Former Toms River, NJ councilman fined over nepotism complaint

🔴 Former councilman's son applied for a police job

🔴 Official tried to get his son special treatment

🔴 Son recently left his career in law enforcement

TOMS RIVER — A former township councilman has been fined for pushing the police chief to hire his son despite low scores on his application.

Former Toms River Councilman Brian S. Kubiel was fined $400 by the New Jersey Local Finance Board, John Paff with TransparencyNJ.com first reported.

Kubiel, who now serves as the chief administrator on the Toms River Board of Fire Commissioners District No. 1,  was fined $100 for each of the four violations

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The ethics investigation began in 2019 and wasn't resolved until last month. And it wasn't made public until this past week due to state confidentiality laws.

New Jersey 101.5 requested comment from the Department of Community Affairs, which oversees the Local Finance Board, about why the investigation took six years.

"The Local Finance Board undertakes a thorough review of all complaints submitted to it. There is no typical time frame for the resolution of a complaint, as it is dependent on the facts and circumstances of each matter presented to it," Lisa Ryan, DCA spokesperson, said

Ethics violations in Toms River

According to the notice of violation, Kubiel violated ethics laws against getting privileges and financial gain for his immediate family.

In 2018, Kubiel's son applied to be a Toms River police officer.

That year, Kubiel voted in favor of an ordinance to change police hiring practices, including an increase in the number of new hires and a provision to let new applicants improve their written scores.

The ethics investigation found that Kubiel's son had scored too low on the written exam to qualify as a police officer, and the councilman had sent an email to the police chief asking him to look into the exam score.

Councilman's son leaves law enforcement career

While Brian Kubiel's son didn't end up as a Toms River police officer, he did get a job in a different town.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Kevan Kubiel served as a dispatcher for nearly four years before he became a police officer for Howell Township.

He was a police officer from October 2019 through December 2023 before he left to serve as a detective with the Ocean County Prosecutor's Office for five months.

However, former officer Kubiel did not leave the Howell police department on good terms, according to a discrimination lawsuit.

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Kevan Kubiel said he was repeatedly mocked for being gay and that one of the incidents resulted in him being outed to his parents, the Howell Patch reported.

The case has not yet been resolved.

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