Cory Storch for Good Government in Plainfield

PMUA - Major Developments Require Residents Attention

2012-01-27T17:04:00.004-05:00

The Plainfield Municipal Utilities Authority settlements with "retired" executives Eric Watson and David Erwin are getting a lot of attention. Plainfield residents are on the hook for $1 million because the PMUA Commission decided on this settlement instead of leaving the decision in the hands of an arbitrator.

Plainfield is being treated by the Commission and these executives as a deep pocket. As a long time member of the Council finance committee I can say without hesitation that Plainfield's pockets are small and are developing holes. I put in a call to the Governors office and spoke to a Richard DeRose to learn if there is any recourse for Plainfield residents. I am waiting for a response.

There is another current PMUA issue that is even more important in my opinion and is not getting much attention. The contract of interim Executive Director Duane Young is expiring this spring. He is seeking a permanent appointment. He got off to a good start, re-organizing the central office, holding the solid waste rates level and lowering the sewer rates. He deserves the opportunity to continue as PMUA's leader. He is bringing a professional style of management that is sorely needed.

The PMUA was created to serve our residents with the best services possible at the lowest cost. Based on comments made by commissioners in public meetings, I believe there is confusion about the mission. Fulfilling the long time promise to bring outside business would be a good thing if it offsets the cost to residents but not if it is for the benefit of a few entrepreneurs.

Duane Young's performance should be judged on the quality and cost of services. Outside business development is just a small part of that. And rates can be reduced in other ways than revenues from new business ventures. I think it is in Plainfield's best interests to support Duane Young as he restores credibility and efficiency to an important Plainfield service organization. Speak to your PMUA commissioners. They decide who will lead the PMUA. They are:

Malcolm Dunn
Alex Toliver
Tracey Brown
Carol Brokaw (has already expressed support for Duane Young)
Harold Mitchell (has already expressed support for Duane Young)
Cecil Saunders (alternate commissioner)

Pay to Play Reform Passes!

2011-11-15T09:26:00.003-05:00

Last night was an important moment for local government. The City Council approved four reform ordinances that will change the way city hall bids and contracts for professional services. Three of the four ordinances passed unanimously and the fourth, the most important one of all, passed with five votes. The Mayor has 10 days to let these ordinances stand or she can use her veto power.

These ordinances do not end pay to play. For that to happen, the state legislature would have to approve much stronger legislation closing significant loopholes. On the local level, Plainfield can consider strengthening the legislation we just approved. Let's have that discussion 10 days from now.

As Councilwoman Rebecca Williams pointed out, we can urge the PMUA Board of Commissioners and the School Board to approve similar reform measures through policy resolutions. That will be a question I put to the two PMUA Commission nominees that the Mayor just put forward.

Plainfield Municipal Utilities Authority - A New Direction?

2011-11-13T09:41:00.002-05:00

I attended the PMUA Board of Commissioners meeting last Tuesday. Duane Young, the interim Executive Director, introduced the annual budget and there was some good news for rate payers. Solid waste charges remain the same and sewer charges will go down 2.6%. Solid waste charges to the PMUA are rising and a re-organization of staff was needed to keep solid waste rates level. 15 staff positions were eliminated. The budget is up for adoption at the December meeting.

Mr Young acknowledged that that the PMUA has public relations problems and needs to change its ways to regain the confidence of the public (my words - can't recall exactly how he said it). One improvement would be to hold the meetings at a time more convenient to the public. Last weeks meeting was at 6 pm and on election day no less. That creates a bad impression, like the commissioners are trying to avoid the public.

Time will tell if this is a new direction for the PMUA, a move towards responsiveness to its customers. Further rate reductions would do a lot to ease rate payers minds as well as the burden on their family budgets.

Post election comments

2011-11-11T16:54:00.002-05:00

I thank the voters for having confidence in me for another 4 years of service. Municipal officials and employees face real challenges and things will not get any easier. There is no evidence yet from the Mayor of a willingness to collaborate. I do not doubt her desire to see Plainfield succeed but she seems to want to go it alone. We must never close the door between Mayor and Council because the residents of Plainfield need us all to do the absolute best jobs we can do...together. I promise to meet this challenge.

Some supporters have commented that because I supported the Democratic ticket, that I have sold out my principles. There is nothing further from the truth. I ran against my local democratic party organization in the primary to earn the right to be on the Democratic line in November. I agreed to be part of a team for election with people that I sometimes disagree with. I will continue to have those disagreements but there are still some common values and strategies that I share with other Democrats. I share a belief that in our economic downturn everyone must share the pain, not just poor, working poor and middle class citizens. I believe that capitalism and government regulation can go hand in hand. These beliefs influence what I do as a councilman. But I do not walk in lock step with anyone, not the local party leader nor my allies on Council.

Time to get off my soap box. Plainfield faces serious problems. I believe that I can make a positive difference and I look forward to working with fellow residents for the betterment of Plainfield.

Election Day - Suport the Democratic Ticket

2011-11-07T17:00:00.004-05:00

Please come out to the polls and show that Plainfield is committed to the democratic process. And when you cast your ballot, I urge you to vote for the Democratic team in column A.

Plainfield needs the support and cooperation of county and state government and our best chances are with effected officials from the Democratic Party. They understand best what the needs of our community are. The economic downturn has limited what government support is available to Plainfield. The Republican Party would deliver a much smaller slice of the pie to Plainfield if we do not return Democratic freedholders and legislators to office. And we need government support to alleviate our property tax burden and for the public - private partnerships that will bring redevelopment and economic growth in the future.

Halloween Recap

2011-11-01T07:01:00.002-04:00

I spent the active hours of Halloween walking and driving around the 2nd Ward with my council colleague, Rebecca Williams. We were happy to see families on the streets having fun while feeling safe and secure. We spent time in the sections of town that get the most trick or treat action: Sleepy Hollow, Netherwood and Hillside historic district. There is a long standing tradition for families from all over town and out of town to trick or treat in these areas. Our tour confirmed that this tradition is thriving. We also saw some trick or treating behind Cook School and on Stilford and Thornton.

The downed trees made Halloween spookier than ususal. There are still a few blocks with no street lighting and most trick or treaters wisely paid attention to police barricades. The police were visible throughout the night and when we did our post curfew drive around, we did not see anyone on the streets.

A number of years ago some unfortunate incidents were giving Halloween a bad reputation nationwide. We experienced a drop off in trick or treating and a few local trouble makers caused many Plainfield residents to worry about the future of this great tradition. A few years ago, Councilman Rashid Burney, Police Director Martin Hellwig and concerned residents helped the Halloween comeback with a safety plan. Last night was proof that families feel comfortable taking to the streets and showing that Halloween is alive and well.

Council Meeting of November 1, 2011

2011-10-29T17:14:00.006-04:00

This meeting started out as a special meeting to approve the 6 month budget but new items have been added.

Four of the items are the pay to play/competitive bid reform ordinances. One specifically deals with bidding for insurance services. One is the model pay to play reform ordinance created by the Center for Civic Responsibility. The third calls for developers to disclose their political contributions when they do business with our land use boards and the last would bring much needed reforms to Plainfields bidding process for professional services.

We are also considering a resolution bringing David Kochel back as a consultant for a few months to aid what will prove to be an uncertain transition to a new city administrator yet to be hired.

There may also be some consideration of a way to save money on employee health benefits.

Plainfield Grassroots 5 K Run

2011-10-15T12:39:00.005-04:00

Today I had the pleasure of running in the Plainfield Grassroots CDC's first annual 5kilometer run. The weather was perfect and the turnout was good. All proceeds will go towards good Plainfield causes. One of the best aspects of the event was that many slices of Plainfield life were represented - young, not as young (have to be politically correct), African American, Hispanic, white. The walk/run course led us through west, central and eastern sections of town. The organizers truly wanted to bring Plainfield together and they succeeded. Darryl Clark - wearing the blue jacket in the photo below - was a driving force for the event. There were many others. Kudos to all of them.

Unfortunately my other photos did not download properly.

For those skeptics wondering if I finished the run, I was proud to be the first elected official to cross the finish line and no, I didn't pull a Rosie Ruiz. Where there other elected officials in the event? No comment.

Eliminate the Invisible Tax on Plainfield Residents

2011-10-01T08:49:00.006-04:00

Important City Council meeting Monday, October 3 at 7:30 at Plainfield City Hall

There is a long standing tradition in New Jersey government to give professional services contracts to preferred vendors who in return make campaign contributions to political leaders of the party in power. Ethical? No, but legal? Yes.

Plainfield is no exception. I have been advocating for "pay to play" reform since I joined the Council. It appears the time is right to finally move on reform legislation. Not only are there enough Council members interested in reform but enough of them to finally buck the system.

The problems with pay to play are many. It enables the party and people in power to amass huge war chests that are a disadvantage to outsiders, newcomers and non-incumbents who want to run for office. It creates a lack of confidence in government among voters. And it is an invisible tax on the average person.

Professional services includes work done by attorneys, engineers, insurance brokers and architects. New Jersey gives cities and counties the ability to purchase these services without going out to bid for them.

You can become a favored vendor by making campaign contributions to politicians in power who have the ability to influence the awarding of contracts. The cost of these contributions gets passed on to the taxpayers through the contracts approved by municipal councils and freeholder boards. This is a double whammy because the incentive for vendors to do good work is diminished - why try hard to please the customer when you get the contract through an insider arrangement behind closed doors.

The Plainfield City Council will be hosting a presentation on pay to play reform this coming Monday at 7:30 pm. The Center for Civic Responsibility, a leader in the reform movement, will present four model ordinances that have been adopted by municipal governments around the state. Please come out to learn and show your support for reform.

The invisible tax provides a real benefit to those who want to maintain the status quo. There will be an invisible push back on Council. Let your representatives know how you feel about the invisible tax.

The Mayor, the Council and Accountability

2011-09-26T16:36:00.004-04:00

Th public deserves to know what is happening at city hall. The WBLS debacle raises serious questions about how the taxpayers money is being spent. The following are my thoughts and positions on this subject. It is meant as an explanation of the need to balance the demand for accountability with the need for restraint. I am limited in what I say in order to protect the city from lawsuits.

