Talk about throwing good money after bad.
Taxpayers will shell out about $1 million to elect a replacement for disgraced Brooklyn pol Carl Kruger — who pleaded guilty to taking more than $1 million in bribes — although the eventual winner will spend no more than eight months in office.
That’s because Kruger’s 27th District state Senate seat will be wiped off the map by the redistricting process by the end of the year.
There still hasn’t been a winner declared in the March 20 special election to replace Kruger — who resigned in disgrace in December — between Republican David Storobin and Democratic Councilman Lew Fidler.
Storobin unofficially won by a mere two votes. So now, officials will recount all 22,000 ballots by hand — a lengthy process that could take months and hours upon hours of overtime at the Board of Elections.
But the Legislature will adjourn for the year in June, which means the eventual winner may never cast a vote in Albany.
“It’s the political equivalent of ‘The Twilight Zone.’ Nothing is rational. It’s crazy,” said Baruch College political-science professor Douglas Muzzio. “On so many levels, it’s a waste of money. It’s a seat that’s going bye-bye. There’s no tenure to the seat.”
Kruger tearfully pleaded guilty late last year and will be sentenced Thursday. His deal with prosecutors calls for between nine and 12 years in the slammer. His co-conspirator boyfriend, Dr. Michael Turano, also pleaded guilty and will be sentenced this week.
Adding insult to injury is that the cost of the special election keeps increasing.
Board officials said the initial cost to hold the election was $750,000.
That figure covered the cost of poll workers and monitors, transporting the optical-scan voting machines to poll sites, advertising, mailings and other planning and administrative costs.
But overtime costs to deal with the recount are piling up.
Between March 17 and March 31, the board reported paying $125,000 in overtime — most of it to handle the recount, sources said.
Even if only half of the overtime costs are attributed to the recount, the price for the race would be $825,000 through the end of March and nearly $900,000 for the first half of April.