Politics & Government

AG Won't Say Which Politicians Got Birdsall Illegal Donations

Executives from Birdsall Engineering - a firm with deep ties to Woodbridge - have been indicted on a Pay-to-Play donation racket


Seven current and former executives from Birdsall Engineering, a Monmouth County-based engineering firm, were indicted Tuesday on charges that they tried to circumvent the state's restrictions on campaign donations by reimbursing employees for donating to favored politicians.

The total amount of money spread around may be over $686,000. In response to the NJ Attorney's General's request, a Monmouth County judge Wednesday froze the bank accounts and other assets of the beleaguered Birdsall firm, northjersey.com reported.

But of all the details divulged by the ongoing investigation of the NJ Attorney General, the one thing they won't say is which politicians and campaigns were the beneficiaries of the illegal donations.

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"We're not giving out that information," said AG spokesman Peter Aseltine. "They donated to many political campaigns around the state. We're not putting out a list of those organizations."

While Birdsall has done millions of dollars of business with municipalities around the state, perhaps no town has had as close or continuous a relationship with the company as Woodbridge Township.

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Since January, the town council has approved several large contracts and change orders for Birdsall. And in February, Mayor John McCormac gave the welcoming remarks at a Birdsall event on FEMA flood mapping, held at the Woodbridge Hilton.

Just this year, the township has given Birdsall tens of thousands of dollars in contracts and change orders: 

Birdsall was also the engineering firm and contractor on the town's solar projects on various buildings. Scott McFadden, one of the indicted executives of the company, gave a presentation in 2010 to the council on how the solar panel projects were cost effective.

They were also given a contract last October for $15,320 to manage the township's solar renewable energy credits (SRECs) as the bottom was falling out of the SREC market.

The sale of SRECs was predicted to pay for the cost of the solar panel installation, before the SREC market was flooded and dropped to an all time low by December.

There is no indication what the township will do now that Birdsall's top management is facing major legal woes. McCormac's office did not return calls for comment.

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