Until very recently, I tried to approach the WBLS problem assertively in private but with restraint in public. I believe it is a council persons responsibility to hold the Mayor and administration accountable for questionable practices. I was in favor of investigating from the beginning. I disagreed with those council colleagues who favored investigation of legal wrongdoing only. I felt and still feel that the Council must hold itself and the Mayor accountable for frivolous, wasteful and self serving expenditures. WBLS always seemed to fit this description in my eyes. I favored hiring the attorney originally proposed for the investigation, Jackie Drakeford. She was not hired because of accusations of a conflict of interest but I wanted to proceed with her because I know from experience that she has integrity and would not allow self interest or any interests outside those of Plainfield to interfere with a thorough and fair investigation. But it was not to be. This caused a delay in beginning the investigation but thanks to four council members, we persisted in hiring an attorney to go forward. My opinions expressed above were stated in executive sessions because I felt a need to show restraint in public.

There are two considerations that led to my exercise of restraint. The Mayor, any Mayor, deserves to be respected for her position and be given the benefit of the doubt within reason. More importantly, any negative publicity for Plainfield is adding fuel to the fire. Transparency and openness must always win in the end but pulling punches is sometimes a good thing in the short term. I promised myself before taking public office that I would not speak in anger against people hurting Plainfield unless a greater good is served. I have mostly been able to restraint myself from public venting (which is different from specific criticism coupled with constructive actions for improvement). Some of my constituents see this as a weakness but an effective elected official is one who does more than state problems and fan the flames of citizens frustrations.

One example of using restraint to advantage was in my second year as a school board member. We had just gone through a bitter and divisive election and the faction I belonged to was now the majority faction. The board decided to do a national search for a Superintendent. Of course we were divided on how to proceed. Instead of fighting through the search process as previous boards had done, we decided to have our fights in private. This did not serve the public curiosity but the public good was served. We were able to attract qualified candidates, one of whom, Larry Leveritt, was hired. He was certainly more qualified than any superintendents we have had since and he did more for the Plainfield schools than anyone in recent times.

I believe that if the school board behaved as was the tradition, we would not have found qualified candidates. I fear that Mayor Robinson-Briggs' style has led Plainfield to experience a dearth of good candidates for key management positions at city hall. When Plainfield Council members are in the spotlight regarding situations like these, it's important to strike a balance between "tell it like it is" and "put the best foot forward".

So why I am writing this now, more than a year after the anti-gang forum involving WBLS? For me the assertiveness - restraint balance has changed. By refusing to cooperate with the Council's attorney and trying to avoid the subpoena, Mayor Robinson-Briggs has pushed things beyond the bounds of ethics, reason and accountability. And the subsequent media coverage has once again put Plainfield government in a bad light. There is not much of a down-side for Plainfield to tell it like it is at this point.

Ultimately the public deserves to know what is happening at city hall. There are legal reasons to temporarily withhold information from the public if it serves the public interest to do so. There are aspects of this case that have not seen the light of day yet but they will. There are times when an elected official holds back information or even opinions for reasons not understood by constituents. And those constituents can get frustrated by a perceived lack of commitment or resolve by council members. That is part of the bargain you make when you run for office. But it all comes out in the wash. Or most of it anyway. And the true test of the Plainfield City Council will be not that we found wrongdoing but what actions we will take to deal with it effectively.

New Contact Information for Me

2011-09-23T23:31:00.000-04:00

I have a new phone number: 908-565-3741

and a new email address: cory.storch@plainfield.com

Those of you who were using the plainfield.com address have seen a delay in hearing from me because of technical problems. I could read but not respond to emails until today. It is finally fixed. So I am not using my gmail account for city business from here on.

Kensington Ave speed humps

2011-09-22T14:35:00.003-04:00

I heard that the speed humps were removed. The installation was not done according to Plainfield's specifications and there was a dispute with the contractor about getting a fix. A new contractor has been brought in to do them according to specs. I thought they were just going to be be shaved down so this is a surprise. I will provide updates as new information becomes available.

There will be no additional cost to Plainfield as enough money was withheld from the payments to the original contractor to cover the corrective actions needed.

Plainfield Library Childrens Room Opening

2011-09-16T12:28:00.006-04:00

Last night my first reaction, upon walking into the new children's room, was astonishment. Then delight. The library staff and the board is to be commended and special kudos goes to library director Joe DaRold. This is an example of how commitment to excellence can demonstrate how special a place Plainfield is.

The leadership at the library carried out a vision to inspire Plainfield youth. It's inspiring to adults also, for a number of reasons:

* The board took on a financial commitment to make this happen. They went beyond asking government to do for them. They made this a public - private partnership, enabling them to go beyond a plain vanilla renovation project. You have to see it for yourselves.

* The libarary board saw this as an investment in Plainfield, not merely a project. The additional cost of this room will bring us real returns in the long run. It will bring more children into the library and instill the message that learning is fun.

* It will add to the positive "buzz" about Plainfield when out of towners visit this special place. We need this big time to counteract the negative media coverage of Plainfield. (That's why we need to invest in streetscape improvement projects and historic preservation whenever possible).

* Plainfielders need more reasons to take pride in our city. We now have one more reason.

August 8 Council Meeting: Recap

2011-08-11T08:56:00.004-04:00

The agenda fixing meeting was attended by about 30 residents. I once thought that televising the meetings would decrease attendance but that does not seem to be the case, a credit to the citizens of Plainfield, who really care about what happens in their city.

Public Safety Director Helwig gave a very brief report on the recent shootings. I was disappointed that the entire focus was on police enforcement. We really need a Mayor who can rally the community around a comprehensive approach to public safety. Police enforcement should be one aspect along with a coordinated public education, jobs training, mentoring and recreation strategy. Mayor Bloomberg recently announced a program for minority youth that combines jobs with educational commitments and mentoring. Just what Plainfield needs. I would love to see such a program in the Mayors next budget. That would have my support.

Spotshotter - my ambivalence comes from the lack of an overall public safety plan. I hope this isn't just an expensive gimmick, presented to mollify public concerns. It appears to have enough Council support for approval so time will tell. If the administration is really serious about Spotshotter, don't send the vendor to tell Council how great the program is. We need an objective analysis of data.

PMUA Taskforce - the fifth and sixth members will be added: Wilbert Gill and Marion Clemons. These are Annie McWilliams and Vera Greaves appointments, respectively. There is still one more appointment to make because the seventh nominee was a PMUA employee and was turned down by the Council. This group needs to get started and I will push for that by the end of August, seventh member or not.

The item generating the most discussion was the Lampkin House on Terrill Road. The majority of Council members felt that this is a financial responsibility the city just can't handle at this time. I have no argument with the Council majority on the fiscal concern. The $92,000 match for the county grant would be hard to justify for the city at this time. And time is short because the house is in danger of falling down.

It is a real shame because this could be more than just another proposed history house/museum. The only way to save this opportunity is for a group of citizens to convince the city that they have the staying power to find private grants that can combine with county, state and federal resources to make this project successful. The city would have to make a contribution but it would have to be a small part of the fiscal package. Could the Drake House board of trustees expand to become a larger entity to bring the Lampkin House under its wing? Is there private money available very soon to bring down the purchase/stabilization match the county requires? How much of a commitment can we get from the county for the Lampkin House? We have all heard stories of how an old property was rescued and made into an important community asset. It takes a lot of work by community volunteers. If there is anyone who is serious about discussing these questions and making a commitment to the Lampkin House, please contact me.

Council Meeting of August 8: Preview

2011-08-06T10:00:00.004-04:00

The agenda fixing session begins at 7:30, preceded by a special meeting at 7 pm. At 7the Council takes up the second reading of the ordinance to enable the extension of acting senior city managers in their temporary positions. I am in favor of this legislation because it continues the employment of David Kochel, an experienced City Administrator, for a second 90 day period. The Mayor has had real difficulties recruiting senior managers (CFO, City Administrator, Director of Urban Development and Public Works) and this buys her more time.

The agenda fixing meeting features an update from Public Safety Director Helwig who has been asked by the Council to discuss what the police division is doing about the continuing gun violence and tragic shooting deaths in 2011.

Also of interest:

* a resolution appointing Suplee-Clooney as the city auditor for FY 2011. They do a good job and have been Plainfield's audit firm for many years. At some point, this needs to be bid competitively but with the weak position Plainfield finds itself administratively, this is not the time for it.

* we only received one bid for banking services (you may recall the Council passing a resolution requiring the Mayor to put banking out to bid so Plainfield could be assured of getting the best deal possible) and the bid will likely be rejected so we can go back for more bids. When I get more information, I will report on this in a future blog.

* a resolution seeking approval to submit a Union County grant application for $92,500 to purchase and stabilize the Lampkin House on Terrill Road. Plainfield would have to put up a match in the same amount. I believe the city should weigh the match and ongoing costs if we purchase (maintenance and lost taxes) against the future benefits. Any time a fully developed community like Plainfield has an opportunity to add open/public land, it should be seriously considered. It appears to me that not taking action will result the collapse of the third oldest house in Plainfield. Given Plainfield's weak financial position and current obligation to support the Drake House, this will be a tough decision to make.

* liens against 13 properties in need of yard clean-up by the city. Kudos to the Mayor and administration for taking action to keep our neighborhoods looking good.

* executive session begins at 6 pm and has several items of interest that may get reported out at the August 8 public session and, if not, at a later date.

Enjoy the weekend!

City Council Meeting of June 14

2011-06-15T08:42:00.003-04:00

Another long Council meeting that started with a 6 pm executive session and ended around midnight. When the Council's confidence in the administration increases, I believe the meetings will be shorter and business will be conducted more efficiently. The most important positive action will be the appointment of a permanent city administrator who is competent and willing to work with the Council. Right now we have an acting city administrator who appears to fit that bill. Unfortunately he can only stay 90 days under the Plainfield ordinances.

Highlights of the evening:

* the road paving program - another of many discussions about the wisdom of our road paving selections. To some extent we continue on automatic pilot, guided by a scoring system that does not take into account the amount of traffic, safety issues, whether a road is a gateway to the city and other critical considerations. I used Watchung Ave to illustrate my point. The administration supports paving it from Hillside Ave to Woodland next. Compare that to the Leland to Woodland section which needs paving much more. Then check out Sterling, Cambridge and Oxford and other streets behind Cook School. You will see some of the worst streets in the city. Yet there has been no paving there at all. We have limited resources and need to make wiser decisions about the sequence of roads to be paved. I was asked to forward my recommendations to our Council Neighborhood Services committee. Once again, I will do so.

* Shotspotter - the vendor was back with a much better financing plan. And kudos to the administration for obtaining a $250,000 public saftey technology grant. Later we found out this is "almost" a done deal. Still a reason for hope. The Council had previously asked for expert input on the value of Shotspotter but that was not forthcoming at the meeting. I cannot vote for such an important initiative simply based on a vendors testimony. Once again I asked for the administration to reach out to the Prosecutors office, the State Police and other independent law enforcement entities to guide Plainfield's investment of public safety resources. Do we pay for Shotspotter (approximately $160,000/year after the grant runs out), more surveillance cameras, more police or more root cause interventions (recreation, youth career development, substance abuse treatment). Or a combination of the above.

