Caputo not Sorry for His Double-Dipping

Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo this week following a Star-Ledger report revealing that he was collecting a hefty pension even while drawing a $150,000 annual salary as executive.

Other elected officials also benefit from the legally allowable practice, known as “double dipping”.  Among those officials is Ralph Caputo of Belleville, who collects a pension from his work as a legislator and educator.

Caputo, however, is not sorry.

“It’s not a huge pension, as you know,” said Caputo, the District 5 representative on the Essex County Board of Chosen Freeholders and an Assemblyman for the 28th District. “It’s only about $900 a month.”

Caputo, who accumulated the pension while working as an educator from 1964 to 1981 and as a  freeholder, began drawing his pension last year. He consulted with pension officials first to make sure he was allowed to collect, he told Patch today.

Caputo acknowledged that private-sector taxpayers, as well as public employees who are now being asked to make benefits concessions to close the state’s mammoth budget gap, are not happy with elected officials who seem to be having their cake and eating it too.

“In this economy people are paying close attention to this,” said Caputo. “People are angry. They have a right to criticize.”  

Caputo, however said those officials simultaneously getting pensions and salaries are not all equal, and  he said his own case illustrates the point. Caputo had not begun collecting his pension until he was 69 years old -- four years after he became eligible for Social Security. At his age, Caputo said he was worried that if he did not start receiving his pension now, he’d never get the chance.

“When am I going to collect? When I’m in the cemetery?” Caputo joked. “I’m not exactly a young guy and I think it was time to collect my pension. I earned it. This is like an insurance policy for my wife in case I pass away.”

He added that the laws allowing for double-dipping were originally intended to make it financially possible for people of retirement age to serve in relatively low-paying elected offices. Caputo’s freeholder salary is $32,000 a year and his Assembly salary is $49,000. Caputo, however, has announced that he will not seek another term as freeholder later this year, leaving just his Assembly salary if he is re-elected to a seat in that body.

Caputo also said that unlike some, he has never drawn especially lavish pay at the taxpayers’ expense.

“My highest pensionable salary in the public arena was $32,000 a year,” he said.


Caputo did say, however, that the practice of allowing officials and public employees to draw retirement benefits should be reformed. Public pensions are based on years of service, and can be drawn once someone has put in enough time, even if the beneficiary is still relatively young.  While not criticizing DiVincenzo directly, he noted that the county executive was still in his 50s when he began collecting his pension and that his total package is generous.

“I think there should be some sort of capping, maybe tiers, where you’re not able to get more than a certain amount” in combined salary and pension. Caputo also said that the age of the person seeking to draw a pension and salary should be a consideration, so “ young guys” can’t take advantage of the system.

Caputo also said, however, that reform can’t stop with elected officials but must extend to public employees as well, like some high-paid county and municipal workers. He cited the case of retired school superintendents, who might have six-figure pensions and routinely work for school districts at pay rates of several hundred dollars a day.

“You have superintendents, state employees working for the executive superintendent, who make more than the governor,” Caputo said.  “There’s a number of them out there. That’s unbelievable.”