On Sept. 15, former PMUA Executive Director Eric Watson returned to the role he held before leading the authority, heading the city Department of Public Works & Urban Development. Mayor Adrian O. Mapp named him to a 90-day acting position which expires Dec. 15.
The mayor will have to seek City Council advice and consent to his nomination of Watson if he is to receive a full term concurrent with the mayor's, ending in 2017.
While he had many supporters on the council as PMUA director, it is not apparent how much he might have for confirmation as department head. The council meets on Dec. 1 for an agenda-fixing session, folllowed by a voting meeting on Dec. 8. If no action is taken by then, the council could tsck a special meeting on to the Dec. 15 agenda-fixing session for the January reorganization.
Two council members, Tracey Brown and William Reid, are former PMUA commissioners. When she served as council liaison to the PMUA, Council President Bridget Rivers often defended the authority against criticism by other council members. But a majority this year has frequently chosen not to support Mapp's decisions, so his choice of Watson could falter simply because of council hostility.
The public has no vote in the matter, but has had plenty to say about Watson's return to a city post after receiving a controversial settlement in January 2012.
Also of note, current PMUA Executive Director Dan Williamson's contract will expire in July 2015. Williamson was the city's corporation counsel before being hired to head the PMUA. Watson headed the authority from 1995 to 2011, but Williamson received just a three-year contract. His continued employment will be decided by the authority's board of commissioners.
--Bernice
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There are 565 municipalities in NJ. The Public Works Association of NJ has 70 pages listing Public Works departments throughout the state. It is hard to imagine there is not someone somewhere, maybe even in Plainfield itself, who has the qualifications to head our department. Someone without a track record of mismanagement, patronage, and financial abuse that has cost residents millions a year during the period Mr. Watson was PMUA Executive Director and in the years since he David Ervin bamboozled the PMUA Board to hand them $1,000,000 of ratepayer and taxpayer money.
ReplyDeleteRemeber that Watson was the Dir of PW when he encouraged all of his friends etc to create the PMUA and make him top man. Now he would have no reason to end the game now
ReplyDeleteWhat has Mr. Watson accomplished in the past 60 days since he has been here? Is the City any cleaner? Why has the inspection dept and DPW not been working on cleaning up downtown ? Downtown looks to dirty to shop there, and I can never find a place to park even when I just want to go to the bank.
ReplyDeleteActually, Mr. Watson should be repaying Plainfield's citizens for that million-dollar bonus he and Mr. Ervin got after they quit their PMUA jobs. Suggestion: he should work "pro bono," as a lawyer would say!
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