Representatives of a Hoboken-based citizens’ good-government group called the People for Open Government set up a small table across from City Hall last week and collected over 300 signatures from registered voters to get so-called “pay-to-play” election reform legislation on the local ballot in this November.
But now they are worried that their efforts may be dashed after the state Senate and Assembly voted on and approved their own pay-to-play ban, which is a weaker compromise that could have the ancillary effect of invalidating stricter local pay-to-play bans.
“Pay to play” is a term used when campaign contributors get hired for government jobs. If the hiring is a direct result of their campaign contribution, it’s illegal, but often, it’s hard to prove that there’s a correlation. Additionally, some businesses may feel pressured to donate to re-election campaigns to keep their contracts. Pay-to-pay legislation would establish controls to discourage this.
The state votes
The bill that passed the Senate and Assembly Thursday afternoon would restrict businesses and professionals holding no-bid contracts of over $17,500 from donating to the candidates and party committees associated with the specific government that hired them. The Senate bill’s primary sponsor was Sen. Bernard Kenny (D-Hoboken).
Now that the bill is passed, all that is left is for Gov. James McGreevey to sign it into law, which he is expected to do.
The pay-to-play bill was among 13 bills passed by the legislature Thursday dealing with ethics reforms. Other legislation included a pilot program for publicly financed legislative campaigns and measures to tighten regulations on lobbyists.
The pay-to-play bill would also make it illegal for campaign donors to get certain government no-bid contracts with the state, county or city in which they donated.
The idea is to cut down on the appearance that a business might have contributed in order to get contracts, and to lessen pressure on contractors to contribute. It may curtail the cycle of campaign contribution and public contracts that has been in governmental pipelines for several years. The pressure to act has been growing dramatically in the past several months.
The final result was a compromise bill that was hammered out in the backroom negotiations, and support for the bill has fallen along party lines, with most Democrats supporting the legislation and Republicans saying it has too many loopholes.
The Democrats said that the pay-to-play compromise would apply to all three levels of government and also address constitutional concerns that Democrats had said kept them from making their proposal broader. Those who support the compromise, such as Kenny, said that New Jersey is ahead of the curve and is doing more to curb pay to play than many other states.
But critics, including many Republicans and several “good government” activist groups that support stricter pay-to-play reform, said the bill will block local municipalities from forging their own more restrictive reforms. “In its current form, this legislation provides very little protection from the practice of pay-to-play in which large contributions are traded for lucrative government contracts,” said Harry Pozycki, the chairman of Common Cause New Jersey, a state lobbying group that advocates open government. The organization has been the loudest advocate for sweeping pay-to-play reform, on both the state and local level.
During testimony before the legislature, Pozycki said the bill has been compromised to the point of ineffectiveness. For example, said Pozycki, the approved bill exempts any government contract that is currently subject to “fair and open” public bidding requirements. The example given by the group was the state $550 million auto-inspection contract given to Parsons Infrastructure and Technology Group in 1998 by a Republican administration. The company, whose executives were big political contributors, won the bid through an open competitive bidding process but was given too much leeway in fulfilling the terms in contract.
Also, said Pozycki, the approved bill could have little effect on “professional services” contracts such as the ones for lawyers or accountants. That is because professional service firms can contribute to politicians if the contract comes about from a “fair and open” competitive process. This type of ambiguous language, they claim, could offer some firms ways around the law. “The competitive guidelines that are offered as a substitute for pay-to-play contribution restrictions on professional contractors such as lawyers, engineers and architects are loose and provide much room for mischief,” said Pozycki.
Additionally, said critics, the bill only offers a limited restriction of “wheeling,” the practice of transferring campaign money from one county political party to another. Wheeling would be banned from January until June, which would protect incumbents from interparty challenges, but would not be expressly prohibited before the November general elections.
The local angle
So what happens if counties and municipalities want to adopt their own stronger pay-to-play reforms? There are currently 15 municipalities in the state that have passed public contracting reform legislation. Towns with local pay-to-play bans include Asbury Park, Bradley Beach, Freehold Township, Holmdel, Manalapan, and Marlboro. Because the state bill is silent on local anti-pay-to-play ordinances, it could have the effect of making local ordinances void after it is signed into law by Gov. McGreevey.
“Unless a provision is added that enables counties and municipalities to adopt their own strong, effective pay-to-play reforms,” said Pozycki, “this legislation will take us backwards by pre-empting local and county efforts with weak, ineffectual statewide standards.”
Officials from Common Cause are hopeful that an amendment can later be added to the bill that will provide municipalities with some leeway in creating their own legislation.
That takes events to Hoboken, where the People for Open Government have been pounding the pavement getting people to sign a petition to get three ordinances on the local ballot in November. While the state bill would have no effect on two of their proposed ordinances, one for developer disclosure in applications for major zoning and the other for competitive negotiation requirements for professional service contracts, it could kill the proposed ordinance that would put more stringent limits on political contributions from public contractors.
Representatives from POG said that they are worried that this state bill is too lax, has far too many loopholes, and would directly affect home rule and the ability of cities to make tougher restrictions.
“It’s something we’re worried about, but it’s not going to stop us for collecting signatures and pushing for stronger [pay-to-play reform],” said Ann Graham, the group’s chairwoman.
Ron Rosenberg, a member of POG, said that especially in a town like Hoboken, where campaign contributions are such a integral part of the political landscape, this type of reform needs to be ironclad. “It’s something that could level the playing field,” said the former City Council candidate.
Many of the people who approached the People for Open Government’s table were willing sign the petition, but not everybody was too excited about idea.
“I can’t sign this,” said one unidentified man Thursday evening. “I have a contract with the city.” As the man continued to walk down Washington Street, POG’s Ann Graham turned to one of fellow group members and remarked, “That’s exactly why we are doing this.”