Hamilton's new mayor Kelly Yaede won’t be on council to handle a number of issues that come before them Tuesday night, including one with close ties to the mayor scandal, another from the short mayoral tenure of Meara and one linked to an emerging state criminal case.

Meara, president of the council, said he had reservations about a contract on the agenda for Birdsall Services Group, an engineering firm whose former marketing director plead guilty last week to pay-to-play violations.

“I’m real uncomfortable in doing business with Birdsall at this point,” he said. “I don’t know if this was an individual and I don’t know if this was ingrained at the company.”

Councilman Dave Kenny had a different take. He said that because the township bids out all contracts, including the one on tonight’s agenda, they should not be so concerned.

“Clearly we do bid these engineering contracts that do not have to be bid,” he said. “When we’re saving taxpayers money, I think we should go forward with the award.”

Rich Watson, the director of the township’s Department of Water and Pollution Control, said his department requested the contract after corrosion caused pipes to fail, causing further damage in the RBC building before Superstorm Sandy last month. They conducted immediate repairs, and he said Sandy largely spared their facilities.

“We dodged a bullet in not having additional damage from Sandy,” he said. Watson said BSG had experience working for the township, including at the same plant. They would come in to assess the damage from before the storm and make recommendations on further repairs, if any are needed.

He said his department received two bids on the work and one was more than twice the $8,200 Birdsall presented.

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