* PMUA Citizens Taskforce - I urged Council members to appoint one representative each for action at next Mondays Council meeting.

* The Armory - the Mayor had the previous proposal brought back for discussion. Problem is we had that discussion months ago, the Council said "not worthy of action" and nothing of substance was added by the administration this time around. This is just stirring the pot. When a real proposal is made, then we should discuss it in public.

* Calendar year budgeting. Our CFO has prepared us to switch to a calendar year budget. That includes a "transition" 6 month budget from July to December. Thanks goes to Adrian Mapp, the original advocate for the change. There are advantages for Plainfield that I am sure he will cover in his blog.

We had many other items of business but too much to write about today. The Council business meeting is next Monday at 8 pm at the Municipal Court chamber.

Thank You to My Supporters

2011-06-10T09:48:00.002-04:00

It was gratifying to me that voters selected me for another term on the Plainfield City Council. This campaign was a trying experience for me and my family. It was disheartening to see attacks on family and on my running mate Dee. These attacks made the support of friends all that more important.

There are too many people to thank in one blog post but I will try to thank each of them personally. I am proud to be associated with the many good people who got involved with this campaign. They did it because they love Plainfield and know that, with a more effective government, it can be a better place to live than it is today.

Even though we did not win every race on June 7, the fight for a better local Democratic Party, a better municipal government and a better Plainfield must and will go on.

It's the Voters Turn

2011-06-07T05:46:00.002-04:00

Please be sure to vote today. Plainfield Democrats have a real choice in this primary election. Dee Dameron and I are running for City Council in column C. We have run a campaign on the issues facing Plainfield and we bring far more experience to the table than our opponents.

Most important in this election is the future leadership of Plainfield city hall. Column C has Democratic City Committee candidates who are committed to replacing Jerry Green as local party leader. They are committed to a more inclusive way of developing local talent and selecting candidates for Mayor and City Council.

It's time to take back Plainfield.

Vote Column C

Partners in Nasty, Dishonest Campaigning

2011-06-05T00:33:00.010-04:00

Tony Rucker and I promised each other that we would stick to the issues and not get personal.

When my supporter, Dan Damon, got out of line, I called him on it - publicly. I have been telling my campaign team since the beginning to stay cool and be positive.

Tony has not kept his part of the agreement. I never expected Jerry Green to run a clean campaign but Tony has an opportunity to distance himself from Jerry's ugly behavior. Will he take responsibility for his supporters behavior? Four years ago, Tony's campaign hired Park Hotel residents to picket the Evergreen School polling place on election day with signs claiming I was trying to put them on the streets. I asked the Park Hotel residents if they knew who I was and they stated that they had no idea who I was. When I confronted Tony, he said he knew nothing about this exploitive stunt.

Now we see a dirty mailing piece from the column A/Jerry Green team getting personal with my family and my running mate. Let's look at what the Green/Rucker/Greaves team are saying.

Greaves opponent is Dee Dameron, my running mate. Dee came back to Plainfield to help her mother. Dee is a fine person who has done nothing except make positive contributions to our community through her work with a non profit organization, her volunteer work on the Citizens Budget Advisory Committee and her steadfast advocacy for residents at City Council meetings.

My daughter was in a summer intern program the PMUA ran for dozens of students. She was part-time during the summer and did real work.Her internship took place before I was ever elected to the City Council. Are my opponents saying that Plainfield students do not deserve opportunities to learn and work in Plainfield?

This statement is not taken personally but is an example of the many distortions put out by Jerry Green during election season. The economic development study referred to was done by Rutgers University at no cost to Plainfield. And there have been no contracts awarded to any vendors for this initiative. This distortion only serves to divert attention from the many contracts awarded that benefit Jerry Green.

This campaign mailer is distateful, unethical and untrue. I make no comment on Jerry Green's character. There is still a brief opportunity, however, for Tony Rucker and Vera Greaves to show some character.

Regarding Campaign Silly Season, 2011

2011-06-02T22:34:00.004-04:00

Dan Damon's blog comparing Tony Rucker to Nazis was uncalled for and in poor taste. It also doesn't help us focus on issues to use the word "thief" to describe Tony. Putting a question mark after the word doesn't make it any better.

I made a promise that if any of my supporters stepped over the line, I would speak out on it. Using false assertions and personal attacks only diverts us from an important discussion on Plainfield's real issues and problems. Luckily for Tony, nobody takes Dan's "Nazi" comment seriously. Any damage done is to me, by association.

On the other side, I hope Tony will publicly apologize for untrue and misleading statements he has made about me taking money from the PMUA. Tony's people doctored up a campaign fund report and blurred it so it is unreadable and are claiming this is proof I took the PMUA's money. I state for the record that I have never nor never will take money from the PMUA. The only flow of funds between the PMUA and me is not in my direction. But don't take my word for it, dear reader. Google New Jersey ELEC (stands for Election Law Enforcement Commission) and do a candidate report search using my name. You will see every report I have filed since 1999.

And Tony, your allegation I took money from a shell organization is completely false and misleading. Don't you know that you are sharing a campaign headquarters and phone bank with Assemblyman Green (and therefore getting contributions from him). He is connected to the most substantial flow of pay to play campaign contributions in New Jersey, funneled through various campaign accounts and political action committees. You are a minor beneficiary of this, just as every Plainfield Democratic candidate before you. I study the ELEC reports and I believe that, over the years, there are only a few local candidates who can proudly say that most of their contributions come from sources other than pay to play. Ironically, you and I are in that small group ( I am giving you the benefit of the doubt because I can't find your ELEC reports).

I also expect Tony to speak out on the nasty and false attacks that his campaign people are making about my record. We did agree at the beginning of the campaign to stick to the issues. Prove that you have command of the issues and some real solutions. That's the way to win votes.

Tony - this is a moment of truth. Are you going to do the honorable thing and rise above the ugliness and irrelevance that sometimes mars Plainfield political campaigns?

Park Ave/East Ninth St Improvements

2011-06-02T13:07:00.005-04:00

It's been a four year wait but work has finally begun to improve this intersection. Bernice Paglia's blog post in February 2007 gives the background on the project. I want to reinforce that credit is due to two Plainfield residents, Maria Pellum and Barbara Kerr. When they first heard about the safety enhancements planned for the intersection, they saw an opportunity. "Why not beautify the city at the same time". They drafted a plan to add attractive lighting, seating and landscaping on the peninsula.

I helped them get an audience with the county engineers and after some negotiating, an excellent plan was conceived. When the county agreed to some of the new features but not all, a big assist came from April Stefel from the Plainfield Planning Department. She advocated successfully that the city contribute to the enhancements.

The rest is covered by Bernice.

My Accomplishments as a Councilman

2011-05-27T08:16:00.002-04:00

I love Plainfield and I am proud to have been of service as a team player to unlock the incredible potential that exists in our city. My opponent, Tony Rucker is campaigning on his main position: "Cory Storch hasn't done anything. It's my turn". Tony, if you hadn't stopped following the City Council after you lost the election 4 years ago, you would know better. Do your homework!

Below are some of the recent accomplishments that I have achieved. Much more needs to be done.

Public Safety: advocate for surveillance cameras and supporting use of Urban Enterprise Zone funding to make it happen. I am a long time advocate for enforcement of our speeding laws. I was an advocate for the creation of our Curfew Ordinance (needs the leadership of the Mayor to enforce it).

Recreation: advocate for creation of a Recreation Commission. Although the Mayor vetoed this Council ordinance, I will fight to bring it back and get it approved. Only with a commission can residents be assured that Plainfield recreation programs will be held accountable to do what needs to be done for our children and seniors.

Easing the Tax Burden: as a member of the Finance Committee for each year on Council save one, responsible for budget reductions saving residents millions in property taxes. I was co-author and primary sponsor of FY 2012 budget planning resolution calling for 5 year budgeting, earlier budget adoption and a more collaborative process. I am long time advocate for competitive bidding for engineering, legal and insurance services (opposed by Mayor).

Banking Ordinance - As member of the Finance and Administration Committee I assisted with the creation of, and the adoption of an ordinance that directs the Administration to issue an RFP for banking services. Such an RFP will ensure the City receives the greatest return on the money it invests in financial institutions. This also prevents the Administration from making arbitrary investment decisions with our tax payers’ money.

Bid Threshold Ordinance: As a member of the Finance and Administration Committee I assisted with the creation of, and the adoption of an ordinance that lowered the bid threshold from $39,000 to $17,500 so as to promote greater competition amongst vendors while preventing the Administration from awarding non professional service contracts above this $17,500 pay to play limit without approval from the Council.

Road Program: as a member of Council Finance Committee, created the original road paving program in 2004, leading to first city-wide paving program in 30 years. I was a leading advocate for purchase of road maintenance equipment - milling/paving machine, hot patch and crack sealing equipment.

Roads: I supported bond ordinances that led to the reconstruction of numerous roads including Kensington Ave, Thornton Ave, Stilford Ave, Oak Lane, Evergreen Avenue, Watchung Avenue, Carnegie Ave, Central Street, Cedarbrook Road, Brook Lane, to name just a few.

South Ave Road Reconstruction – I advocated for and supported the funding for the reconstruction of South Avenue from Terrill Road to Woodland Avenue, a project that will get under way this year.

CFO Resolution: I supported a resolution that was sent to the NJ Division of Local Government Services encouraging the DLGS to appoint a CFO. This caused the State to intervene thus forcing the Mayor to appoint a CFO after nearly three years.

Dudley House: I supported the transfer of Dudley House to a non-profit organization at a significant cost savings to tax payers. Instead of being a cost to the City, Dudley House is now a generator of revenue for the City. Services are operated by a qualified non-profit service provider with an excellent reputation.

Advocate against hate and bias crimes: I was author and primary sponsor of the resolution against hate crimes and ugly free speech.

Environmental Advocacy: I was the first LEED advocate in Plainfield, got LEED commitment into downtown redevelopment agreement. This makes Plainfield a leader in making our downtown a healthier place to live and shop.

Environmental Advocacy: I was a primary sponsor and long term supporter of Shade Tree Commission and as a Council advocate, provided tree planting funding.

Library Advocacy: I protected our library from budget cuts that would reduce hours of operation and reduce access of citizens to educational and career resources they need to succeed.

Flood Control: I was a leading advocate for the North Ave flood control and road improvement project.

