On any day, the man in charge of Paterson’s police officers and firefighters — nearly 800 city employees — could be more than 100 miles away in the rolling hills of northeastern Pennsylvania, working for another municipality as a police chief.

Such is the conundrum posed by Jerry Speziale.

He is Paterson’s public safety director, with an annual salary of $92,000. He’s also the police chief in Hazleton, Pennsylvania, earning $71,000 a year.

It’s not uncommon for police officers to take on extra, part-time jobs. In their off-duty hours, many cops work as private security guards. Firefighters, in turn, frequently offer their expertise as safety consultants, instructors or construction supervisors.

But Speziale’s moonlighting gigs are strikingly different. Neither job is part time. Indeed, officials in Paterson and Hazleton said in separate interviews that they expect the 58-year-old Speziale to be working full time in their respective cities — and available 24 hours a day for emergencies — a standard for police chiefs and public safety directors in American communities.

So how does Speziale do it?

That question, which has simmered behind-the-scenes in both cities during the three years since Speziale took on the dual public safety roles, broke into full view recently when Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh told Speziale to sever his ties with Hazleton.

'We don't want to share him'

“We don’t want to share him with Hazleton,” Sayegh said in an interview after disclosing his frustration with Speziale during an editorial board meeting last week with NorthJersey.com and the USA TODAY NETWORK New Jersey.

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To keep his jobs separate, Speziale, who recently moved from his home in Wayne to an apartment in Paterson, engages in a delicate bureaucratic juggling act.

He drives two police vehicles — one issued by Paterson, another from Hazleton. He carries two cellphones — one for each city. In Hazleton, he wears a blue police chief’s uniform and carries a gun. In Paterson, he generally dons civilian garb but occasionally is seen in a Paterson police uniform or shirts or jackets emblazoned with Paterson’s municipal emblem.

In separate interviews, officials in Hazleton and Paterson offer strikingly similar views about Speziale, pointing out that few residents have complained about his moonlighting and that most praise his leadership and crime-fighting skills. After Sayegh’s demand for Speziale to leave his Hazleton job, eight of nine Paterson City Council members publicly declared that they had no problem with his working in the Pennsylvania city.

Yet officials in both cities also conceded this startling fact: No one could say when Speziale actually worked in their city and what hours he kept.

Sayegh said he “is not quite sure” when Speziale leaves Paterson and heads to Hazleton — and how long he works there.

“I think maybe once a week,” Sayegh said of Speziale’s treks to Hazleton, adding: “He’s only a phone call, a text message away.”

Hazleton Mayor Jeff Cusat said Speziale is “probably here four days a week.” But he couldn't say exactly when.

“There’s no set schedule," Cusat said. “He works around his other job. He’s here when I need him to be here.”

Cusat, a Republican who is facing a challenge from his own party in next month’s primary election, added that “me and Jerry are a team, and he is committed to staying and helping me as long as I’m the mayor of Hazleton.”

But Cusat’s mayoral challenger, Allison Barletta, a city councilwoman, said she plans on retaining Speziale as police chief if she wins.

“To be honest, I think Jerry Speziale does a phenomenal job for us,” Barletta said. “I see he does divide his time with Paterson. We never have an issue. If there is a shooting, Jerry Speziale is there. I’m not exactly sure how he does it. He’s like a superman.”

Hazleton’s former mayor, Joseph Yannuzzi, a Republican who initially discussed hiring Speziale as the city’s police chief in 2011 but selected another candidate when he felt Speziale might not sever his ties to Paterson, said he thought Speziale was on the job full time now.

Told that Speziale might be working in Hazleton only a few days a week, Yannuzzi said, “That’s news to me.”

“I thought we had him full time,” Yannuzzi said, adding: “I don’t know where he goes. I don’t keep track of his time. I think he belongs in Hazleton.”

In an interview, Speziale said he works “on average” three days a week in Hazleton — usually weekends and one day in the middle of the week. He insists he can monitor the Hazleton Police Department at other times by using his cellphone, which has a special app that allows him to connect directly to officers' radios and to a 911 dispatcher.

“If there’s a shooting at 3 in the morning I’ll take a ride up,” said Speziale, who stays in motels near Hazleton when he works there.

