Hypocrisy Overload

Allow me to quote from Tom McEnery's post last week on Obnoxious Blowhards.

The owners of Garden City were the subject of some very stringent enforcement, grand jury probes and indictments, and received the harshest of sentences. That should have been a lesson to the city. It wasn’t.

Under Susan Hammer and her budget director, Bob Brownstein, a very permissive attitude evolved, and a gigantic club, Bay 101, was permitted. They made large contributions to politicians and had significant ethical problems involving the same. At one time, they and their lobbyists were the most powerful special interest political donators in the city.

The bleak description McEnery lays out is this. After he left office, and Hammer came in, the clubs multiplied, salting the soil of economic development and laying waste to the ethically weak. Orphans and widows lines the streets, wailing unearthly laments and being callously run over by wealthy card club owners racing their Lamborghinis. McEnery may be Irish, but he sure wishes he were Dickens.

But a tipster provides another quote, from a May 23, 1987, article in the Mercury News describing the Garden City situation. Emphasis added.

Fourteen Garden City owners or associates were indicted early this month on charges ranging from tax fraud to campaign violations. Thirteen of them were accused of conspiring to launder political contributions.

Club records show that Garden City owners handed out money to 17 candidates, including San Jose Mayor Tom McEnery, county Supervisor Tom Legan, District Attorney Leo Himmelsbach, Sheriff Robert Winter and others.

The biggest recipient was McEnery, whose campaigns have received $16,960 from the club or its associates since 1981. That does not include approximately $8,500 given to the Measure J, the San Jose city charter amendment that last year substantially increased the mayor's power.

Yes. You read that right. At the height of the despicable corruption and widow-wailing, the casinos were handing out cash to no one more than Tom McEnery, who undoubtedly assumed his favorite position: hands out.

In fact, another article from January 29 of that year, goes into more detail.

McEnery, who over the past five years has received more than $10,545 from Garden City employees, and Winter, who has received $7,401 during that time, confirmed last week that they have been contacted by the Santa Clara County District Attorney's office about Garden City campaign contributions.

Many of the contributions were under $100, meaning they didn't legally have to be reported, though some, including McEnery, did. But, to most, that would seem to raise questions, including, apparently, the DA, who must have gotten tired of looking into McEnery by the time his term was up.

And where'd the money come from? A March 2 article answers.

To get around that, [Garden City President Nick] Dalis said, he would tell employees and partners he needed checks, then repay them in cash.

''I'd deliver them (to politicians) myself," he said.

No, in case you're wondering, that's not legal.

And of course, in classic small-town San Jose politics fashion, this plant's root run deep.

• The Garden City folks who went down were mostly targeted for tax evasion - skimming cash off the top of Garden City's profits. One of the main guys who took the fall, operations manager Henry Schiro, was stepfather to none other than the Chamber's favorite Mayoral contender, Michael Mulcahy. Mulcahy, in fact, is quoted in one Merc article calling his stepfather a "victim of a game of greed."
• The reporter on these articles? One Scott Herhold.
• And, of course, the campaign treasurer for many of the recipients of this money was none other than our old friend Chuck Reed. He was responsible for reporting this income and was paid, in part, from it. Kinda makes you think, doesn't it?