Council appoints 3 to BTMUA, Zoning Board
Dem. councilwoman approves, opposes and abstains on nominations
BY COLLEEN LUTOLF
Staff Writer

Dennis Salerno

BRICK -Two vacant seats on the Brick Township Municipal Utilities Authority and the Zoning Board of Adjustment allowed the Township Council to make three new appointments Sept. 12.

Dennis Salerno, 61, appointed by the council as an alternate BTMUA commissioner in January, will fill the seat left vacant by former commissioner Andrew P. Nittoso Jr., who resigned. The term expires Jan. 31, 2007.

Salerno, treasurer of the local Republicans' 2005 campaign, is an attorney with local and Jersey City offices.

He is a former Hudson County freeholder who worked as a public defender in Jersey City in the 1970s, and sat as a Jersey City municipal judge between 1991 and 1994. Jersey City remained his employer through 1999, after Salerno was appointed as an assistant corporation lawyer handling real estate matters for the city, according to his résumé.

Nittoso, a Democrat, resigned his position as part of a settlement made with the Republican-majority council after the governing body brought Nittoso up on 19 charges of misconduct, inefficiency and neglect of duty charges in June 2005 in an effort to remove him from the commissioner board.

Dr. Joseph Buttacavoli

A grand jury had previously found Nittoso, along with former BTMUA chairman Daniel Newman Sr., innocent of any criminal wrongdoing in 2005 after it was made public that Newman had a $19,000 unpaid sewer bill.

The settlement with the council was reached in April, the same night the defense was scheduled to cross-examine BTMUA Executive Director Kevin Donald, who had testified that Nittoso had told him to bury Newman's overdue bill.

Nittoso submitted a resignation letter April 27, although he was allowed to keep his commissioner's seat until Sept. 30 and retain health benefits for three months after leaving the board as part of the settlement's terms.

Nittoso succeeded Newman as BTMUA chairman but was assigned to assistant secretary/treasurer when a Republican majority took over the utility in February. Since the reorganization, Nittoso attended two BTMUA meetings, according to BTMUA records.

Madeline Iannarone

Dr. Joseph Buttacavoli, 56, is a local dentist who will fulfill Salerno's unexpired term as an alternate commissioner. That term expires in January 2009.

Buttacavoli ran for a council seat as a Democrat in the early 1990s, but he said after his appointment that he has no interest in pursuing elected office in the future.

"I've always tried to give back to the community," he said. "I was told they were accepting résumés, so I submitted one. I thought it was the right thing to do. I live and work in the community."

Dr. Buttacavoli sat on the Brick Police Athletic League Board of Directors between 1976 and 1996 and served as that organization's president from 1990 to 1996. He served as Brick Rotary Club president between 2003 and 2004, sat on the Brick Hospital Fund's board of directors between 1982 and 1985, and was a member of the Brick Kiwanis Club for 10 years and served as its president in 1981, according to his résumé.

Both men receive $2,650 as an annual stipend. As a regular BTMUA member, Salerno also receives health benefits that amount to, on average per commissioner, $15,081, according to the BTMUA. Buttacavoli does not receive health benefits.

Salerno will assume committee seats once held by Nittoso: reservoir committee, watershed committee and buildings and grounds committee. Buttacavoli will move into Salerno's former committee seats: finance committee, personnel committee and watershed committee, according to the BTMUA.

Madeline Iannarone, a 2005 Republican campaign worker, was appointed as an alternate member of the Zoning Board of Adjustment to fill the unexpired term of board member James Osborn. Her term expires Dec. 31, 2006. The board meets twice a month. She will earn $51 for every meeting she attends.

Iannarone is a Brick Township High School graduate who has been a senior hairdresser at J.C. Penney at the Ocean County Mall since 1999, according to her résumé. She is also a Brick Municipal Alliance Committee (B-MAC) volunteer.

The six Republican council members all voted in favor of the appointments.

The council's lone Democrat, Kathy Russell, opposed Salerno's appointment, abstained on Iannarone's appointment, but approved Buttacavoli's appointment.

The council did not discuss the appointments at a caucus meeting the week before the vote.

The council usually discusses any business they will vote on at a caucus meeting the week before the vote.

Russell said she did not receive the proposed appointees' résumés until she arrived at the council meeting the night of the vote.

"I checked my e-mail when I got home at 4:30 and I called the clerk to ask her whose résumés they had," Russell said. "I didn't see the résumés until I got to the council meeting."

Russell knows Dr. Buttacavoli and his record of volunteerism.

"I would have liked to have seen him become a commissioner," she said. "I don't know Madeline Iannarone. Her résumé didn't say anything about volunteering. They kept saying she volunteers, but there was no information on her résumé.

"As far as Dennis Salerno, the choice could be better," she said. "I really thought someone else could be appointed as a commissioner. A better choice."

Russell didn't say why Salerno was not a good choice, or who would have been a better choice for commissioner over Salerno.

Municipal Clerk Virginia Lampman said that she was unaware that the council was going to make appointments until Sept. 12.

Acropolis said there was no secrecy.

Council members called the clerk's office after they realized the résumés were not in council members' packages that are sent home with the coming week's business every Friday evening, Acropolis said.

"They e-mailed everybody Monday morning," Acropolis said. "I don't know if Kathy Russell doesn't check her e-mail."

Russell is critical of how the latest round of appointments was handled, yet the Democrats in 2003 voted to appoint Leon Mowadia to the council at a caucus meeting, Acropolis said.

Acropolis had called for a public question-and-answer session before Mowadia's appointment, but the council president at the time, Kim Casten, denied the request.