By Michelle Brunetti Post of Atlantic City
Atlantic County commissioners voted Tuesday not to investigate the finances of the Atlantic County Utilities Authority after ACUA President Rick Dovey answered questions about spending $10,000 on a campaign against a proposed trash transfer station. Caren Fitzpatrick, of Linwood, had sponsored a resolution to authorize the investigation but withdrew it later in the meeting.
She said she felt she had an obligation to question such spending but got the answers she needed. The commissioners unanimously voted to withdraw it.
“To find that $10,000 was spent on what amounts to a campaign not related to trash or recycling … we want to know why,” Fitzpatrick said in explaining the resolution. “That’s what this is about.”
Councilman Ernest Coursey, of Atlantic City, asked Dovey whether he had authorization from his board of directors to start the opposition campaign.
There was not a vote by our board,” Dovey said. “I have the authority to do it, and they ratified it when the bills came due.”
The campaign included yard signs saying “Stop the Dump” and other materials in opposition to the project proposed for a site off Washington Avenue in Pleasantville. Workers installed the signs around Pleasantville using ACUA trucks that are still marked as county vehicles, causing confusion about who was sponsoring the campaign.
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