Joseph Bruno has long been touted for his successful business skills. His story has long been that he took a few thousand dollars and turned it into a fortune with the Coradian company. After selling it he went on to diversify and go into politics.
That may be what he tells his friends up in Albany but the truth sounds more like the business ventures of George Bush. Bruno has overseen many business failures and most of his wealth comes from a consulting firm with and unlisted phone number and un-named clients.
From The New York Times:
Some of Mr. Bruno’s other business ventures, before and after he sold Coradian, did poorly. In one case, he lost about $150,000 on a real estate project that dragged on for 17 years, a former partner said. And in the past six years, he has lost at least $50,000 on investments in high-tech companies, according to financial disclosure records and interviews with his aides.
Mr. Bruno’s mixed success as a businessman might have important implications for a federal grand jury investigation into his financial dealings. Soon after selling Coradian, Mr. Bruno — who has for years complained that being in office has hurt his ability to make money — opened a consulting business out of his home. That business is now the focus of the federal investigation into whether Mr. Bruno provided government favors to his consulting clients, people who have been briefed about the inquiry have said.
Records show that the consulting business has been a consistently reliable stream of income for Mr. Bruno. Yet the firm does not advertise or have a published telephone number and Mr. Bruno has refused to publicly identify its clients, describing them only as “substantial and important business people.”
Now that Bruno is under the microscope of the blogosphere and more importantly a federal grand jury his dirty past is going to come back to haunt him. The NY Times story does not mention Joseph's defense of the article since he declined to be interviewed. Unfortunately for Bruno, he can not decline the steady march of the law into his life to expose his secrets.
Coradian was successful for a time, although when a major contract went south so did the firm. State contracts valued at $1.5 million over five years. Eventually Bruno sold it to Mitel along with a ton of debt. There wasn't much money to be made in the deal for anyone involved according to others involved in the sale.
Bruno continued to blur the line of ethical conduct as a businessman and a legislator.
Fast-forward to 1999:
Mr. Bruno’s willingness to mix public and private interests was apparent in another real estate deal he entered into in 1999, when he and his son Joseph bought a small apartment house in Troy from Russell C. Ball, a state contractor whose wife, Dori Evans, served as finance director for the Senate Republican campaign committee, which Mr. Bruno controls.
Mr. Ball’s Brooklyn-based company, which does underground utility work, has had contracts on several major state projects, and a couple of years ago he created a nonprofit group that purchased full-page newspaper ads saluting Mr. Bruno. An official familiar with the investigation said the F.B.I. has questioned people about Mr. Ball’s relationship with Mr. Bruno. Mr. Ball had no comment.
In the end that deal lost money too, including a lobbyist-friend of the family that took a financial hit as well. So while Bruno has lost considerable amounts of money, where do his riches come from. Certainly the ice business of the 1940s and 50s doesn't pay the bills.
What does generate income is Capital Business Consultants L.L.C. The consulting firm does considerable business by giving advice to companies that use Albany to generate work. Bruno did not want to reveal his clients, however the federal investigation has shed some light on the firm.
One of his first clients was McGinn Smith, an Albany investment firm. Mr. Bruno has invested both personal and campaign funds in companies controlled by McGinn Smith’s chairman, Timothy M. McGinn. In 1999, Mr. Bruno reported making an undisclosed amount of money on the sale of stock in Pointe Financial, a bank holding company of which Mr. McGinn was chairman. It was one of Mr. Bruno’s few profitable stock investments in recent years.
Another consulting client was Jared Abbruzzese, a businessman and friend who has flown Mr. Bruno around on private jets and who, until recently, was part of a group competing for a statewide horse racing franchise. From 2002 to 2004, Mr. Bruno decided to award $500,000 in discretionary state grants to a company in which Mr. Abbruzzese was a major investor, Evident Technologies.
Bruno's light seems to get dimmer and dimmer these days. His clients have been outed by the Feds, his son is under the glare of the investigation and Joseph just isn't feeling that well about his predicament. Eventually Joe, things have a funny way of catching up to you.
|