Joseph Ferriero

Democratic State Chairman Joseph Cryan: Politicker file photo 

State Democratic Party Chairman Joseph Cryan today said it would be in the best interest of the party for embattled Bergen County Democratic Organization Chairman Joseph Ferriero to consider resignation.

"Clearly the Bergen County Democratic Organization needs a change at the top for permanent leadership to move forward," said Cryan.

From the governor down, there’s mostly been a delayed hammer drop on Ferriero, with the official public comment that Assemblyman Mims Hackett (D-Orange) and Assemblyman Alfred Steele (D-Paterson) - arrested last year on corruption charges - were elected officials, not party masterminds.

NEWARK - Charged with eight counts of corruption, Bergen County Democratic chairman Joseph Ferriero and Bergenfield attorney Dennis Oury made bail today on a $200,000 property bond ordered by federal Magistrate Judge Madeline Cox Arleo.

Indicted yesterday for their role in a grants scheme, Ferriero and Oury turned themselves over to the FBI today and appeared in Cox's courtroom around 2:30 p.m.

They stood with their attorneys in a pretrial appearance that laasted all of five minutes.

Gerald Krovatin of Newark is representing Oury, and Joseh Hayden of Roseland is representing Ferriero.

Each defendant said three words when Cox asked them if they understood the bail package agreement.

NEWARK - He says it every time, and he said it again this time: until larger numbers of people get involved in civic life and engage the democratic process, public corruption by a few will continue to dominate.

"The only thing that ultimately holds people to account is the ballot box," U.S. Attorney Chris Christie said on the day he announced the indictment of Bergenfield Attorney Dennis Oury and Bergen County Democratic Organization Chairman Joseph Ferriero.

"I’ve said that for years," Christie added. "That’s the only way it gets fixed."

He cut an unprepossessing figure as he made the rounds of open bar fiestas and happy hours in Denver, hobnobbing with the governor here, buttonholing some bigshot fundraiser there.

He smiled through the whispers and rumors.

But at the Democratic National Convention last month, bad feelings inevitably saturated the atmosphere of powerhouse Bergen County Democratic Organization Chairman Joseph Ferriero, the man who likens the make-up of his county organization to the way the ingredients go together in Coca-Cola.

The news that FBI agents stormed his office came just days before the start of the convention, prompting state Democratic leaders to field uncomfortable questions about Ferriero even as they were packing their bags and hightailing it for the upscale Inverness Hotel.

State Party Chairman Joseph Cryan told the media he wouldn’t ask the embattled party boss to stay home, and so there was Ferriero in Denver.

Never a big fan of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), the powerful Democratic Party boss backed Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) in the party’s presidential primary.

NEWARK - A reporter asked U.S. Attorney Chris Christie if he could confirm an investigation of Bergen County Democratic Chairman Joseph Ferriero on a sexual assault charge, or comment on whether there is any nexus between that and the conspiring to defraud indictment the U.S. Attorney today read against the embattled Democratic Party leader.

Christie just shook his head at the podium.

He wouldn’t confirm the assault charge, which the Star-Ledger last week reported allegedly occurred at a barbecue at Ferriero’s Old Tappan home.

But the U.S. Attorney did say it has nothing to do with the federal corruption charges.

U.S. Attorney Chris Christie, right, and FBI Director Weysan Dun.: Politicker file photo 

Newark - Numbers 129 and 130.

Those were the designations U.S. Attorney Chris Christie used to refer to Bergenfield attorney Dennis Oury and Bergen County Democratic Chairman Joseph Ferriero.

"You stack those numbers up against the number of municipalities in this state and 130 starts to look pretty small," Christie said of the number of public corruption indictments he’s secured in the last seven years.

The buzz question coming into this press conference here on the seventh floor of the Peter Rodino federal building was why Christie chose to have a press conference concerning the indictment of Ferriero and Oury without possession of the men themselves.

"It was late in the day," said the U.S. attorney. "The indictment was returned at 2:15 p.m. and we reached out to their (Oury’s and Ferriero’s) lawyers immediately. We asked them if their clients were willing to voluntarily surrender and they told us ‘yes.’

NEWARK - U.S. Attorney Chris Christie today announced the indictment of Bergen County Democratic Organization (BCDO) Chair Joseph Ferriero and former Bergenfield Borough Attorney and BCDO counsel Dennis Oury on eight counts of conspiring to defraud the Borough of Bergenfield.

"This is another example of people putting private interests ahead of the public interest," said Christie, referring to the two men who are tomorrow scheduled to appear before a federal magistrate here in Newark.

Never disclosing their owenership of a fledgling company called Governmenal Grants, according to the indictment, Oury and Ferriero allegedly received $25,016.97 and $27,538.04 respectively from the Borough of Bergenfield for helping the town receive a grant and loan package.

The rest of $128,625 the men received from the town they disbursed to "other individuals associated with Governmental Grants," the indictment says.

"No where did Ferriero and Oury disclose their ownership of Governmental Grants," said the U.S. Attorney. "They didn't file disclosure forms. Ferreiro never told anybody. Disclosure would have put their greed into the light of day."

Former Gov. Jim Florio used to ride the Amtrak train to Washington with Joe Biden, now the Democratic VP candidate: Politicker photo
DENVER – Standing in the lobby of the Inverness Hotel this morning flanked by Democratic State Chairman Joseph Cryan and Bergen County Democratic Chairman Joseph Ferriero, former Gov. Jim Florio said that he’s very excited to see his former commuting-mate tapped for the Democrats’ Vice-Presidential nomination.

“I’m very enthusiastic. He’s a personal friend,” said Florio, a superdelegate who originally supported Hilary Clinton.

During his years in Congress from 1975 to 1990, Florio, who commuted to Washington daily from the 1st District, would occasionally find himself on the same train as Biden, who commuted from Delaware. That led to a friendship and the occasional campaign function attended by Biden.

State Senate President Richard Codey (D-Essex).: Politicker photo 

Nothing’s ever rock solid in politics, but the top of the Trenton power heap may contain more potential for movement than usual in the lead-up to Statehouse reorganization come January.

Two possible factors include Speaker Joseph Roberts’s (D-Camden) imminent departure from the Assembly, and the possibility that a newly crowned Obama administration would haul former Wall Street guru Gov. Jon Corzine out of New Jersey to crunch numbers in Washington.

In the thicket of this political drama, it’s difficult not to identify Senate President and former Governor Richard Codey (D-Essex) as a protagonist.

"I’m just a kid from Orange," Codey told a packed auditorium in his native Essex County town last month - but he’s also a former governor, who by all appearances liked the job and enjoyed great popularity.

Sen. Bob Menendez, earlier this year with Hillary Clinton: Getty Images Photo
No longer as involved in the day-to-day mechanics of local politics, Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) in back to back statewide elections has proved to be his party’s New Jersey go-to guy.

The former mayor of Union City got out the machine-backed Feb. 5 vote for Clinton with a war cry - "We have an opportunity in Hudson, Hudson, Hispanics, Hillary and history." And leading up to June 3, he helped U.S. Rep. Steve Rothman (D-9) stare down a party uprising in Bergen County that might have weakened crucial organizational support for U.S. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.)

Clinton won by ten points here with significant Latino support, and Lautenberg buried U.S. Rep. Rob Andrews (D-1) yesterday, 61-34%.