Woodbridge has Five Members in the $100K Retirement Club

Woodbridge has five members in the state's '$100K Club.' That's the name given by New Jersey Watchdog, an online investigative reporting site, to what they call "New Jersey's elite corps of retired public employees" who've retired with public pensions of $100,000 a year or more.

In some cases, much more.

Topping Woodbridge's golden retirees is former . After heading the township's police force for 20 years, Trenery retired with a pension worth $137,809.

His retirement came in conjunction with Mayor John McCormac's push to rid the police department of a police chief and hire instead , saying that these new department chiefs who would answer directly to him would save taxpayers money in salaries, pensions, and benefits.

The civilian police director position - at a salary of $140,000 a year - went to a retired Woodbridge police captain, Robert Hubner, who also made New Jersey Watchdog's $100K Club list.

Hubner retired from the force in 2010 with a $107,339 pension. But between his retirement and appointment as civilian police director, McCormac keep Hubner busy by hiring him at another $75,000 a year job in Woodbridge, 'ticketing scofflaws,' as centralnj.com put it.

The new assistant police director, Joseph Nisky, was hired with Hubner at a . Nisky was a former Woodbridge police lieutenant who also retired in 2010. 

With his police retirement pension of $88,000, Nisky just missed New Jersey Watchdog's $100K Club. Nisky kept busy between his 2010 retirement and 2011 rehiring as assistant police director when McCormac hired him in the interim to head the township's recreation department at a salary of $82,000.

Another former Woodbridge police officer who retired with a hefty pension is Philip DiNicola, who serve as a deputy police chief. Like Hubner and Nisky, DiNicola also kept busy with another Woodbridge Township job in his retirement: he was hired in 2010 as the township's Court Director.

DiNicola's police pension is $131,016 a year.

Yet another former Woodbridge policeman is also on the $100K Club list. A former township police captain who was in charge of the department's Communications Divsion, Barry C. Burns retired on a pension of $107,058.

The last Woodbridge member of the highly paid pension club is long retired former Schools Superintendent Dr. Frederic Buonocore. 

After retiring in 1995 with a pension of $104,689, Buonocore caused a big stir when he left his job and pocketed $250,000 in unused sick time, according to the Metuchen/Edison Sentinel.

That caused a change in the rules that capped the amount of money a superintendent could take with them upon retirement at $15,000.

Since he left Woodbridge, Buonocore has worked as an adjunct profession in Monmouth University's School of Education. In 2010, he also ran and won as a councilman in Sea Girt, where he lives.

New Jersey Watchdog has a full list of the 1,244 pension recipients here, which represents a 28 percent increase in well-heeled retirees over 2010.