Gov. Christie's Atlantic City action right on cue

ATLANTIC CITY - Who needs HBO?

As the cable giant gets ready to broadcast its series Boardwalk Empire, the epic saga of Atlantic City politicians, vice, and dames, the real-life Atlantic City - as if on cue - had one of its regularly occurring convulsions Wednesday when Gov. Christie delivered a jolt to the sagging resort.

Wearing a bright magenta tie as he stood across from Boardwalk Hall, before hundreds gathered as if for a parade, Christie left no doubt who was boss. Some compared it to the day when Gov. Brendan T. Byrne came to sign casino legislation on the Boardwalk.

Lorenzo Langford, Atlantic City's beleaguered mayor, stood off stage, suit jacket off in the heat, just over the governor's left shoulder.

It was a familiar scenario in a city where political careers crash with the predictability of waves at high tide: a mayor under fire, accusations of waste and ineptitude, outside authorities threatening to step in - and now, initiating that process.

Earlier in the day, Christie sliced through the niceties at an appearance at the Meadowlands, calling Atlantic City "a historically corrupt, ineffective, inefficient local government that has squandered hundreds of millions of dollars it has gotten over the years."

That there were no indictments announced was a novelty in a city where mayors and councilmen regularly are charged with criminal misdeeds.

The city's rogues' gallery includes convicted former Mayors Michael J. Matthews (corruption), James Usry (campaign finance shenanigans), and Robert Levy (falsifying his military record and then vanishing) in the casino era, and Mayors Richard Jackson and William T. Somers (bribery, both) in the late '60s and early '70s.

More recently, there has been City Council President Craig Callaway (convicted for bribery and secretly videotaping a rival councilman with a prostitute) and Councilman Marty Small (facing charges of voter fraud).

Just this week, a city worker was indicted for dealing heroin around the city's All Wars Memorial Building.

Historian Nelson Johnson said Christie's proposals to aid gaming and entertainment interests harken back to an earlier era of Atlantic City. Johnson's book Boardwalk Empire is the basis for the Prohibition-era HBO series, which debuts Sept. 19 and focuses on political boss and racketeer Enoch "Nucky" Johnson (renamed Thompson in the show).

From 1880 to 1960, he said, the resort thrived precisely because politicians supported the then-illegal gambling and alcohol industries (and prostitution, for that matter).

"That was a period in which the hotel industry and government spoke with one voice," he said. "The partnership was quite visible, quite established. Maybe that's what's needed today."

Since the '70s, there has been a power vacuum in town, with "wannabe bosses" who - with the exception of former Democratic mayor and current State Sen. Jim Whelan - fell short, Nelson said.

"What you have is chaos," he said. "You have politicians who don't have a full appreciation for the fact that they're not going to be the next . . . Nucky. What happens? They go to jail."

Christie's proposal to create a state-run "tourism district" could exacerbate the long-standing tension between the casinos and Atlantic City residents, whose fortunes legalized gambling was supposed to bolster but never really has, say some.

"The people in Atlantic City have been dispossessed for a long time," said Temple University historian Bryant Simon, author of Boardwalk of Dreams. "They were dispossessed by Nucky Johnson, no matter what HBO will say. This is a town that never had democracy."

Viewed one way, say observers, Christie left Langford in charge of the city's mostly minority neighborhoods, while taking its jewels - the Boardwalk and marina, the casinos and the beachfront.

But the move could prove to be a burden lifted rather than a back turned.

"If it allows a redeployment of the police to the neighborhoods, that would be such a tremendous help toward stabilizing things," said City Councilman Steven Moore.

Langford said he hoped for a "collaborative" rather than combative relationship with the state. City residents wary of further stratification recall instances of alleged preferential treatment of gaming interests, most prominently when a tunnel proposed by casino mogul Steve Wynn required bulldozing homes.

In the meantime, with the possibility of a new boss in town, Atlantic City can look forward to these ongoing plot lines in a city never short on them:

Will Christie, a huge Springsteen fan, get Bruce to return to Boardwalk Hall or start an E Street Casino?

Will the town's identity crisis finally be resolved? For those who watched the city flirt with "family-friendly" before going to "adults-preferred," hearing Christie talk about creating more PG-rated attractions was wearying.

And, most significantly, will residents finally reap the benefits of casino gambling?

Outside Boardwalk Hall on Wednesday, the pageantry and casting showed the seaside resort at its insider-y best, with hundreds of casino employees, politicians, lawyers, tourists - pretty much everybody.

"This is absolutely historic," said former State Sen. William Gormley, who recalled Byrne's seaside bill-signing in 1977. "He's creating a national business model."

Gormley agreed that Christie was hearkening to an earlier era, when political bosses "focused on the 'product' " of Atlantic City. But, given the governor's prior job as U.S. attorney, Gormley quipped, "I don't think Nucky and he would have gotten along."

John Brenner 3d, a retired fire captain, showed up just for the theater of it all and was not disappointed. The town was on top of its game.

"The show's always on in Atlantic City," Brenner said. "It's always live."