'08's top 10 - No. 2: Plainfield mayor abruptly fires finance director

Counting down toward 2009, Plainfield Today is posting the top 10 stories of '08 that readers have found of interest, measured by number of views.

Today, Number 2: Robinson-Briggs abruptly fires Plainfield's finance director.

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"Robinson-Briggs abruptly fires Plainfield's finance director"

Douglas Peck (from his website, now defunct).

Plainfield Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs' judgment took another hit Monday as word seeped out that her hand-picked Director of Finance and Administration, Douglas Peck, had cleaned out his desk and was gone. Along with the car he is said to have used without authorization.

The ground had become increasingly shaky under Mr. Peck's feet after he flubbed the management of Mayor Robinson-Briggs' FY2009 budget introduction (read about his infamous 'Crayola document' budget presentation here).

But the proverbial icing on the cake may have been Peck's failure to produce the materials necessary for the Planning Board to move the City's five-year capital improvements plan forward, causing a Planning Board meeting to be canceled on short notice and leaving others in the Robinson-Briggs administration to try and salvage the mess.

Peck's tenure as a City employee has been exceptional, to put it mildly.

(Prior to his appointment by Robinson-Briggs, his only previous connection with Plainfield seems to have been a consulting contract with the PMUA, for whose Commissioners he conducted a 'strategic planning retreat', where -- among other things -- he plumped for the PMUA to start and operate a Charter School in Plainfield.)

Peck began with the Council approving an unheard-of $12,000 stipend in addition to his salary, interpreted at the time as covering his moving costs (though he later disputed that) -- and taking his first week on the City payroll off (see here) as a 'freebie'.

Then there was the matter of bonding; it turned out that, unlike every previous Director of Finance and Administration, Peck was unable to be bonded. The defect was such that the Robinson-Briggs administration pondered giving him another title, though nothing ever came of that idea.

Throughout the summer, I got word that the Mayor's other appointees were seething at the lax work weeks Peck was putting in; some say he never put in a five-day week the entire period he was with the City.

The budget, which was one of Peck's main responsibilities, turned out to be a donnybrook, for which Mayor Robinson-Briggs took it on the chin (see posts here).

But there were other, and more disturbing, rumors -- that Peck had commandeered a City vehicle and was driving it 24/7 without a Council resolution accepting liability on the City's behalf (see my posts here and here); and that he had physically attacked another City employee in a public scene at Hugo's, the bar which occupies the premises of the former Lily Greenleaves. You'll find no police report on that.

The Council, which has a fiduciary responsibility to the community as its corporate body, had not yet looked into the vehicle issue as of Mr. Peck's departure.

In her report on Peck's departure, Bernice quotes Mayor Robinson-Briggs as saying that though Peck's firing was for 'personnel issues', there was "nothing 'criminal or illegal' involved in the decision" (see full post here).

That may be, but I am told the search is on for the missing city vehicle.

Seems the most likely place to start is the parking lots at Newark Liberty airport.

Would that be long-term or short-term?

The Green/Robinson-Briggs administration is now in the position of having to search for a sixth person to fill the Finance and Administration position, with only her lame-duck year left.

If this were a major league baseball coaching position, the front office would have fired the coach by this time.

Plainfield's 'front office' is the voters.

Next year they get to voice their opinion on the coach.

UPDATE: The missing vehicle, used by Peck without Council authorization, was eventually recovered. No one wants to 'fess up -- the best I can find out is that it was NOT returned by Peck and that it was NOT recovered in Plainfield. Ah, life's little mysteries....

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• No. 10 - Nov. 17: "Plainfield official using vehicle without permission?"
• No. 09 - Oct. 08: "Mayor loses bodyguards: Right move, wrong reason?"
• No. 08 - July 14: "Council discusses troublesome South Avenue zoning changes"
• No. 07 - Jan. 28: "Plainfield rallies for Obama tonight" (plus followups -- the rally, the Primary)
• No. 06 - Apr. 1: "Dan tosses his hat in the ring"
• No. 05 - Mar. 20: "Jerry's troubling trifecta: Muhlenberg, Abbott, Santiago"
• No. 04 - May 9, 20: "Saving Muhlenberg or Jerry?" | "The Mayor and the Muhlenberg Mess"
• No. 03 - Sep. 30: "Development: The meltdown hits Plainfield"
• No. 02 - Dec. 2: "Mayor abruptly fires Plainfield's finance director"
  

-- Dan Damon

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