Puharic should take a closer look at his associates

In Bayshore Journalista chairman opinion news...

Former Freeholder Ed Stominski and Mel Hood are wonderful men. However, they do not have the votes to win the chairmanship. Their base of votes will pull from Jim Giannell's, and thus elect Adam Puharic chairman. It will be unfortunate if their legacy becomes that of spoilers in one of the most important elections the Monmouth County GOP has faced.

And then the news that Adam Puharic may be considering Scott Broschart as MC GOP executive director. Jim Purcell reported it first, but I heard it from a different and highly reliable source as well.

I find this greatly disturbing for a number of reasons. One of which happens to be allegations about Broschart's campaign financing, which were investigated by the Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office, though Broschart was never charged with any crime or violation.

But there is also an incident I never put out there in the public record that I feel compelled to reveal now.

During the time I was a reporter, I received a tip that Broschart had allegedly been stalking two Democrats who were possibly in a relationship.

I readily admit to a certain level of deception in what happened next, but I felt it was necessary to uncover whether stalking had or had not occurred. I called Mr. Broschart under the auspices of having an interest level in the nature of the two Democrats' relationship.

Mr. Broschart said he had done "some investigating" into the matter and sounded pretty eager to show me what he had in possession.

The next day Mr. Broschart came to Courier with photographs of the woman's car at her home as well as two letters disparaging the individuals. Mr. Broschart said he had not taken the photographs or written the letters himself, but had received them in the mail from an anonymous source. I found this difficult to believe, as did others at the office.

The two individuals involved -- who were not in elected office -- suffered other indignities by a correspondent or correspondents who remained anonymous. The nature of these would turn your stomach, but for the sake of preserving the identity of these individuals, I can't go into specific details.

This story is pretty well known among party leaders.

If one of Adam Puharic's first decisions as GOP leader is to select Broschart as executive director, the party is on the road to total disaster. And it speaks a great deal to Adam Puharic's fitness as a potential chairman that he would allegedly associate with such people.