ALBANY – State Senate Republicans received more than $250,000 in contributions from a company that later got a $7.9 million lease for an unneeded Albany office building, according to an internal Senate Democratic memo, The Post has learned.
The explosive claim was outlined in a memo written last week by a senior aide to Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith (D-Queens) that concludes that an investigation by an outside agency should be considered.
The senior aide contends that individuals and entities associated with the property at 90 S. Swan St. made “sizeable donations to the Senate Republican Campaign Committee corresponding to dates the Senate expanded the space it leased,” according to the memo sent to Senate Secretary Angelo Aponte.
The pattern of contributions “appears to raise serious legal and ethical questions as to whether campaign contributions were explicitly made or solicited in exchange for the unnecessary expansion of lease space housing Senate employees,” adds the memo, a copy of which was obtained by The Post.
During a 10-year period through 2008, according to the memo, three subsidiaries of Omni, a real-estate company, and two of its officers, David Swawite and Richard Zipes, contributed nearly a quarter of a million dollars to Senate Republicans.
The memo questions the need for the office space, used in part to house the Senate’s “research” staff, which has been linked to the GOP’s political operations.
“It appears that when in the majority, the Senate Republicans unnecessarily left taxpayers holding the bag on a $7.9 million contract for office space it may not have needed to house what has been described as a ‘quasi-political operation,’ ” the memo states.
Omni officials didn’t return calls for comment.
Former Senate Secretary Steve Boggess, a close friend and ally of former Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, defended the lease and insisted he was unaware of the Omni-connected campaign contributions.
“The reason we expanded 90 S. Swan St. is because we closed two other locations that we had,” insisted Boggess, who left his state post in December to become a lobbyist.
“We consolidated those spaces over a period of five years, and saved the state money.”