A Long Island garbage man says his municipal bosses acted like mini-Don Corleones whi♈le running what amounted to a Mafia operation.
Lawrence Coleman, 29, is suing the town of Hempstead claiming that the higher-ups in charge of its sanitation department refused to promote him to full-time unless he made donations to local Republican🦹 clubs, including in East Rockaway, according to court papers.
“A number of defendants’ ꩲown employees compared the hierarchy within the department to that of the Italian Mafia,” courಞt papers read.
“They have this saying that when you become full-time, you’re a like a made man,” Coleman told🐼 The Post on Thurstowday.
Coleman worked for the township as a part-time employee for 10 years, earning between $10 and $14 hourly. But he refused to pay dues to the Republican organizations, so they wouldn’t give him a full-time gig, 🔯according to court papers.
Coleman applied 20 times and was d🌼enied each time, he said. He said most of the garbage men would get promoted iꩵn their sixth or seventh year working.
“I would have to bribe my ꦅway up the ladder. It’s basically pay to play,” Coleman said.
He said that in addition 🐻to not prom🦩oting him, supervisors gave him bad routes in lousy areas while doling out the good jobs to those who paid club dues.
Coleman now works as a delivery worker for a restaurant in Manhattan, according to his attorney Jonathan Tand. The suit against the Town of Hempstead is filed i𝕴n Brooklyn Federal Court.
“H꧙empstead Town does not comment on matters of pending litigation,” said Mike Deery, the municipality’s director of communication.