“Money is what greases the wheels — good, bad, or indifferent,” City Councilman Dan Halloran said.
The conversations reportedly recorded by investigators working for Preet Bharara, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, should be shocking but they were not. A cynicism now pervades the public perception of city and state government.
People have come to expect corruption.
“Every New Yorker should be disheartened and dismayed by the sad state of affairs in this state,” Bharara told reporters last week. “As I’ve said once before, every time a politician is arrested in New York it should not feel like a scene from ‘Groundhog Day,’ and yet it does.”
Halloran, 42, was arrested last week along with state Sen. Malcolm Smith and other elected officials. The northeast Queens councilman was allegedly part of a bribery scheme to rig the city’s mayoral race.
Prosecutors say Halloran accepted more than $20,000 in cash to act as an intermediary with the two Republican county leaders to support a waiver so Smith, a southeast Queens Democrat, could run for mayor on the GOP line.
In addition, prosecutors contend that if Smith had been elected, Halloran expected an appointment as a deputy police commissioner or a deputy mayor.
Like anyone else who is arrested, Halloran is innocent until proven guilty. He is out on $250,000 bail, but unless he can prove it is not his voice, the recordings reveal a man who is not fit for office.
He and Smith have done great damage. Halloran has betrayed the trust of the people of his district, which includes Bayside, Whitestone and College Point, and the voters who elected him. The councilman should give serious thought to resigning.
State Sen. Tony Avella, who represented the 19th District as a Council member before Halloran was elected, said “the system lends itself to corruption.”
Halloran and Smith may soon join a list of corrupt Queens officials who have been convicted of violating the public trust in recent years, including Sens. Shirley Huntley and Hiram Monserrate and state Assemblymen Anthony Seminerio and Brian McLaughlin.
New Yorkers should appreciate the aggressive work of Bharara’s office in uncovering a culture of corruption.