He also explained that much of his work as Hazleton’s police chief involves writing applications for grants to upgrade the department’s communications and hire more officers — a task that he insists does not require him to be on the scene.

“A lot of my stuff is done from my bedroom,” Speziale said.

Asked when he catches up on sleep, Speziale said, “I’m quite a tenacious guy. I’m quite energetic.”

A run for sheriff?

Sayegh’s demand for Speziale to leave his post in Hazleton came in the wake of another revelation: that the mayor threatened to fire Speziale, a fellow Democrat, from his public safety director’s job in Paterson if he went ahead with plans to run for Passaic County sheriff. Speziale held that position previously — for nine years, from 2001 to 2010. He resigned the sheriff's post to join the Port Authority, first as a deputy police superintendent and later as the agency’s assistant director of public safety.

Sayegh insists that he is not angry with Speziale. In separate interviews, both said they like working with each other. But for Sayegh, Speziale’s multiple jobs — and possible ambition to run for sheriff again — had become a distraction. Sayegh and officials in Hazleton also concede that it has been their good fortune that Speziale has not been in Paterson when a major shooting occurred in Hazleton — or vice versa.

“I am the cheerleader in chief. I’m the brand ambassador,” Sayegh said. “I have to promote Paterson to potential investors. It all starts with public safety.”

As Paterson’s police director, Speziale, a veteran officer whose undercover exploits with the New York City Police Department and federal Drug Enforcement Administration gained international acclaim, has been credited with reducing crime in the last few years, especially the city’s murder rate. Sayegh recently expanded Speziale's role, giving him the title of public safety director and placing him in control of the city's police and fire departments. But Sayegh did not raise Speziale's salary.

At the same time, Speziale has also gained a reputation in Paterson as being unusually accessible, passing out his cellphone number to just about anyone. He was also credited with calming tensions after city residents took to the streets to protest the death of an African-American man who had been taken into police custody after suffering from an apparent drug overdose.

But Paterson’s Police Department faces a difficult challenge after Speziale helped to initiate an FBI investigation that has already resulted in the arrest of six officers on a variety of charges that include stealing from motorists at traffic stops and beating a hospital patient.

For a possible sheriff’s campaign this year, Speziale had already collected 4,000 signatures to gain a place on the Passaic County Democratic primary ballot. He also could still draw on $500,000 in campaign funds left over from his time as Passaic’s sheriff.

After several powerful Democrats intervened, including Gov. Phil Murphy, Speziale dropped out of the sheriff’s race. But Sayegh's public venting about Speziale’s political future refocused attention on his dual roles in Paterson and Hazleton.

In a lengthy interview, Speziale remained decidedly noncommittal about his plans in Pennsylvania. He promised to devote himself at some point to Paterson full time and eventually sever ties with Hazleton, a former coal mining city southeast of Scranton with roughly 25,000 residents and about 40 police officers.

But he would not say when.

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“I understand the mayor of Paterson,” Speziale said, noting the concerns about his being in Hazleton if a major crime occurs in Paterson, New Jersey's third-largest city, with 148,000 residents.

“This is my home," Speziale said of Paterson, which has 418 police officers and 380 firefighters. "This is where I was born. This is the place I love. I will do everything I need to do for Paterson.”

He noted, however, that a prime reason he sought work as a police chief in Hazleton was to maintain his license as a law enforcement officer. His job in Paterson is technically considered a civilian position. If Speziale let his police license lapse more than three years, he said, he would have to return to a police academy to be certified.

Seth Stoughton, a former Tallahassee, Florida, police officer who became an attorney and studied moonlighting standards at more than 150 police agencies in 2015 as part of a national survey, said there are no national standards or rules on how cops should work part-time, off-duty jobs. Told about Speziale’s arrangement, Stoughton, now a professor at the University of South Carolina School of Law, said he had never heard of a public safety officer in a major city like Paterson working as a police chief in another city in another state.

“Being away occasionally is one thing,” Stoughton said. “Being a significant distance away regularly can create problems. What if there is a totally unrelated incident in each town?”

So far, that scenario has not happened.

But Speziale insists he can handle anything.

“I work 24/7,” he said.

Email: kellym@northjersey.com