Coda
No town meeting 'til you fill out the proper form
GREG BEAN
As the captain said to the convict road gang in "CoolHand Luke," themovie that put me off hard-boiled eggs for more than a decade, "What we got here is ... failure to communicate."

That's what happened in Gov. Jon Corzine's office last week over the announcement that he has scheduled the first of his promised public hearings on financial restructuring and debt reduction (also known as figuring out howmuchwe have to increase tolls on state roads to pay down $32 billion in debt).

If anyone remembers (and unfortunately for Corzine, lots of people do) the governor promised to hold town hall-style meetings in all 21 New Jersey counties so people could say their piece about his hazy proposals.

Last week he announced on a stateWeb site that he had scheduled the first four of those meetings, starting Jan. 12 in Livingston and running through a Jan. 19 meeting at Cape May Court House.

So far, so good.

But, in a public relations and planning blunder that I'm fairly certain was conceived by the team that gave us New Coke, Corzine's announcement confused most people and made the rest mad.

First of all, even though the first of the promised town hall meetings has been scheduled, Corzine still hasn't told anyone about the specifics of his plan for getting New Jersey out of this fiscal morass.

It seems to involve leasing out the Turnpike andmaybe other state toll roads to private contractors, or keeping the roads and increasing the tolls to bring down the state's debt. Nobody knows how high the toll hike would be, but most people in the know say tolls would likely have to be tripled in order to make a serious dent in the deficit and debt.

So Corzine is inviting people to come out and comment on a plan they haven't heard yet (where does he think he is, Edison?).All they know for sure is that whatever the details of the plan, it's gonna cost them more money. The only question is how much.

That's poor communication, but it did not end there.

In his announcement about the meetings, Corzine said thanks for taking an interest in financial restructuring and debt reduction in New Jersey, and then he went off the rails.

"The details of the meetings including locations, dates and times can be found under the Town Hall listing," Corzine

wrote. "If you would like to attend youmust

RSVP (emphasis added). You will find the registration formunder the link Town Hall RSVP."

Say what? Why would anyone have to RSVP to attend a public meeting? Is that even legal?

Let's take a look at the state's open meetings law. Anything in there about mandatory RSVPs? Nope, not a word.

Corzine is apparently making it up as he goes along.He wants to know who plans to attend these public meetings, and he wants to know asmuch about themas possible.

What's on this registration form, you ask? Well, it turns out that if you want to attend one of these meetings, Corzine wants to know your full name, your title, your organization, your street address, your county, your state, your ZIP code, your daytime phone number (plus extension), your evening phone number (plus extension) and your e-mail address.

Why does he want this information? He didn't say, but the mere fact that he asked for it was enough to make some people around here a little crazy.

In an interview that appeared in the Jan.3 edition of the Asbury Park Press, state Assembly Minority Leader Alex De- Croce compared prescreening audiences in this fashion to the Soviet Union.

Smack! Pow! Zap!

Responding in that same article, Corzine spokeswoman Lilo Stainton, spinning like a dreidel, said it was all a misunderstanding. The notion that anyone would be denied access to the meetings, RSVP or not, was "ludicrous," she said, and anybody who shows upwill be allowed to participate.

Well, if that's true, why did Corzine say an RSVP was mandatory? We know the governor is doing a pitiful job of communicating with us, but is he even communicating with his own spokeswoman?

Apparently not, since their statements are diametrically opposed.

You know, you just can't make this stuff up. Our governor schedules public hearings to get comment on a plan that's still a secret, and there's a question about whether folks who don't fill out an intrusive and suspect RSVP form with a bunch of personal information will be allowed to attend.

I don't know about you, but if Jon Corzine can't even schedule a few public hearings without throwing people into a tizzy, I'm not exactly brimming with confidence that his top-secret plan for something as complicated as restructuring this state's completely screwed-up finances will work any better.

Then again, how would we know? Considering this administration's track record with communication, it probably wouldn't tell us either way - unless we fill out the proper paperwork.

• • •

For those keeping track, this is the week former Keyport mayor and current felon JohnMerla was scheduled to report to federal prison to begin serving his 22-month sentence for corruption. If all went as planned, Merla began serving time Jan. 8 and won't be back on the streets for nearly two years.

Merla - who finally pleaded guilty to accepting $23,000 in bribes from an undercover FBI informant- was the most flamboyant of all the miscreants busted in the highly publicized Operation Bid Rig sting.

He was also themost polarizing, at least in his home community. John Merla tore Keyport apart and gave it a black eye in a national forum. There were some residents who wondered if the nice little community would ever fully recover.

After years of turmoil, however, it looks like things are finally getting back to normal in that Bayshore town, and the black cloud that's been hanging overhead for so long is finally giving way to sunshine.

If nothing else, the saga of JohnMerla is testament to the fact that once in a while, the system of justice in this country works exactly as it was intended.

Do the crime, and you'll do the time.

Even if it's only 22 months.

Gregory Bean is executive editor of Greater Media Newspapers. You can reach him at gbean@gmnews.com.