State legislators still have plenty of questions after NJ Advance Media's report.
METUCHEN -- The state's highest-ranking law enforcement official should look into whether public funds were misappropriated during a 2 1/2-year spending spree at an obscure government agency, a legislator said Thursday.
"It just feeds into the public cynicism about government," said Assemblyman Reed Gusciora after NJ Advance Media's report Thursday about the New Jersey Schools Insurance Group. "Shame on them for doing this at government and taxpayers expense."
According to an NJ Advance Media investigation, employees of the government agency used taxpayer-funded credit cards to rack up hundreds of questionable expenses -- tens of thousands of dollars in food, booze, flowers, gifts, retirement parties, and more. New Jersey taxpayers picked up the bill.
In total, the news outlet flagged $150,000 in potentially questionable credit card expenses, including $49 in in-flight liquor, $53 at a liquor store, $515 for baseball tickets, $1,115 for flowers, and what organization officials now acknowledge was an overgenerous travel budget. The credit cards were discontinued in 2015, and leaders at the government insurance company have pledged to rein in spending.
http://www.nj.com/middlesex/index.ssf/2016/03/njsig_spending_investigation.html
Gusciora, D-Mercer, said that he thinks the attorney general should investigate whether public funds were misappropriated, especially given that several public school officials who were noted on expense reports as having dined with NJSIG employees fervently denied they'd done so.
He also questioned why the public employees had government credit cards in the first place.
"It's very shocking that rank and file employees would have any kind of government card, for this very reason," said Gusciora, the chairman of the regulatory oversight committee in the lower chamber.
The most expensive single item was a $2,386 purchase at Rat's Restaurant in Hamilton, one of the most expensive eateries in the state.
"Who'd have thunk that to eat at Rat's, all you need is a government job," Gusciora said.
The attorney general's office declined to comment.
State Senator Robert Gordon, chairman of the chamber's Legislative Oversight committee, said he was going to raise the issue with the state auditor. One possibility, Gordon said, is legislation that would make it clear that the state's 40-odd joint insurance funds need uniform expense-report policies. (The NJSIG is called a joint insurance fund, or a JIF; they're created by the government to pool risk.)
"Clearly in organizations like this, you just need a policy in writing that some things are acceptable and some are not," said Gordon, D-Bergen.
Said Gordon: "Tickets to the Phillies? I mean, give me a break. I'd never submit that to my boss."
The NJSIG will take up a package of spending reforms later this month; it includes restrictions, but not outright prohibitions, on purchasing alcohol, for example.
For Jay Eitner, who became the superintendent of schools at the Waterford Township schools in Camden County last year, the spending was a setback for the education community, which he says always battles perceptions of waste.
"Truth be told, had it been one of my fellow superintendents that did this, we would have been burned at the stake and shamed for eternity," Eitner said. "It's atrocious."
He added that it appeared to him that the new executive director, William Mayo, was trying to clean up the agency. So he doesn't think it will affect his school district's business with the insurance company (they've been a client since before his tenure).
But, he added about some purchases: "It's like... come on, man. This is gold for every person who hates education."
In Edison, the findings were greeted with something less than shock.
The school district there had done battle with the NJSIG in the courts, claiming the insurance agency was shortchanging it on the cost of rebuilding James Monroe Elementary School, which burned to the ground in 2013. (The NJSIG said that it offered the district a fair deal that conformed to the schools' insurance policy, and the two sides reached a settlement out of court.)
Things became so acrimonious that Edison switched insurance companies.
Frank Heelan, the president of the school board there, noted that the gulf between the two sides in the legal battle was millions, dwarfing the questionable spending. So it wouldn't have made up a huge difference, Heelan said.
But when it comes to wasteful spending of public dollars, it's about the principle, he said in a recent interview.
"It's part of the human greed equation, I guess," Heelan said. "When something catastrophic happened, they weren't there."
Brian Amaral may be reached at bamaral@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @bamaral44. Find NJ.com on Facebook.