Economic Development:
• primary sponsor of transit village vision study, finally giving residents a say in how we want Plainfield to develop. Now we have a blueprint with which to attract and guide developers.
• leading advocate and co-sponsor of Rutgers Economic Development study, currently under way. This will be Plainfield’s road map for job creation for our residents.
• leading advocate and sponsor of resolutions creating downtown streetscape
• primary sponsor of abandoned properties ordinance

Checks and Balances:
• In the 5+ years that Mayor Robinson Briggs has served, I have blocked bad ideas and proposals that were not in the city’s interests. Unfortunately there are too many of these to list. To name a few: the firing of the best city administrator Plainfield has had in many years, the proposed Monarch tax abatement and the city’s proposed purchase of the YWCA building.
• Much more can be done but the Mayor needs to be pushed hard to deliver good services to Plainfield residents. A strong City Council is needed more than ever.

Vote for the Democratic team in Column C: Dee Dameron and I for Council and City Committee candidates as well. It's time to take back Plainfield.

What to do at the Muhlenberg Campus

2011-05-15T20:37:00.004-04:00

The Muhlenberg campus is an opportunity waiting to happen. Many unmet health and social needs of Plainfield residents can be addressed by concentrating resources at the Muhlenberg campus. The use of the campus must be defined so the interests of the community are first and foremost and the campus is not merely an opportunity for a few developers.

Here are just some services that could be provided to residents at Muhlenberg:

* Veterans outpatient services and support groups (freeing up more Monarch space for seniors).

* Relocation of social services from downtown retail/office locations to the campus.

* Specialized nursing home beds for people suffering from dementia/Alzheimers.

* Expansion of Neighborhood Health Services (aka Plainfield Health Center) services.

* New partnerships for career preparation in health related professions with Plainfield Public Schools, Union County College, Kean U, UMDNJ.

* The city could rent space or get free rent for the health department (freeing up space in city offices).

* A priority would be to maximize the number of specialized inpatient beds. Mental health inpatient beds were lost and are still needed. A birthing center staffed by nurse/midwifes and backed up by doctors is a definite need.

Solaris spends several million dollars annually for property maintenance. There is pressure to do something and that something must be driven by community interests, not outside interests.

There are two challenges in recreating Muhlenberg. The first is financial. There has to be enough operating dollars flowing through to support the services provided. We should think about this the way a developer plans a shopping mall: a few anchor tenants and then more smaller rentals to fill out the space. Not all the eggs in one basket. So if one service provider goes away, the campus is still viable. This is especially important in the healthcare industry as it faces major changes due to advances in medical research and technology as well as affordability challenges.

The second challenge is political. I recently asked a Solaris administrator what they are doing about Muhlenberg and what they need from the city to move forward. The answer was not money or zoing changes. It was "the city needs to define what it wants at the Muhlenberg campus so interested parties don't have to fear resistance and attack when they advance their plans."

Plainfield continues to grieve a beloved institution that was an economic engine and saved lives at the same time. It's time to look forward to create a new campus that can improve the health and wellness of residents, create jobs and provide health related career opportunities for young people.

Why I am Running for Re-election

2011-05-07T00:09:00.005-04:00

My wife Lois and I have spent the last 32 years making Plainfield our home in many ways. We moved here in 1979, bought a fixer upper on Osborne Ave, raised two children there, got involved as Cook School parents and made lots of friends through the youth soccer club, the symphony and many other civic endeavors . We've done what many people have done in Plainfield: we've fallen in love with this town.

I've served Plainfield in elected and appointed capacities for many years. If you are inclined to throw out incumbents, you may not vote for me. If, however, you appreciate someone who has never and will never give up the fight for a better Plainfield, I want your support on election day.

Here is why I fight for Plainfield: there has been an ongoing struggle between positive change and status quo in Plainfield. Forces for change were led by the late Al McWilliams. His second term as Mayor, when he had the support of New Democrats on the City Council, was a time when Plainfield's true potential was unleashed. I was one of those New Democrats who helped Plainfield begin to turn around. Our road paving program began. Abandoned homes were renovated. Our Front Street streetscape was installed and downtown development took place after 30 years of inaction. The North Avenue flood control project was completed and much more.

Unfortunately, Assemblyman Jerry Green regained power and, as chairman of the Democratic City Committee, helped elect Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs. They have been impediments to the fulfillment of Plainfield’s true potential for the last 6 years. June 7 is your opportunity to say you want to put Plainfield back on track.

Many friends have asked me why I want the frustration that comes with public service in Plainfield. I believe in Plainfield and have always felt our missing ingredient is leadership. This election is about leadership. I am running for the 2nd Ward City Council seat and my running mate is Dee Dameron, running for the 1st Ward-4th Ward seat. Our team includes a slate of Democratic City Committee running mates. We are for progress. We are for change. Help us strengthen the City Council and the local Democratic Party on June 7. We need your help to fight for Plainfield's future.

.

At the Opening of the City Sponsored Youth Baseball League

2011-05-01T07:49:00.007-04:00

I stopped by the field on Rock Avenue Saturday for opening day festivities. Ballplayers of various ages were in uniform, gathered around their respective coaches and managers, waiting for the parade to begin. Joy was in the air. City politics could do nothing do to spoil the good time, I hoped.

I was thinking about the years my son Matt and I spent in the Plainfield Youth Soccer Club. Its about the game but also much more. It is about teaching kids about sportsmanship, team work and skill building. Its enjoying the weather and communing with neighbors: community building.

A question has been raised in the rancorous debate between City Council, Mayor, citizens and recreation division employees. The question is: "where have you been? We haven't seen you around" It is meant to imply that only some people care about the children. There is a political agenda behind it.

At opening day, I was approached by an adult who was prominent in the city baseball league who put this in what I hoped was a more positive way: "it's good to see you here today". I still wasn't sure how to take that. What was he implying, that I haven't showed up until today? So I recounted my 10 years as youth soccer coach. The teams I coached were representative of the diversity of Plainfield and I was glad the players got to interact and know each other as people. But I wasn't sure if I was being put on the defensive so I defended myself.

It will be difficult to get past the negativity caused by the rumor, spread through the public schools, that the City Council was shutting down the recreations summer programs. But we can and we must. The focus must be on taking steps to increase participation in the Plainfield Recreation Division programs. That is what the City Council set out to do when the recreation debate began. It veered off course because some peoples job security felt threatened. But since all parties do care about the children, it behooves us to improve and expand recreation opportunities for Plainfields children

Bump-outs on South Avenue

2011-04-22T10:12:00.002-04:00

The Planning Board held a capital project review hearing last night on South Avenue reconstruction. It was gratifying to participate in a vigorous debate on what features are important in a transit village and the pros and cons of bump outs and other traffic calming measures. Residents, property owners and merchants were present to share their views. By the way, I was swamped with emails this week, mostly in favor of bump outs and a few opposed.

Administration officials have been saying that the community wants the bump outs eliminated. One surprising comment shed light on the way we get input from the community. As it turns out, the meetings on this topic have been poorly attended by the public and not well advertised. For the most part, only two merchants and one resident have been part of the discussion. The resident has been advocating for speed tables, signage and other strategies to protect pedestrians and drivers and to retain the transit village feel. These comments have been ignored.

One speaker expressed frustration at the inability to get attention from the Mayors office and said that the previous Mayor responded quickly to calls to replace missing bump out signage on South Avenue.

After healthy discussion, the Planning Board put together recommendations to the City Council for the South Avenue reconstruction.

Merchant concerns were addressed: bump outs will be reduced in size and curbing will be beveled or recessed. One bump out next to PNC Bank is a safety hazard and will be eliminated.

Resident concerns were also addressed: high pedestrian traffic areas - Belividere Ave and Plainwood Square Park - will maintain current bump out size (with beveled or recessed curbing though). One astute Planning Board member pointed out that bump out visibility is poor and that accidents can be prevented with signage and painted curbing. This became a recommendation. Also, walkways created with pavers will be retained.

It seems to me that the Mayor and Assemblyman Green want to focus on mistakes made by the previous administration and that the answer is to denigrate and eradicate all signs of their projects. Last night we participated in a rationale, issues oriented discussion about the bump outs and came away with a middle ground that can benefit everyone.

Now it is up to the City Council to decide what to do with the Planning Board recommendations. There will likely be additional cost and time involved for the South Avenue project. We are already projected to spend $1.3 million. I will not be surprised if the Mayor and her people oppose the Planning Board.

I say lets embrace the Planning Board recommendations. South Avenue is a successful public - private partnership that brings tax ratables and shoppers to Plainfield. If we are going to do this, lets do it right, in the spirit of transit villages. The Council has recommended various ways the administration can save money on capital projects. But lets not be short-sighted about last nights outcome. That will be a good investment for Plainfield.

Ugly Free Speech Update

2011-04-18T11:40:00.002-04:00

At the last Council meeting, the Mayor expressed surprise that the Union County Prosecutors Office had taken the position that the Scarlet Letter was "ugly free speech". I just learned that the Prosecutor will be sending a communication to city hall confirming their position.

I also learned that the prosecutors office will not investigate a matter that doesn't rise to the level of a crime unless there is enough evidence to indicate that laws have been broken. That leaves it to Plainfield to do its own investigation.

The Hate Crimes and Ugly Free Speech resolution, passed by the Council this month, calls for the Mayor and her administration to conduct such an investigation and report to Council by April 15. There has been no such report to date. If the Council feels that the Mayor is not acting in accordance with the Council resolution, we may need to conduct our own investigation. I will be discussing this option with my colleagues.

The Hate Crimes and Ugly Free Speech Resolution

2011-04-13T23:45:00.002-04:00

The following is the resolution I wrote and that was approved unanimously by the City Council on April 11:

Resolution in Opposition to Hate Crimes and Ugly Free Speech

Whereas Plainfield is known as a diverse community where people who are different from one another live harmoniously together and celebrate their different cultures and beliefs, and

Whereas an anonymous, hateful letter was distributed at city hall in early April, attempting to stigmatize gays and lesbians, and making untrue and libelous assertions about individual elected officials and community activists, and

Whereas the Union County Prosecutors Office has labeled said letter as “ugly free speech”, and

Whereas said letter was distributed in all city hall mailboxes and there have been assertions that it was copied on a city owned/leased copy machine,

Therefore the Plainfield City Council denounces the anonymous letter and urges the Mayor to aggressively take the following actions:

1. Publicly denounce anonymous ugly free speech and hate crimes.

2. Activate the Plainfield Human Relations Commission to take all steps necessary to push back against hate crimes and ugly free speech, including recommendations to the Mayor and Council for ongoing promotion of tolerance, respect and mutual celebration of diversity in Plainfield.

