OCC board appointee's GOP links questioned

Thomas E. Monahan, a longtime school boards attorney and law partner of Ocean County Republican party chairman George R. Gilmore, was appointed this week to the Ocean County College board of trustees. Critics questioned the appointment, seeing it as an example of interlocking political relationships among the county's elites. But Monahan said he volunteered for the trustee seat because it's been his longtime goal to work with the college. "It's something I've wanted to do for some time. OCC is a great institution," Monahan said. "I'm hoping my experience in working with education will help me."

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After Monahan's appointment was approved Wednesday during a Board of Freeholders meeting, OCC student Suzanne Penna told the freeholders they had made the trustees' board heavy with members of the Ocean County bar. "To have five of the board members as lawyers is redundant," said Penna, who has been a critic of the college administration. Monahan's appointment doesn't do anything for diversity on the board, a principle called for by state guidelines for community colleges, she said.

The panel has 10 members from the community and a student representative; Monahan's appointment runs through 2010. Freeholder Director John P. Kelly replied that he's known Monahan for years and considers him a good candidate. He added that he believes lawyers aren't limited by their profession.

Within a couple of hours, former Republican political consultant Robert K. Haelig had a statement out to local news organizations with his take on the appointment. "The appointment of Thomas Monahan to the OCC Board of Trustees sends exactly the wrong message to Ocean County taxpayers," wrote Haelig, who had a falling out with his onetime GOP compatriots. "Monahan represents the most damaging elements of the boss system." Haelig criticized Monahan and his firm for benefiting from their legal work for Toms River, Manchester and Eagleswood schools, and he asserted that Gilmore "makes more than $2 million a year from the political process."

"Mr. Haelig is very involved in politics. This has nothing to do with politics," said Monahan, who said he's been stating his interest in serving as a college trustee for at least five or six years. "Nobody approached me." Monahan said he submitted his resume to the college this winter when he heard a vacancy would be opening on the board and was interviewed by the screening committee about three weeks ago.