Big Part, Small Actors
Casting call
My professor for my theatre class in college cautioned about casting a great actor in a part if the rest of the actors were not that good. The good actor would only make the others look real bad. It is best to have all the actors of the same talent. I thought of this lesson when Senator Lesniak wanted to place his nephew George Devanney in the top position in Union County.
Two positions were created for Devanney, Deputy County Manager and Director of Economic Development. He was earning the big bucks complete with all the perks and travel opportunities. It even attracted him a new wife. It seems that every thing was perfect except the County Manager at the time, Mike Lapolla, was a bit of a super star.
Mike was the consummate county official. He was a Freeholder at the age of 27. He is an attorney. He held the position of assistant prosecutor and then County Manager. Mike was also the consummate Democrat. Few people did more for the party than he has. He was a true leader acting on his conscience even to the displeasure of the party hacks that wanted a bigger piece of the pie. He also made Devanney look very bad.
Mike moved on to a lofty position as Director of the Turnpike and Pathway Authority. This left the county manager's position open for Devanney. No shocking news that he was appointed to the position by the all nine democratic Freeholder Board. Though he had no experience and no advanced education, Devanney was put in the position of controlling a $300 million dollar budget and 3,000 employees. His qualifications as Lesniak's nephew far out weighed any qualifications that other possible applicants had so that no one else needed to be considered.
Somebody was still needed to do the work so the two titles Devanney held before his promotion were made into two full time positions each earning well over 100,000. Devanney now had only one challenge and that was to not be upstaged by any other actor. It is the same situation a sugar daddy faces with a gold digger wife. The sugar daddy can not have anyone around that is wealthier than he is for he may risk losing his wife to that person. And so politically Devanney must keep down any talented Democrats that can expose his ineptness.
Going into his third year at the helm Devanney has caused the budget to swell to over $360 million and despite a hiring freeze over this time the county ranks have added hundreds of employees. In these past two years Devanney has been systematically shifting upper management positions from the controls of veteran county administrators to less threatening, less capable but always accommodating party hacks.
This has been great for the elite of the Union County Democratic Party but devastating for the people who live here. Property taxes have increases over 40% while services have been cut. The big benefactors to this debacle are those campaign contributors that are rewarded with no bid contracts and the party elite who are party operatives on the public payroll.
If this was a Broadway play it would Rosie O'Donald's "Taboo", the musical about Boy George. Rosie with no experience sunk $10 million into the production that she insisted she produce herself. Rosie lost her own money. Devanney is costing the taxpayers theirs.
Thank you,
Joe Renna