3. Report to Council on April 11 and then in writing by April 15, 2011 the results of internal investigations including when, how and where the anonymous letter was produced and distributed at city hall and who was involved and who observed anything related to the letters production and distribution.

4. Obtain the services of an investigator from county, state or federal law enforcement offices to investigate the possible involvement of city officials and/or staff in the production and distribution of the anonymous letter and if government resources are not available, hire an independent investigator.

By way of this resolution the Plainfield City Council denounces the anonymous letter and all anonymous ugly free speech. All those who feel a need to express themselves regarding other groups or individuals are urged to put their names next to their comments.

Furthermore, the Plainfield City Council deplores the climate of division and fear that is created when people, in bad faith, spread hate anonymously and urges all people of good faith to stand against and speak against discrimination, stigma, prejudice and misinformation. Fear and hate can be stopped by positive action but will grow in the absence of response. At this difficult time, leadership is needed from citizens and elected officials to protect and promote the diversity for which Plainfielders are justly proud.

Hopefully, the Mayor will provide a report on April 15 on the investigations and actions taken to deal with this problem. I will give an update soon after.

Does Plainfield Embrace Diversity

2011-04-11T10:43:00.001-04:00

One of the aspects of Plainfield I have always felt good about is the diversity, tolerance and celebration of differences among residents. Compared to surrounding towns and most places actually, Plainfield gets high marks for cultural competence and diversity. Of course we are not perfect. We are humans and the human condition includes struggling to live alongside those who are different from us.

It saddens and disturbs me that a hateful flyer was recently distributed throughout city hall, a flyer that bashes gays, lesbians, bloggers, PMUA reform activists and certain council members. I have seen these nasty flyers before, around election times. Previously, I felt that these anonymous, cowardly statements should not be dignified by a response. This time it becomes clear to me that the nastiness is not going away. In fact, I see a growing chorus of hate and fear in response to changes in the economic and political winds of Plainfield and beyond.

We should be coming together to deal with real problems like gang violence, foreclosures and rising taxes but we are being urged to divide on class, racial and political lines. This flyer is a hate crime of the utmost distatefulness. But it doesn't come out of nowhere. The tone for hatefulness comes from a few supporters of the current recreation division as they shout, wave their fingers, point at people and pound the table at council meetings. Unfortunately children can tune in to public access television to watch this behavior. Hatefulness is promoted when the Mayor says that certain Council members are responsible for shutting down city run recreation entirely. This message was carried into the Plainfield school system. Some of the Mayors supporters are now spreading the lie that certain council members, myself included, voted against much needed health and social programs currently operated out of city hall.

We need leadership to unite Plainfielders, to fight against our real problems like some of our young people choosing gangs and drugs over education. I remember the time of unrest over the Rodney King incident when urban areas around the country erupted into violence and looting. Then Mayor Harold Mitchell brought local community leaders together and cooler heads prevailed. That's what we need now in Plainfield. I will be calling for this approach at Monday's Council meeting.

Hatefulness grows when people of good will don't speak against it. I am one of those who thought hate would not gain traction in Plainfield. I was wrong.

I do have faith that the vast majority of Plainfielders are people of good will and willing to live among people who look, behave and think differently from them. But we need to stand against hate and fear. If adults can do that, there is hope that we adults can teach young people to make better choices than gangs and drug dealing. We elected officials have to start with respecting each other over legitimate differences on how we fund and operate city services.

My Position on the PMUA

2011-04-07T15:11:00.006-04:00

Dissolution of the PMUA? Some would have Council members just give a yea or nay. Many of my constituents want a yea from me on dissolution. That would certainly help my re-election campaign. But elected officials should not give simplistic or politically expedient responses to the PMUA problem.

The PMUA has dealt with two serious problems in Plainfield and in its early years, I was completely convinced the PMUA was a better solution than what we had.

First, our sanitary sewer system, under city control, had not been maintained for many years and was falling apart. Would city hall do better today with sewer maintenance? Looking at the ineffectiveness of the city to fix our roads, create a useful website and implement modern information technology (and seeing deficits with other city operations), I am not convinced the city can compete with the PMUA on this front.

Second, garbage pick-up is a mixed bag (pun unintended). PMUA workers get much better reviews than the private haulers of the past. But the cost for this service is well above the market rates. Cost has become the overriding concern for me and residents are saying this loud and clear. Here is where the various alternate solutions need to be carefully considered before we "dump PMUA".

Solution 1: dump PMUA garbage pick-ups and go back to private haulers. When we had this in place, some property owners discontinued trash pick-up and dumping became a huge problem. PMUA has made major inroads into this, with a cost shared by all property owners. Could we use private haulers, supplemented by periodic city wide dumping sweeps? That could be more affordable. We would need to do some number crunching.

Solution 2: dump PMUA garbage pick-up and give it to the city. As with sewer maintenance, can the city do this well and at a better price? City services have gone downhill. That's no surprise considering the Mayor's inability to attract and retain good senior managers. To make matters worse, her response to our leadership gaps is to spread blame rather than make concerted efforts to attract talent. Another concern about bringing garbage pick-up back to the city is around cost. Will this solution weaken further Plainfields inability to afford city worker pension and health benefit costs? I don't have the answers but we'd better analyze this before making cost saving claims.

Where does this leave us? Here are options as I see them:

1. Reform the PMUA. That's been my position up till now. I am less and less convinced that this is the way to go for two reasons: the PMUA Commission's refusal to meet with Council and the unfulfilled promise of bringing in service contracts from other municipalities to offset cost to Plainfiel residents. The bottom line on reform is that the Mayor will have to nominate 2 or 3 sharp critics with business experience and a desire to make changes to join the commission. We all know who they are. Mayor nominate them. They don't need to be in the majority on the commission. A fresh perspective will add much needed credibility to the PMUA.

2. Council creates an independent task force to study and make recommendations on Plainfields course of action. This would not be "study to death". It would be a six month time frame. Task number one - determine the Council's legal options. Once these are established, the task force would proceed to tackle the solid waste and sewer concerns expressed all over our city. Participants would have to commit to an objective fact based process. Plainfield has many such people ready to serve. Council would have to commit to take recommendations seriously. One conclusion could be dump PMUA. This should be a clear headed decision. Another conclusion could be keep PMUA with a revised charter and policy and operational changes. The only starting assumption for the task force is that the PMUA must become accountable to Plainfield residents. Current events have proved that PMUA is not accountable now.

The Mayor's Responsiblity for Plainfield Recreation

2011-03-20T11:28:00.002-04:00

The Mayor and her Administration have the managerial prerogative to continue recreation programs without adding money into the budget if that is their goal. Below are Mayor Sharon's three options:

1. During the absence of a Department Head or Division Head, the Mayor has the ability to assign the City Administrator or another Department or Division Head to cover the duties and responsibilities of that office. The Mayor has used this approach before to cover top level management responsibilities (i.e. As City Administrator, Bibi Taylor was assigned the responsibilities of the Director of Administration & Finance and CFO. Currently, the new Director of Administration & Finance, Al Restaino is assigned the responsibilities of CDBG Director and PAS Director. Additionally, Jacques Howard, the UEZ Coordinator, is also assigned the responsibilities of the Department of Public Works and Urban Development.) So, the million dollar question...why is Recreation any different?

2. The Mayor has the ability to create the Recreation Superintendent's position on a part-time basis versus full-time thereby extending or cancelling the April 15, 2011 lay-off. When the new fiscal year begins on July 1, the budget reduction would then be spread out over 12 months instead of 2 months. This option allows the Mayor to work within budget and still have the current Superintendent of Recreation maintain his position.

3. The Recreation Committee is a committee created by ordinance and comprised of concerned residents to provide guidance and recommendations on City-wide recreation programs. Its important to note that all Committee members were appointed by the Mayor last year amid controversy surrounding Queen City Baseball League and the Division of Recreation. Should the Recreation Superintendent's position become vacant, the Recreation Committee's services are still needed. The Committee could fill the service gap and provide the much needed citizen input into the type of programs our community deserves.

Each of these three options would work if the administration made a commitment to work within the resources provided by the approved budget. That has been the way every year including the last two years in which layoffs created staffing gaps that had to be filled. When there is a will, there is a way. These three options can be also be used in combination. All it takes is the usual effort expected of a Mayor.

New Jersey Redevelopment Forum

2011-03-07T10:01:00.003-05:00

I attended the annual Redevelopment Forum held by New Jersey Future last Friday (fyi - no cost to Plainfield for my attendance). This full day learning and networking event had much information relevant for Plainfield.

Of great interest was the New Jersey economy report by Rutgers/Bloustein School economist Joe Seneca. He shared some sobering data on jobs and real estate markets. New Jersey (and the nation) may have seen a Wall Street recovery but a jobs recovery will take at least 10 years before we gain back the jobs lost in the last three years. And the new jobs will be mostly lower paying ones than the ones lost. This has already had a negative impact on the real estate market. Seneca believes we are on the verge of a triple dip in residential home prices - the double dip happened last April with the expiration of the federal tax credit for home buyers.

At the same time, rental vacancies are down so rent costs are rising for residential. Rentals will also rebound because much of the new construction in the last four decades has been for owners, not renters - so the rental market is underbuilt. We are seeing this unfold in downtown Plainfield with the difficulties selling condos at the Monarch and with West 2nd St Commons being planned as rental units.

Seneca's predictions for the future:
1. 2011 - 2020: a slow, lengthy and painful economic recovery in New Jersey
2. 2011: accelerated foreclosures, financing is scarce
3. 2012: the beginnings of a housing recovery, redevelopment planning off the back burner
4. 2013 - 2017: Generation Y peak home buying years, economy slowly recovers, redevelopment projects shift back into gear

Seneca drove home a point about "rail towns" and transit villages. They are an emerging market and development outlook and real estate value is better in these areas than for New Jersey in general. He shared data to prove his point. He responded to a question from a Somerville planner regarding the Hudson River tunnel, saying the the new tunnel proposal is a real opportunity for the Raritan Valley. Even though there are fewer new "slots" going to Manhatten than with the canceled ARC tunnel, Bergen and Passaic counties are not included in the new proposal. Still there will be competition among rail lines and Plainfield will have to have a strong presence within the Raritan Valley Coalition.

For me the take home lesson for Plainfield: we are on the right "track", having started our planning with the vision study and having a developers agreement with Landmark for downtown projects. Planning for the future must continue, particularly on the economic development, transit area zoning and downtown parking fronts. The downtown streetscape improvements begun under the McWilliams administration must continue. We must re-organize citizens and legislators to advocate for the Raritan Valley Line (remember CLANG? - we need it back).

