Sussex Democrat Chair’s “X-Rated” video

By Sussex County Watchdog

We believe in free expression. 

The Sussex County Democrats do not.  State Democrats asked them to find something on the county Republican Chairman.  Murphy operative Leslie Huhn “friended” his Twitter page, and two days later the Sussex County Democrats’ Communications Director was in front of the Sussex County Community College Board of Trustees, asking that the Republican be fired.  It was a partisan political scam by people looking to be “offended” in order to score political points.

Worst still is the role played by SCCC Trustee Howard Burrell.  Last year, when Burrell wanted to be a trustee, this website wrote in support of him.  Burrell gave his word of honor that he would not be political while a member of the college board.  Then he sat there while he was running for Mayor of Vernon.  He didn’t even disclose that he was campaigning when he took a vote against the Republican Chairman.  Just days later, he campaigned at a Democrat political event with the very Democrats who slashed education funding in Sussex County.  An ethical person would have recused himself from taking that vote.  But not Burrell.  

The question is:  Why didn’t SCCC Trustee Chairman Bill Curcio ask Burrell to recuse himself?  Why did Curcio and the board allow the college to be used this way – to sink into partisan politics? 

Yes, we believe in free expression… but hypocrisy needs to be addressed too.

Katie Rotondi, the Sussex County Democrat Chairwoman, has led the stalking of other people’s social media pages.  She and her fellow stalkers have found things to be “offended” by and have demanded that people be punished.  But has anyone looked at what she puts out?

She isn’t re-tweeting something by mistake.  She produces and edits this stuff.  She promotes it.  And there is a whole lot of it.  What follows is one of the milder examples of her stuff (and make sure no children are around to see this)…

https://vimeo.com/182943568

There are things in this video that many people in Sussex County would find to be offensive.  We highly doubt that we could get Bill Curcio and Howard Burrell and the other members of the SCCC Board of Trustees to read out some of the lines in this video.  They would be too embarrassed to do so… although we might just show up and ask them to. 

The SCCC trustees essentially allowed the Sussex Democrat Chairwoman to script their proceedings.  With the help of the SCCC’s newly hired Democrat law firm – a major funder of state Democrat campaigns – Rotondi and the state Democrats used the college to implement a political strategy that actually involved one of their trustees as a Democrat candidate.  This is a very serious ethical issue for the college.

In the midst of turkey vulvas and facial treatments and peeing on desks, we think this video should be reworked to show footage of the trustees… you know, talking and reacting and stuff like that.   After all, they allowed themselves to become part of Katie Rotondi’s body of work, so they should be part of her reel.  Call it performance art.    

Stay tuned…

SCCC Trustee Burrell (D) running for Mayor of Vernon

So now we know what tonight’s circus is in aid of…

Politics.  Real scumbag politics.  The kind that masquerades as self-righteousness when it is really only about self-dealing.

It turns out that for some time now, SCCC Trustee Howard Burrell has been discussing and planning a comeback political career.  Trustee Burrell was a Democrat Freeholder until he was defeated for re-election in 2002 by 4,000 votes.  Sussex County Democrat Committee Chairwoman Katie Rotondi and Murphy county coordinator Leslie Huhn are both Burrell backers.  

We understood why Democrats like Dan Perez and Lorraine Parker wanted to hold an anti-Trump rally disguised as a special public meeting of the SCCC trustees, but we couldn’t figure out why SCCC Board Chairman Bill Curcio went along with it.  Now we know. 

SCCC Trustee Howard Burrell managed Democrat Dan Perez’ 2017 Freeholder race against Republican Freeholder Director Herb Yardley.  Perez lost by 7,000 votes.  Now Perez is returning the favor and supporting Burrell.

The SCCC Board of Trustees dumped a Sussex County firm as its attorney and hired the Union County Democrat machine firm of former State Senator Ray Lesniak.  So it is official.  The facts surrounding this appointment are shocking and will be dealt with in length but suffice to say that Ray Lesniak was a big defender of the corrupt practice of pay-to-play.

So now we know why some players on the SCCC Board of Trustees have dragged their colleague of seven years through the dirt for something he’s apologized for again and again…

Politics.  Dirtbag politics.  The kind of politics that sacrifices human decency, forgiveness, and pity for self-advancement. 

Sussex County Community College isn’t supposed to be about politics.  The SCCC Board of Trustees aren’t supposed to create venues by which to hang one trustee so that another can launch his political comeback campaign.

In fact, using SCCC facilities for partisan political purposes is explicitly against the rules of the Internal Revenue Service.  The process by which an executive session of the Board was called (a trustee is not “personnel” and no lawsuit has been filed by any party) and a public meeting held could pose legal hurdles for the SCCC.

Curiously, Howard Burrell launched his original political career 30 years ago in the midst of the same rhetoric being used by some Democrats today… accusing anyone they don’t like of “racism” and “bigotry” while they push legislation that even most Democrats say is anti-Semitic.  It seems some Democrats have learned nothing in 30 years.

Also worth noting are the assurances made by Trustee Burrell to the Freeholder Board at the time of his appointment just last year.  Burrell’s appointment had been held up by an earlier Freeholder Board over concerns that he would use his position on the SCCC Board of Trustees as a springboard to political office.  The current Freeholder Board appointed him after being assured that politics would not be part of it.  This has obviously turned out not to be the case and Trustee Burrell will have some explaining to do.

It looks like former Freeholder Carl Lazzaro was right about Howard Burrell and Watchdog was wrong to have advocated for Burrell’s appointment to the SCCC Board of Trustees.  We admit our mistake.