{"id":14016,"date":"2019-01-09T02:09:53","date_gmt":"2019-01-09T07:09:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/?p=14016"},"modified":"2019-01-09T02:11:16","modified_gmt":"2019-01-09T07:11:16","slug":"brick-approves-deal-with-employee-union-councilman-calls-for-probe-into-letter-alleging-abuse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2019\/01\/brick-approves-deal-with-employee-union-councilman-calls-for-probe-into-letter-alleging-abuse\/","title":{"rendered":"Brick OKs Deal With Employee Union, Councilman Calls for Probe Into Letter Alleging ‘Abuse’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Brick<\/a>

Brick Municipal Building \/ Photo: Daniel Nee<\/p><\/div>\n

Brick Township council members approved a a four year contract with the union that represents hundreds of its employees, but one \u00a0member of the governing body abstained and called for an investigation into an anonymous letter that alleged abuses during the negotiating process.<\/p>\n

The new pact between the township and the Transport Workers Union Local 220 includes annual salary increases of 2.5 percent for four years. It also freezes employee health insurance contributions, meaning a worker\u2019s contribution level will not increase because they receive a raise or promotion. Officials said the contract provides for a 3 percent total compensation increase per year between the salary hike and the health insurance freeze.<\/p>\n

For the TWU\u2019s 231 members in Brick, including the vast majority of Public Works employees, the new contract came quickly after the previous agreement expired Dec. 31. But while union leader John Menshon said the deal had wide support from the rank-and-file, there was evidently some dissent, which came in the form of a \u201cscathing\u201d letter sent to at least some members of the township council.<\/p>\n

The letter led Councilman Jim Fozman to call for an investigation to be conducted before a vote on the new contract could be taken by the governing body, however he did not receive a second after making a motion to do so. Instead, the council voted 6-0 to approve the contract, with Fozman abstaining.<\/p>\n

The nature of the allegations contained in the letter is murky. Shorebeat submitted a request under the state\u2019s Open Public Records Act during Tuesday night\u2019s council meeting to obtain a copy. The township has seven days to provide the document, which newly-minted Council President Andrea Zapcic said would become public since it was submitted to the township clerk. An official told Shorebeat following the meeting that the township would likely have to redact the name of a single employee who was mentioned in the letter.<\/p>\n

The letter was \u201cscathing,\u201d Fozman said, though he did not divulge its contents beyond saying that it contained \u201chorrible allegations involving abuse toward employees.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some residents who attended the meeting said Fozman\u2019s request for an investigation should have been granted.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt any company I\u2019ve worked for, [an anonymous letter] was treated just as if it was signed in big, capital letters,\u201d said Robert Canfield. \u201cEven if it\u2019s an anonymous e-mail from a fake account, it is always looked into if there are specifics involved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sam Foster, another resident, said the letter may have been sent anonymously because the author was fearful of retribution.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of people are in fear of retaliation,\u201d said Fozman.<\/p>\n

Some township officials questioned the motives behind the letter.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf no one is willing to put their name to something, it could be a political stunt, we just don\u2019t know,\u201d said Menshon.<\/p>\n

\u201cApparently, maybe some disgruntled union members wrote an anonymous letter to complain,\u201d said Township Attorney\u00a0Scott W. Kenneally, though he admitted he did not \u201cthoroughly review\u201d the document.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a big assumption on your part,\u201d resident Vic Fanelli told\u00a0Kenneally.<\/p>\n

At the end of the meeting, Fozman reiterated his call for an investigation, suggesting the township should \u201cretain an independent, outside investigator.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brick Township council members approved a a four year contract with the union that represents hundreds of its employees, but one \u00a0member of the governing body abstained and called for an investigation into an anonymous letter that alleged abuses during the negotiating process. The new pact between the township and the Transport Workers Union Local […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3985,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[24,315,3575,1318,3574],"class_list":["post-14016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-brick-nj-news","tag-jim-fozman","tag-john-menshon","tag-transport-workers-union","tag-twu-local-220"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/checkbook_township.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgt2Ft-3E4","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}