AG’s office interviewed Bayonne councilman to see if quid pro quo kept him from seeking re-election

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An investigator from the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office interviewed Bayonne 2nd Ward Councilman Sal Gullace last month to see if a quid pro quo kept him from seeking re-election.

Bayonne City Hall. Photo via Google Maps.

By John Heinis/Hudson County View

“They can’t offer me nothing, I’m in the middle of a lawsuit, I’m still on Hudson County’s payroll. My son, he offered that my son to come over as a Bayonne cop, he doesn’t want to come over here as a Bayonne cop,” 2nd Ward Councilman Sal Gullace said in a recorded conversation obtained by HCV.

“Just to get you not to run?,” the person who recorded the convo asked.

“They got to make me some kind of offers, right? So I said no, my son doesn’t want to be a cop, he tried, he’s a sheriff’s officer and he got a better offer than the Bayonne cops got so … They’re not gonna bribe me, there’s no bribe I could take,” Gullace replied.

As the conversation continued, the person speaking with Gullace asked what “Veloz” was doing, to which the councilman said “he’s afraid of retaliation too.”

In a phone interview with HCV, Gullace said that Planning Board Commissioner Ramon Veloz approached him prior to him announcing he wouldn’t seek re-election, but scoffed at the notion that he made any sort of offer in exchange for him not to run.

“Ramon Veloz did approach me, but he can’t make me any deals? What deals could he make me? He can’t make me no deals,” he said.

Gullace, who needed 21 leg surgeries after being involved in a terrible accident while working with the Hudson County Improvement Authority in July 2020, also stated that he was visited by investigator from the AG’s office last month.

“I had two agents come to my house to investigate Jimmy Davis. I said look ‘you’re at the wrong house, I’m not Jimmy Davis,'” he recalled, also noting that Davis, who is running Jacqueline Weimmer in the 2nd Ward, never offered him a job or any other incentive not to run.

Veloz, who unsuccessfully sought the 2nd Ward council seat in 2010, said he was never interviewed by investigators and never offered Gullace anything on anyone’s behalf, though said he did suggest a lighter, desk duty job as he still rehabilitates from his injury.

“I said ‘You can request a light duty job at City Hall. Don’t burn the bridge with the administration, keep the door open, because you never know.'”

The AG’s declined to comment and typically do not confirm or deny the existence of an investigation.

Gullace has expressed frustration for not being a part of Davis’ ticket this time around after successful campaigns in 2014 and 2018, pointing out that the mayor regularly refuted a front page Jersey Journal story from May that said the councilman would be replaced.


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