On tour with John Rowland
John G. Rowland tells The Washington Post in a profile Sunday that M. Jodi Rell "threw me under the bus" as he spiraled toward impeachment and indictment, two fates he avoided only by resigning as governor and then making a plea deal with federal prosecutors.
Rowland, who turned 50 last month, comes across as wistful as he grants The Post a look at a disgraced politician in middle age, including a drive by the governor's mansion in Hartford.
"It's all hand-to-mouth right now," says Rowland, who works as a motivational speaker. "I'm making about $60,000 a year. I don't need a lot -- I only want to pay my bills."
The story makes no mention of his present digs: a 5-bedroom, four-bath home on 10 acres of land in Middlebury. His wife, Patricia Rowland, bought the house for $525,000 in September 2006, seven months after the ex-governor's release from prison. The property carries a $417,000 mortgage from Wachovia.
The Rowlands left the governor's mansion July 1, 2004 for a ranch-style home in West Hartford that they rented for an undisclosed sum from Frank Luntz, the Republican pollster. It is where Rowland returned in February 2006.
"No one should feel sorry for me," he says. "I had everything. What I did I brought on myself."
Last December, Rowland was less eager to chat with reporters after a speaking engagement at The Master's School in Simsbury, where he connected easily with students at the Christian school, talking about the importance of his faith in getting through his 10 months in a prison camp.
When a school administrator said Rowland probably would want to take questions from the press, the ex-governor smiled and said, "No."
I followed Rowland to his SUV that day, trying to engage him in conversation. He didn't break stride until he reached his vehicle. He insisted he wasn't mad, not at me, not at the members of his own Republican Party who had turned on him years before, not at anyone.
He said he simply saw no point in explaining himself any more.
"You're going to have your own impressions. You're going to have your own conclusions. You're welcome to them," Rowland told me. Then he smiled, leaned forward and said, "I don't care."
In the Washington Post story, Rowland offers only the barest hint as to why he has changed his mind and decided to talk. At one point, he says, "I'm the ultimate extrovert."
He sheds little light on the corruption that drove him from office.
He talks broadly about the gifts he accepted from staff and contractors, but the bipartisan impeachment inquiry looked at more than gifts. Robert Matthews, who did business with the state, installed his niece as a tenant in Rowland's condominium in Washington, paying three times market rent. The same man later used a straw purchaser to buy the condo, again paying above market.
The Post reports that Rowland has remained involved with ex-offenders and addicts in the North End of Hartford beyond the community service he owed as part of his federal sentence. He is described as traveling with an entourage of one: his black Lab, Coalby.
"I'm more at peace now that I ever was in politics," he says. "I don't care about any of the things I lost, the house, the yes-men."
-- Mark Pazniokas
The only person who threw Rowland under the bus was Rowland, and he took CT with him. Also, remember he copped a plea, there was much more to what he did and what he took from this state including our reputation. Who can ever forget his wife's wonderful poetry as to how badly every one was to her poor hubby/
Posted by: Beverly | June 18, 2007 at 06:28 PM
How can a person convicted of a crime who spent time in prison get any meaningfull job?, there are thousand of ex inmates wondering the same thing after jail your usually marked for life not John Rowland CORUPT,CORUPT any way you slice it ive had problems in my past and find it almost impossible to find and meaningfull employment please tell me the secret as well as all people who have served time in prison only the select few are rewarded for their MIS-DEEDS how unfortunate whats this country comeing to????? the thought is scary to say the least............
Posted by: Alan Piorkowski | January 23, 2008 at 06:27 PM