WPCNR WHITE PLAINS LAW JOURNAL. By John F. Bailey. November 3, 2004: The invitations were engraved, they went out to Commissioners and department heads across the city, but within a few days, the hot White Plains Performing Arts Center party at Trotters was cancelled due to overwhelming response. There apparently was not room for everybody to attend. But, why wouldn't you simply rent out Legal Seafoods across the street and have a strolling block party to handle the overflow? The cancellation was a mystery.

A lawyer not connected in any way with the city, but familiar with the conflicts of interest when fundraising mixes with city government, says that the party to be hosted on Monday, November 8, after the White Plains Performing Arts Center Broadway Salutes White Plains II Gala next Monday evening may have been cancelled for legal reasons, not because of not enough room for potential guests.

The lawyer, intimately involved in the famous Margiotta 1% case in Nassau County 25 years ago, speculates that the legal reason for the abrupt cancellation could be the appearance of double-tapping city commissioners and department key personnel for attendance inviting them to the  Undercover Gala at Trotters, for $500 a person  in addition to inviting them to the Gala Broadway Salutes White Plains II function for $150 a pop.

The legendary Republican boss of Nassau County, Joseph Margiotta lost his political empire when he required contributions from his town government personnel twenty-five years ago in a similar situation.

When Joseph Margiotta was running the Nassau County Republican Party in the 1970s, he used to require that government workers for the Town of Hempstead kick in 1% of their salaries to the Republican Party if they wanted jobs, promotions and overtime, according to the newspaper, Newsday. The Republican Party of Nassau County paid off a $1.3 Million settlement in 1991 on what has been dubbed “The 1% case.” The GOP of Nassau County had to pay pack Town of Hempstead workers who complained that they had to fork back 1% of their salaries to Mr. Margiotta’s party.

Margiotta was also convicted in 1981 by a federal jury on charges that he presided over an illegal insurance fee-splitting scheme that brought windfalls to his political associates in the Nassau County Republican Party.