Seneca's look into New Jersey's future included the following statement: WINKs (single women with no children) and minorities will lead the way with residential housing demand.

A suggestion for the budget mess we're in

2011-02-22T23:17:00.003-05:00

New Jersey Democrats in the state legislature (Ray Lesniak among them) are suggesting we revisit the millionaires tax to bring $630 million annually in new revenues to our state. I agree with this revenue proposal but I have a different idea of what to do with this money besides restoring cuts for current programs.

Let's put it towards the unfunded pension problem. It would be a small step in the right direction but I would put a condition on this pension fund contribution. The unions have to agree to givebacks to help address government budget gaps.

I feel strongly that government unions must play a major role in solving state and municipal budget woes. But it doesn't seem right that when we are asking our workers to sacrifice, Wall Street is doing quite well and corporate earnings are rising. Those more fortunate, the truly wealthy, need to do their part along with workers. It can't be either or. It has to be both. If not, we will continue to see police and fire services decimated and public education compromised. Governor Christie, are you listening?

Homelessness in Plainfield

2011-01-26T11:54:00.004-05:00

Today communities across the nation are conducting "point in time counts" to estimate the extent and causes of homelessness. These counts are street level surveys done every two years by teams of human service and law enforcement workers and volunteers.

I participated in the Plainfield count which was coordinated by the Union County Department of Human Services. We found a lot of homeless people in Plainfield. Between 4 and 7:30 am our teams visited vacant buildings where we were able to make contact with 40 people. Our police escorts woke them up so we could fill out questionaires, provide food and clothing and make referrals for help as needed.

There was a group of people living in a vacant multi-family house near the downtown train station. Reasons given for their homelessness included unemployment, criminal justice system involvement, substance abuse and the high cost of housing. They were encouraged to go to the Plainfield YMCA shelter and they declined. The reason given was bed bugs. An unheated building does not have bed bug problems but the shelter does. Later I was told by an Bridgeway outreach worker that the Y works hard to deal with bed bugs and generally succeeds but this is a difficult problem to eradicate.

Nearby, a vacant office building was temporary shelter for a group of young men who are doing day labor and, apparently, saving money on rent. Only one of ten spoke English and through him we convinced them to go to the county social services office at Park Madison to get shelter vouchers.

Homelessness has many causes. Mental illness and substance abuse are common causes and are often associated with chronic homelessness. People with these problems are more likely to be noticed by the public. During an economic downturn, poverty and unemployment cause a surge in homelessness and we saw that today. Places like Plainfield see increased vacancies and foreclosures and some homeless people will find these locations as their least bad housing option.

Many people who experience homelessness are invisible to most of us. I may blog more on this. For now, I hope my observations helps the reader's understanding of homelessness in our community.

2012 Plainfield Municipal Budget Resolution

2011-01-19T12:21:00.003-05:00

I thought I had posted this prior to Tuesdays Council meeting and to my surprise, it did not appear. I must have accidentally deleted it. The resolution is a set of recommendations for a new budgeting process that requires the Mayor and administration to collaborate with the Council and the Citizens Budget Advisory Committee (CBAC). Better late than never so here is the budget planning resolution. It was just approved by a 4 - 2 vote. Mayor - the ball is in your court. The Council is ready and willing to begin this month.

2012 Plainfield Municipal Budget Planning Resolution

The municipal budget is a set of priorities of the government. With a finite budget, we can only spend so much money. Money spent in one area means there is less to spend in another area. As such, forward directional priorities are necessary to start the entire leadership of Plainfield thinking about pro-active and multi-year budgeting.

Whereas the state of New Jersey is imposing a 2% tax levy cap for Fiscal Year 2012 and

Whereas Plainfield’s municipal government expenses continue to rise while non-property tax revenues are decreasing in the short term and
Whereas the City Council desires to plan proactively to prepare for a difficult budgeting process that will challenge municipal government to meet the needs of residents and employees and

Whereas 2011 Council wishes to work pro-actively with the Mayor and administration to create a budgeting process that meets the above challenge,
Therefore the 2011 City Council recommends the Mayor and administration, in partnership with the City Council, utilize the following strategies:

1) An aggressive budget timetable for SFY 2012 that includes creating a 5 year municipal budget projection to be presented at the January business meeting.

2) The Council and Mayor appoint the CBAC no later than February and empower the 2010 CBAC as a holdover body until then; the Council Finance Committee, Mayor and administration to work closely with the CBAC beginning January to prepare the 5 year projection and 2012 budget.

3) 2011 should be year we begin to migrate non-core services to other entities. Further municipal funding of non-core services puts pressure on the budgets and causes the elimination of core-services like Fire, Police and Public Works. Council understands the value of most non-core services to the community and intends for these non-core services to be continued for our community which needs them.

4) In anticipation of the non-continued municipal funding of non-core services Council directs the administration to work with great haste to find new ownership of these programs. New ownership for at least one of these non-core services should be in place by June 30th. Administration shall report monthly to the Council on the progress of migrating these services to a non-governmental agency. An example and model of such a successful transfer is our own Dudley House.

5) The Citizens Budget Advisory Committee (CBAC) has endorsed this thinking and has named some non-core services to be migrated to non-profits. These include Plainfield Action Services, WIC and the bi-lingual day-care center.

6) The inspections department should be reorganized to include focus on core needs: greater inspection enforcement and reduction in C of C which is already done through the normal market forces.

7) Council directs the administration to utilize the auxiliary Police to the maximum allowable extent of the law. This may mean training, uniforms etc. The Council is hereby directing the administration to come up with a comprehensive plan utilizing the auxiliary department and the Council is committed to fully funding this as a means of increasing public safety.

8) Council directs the administration to continue consolidation of government divisions, bureaus and offices and to redirect scarce resources by shifting unneeded management staffing to direct services.

Only by the timely and collaborative effort of the executive and legislative branches of local government can we remain in control of Plainfield government’s future and avoid outside forces dictating how residents needs best be met. This requires leadership of all elected officials.

Democracy in Action

2010-12-21T10:48:00.004-05:00

Monday nights Council meeting demonstrated why Plainfield is such an amazing place. I am not referring to the decisions that were made. It was the audience participation in the process of government that was so riveting and gratifying to see. After honoring local film-maker Alrick Brown whose movie Kinyarwanda was accepted into the Sundance Film Festival (quite an honor), I want to say "Alrick, make a movie about the civic spirit in Plainfield." We have the tension created by diversity and conflicting agendas that can drive many a story line.

There were two important story lines at last nights meeting. The one involving the Mayor and Bibi Taylor has been covered by Bernice Paglia, Mark Spivey and (soon I am sure) by Olddoc and Dan Damon. The other story will not get the attention it deserves. That is the 2011 municipal budget. A long list of budget amendments were read and approved, bringing the Council closer to final budget approval. Lost in the details were the many budget reductions that will result in reduced services and staff lay-offs. This arduous process included many hard decisions by the Mayor, senior managers and Council. Yes there was some finger pointing and blaming for staff lay-offs but the reality is that we have a state imposed cap on how much we can spend and tax. And budget reductions were made by every elected official- Mayor and all seven Council members. I hope that realization leads to better collaboration going forward.

Looking at the budget story line further, there are two sub-plots I must mention:

1. the Library amendment restores $150,000 to expand its hours back to what they were before the last reductions were made. If you are a Library supporter, you should thank each Council member as this amendment received unanimous support. Particular thanks should go to the members of the Council's Finance Committee - Adrian Mapp, Annie McWilliams and myself - who made this happen by finding the funds in other expense lines rather than increased property taxes.

2. Recreation! Alrick - what a sub-plot we have here. A rumor starts in the community that the City Council members have a personal vendetta against local hero and champion of youth, the Recreation Director. They are going to cut him off at the knees (reduce him to part-time). A groundswell of grass roots support grows and spills out into the Council meeting chamber. Speaker after speaker blast the Council members for mean-spirited disservice to the community. But wait, are those rumors distortions of the truth. The Council actually recommended moving $30,000 from administrative salaries into youth programs, leaving Recreation with the same overall budget as recommended by the Mayor (who happens to be the chief supporter of the Recreation Director). And the Recreation Director's position will be unaffected unless the Mayor decides to reduce his hours - not going to happen. Alrick can you clean up the plot a little, make it a better story than what I just told. Annie and Sharon can play themselves but I suggest you use Sean Connery ( a younger Sean) to play me.

Mark Your Calendar for Monday December 20

2010-12-17T15:15:00.002-05:00

I urge Plainfield residents to come to the City Council meeting Monday at 8 pm.

The word has spread quickly that Mayor Robinson-Briggs has fired City Administrator Bibi Taylor. The Council has made numerous requests for the Mayor to explain her reasons. It is reasonable to expect the Mayor to come forward and give her reasons. She did not do so at last Monday's Council meeting and she has an obligation to do so this coming Monday.

The Council has the power to re-instate Ms Taylor by resolution. Five votes will be required. The City Administrator position is important - he or she is responsible for the day to day operation of city government. Your Council representatives need to hear from you on this critical subject. There will be an opportunity for residents to speak to the Council at the beginning of the meeting. Make your views known.

Everyone I have ever spoken with about Ms Taylor agrees with my assessment that she has been doing an excellent job. Perhaps there are people who agree with the Mayor. We need to hear those views also. Whatever you think, please come to the meeting.

Plainfield Needs a New Budgeting Process

2010-12-14T15:03:00.005-05:00

The following draft resolution was introduced at the last Council agenda fixing session. Credit cannot go to one person as it includes the many suggestions made over the last year by members of Council and the Citizens Budget Advisory Committee. Not all recommendations will be popular but the point is to collaboratively make hard decisions and not avoid the inevitable.

The true test of collaboration between all stakeholders is whether Mayor Sharon Robinson Briggs will convene the Citizens Budget Advisory Committee, City Council Finance Committee members, the unions and members of her administration in January to begin working on the 2012 budget. Everyone has pledged their commitment. Mayor Sharon: the ball is in your court.

2012 Plainfield Municipal Budget Planning Resolution

The municipal budget is a set of priorities of the government. With a finite budget, we can only spend so much money. Money spent in one area means there is less to spend in another area. As such, forward directional priorities are necessary to start the entire leadership of Plainfield thinking about pro-active and multi-year budgeting.

