Posted: Monday, 30 November 2009 11:10AM
Political Gluttony Is Hard To Swallow
Steve Corbett Reporting
Monday, November 30, 2009
Mussels a la Centini?
Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport Director Barry Centini has finally arrived. And his flight from the outer limits of good taste has landed him smack dab in the middle of yet another Northeastern Pennsylvania public service controversy.
The seafood dish named for Centrini was only one of the gourmet courses offered at the opulent airport party county officials held to commemorate the Spring 2006 grand opening of the new airport terminal.
The Joseph M. McDade Terminal Building is a $41.5 million steel, stone and glass structure that replaced the airport’s 47-year-old building. It’s named after former U.S. Rep. Joe McDade, who is ill and aging.
The former congressman, who remains a beloved figure in many political circles, beat federal public corruption charges after being acquitted by a jury. Since his retirement, new charges against McDade gave new meaning to the concept of political public exposure but lawyers on both sides seem to agree that he is too ill for further prosecution.
But McDade sure looked frisky when he donned a tuxedo, posed for party pictures and wallowed in the lavish attention paid to him from supporters and other local mooches at the fancy airport event.
Indeed, frisky could have been the official theme of the night.
The party showered food and music and fun on 900 invitation-only guests who enjoyed a laser light show, grub from around the world, three bands and all the booze they could swallow courtesy of contractors who are said to have picked up the tab.
Several months before the story appeared in Sunday’s Scranton Times I asked Centini to talk with me about the party. Of course he refused. Centini had always talked with me in the past but on this topic he balked.
I had to go to Lackawanna County press officer Lynn Shedlock to obtain documents including the fat guest list and details for the party.
Total: $176,854.23.
Cost to the county: About $23,000.
Estimated cost to contractors: $153,854.23.
The tip I received inferred that the feds were interested in whether contractors who built the terminal offered to pick up the tab as a gesture of appreciation or if some county official put the arm on them to pay the bill whether they wanted to cough up the cash or not. That’s still the going theory about federal law enforcement interest in the gala event. Also in question is whether a contractor who might have paid for party favors was then reimbursed for the expense.
I also spoke with Catherine Shafer, president of CDS Creative, the advertising, marketing and public relations outfit that some mystery county official hired to throw the party. I say “mystery” official because nobody would or could answer my question when I asked who hired Shafer. All I got from Shedlock was that somebody on the airport authority board knew her and threw her the big job.
Yet Shafer played coy when I called to ask about the job, saying that she doesn’t discuss her clients – even though her Website still includes boasts about work she has done for very specific businesses.
But it doesn’t take a public relations expert to know that Shafer just didn’t want to talk.
A federal grand jury subpoena might change her mind.
Any elected and appointed public officials who attended the party should come forward and offer to answer questions. The FBI should not have to hunt them down like wild mushroom caps in a béarnaise sauce in order to get to the bottom of this controversy. Actually, anybody with any information about this over-the-top bash should call the public corruption task force and offer to talk.
Were any laws broken here?
We don’t know yet.
We do know that the VIP event is yet another example of how the politically connected of Lackawanna and Luzerne counties benefit while most taxpayers and good citizens are punished for their lack of clout.
No influence, no power. No influence, no work. No influence, no nothing in hard coal country.
But the party is winding down.
And one day, the party will hopefully end for good.
Living high off the hog must stop.
Political gluttons feasting in the midst of moral famine is just too hard to swallow.
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