently doing or do we go to another approach and actually come up with a new pay-to-play ordinance for the town?" Tarantolo asked.

In an interview Monday, Schiels said he does believe contracts have been awarded to campaign contributors in the past, but emphasized that neither the ordinance nor the accusations regarding political contributions were directed at the mayor.

Schiels said the concept of the proposed ordinance is to correct the process of awarding municipal contracts.

After the meeting, Tarantolo said the proposed ordinance would have had no effect on the appointments made at the reorganization meeting.

"It would not have had an impact on any of the resolutions voted on," Tarantolo said.

"[The] objection [to the appointments] was the fact that the résumés submitted by the existing professionals did not have a fee schedule attached," Tarantolo said.

Schiels, Forbes and Rau said at the reorganization meeting that they would not support the appointments without attached fee schedules, according to Tarantolo.

The vote on the appointments was split along party lines, 3-3, with the three new Republicans voting against the reappointments and the three Democratic veterans on council voting in favor of the appointments.

Tarantolo was forced to use his tiebreaking vote to pass the appointments at the meeting.

"[Schiels] felt that [the council] should take a look at [the way appointments are made], and implement a pay-to-play ordinance," Tarantolo said.

"Many towns have taken the initiative to do their own pay-to-play ordinance," he said, adding, "Eatontown does not have anything near to what was proposed, but I have no objection to it."

Tarantolo explained that typically when contracts for borough professionals are voted on by council and finalized by the mayor, a fee schedule is included with the contract.

He added that the fee schedule for the appointed professionals in the borough has remained relatively unchanged from year to year.

The proposed ordinance was turned over to the borough's finance committee, headed by Schiels, for further evaluation.

The proposed ordinance is aimed at restricting the hiring of contracted employees to borough positions if they have made substantial contributions to individual politicians or political parties, according to Schiels.

Under New Jersey's pay-to-play laws, contracts exceeding $17,500 can be bid on by using either the "fair and open" process or the "unfair and open" process, according to the statute.

Eatontown currently uses the fair and open process.

The fair and open process requires the borough to advertise for contracts for at least 10 days in order to allow anyone interested in the position to submit a résumé, according to Tarantolo.

The unfair and open process does not require the borough to advertise for contracts and allows the borough to request résumés from particular contractors.

The fair and open process calls for the borough to award bids to the lowest proposal, while the unfair and open process calls for the borough to award bids based on service and reliability.

Schiels said that the main difference between the two processes is how much in political contributions a contractor canmake.

Schiels explained that under the fair and open process, a contractor is able to make no more than $2,600 in political contributions.

Under the unfair and open process, Schiels said, a contractor is able to make a maximum contribution of $300.

The borough's fair and open process was not being properly adhered to when a fee schedule was not included with the résumés for the appointed officials at the reorganization meeting, Schiels said.