More Nojay: Just a slice of county corruption
Maybe this isn’t, strictly speaking, corruption, but just rampant nepotism?
While I was looking up info for the recent post on Bill Nojay’s new show I came across this, originally from the Fairport-Perinton Post in 2004:
Nojay recently announced his resignation from the post of chairman of the Rochester-Genesee Regional Transportation Authority. He was appointed chairman in 1996 with the backing of newly elected County Executive Jack Doyle and County Republican Chairman Steven Minarik, shortly after Doyle was elected in 1995.
Uh-oh, spidey sense is starting to tingle.
Nojay, an attorney with Saperston & Day was Doyle’s campaign finance chairman. Doyle and Nojay then overrode the recruitment efforts of the commissioners of the R-GRTA, who had already selected a transportation professional for the job, to have Don Riley, ex-town supervisor of Greece, with no transportation experience, named head of the Regional Transit Service. They later brought in Mark Aesch, a member of the staff of Republican representative Bill Paxon, who was without a job when Paxon chose not to run again.
Did you get all that? That’s a lot to digest. Let me break it down for you: if you’re a Republican politician in Monroe County, you have job security and upward mobility, regardless of your experience or skill set.
But there’s more. You know the bus station that’s part of the Renaissance Square project?
According to New York State Comptroller’s Audit of the Central Station project, R-GRTA (read Nojay) spent $313,229 of taxpayer money for advertising the proposed bus station. Television viewers became familiar with Nojay’s face as he presented a “smoke and mirrors” digital simulation of the station, whose price tag gradually increased to a staggering sum of $58.5 million.
He created his own name recognition at taxpayer expense, in anticipation that he would run for the job of either Representative Louise Slaughter or Representative Houghton, depending upon which retired first. He brushed off the criticism of transportation and planning professionals, many of whom, including this writer, claimed it was a waste of taxpayer money. He politicized the issue, calling his critics lackeys of Representative Slaughter, who steadfastly refused to support the project.
The Comptroller’s audit validated much of the professional criticism of the project.
Maybe that’s where a lot of his vitriol against Rep. Slaughter comes from. From a recent critique of his new radio show:
Nojay’s constant hammering of Congresswoman Louise Slaughter and her position on the issue of a Fairness Doctrine wore thin after a while.
Hmmm. IIRC, the Fairness Doctrine was in place to ensure that the side that’s better-funded doesn’t control the debate. Why would anyone have a problem with that? Isn’t that “Fair and Balanced” at its most basic?
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