After failed run, Rubin lands new gig
There's a new face at the controller's office. It's also and old one at City Hall.
Running for office is always a risk if you are already a city employee, because you have to quit your job to do it. Democrat Bill Rubin, who worked in the commissioners' office for 25 years, made that leap when he ran against GOP Councilman Brian O'Neill last year and lost.
But Rubin, who has been doing consulting work for DC-33, the city's blue-collar union, has landed on his feet.
He tried to return to the commissioners, but that didn't happen, so now he is the new deputy director of fraud investigations for City Controller Alan Butkovitz.
Rubin says that he will no longer consult for the union and that his background doing financial work for the commissioners and as former vice chairman of the pension board gives him keen insight into how government works.
Given his strong union ties, will he be able to be tough on members gone wrong, as well as on all city employees?
Yes, he says, because those people feed what he says are unfair stereotypes of city workers as lazy and crooked.
Butkovitz said Rubin, who will earn about $70,000 yearly, had impressed him when the two served together on the pension board.
"Rubin is one of the smartest guys I know in city government, and I grabbed him when the commissioners weren't smart enough to grab him," Butkovitz said.
Click here for Philly.com's politics page.