So the other week the $61 billion Sandy Relief Act was bullied into law with it’s Alaskan fisheries, Smithsonian renovations, climate change studies, and all sorts of other lard packed into it. Some last minute face-saving proposals, like Rob Andrews’s “clean” Sandy bill proved not to be necessary as some very powerful east coast politicians basically threatened to destroy the career of any Republican congressman who actually stood for principle and voted against it.
But even the so called “clean” part of it is not so clean at all.
Hundreds of millions of dollars from the Sandy bill will be funneled through FEMA to a very large Florida-based contracting company called AshBritt. Needless to say, AshBritt has pull.
Read:
Politically connected Florida firm gets Sandy cleanup contract
Christie awards second contract for Sandy cleanup to influential firm
Were taxpayers gouged on Sandy cleanup?
After Sandy: The State’s Contract With AshBritt Reeks Of “Business As Usual“
So here it is in a nutshell: Politicians from both parties receive hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations from AshBritt and it’s lobbyists. This is what politicians call “vetting”. And since AshBritt has been “vetted” in a very big way, they have a direct pipeline to that FEMA cash. The state politicians help out by rigging the process to make sure that the towns have every incentive to use AshBritt despite their greatly inflated prices and every disincentive to employ local contractors who might actually charge the taxpayers a fair price. Here in Belmar, the incentives are particularly attractive due to the fact that the mayor’s wife, Maggie Moran, actually works for AshBritt’s local partner! For the record, Ms. Moran has stated that she had no involvement with Belmar’s November contract with AshBritt.
Next Wednesday evening Belmar will be awarding a second multi-million dollar contract to CashPitt AshBritt.
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