Whereas the state of New Jersey is imposing a 2% tax levy cap for Fiscal Year 2012 and

Whereas Plainfield’s municipal government expenses continue to rise while non-property tax revenues are decreasing in the short term and

Whereas the City Council desires to plan proactively to prepare for a difficult budgeting process that will challenge municipal government to meet the needs of residents and employees and

Whereas 2011 Council wishes to work pro-actively with the Mayor and administration to create a budgeting process that meets the above challenge,

Therefore the 2011 City Council recommends the Mayor and administration, in partnership with the City Council, utilize the following strategies:

1) An aggressive budget timetable for SFY 2012 that includes creating a 5 year municipal budget projection to be presented at the January business meeting.

2) The Council and Mayor appoint the CBAC no later than February and empower the 2010 CBAC as a holdover body until then; the Council Finance Committee, Mayor and administration to work closely with the CBAC beginning January to prepare the 5 year projection and 2012 budget.

3) 2011 should be the year we begin to migrate non-core services to other entities. Further continuation of non-core services puts pressure on the budgets and causes the elimination of core-services like Fire, Police and Public Works. Council understands the value of our non-core services to the community and intends for these non-core services to be continued for our community which needs them.

4) In anticipation of the non-continued funding of non-core services Council directs the administration to work with great haste to find new ownership of these programs. New ownership should be in place by June 30th for at least one of the non core services identified by the 2010 CBAC. Administration shall report monthly to the Council on the progress of migrating these services to a non-governmental agency. An example and model of such a successful transfer is our own Dudley House.

5) The Citizens Budget Advisory Committee (CBAC) has endorsed this thinking and has named some non-core services to be migrated to non-profits. These include Plainfield Action Services, WIC and the bi-lingual day-care center.

6) The inspections department should be reorganized to include focus on core needs: greater inspection enforcement and reduction in C of C which is already done through the normal market forces.

7) Council directs the administration to utilize the auxiliary Police to the maximum allowable extent of the law. This may mean training, uniforms etc. The Council is hereby directing the administration to come up with a comprehensive plan utilizing the auxiliary department and the Council is committed to fully funding this as a means of increasing public safety.

8) Council directs the administration to continue consolidation of government divisions, bureaus and offices and to redirect scarce resources by shifting unneeded management staffing to direct services.

Only by the timely and collaborative effort of the executive and legislative branches of local government can we remain in control of Plainfield government’s future and avoid outside forces dictating how residents needs best be met. This requires leadership of all elected officials.

Anti-violence rally last week

2010-11-28T23:24:00.005-05:00

I attended the rally organized by the Peoples Organization for Progress last week on West Front Street. I was struck by the hunger of the participants for leadership to emerge in Plainfield to address the problems facing the youth of our city.

Most of the recent focus by elected officials has been on law enforcement solutions like spot shotter technology and promoting anonymous tips to the police about criminal activity. And there is no doubt about the importance of the police department to ensure the safety of Plainfield residents. But lets be honest. Law enforcement will not solve our gang and drug problems. We need to get to the causes.

So I was encouraged when Councilwoman Annie McWilliams put the idea of a youth master plan on the table at the last Council meeting. It is a starting point. Bring together all the adults and young people who are currently serving as role models and providing services, opportunities and mentoring to young people. Get them to work in a more coordinated way. Bring more volunteers into the helping process. Learn from other cities that have implemented best practices in youth programs.

There are signs of hope. I heard one of the youth baseball leaders say at a recent Council meeting: why can't the two leagues play each other so the kids can mingle. I would prefer we have one league but hey this is a step in a positive direction after many months of accusations and ill will between the adults of the two leagues.

If we want our children to become good citizens, we adults will need to lead the way.

League of Municipalities Convention

2010-11-23T22:59:00.004-05:00

I attended for one day this year. I attended a session named "Real Property Tax Reform - How do we get there." Professor Ernie Reock from Rutgers led off led off and told us the bad news we already know - New Jersey is a leader in taxation. He listed principles to follow for tax reform - tax changes need to be broad based, progessive and shifted away from property tax. He felt that an increased sales tax is a good way to replace property taxes. It tends to hurt people at the lower end of the earning spectrum and he said this can be corrected by exempting items such as clothing and over the counter medications. Dr Reock was following by three state legislators. There was a fair amount of rhetoric and not much substance. The highlight was Jon Bramnick saying that municipalities have done a better job of budgeting than state government because they are forced to make hard decisions every year and the state can defer its problems year after year. He urged the audience not to send its money to Trenton. Another legislator advocated an increased gas tax as long as the revenue is dedicated to the Transportation Trust Fund. I agree with that.

The most useful session for me was "Doing Less with Less - Prioritizing Needs and Staffing". I knew this would be good because the moderator was Reagan Burkeholder, the retired City Manager of Summit and instructor of the class for newly elected officials in New Jersey (I took his course 7 years ago). Reagan is active in the national movement to use comparative performance measurement to improve the performance of municipal government. This approach is currently used in only 12 of the 566 towns in New Jersey. Plainfield is not one. We did take a step in the right direction thanks to Annie McWilliams who required Plainfield division heads to use goals, objectives and data when they made their presentations recently at the Council's budget hearings.

Here is what Reagan had to say:

1. from 2004 - 2009 the average NJ municipal budget
* grew 4.9% per year
* surplus shrank .4% per year
* non property tax revenues few 2.5% per year
* delinquent taxes grew 4.7% per year
* taxes grew 7.6% per year

2. the experts projections for 2010 - 2015
* total revenues will grow 2.3% per year
* surplus will continue to shrink
* delinquent taxes will grow 3% per year
* taxes will grow 2.5%/yr (this accounts for the 2% tax levy cap and exemptions)

3. The outcome: without a drastic cutback, expenses will exceed revenues by 15% after five years. Not all municipal expenses are under the control of local elected officials. So 80% of the budget would have to be reduced by 20% over five years.

Imagine what that would do to Plainfield city government. If we do business as usual, it would not be possible to maintain our public safety staffing at current levels.

4. What to do:
* decide what services are needed
* least expensive way to provide them
* much more engagement and education of citizens in the budget process
* comparative performance measurement - how do we stack up against other towns
* 3 year budgeting
* engage employees in discussion of how to save money and improve services

A panel of city administrators and CFOs spoke about initiatives in their towns. The highlights:
* two towns share overnight police patrols
* once a week trash pick-up
* talk honestly and early about lay-offs in all departments
* apply credit card company business practices to the tax collection office
* combine divisions with city government to share administrative support staff:
examples - planning and economic development
- city administrator and city clerk
- recreation and health
- finance and tax collection

2nd Ward Roads Update

2010-10-27T14:37:00.003-04:00

There is a flurry of activity on roads in the 2nd Ward. Here are the highlights:

1. Watchung Ave between 7th St and Hillside is being paved. Curb work continues this week. Concrete driveway aprons will be installed beginning later this week or next week. Paving is expected to happen the last week of November or the first week of December.

2. Old and missing street signs are being replaced in the Netherwood neighborhood today and tomorrow.

3. The intersection of 7th St and Belividere Ave. will have crosswalks painted tomorrow or Friday, weather permitting. Pedestrian crossing signs will be added for west bound traffic along 7th St east of the intersection. This busy intersection has seen many accidents and has a lot of pedestrian traffic going to and from the Netherwood train station.

Thanks go to the Public Works employees and to the local advocates for speaking out on behalf of their neighbors for these improvements. More to follow.

CFO update

2010-10-25T20:08:00.002-04:00

I spoke last Friday with the Deputy Director of Local Govt Services, a division of NJ Department of Community Affairs. He said Plainfield will be hearing from DCA imminently with a resolution to our CFO problem. He would not disclose what the answer would be because his letter was sitting on the Commissioners desk for approval.

I am not sure if this is good news or not. It would be a real let down if DCA does not come to the aid of Plainfield on this matter. What is DCA for if not to assist local governments in need. I will hope for a temporary resolution to our problem as well as a permanent one.

Thanks must go to Maria Pellum who contacted DCA herself to urge them to action. I asked the state official if he could acknowledge any communications from Plainfield citizens and he said he had heard from a number of people.

Attending the NJ League of Municipalities Convention

2010-10-11T14:03:00.006-04:00

I applaud Councilman Rashid Burney for his decision not to attend the League Convention in November. It is not a good use of taxpayers money for an outgoing elected official to spend city dollars in such a way. This should hold true for the Board of Education, the PMUA and the Housing Authority, each of which sends elected and appointed people to conventions on the taxpayers dime. When I was on the Board of Education, I argued for the same approach to be made policy but did so in vain. It is on the to do list of the City Council's Finance Committee. The only thing one official can do for certain is to set the good example as Burney does.

I want to make sure there is not a misperception on the cost of the League of Municipalities Convention. Rashid mentions saving $1500. The cost for Council members to attend is more like $400. That assumes the costs are limited to registration ($60), two nights for the hotel (at $140 per night) plus gas and tolls. I do not believe that Plainfield Council members are requesting reimbursements for food and drink. There was one unfortunate exception in the past but that person is no longer on the Council. And when that came to the attention of the Council, we refused to make the reimbursement.

As for getting the most from the convention, Rashid makes good points. I only need to add that every sitting Council member I have attended the League convention with has been an active attendee at sessions and networking events. I agree with Rashid that the convention sessions are very helpful.

I plan to attend for one day as I did last year. Last year I did not stay overnight. This year I am still undecided but if I do, it will be for one night only. I promise to share through my blog what I learn from the 2010 convention and hope to implement.

Shot spotter technology: two things to consider, two things to avoid

2010-09-26T17:51:00.006-04:00

Plainfield is poised to purchase technology that will enable the police to instantly locate gunshots in our city. The upfront cost is $1 million to cover an area stretching completely across the city from east to west. The ongoing cost will be $100,000 per year for the service contract. Proponents say we will get more convictions and the shot spotter program will be a deterrent to crime. Other cities are getting onboard and the company that sells the shot spotter program claims that it reduces crime.

Public safety is a huge concern in Plainfield and nowhere more than in some west side neighborhoods. Citizens deserve to be safe and to feel safe so this technology needs serious consideration. The Council has already approved the financing for it on first reading. Second reading will likely be in October.

I am in favor of Plainfield becoming a shot spotter city. My problem is the approach we are taking. Two things we must consider:

1. We are taking a buy first, plan later approach. Technology in and of itself will not solve our crime problems any more than a computer on a desk at the One Stop Career Center will get someone a job. We need a comprehensive strategy for crime. It needs to include technology, adequate police manpower, best practices in rapid response, recreation programs for youth and jobs programs for young adults. If we are going to spend $100,000 a year on a technology contract, we need to ask if some of that money could instead help balance our strategy by hiring mentors to work with kids evenings and weekends. It appears to me that we are rushing into this because no-one wants to appear to be against crime fighting. The reality is that fighting crime does not address the core problems facing our youth and we need to deal with them and fight crime at the same time.

