It serves no useful purpose to arouse alarm among commuters, because NJ Transit manages to do this almost daily without any help.

But in just a few hours Friday, a former member of senior management, fired for reasons his superiors cannot clarify, depicted NJT as an agency of rapacious incompetence, run by political hacks who have transformed the country's third-largest commuter railroad into a "toxic environment" that has destroyed morale and compromised safety.

Todd Barretta was hired in March to oversee "the development and implementation of systems and strategies to ensure corporate compliance with applicable legal and regulatory requirements, internal policies and risk management plans."

If Chief Compliance Officer is not on the top rung of the organization chart, it's close to it.

Then he was fired two weeks ago, for reasons that are neither specific nor consistent.

But in testimony given to a joint legislative committee, Barretta gave us a disturbing peek behind the curtain - the kind that demands further examination.

He said he witnessed instructors giving employees the answers to safety-training tests. He observed potential misuse of Sandy recovery money. He revealed that the railroad is likely to miss a federally-mandated deadline to install a safety system that might have prevented the fatal crash in Hoboken. He pointed out the agency's lack of compliance with family leave laws.

And when he documented these and other failures, he was told by executive director Steve Santoro not to put anything in writing - and was subsequently suspended.

"Extremely credible testimony," Assemblyman John McKeon, D-Essex, a committee co-chair, called it. "Virtually all of it is verifiable."

His co-chair put it this way: "Prior to this hearing, I felt most of the problems we're seeing at NJT were primarily the result of an organization starved of funding," state Sen. Bob Gordon, D-Bergen, said. "After Friday, I realized it's also organizational chaos borne out of rampant patronage."

Barretta also claimed that political appointees use their influence "to terrorize every other employee," leading to an exodus of qualified personnel. This is of interest to the committee because of NJT's ongoing refusal to provide job descriptions for some executives, notably the inexcusably-employed allies of Gov. Christie who pull down $170,000 a year.

And that was hardly all of it. Attorneys who won millions in discrimination settlements from NJT told the committee that agency's Equal Opportunity Office refused to discuss institutional changes to prevent future lawsuits, even after NJT was incentivized with offers of lower settlements.

But Barretta rang the loudest alarms, and predictably, NJ Transit attacked the messenger and not the message. NJT initially said he was fired because he had failed to return an agency laptop. Then Barretta produced a receipt that proved he had, in fact, returned the computer.

Then Executive Director Steve Santoro said Barretta was fired because he misused a company car - no specifics were provided - and sneered, "Mr. Barretta has known me for a few months -- how he could make that observation is interesting."

Actually, that is pretty much what Mr. Barretta was hired to do.

And the truth is, NJ Transit isn't exactly a tough read. Its history under Chris Christie is mostly budget deficits, lousy service, rate hikes, aging equipment, safety violations, federal sanctions, leadership failures, management dysfunction, patronage, discrimination suits, derailments, and a death on the platform in Hoboken.

The governor pacified himself by suggesting that the committee is on a witch hunt, and implied that he deserves a gold star for his stewardship. He is alone in that assessment.

Pulling at two or three strings won't undo this knot. It will take a patient legislative approach to untangle this mess, so Gordon will soon introduce a bill that, among other things, will increase oversight by the Legislature and the NJT board, enhance transparency by requiring public hearings prior to changes in service, and strengthen whistleblower protections.

It's a start, and culture shift shouldn't have to wait for the next governor to begin. Because if just half of what Todd Barretta says is true, it's evident that our linchpin agency needs more employees just like him.

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