Murphy fires Scharfenberger for skipping his press conference

Republican Freeholder Gerry Scharfenberger was fired from his job in the Murphy administration this afternoon. PoliticsDW broke the story.

“I paid the price for not attending the press conference,” Scharfenberger said when reached by MMM.  The freeholder was referring to Governor Murphy’s event in Marlboro last week to promote his scheme to convert property taxes in to charitable donations as workaround to the new federal tax law which caps the deduction for state and local taxes at $10,000.  Murphy claimed bi-partisan support for the scheme, but only five Democrat mayors from Monmouth County showed up to support the governor.

“I had hoped to see you Friday but things didn’t work out, Best of luck and see you around town,” Scharfenberger said the governor texted to him in response to his own text thanking Murphy for keeping him on for month into the Democrat administration.

Murphy and Scharfenberger both live in Middletown where the freeholder served on the Township Committee for 13 years before becoming a freeholder last week.

Scharfenberger was a Christie Administration holdover. He was Executive Director of the state’s Business Action Center and and Director of the State Office for Planning Advocacy. The jobs paid $99,359.  He said that Murphy asked him to stay on for the first six months to one year of the new administration but didn’t tell him that attendance at press conferences were part of the job.

Scharfenberger said that Jay Boone, Chief of Staff to the Secretary of State, delivered the termination message, effective immediately, late this afternoon.

Murphy was very angry about Monmouth GOP Chairman Shaun Golden’s statement condemning the scheme and that no Monmouth County Republican who had been invited to the press conference showed up, according to a source who asked not to be named.