Say it ain’t so! Joe Makes Bank from the PLCB

Remember PLCB CEO Joe Conti? Boondoggles like wine kiosks and inventory shortages should spring to mind.

After six years of these and other questionable decisions that remain under investigation, Joe decided to call it quits (from a position Gov. Rendell created just for him) and retire—well, sort of.

For Joe, retirement meant being hired back immediately as a consultant on an “emergency” basis—at $80 an hour. Of course, if there was an emergency in the state liquor monopoly, it must have been Joe who created it in the first place, right? Who better to fix it?

In his seven months as a part-time consultant, Joe Conti earned nearly $70,000. Even better, as a retiree, he collected a pension of more than $60,000 per year at the same time.

Those are the kinds of business decisions that lead to failure in the private sector, but for the PLCB, it’s just business as usual—and we’re all paying the price.