For unknown reasons, the blog I posted earlier today from the Wally Edge blog did not post.  So here it is again:

“It’s tough to tell a Democrate from a Republican in Warren County these days, but it’s clear that former Warren County Democratic Chairman (and Bob Torricelli campaign treasurer) Michael Perrucci is emeging as a significant power in solidly Republican Warren County.  A fledgling law firm, Florio Perrucci Steinhardt & Fader, includes former Democratic Governor Jim Florio, curent Warren County Re;publican Chairman (and Lopatcong Mayor) Douglas Steinhardt; Paul Fader, the ex-Mayor of Englewood who served as Chief Counsel to Governors James E. McGreevey and Richrd Codey; and Bloomsbury Mayor Mark Peck, a former aide to Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll who ran for the GOP Assembly monimation the the 23rd district last year.”

“In a fortunate coinncidence, Fader’s new legal work rep;ortedly includes a contact with the South Jersey Transp;oration Authority, which was approved by the Governor’s office prior to Fader signing up with the firm.  The Governor’s office also signed off on the appointment of James Stetner as Chief of Security of the Delwre River Joint Toll [Bridge] Commission; Stettner is a Phillipsburg Councilman and was Council President when Perrucci was named redeveloper for several parts of the town, including a brownfield site that had been set aside for the New Jersey Transportation Museum.  The site was to be purchased with a combination of county funds and an $800,000 state Economic Development Fund grant approved a few years ago.  The state has since backed off its funding commitment [through the political influence of Perrucci and his associates] and Perrucci is interested in deeloping riverfront condominkums instead [italics added by Billybytes publications’ founder Easton resident Billy Givens, who also as a founding member of the Warren and Sussex counties’ Paulinskill Trail Committee lobbied successfully for the Phillipsburg State Transportation Museum nearly 20 years ago, before he and his family moved to Easton’s College Hill neighborhood].”

Does this remind readers of Ashley Development’s Riverport project on the banks of the Lehigh River in South Bethlehem and Arcadia Properties’ Riverwalk project on the banks of the Delaware River and Bushkill Creek in Easton?

“Fader has developed a certain affinity for Warren County over the last few years.  He helped push through legislation that assured Warren would get two of the five Commission slots on the DRJT[B]C.  The commission recently purged some Reublican appointees, including the wife of former Mercer County Execcutive Robert Prunetti.  This has enhanced Perrucci’s ability to deliver some jobs at the DRJT[B]C [as political patronage].  Steinhardt’s father, Hackettstown (and Pohatcong) Municipal Court Judge Joseph Steinhardt, is reportedly Perrucci’s choice to replace Robert Ellwood as the Phillipsburg Municipal Court Judge.”

The Billybytes publications have already linked the president and vice-president of the Greater Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce, Anthony “Tony” Iannelli and Marta Boulos Gabriel, respectively, Northampton Community College administrator Paul Pierpoint, former Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corporation Executive Director Ray Sukoski, Lehigh Valley Industrial Parks (LVIP) President Kerry Wrobel, The Express-Times president and publisher Martin K. Till and reporter Anthony “Tony” Salamone, former Phillipsburg Mayor and current DRJTBC Chairman Philip Mugavero, and Newark Star-Ledger reporter Steven Chambers to meetings with Perrucci and Florio at the Warren County Community College in Washington Borough, New Jersey, and the Harkers Hollow Country Club and Golf Course in Harmony Township, Warren County, New Jersey.

The purpose of the meetings was to exclude the City of Newark, from whom the New Jersey State Park System purchased the Paulinskill Valley Trail, from the Phillipsburg, New Jersey, Metropolitan Statisical Area (MSA) and add it and the rest of Warren and Hunterdown counties to the Lehigh Valley MSA in a racist and political maneuver that weakened Newark’s prospects for development grants and strengthened the prospects of those grants like the “Lehigh VAlley’s” Riverport and Riverwalk projects.

Let me try again to see if I can post this article on the http://www.billybyte.com/blog.