2. Big problem, limited resources. Our administration wants to spend taxpayer dollars without having really looked for the grants that are out there and being used by other towns. When faced with an expensive gamble that shows promise, a sensible thing to do is ease into it. I am not saying study it to death. I mean install shot spotter in a smaller section of town. Starting with the west side makes sense because our crime statistics tell us we should concentrate there. We can see how it works and decide later if the east side of town would benefit from shot spotter. Hopefully we will have made some progress on getting grant money. Or perhaps we would decide to concentrate more on the core problems through recreation and jobs programs for kids in the sections of town where gang activity is prevalent.

There are many unanswered questions. What if silencers are installed on handguns? What if a gang member fires shots in the eastend to divert the police from a planned gun confrontation in the westend? We need answers and comprehensive strategies. Lets move on this but not rush into an emotional decision that may or may not be the best way to use Plainfield's limited resources.

Two things we need to avoid as debate on this initiative continues:
1. I don't believe Council members are polarized on this issue as New versus Regular Democrats. But some members of the public will want to pressure Council members by accusing them of being "political". I heard that during the public comments at the last meeting. I worry that elected officials may be pressured to rush into this to avoid the accusation of not caring about citizens safety. That is nonsense.

2. The perception that city resources are unfairly distributed between the 4th ward versus 2nd ward also came up at the last Council meeting. The comment referred to people on the hill. I live on "the hill" and here is a news flash: there are gunshots on the hill. Another news flash in case you think "the hill" is synonymous with white people: it is the most ethnically and racially diverse neighborhood in Plainfield. By far. And people "on the hill" care about what happens in other parts of town. We understand that for Plainfield to thrive, the whole town needs to be safe and secure.

I hope we can move on the shot spotter proposal but not before elected officials look at this with open eyes and rational minds.

Dear Assemblyman Green – Cease and Desist in Your Actions to Smear a Non Profit Agency that Helps People in Need.

2010-08-15T10:40:00.002-04:00

In light of the fact that Assemblyman Green has inexplicably brought my employer, Bridgeway, and its internal personnel transactions into the public arena, my Board of Trustees has asked me to respond on behalf of Bridgeway.

It is unfortunate the Assemblyman’s political agenda would lead him to attack a leading organization that champions the rights of disadvantaged people to lead lives worth living. Every person served by Bridgeway has a diagnosis of a serious mental illness. These individuals deserve the same respect and opportunities as everyone. Additionally, most of Bridgeway’s clientele are poor with a high percentage of people representing minority groups.

Bridgeway is dedicated to the rights and equal opportunities of minorities, advocating to eliminate disparities based on disability, gender and sexual preference as well as race. Bridgeway’s services continue to be cited as “exemplary” by both the State of NJ and the Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities, the international agency that accredits mental health providers. The NJ Association of Mental Health Agencies named us as the Mental Health Provider of the Year in 2007. To maintain those standards, Bridgeway strives to recruit and retain the best employees in the field and ones who can relate to persons served because they look and speak like them.

It is true that 3 people, myself included, who helped build Bridgeway over many years to what it is today, are not members of minority groups. But we at Bridgeway are proud of the fact that our employees truly represent the communities we serve. Our most recent Affirmative Action Report (AAR) shows that of 167 full time employees, 54 were African American, 25 were Hispanic and 10 were Asian. So the minority employees totaled 89 or 54% of all Bridgeway employees. The total number of promotions for the most recent reporting period shows that of 4 promotions, 1 was African American and 2 were Hispanic. None of the most recent promotion information is contained on the AAR. Of the last 5 promotions, one (Assistant Director) was African American, one (Quality Improvement Director) was Asian. Four of the five were females. They bring the total number of current minority employees who are managers and supervisors to 13, of which 6 are African Americans. We are proud of the efforts made to recruit and promote minority employees but we will continue to push for more minority employees to climb the career ladder at Bridgeway.

Bridgeway does not use a civil service system approach to promoting staff. Our system is merit based with seniority being an additional factor. This ensures that Bridgeway’s service recipients, who have been discriminated against and have frequently been denied opportunities, receive the very best in services.

When Two Worlds Collide

2010-07-18T07:14:00.004-04:00

Fans of Jerry Seinfeld may remember the Seinfeld television episode when George tried and failed to keep his two worlds separate. Like George, I try to keep my two worlds apart. In my case, it is my elected official life in Plainfield and and professional life as Executive Director of Bridgeway Rehabilitation Services, Inc. A recent blog post by Assemblyman Jerry Green distorted my track record as a mental health professional and that of my employer, Bridgeway. To my Plainfield constituents - I wish to set the record straight.

Bridgeway Rehabilitation Services is a not for profit psychiatric rehabilitation service organization. We serve adults who have been diagnosed with serious mental illnesses, people whose psychiatric illnesses have been exacerbated by poverty and co-occurring substance abuse, chronic medical conditions and homelessness. Most of the people Bridgeway serves have spent time in state and local psychiatric in-patient units. State psychiatric hospitals are not humane environments and cost the taxpayer $180,000 per patient per year.

Bridgeway offers recovery, a new way of viewing and coping with serious mental illnesses. We offer a wrap around service that supports people to not only manage their symptoms and take their medications but to strive for a life worth living. That means working, going to school, having your own apartment and a circle of support comprised of family and friends - what everybody wants.

Bridgeway is part of a state-wide network of service providers who work with the state to help institutionalized people re-integrate into the community. Years ago it was believed that mental illness was a life sentence to be spent in an institution like Greystone Park or Trenton State Psychiatric Hospital. As treatment improved, it was believed that people could live in the community but in a group home or boarding house like the Park Hotel. Group homes cost the taxpayer $65,000 per year per resident and up. Today we've taken a big step further because the research clearly demonstrates that most people with serious mental illnesses can live independently with flexible supports. This approach, called supportive housing, is what Bridgeway specializes in.

Supportive housing costs the taxpayers $10,000 to $30,000 per year per person, depending on the complexity of the needs of the person served. Supportive housing as done by Bridgeway, is scattered site. That means each person has his/her own apartment and they are not clustered or in a congregate housing arrangement. Unlike the Park Hotel or a group home, that is true community integration. Bridgeway serves 1500 people each year, spanning 8 counties in central and northern New Jersey. Over 90% are in supportive housing. Some live with their families and a few live in places like the Park Hotel. We offer them the opportunity to move out into a more independent living arrangement. It's their choice.

Bridgeway believes choice is critical for service recipients and it is maximized by helping people find apartments in the existing rental market. That means properties are not taken off the tax rolls. The only exception Bridgeway made was when we purchased 4 two bedroom condomiums in Union County and 1 three bedroom house in Hunterdon County for use by our service recipients. To maximize choice, we did not purchase in the two urban centers, Elizabeth and Plainfield, because we felt that more living opportunities should be created in suburban areas. And those condo properties were taken off the tax rolls (Elizabeth and Plainfield were clearly doing more than their share to assist people with disabilities).

Supportive housing works because Bridgeway offers multi-disciplinary service teams that are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week to come out for home visits. One of these teams is based in Plainfield and rents office space on East Front Street. Most Plainfield residents are unaware of this because our community integration approach is working.

Bridgeway was recognized as mental health agency of the year in 2007 by our trade association, NJ Association of Mental Health Agencies, representing over 160 organizations. I was recognized as psychiatric rehabilitation agency director of the year in 2008 by the U.S. Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association.

Although Bridgeway is prominent in its field, Bridgeway and its service recipients are virtually invisible in the community and that is a good thing, considering the stigma that comes with mental illness. People with mental illnesses deserve the opportunity to become productive members of our communities and do not deserve to be stigmatized, especially by elected officials with political agendas.

Response to Assemblyman Green

2010-06-20T06:54:00.003-04:00

Thank you Assemblyman Green for recognizing the power I have to influence the course of events in Plainfield. For the record, however, the Park Hotel was converted into a boarding home in 1970. I was a college sophomore in Buffalo, NY at the time.

As for group homes, I am guessing that you forgot the discussion we had a few years ago about the Park Hotel and group homes. I will refresh your memory. You came to me with a plan to close the Park Hotel. I told you that plans for the 170 residents would have to be included so they weren't just put out on the street. I explained that there are more humane solutions than warehousing people in large boarding homes. I mentioned supportive housing as a solution and that I work for a non profit organization that subscribes to the supportive housing model. You may recall that I am the co-founder of the New Jersey Supportive Housing Association and I invited you to speak at one of our meetings in Trenton. You did so.

Boarding homes and group homes are the traditional approach to housing for people in need. In fact, most special needs populations are capable of living independently if they are offered services and supports by human service professionals who visit them in their apartments. This is supportive housing - what I do for a living.

Supportive housing has the advantage of helping people with special needs integrate into the community. They are not in congregate housing which calls attention to them. They are living just as you or I do. Supportive housing as done by the non profit I work for does not take properties off the tax rolls. We do it as market rate rentals. Assemblyman Green - your claim about a bank being converted into a group home has nothing to do with the organization or work I am associated with. In fact I don't even know what property you are referring to. I hope this is not an example of throwing out misleading information and hoping some of it sticks.

It is sad that you are attacking me with false accusations. Recently you offered to give me the party endorsement in next Junes City Council primary election. Suddenly you have changed your mind? Would that have to do with my criticisms of your unethical campaign accusations of your political opponents?

Election Campaign Thoughts

2010-06-12T09:55:00.004-04:00

Bernice Paglia and Old Doc have done an excellent job of telling it like it is and I thank them for their service to the public. We are lucky to have bloggers that are energetic and persistent in following the often confusing chain of political events in Plainfield. I do not wish to be repetitive so my comments are more on the personal side.

This campaign brought a very difficult choice for me. I have a lot of respect for Rashid Burney and Rebecca Williams. And they are both close friends of mine. It is safe to say that there are few people in Plainfield who have done more for our city than these two. Certainly none of those who criticized one of them during the campaign has their record of civic accomplishments.

Both candidates inspired passionate supporters, also friends of mine and on both sides, to work on their behalf. It's a huge compliment when serious, committed people line up as your supporter. And both Rebecca and Rashid deserve this kind of support. Neither one deserved the personal attacks that surfaced during the campaign.

My definition of an ethical, issues oriented election campaign does not include personal attacks. Here is my hope for the future in Plainfield elections:
1. Stick to the issues.
2. The incumbents record is fair game. The challengers past civic activities and related employment are fair game. Get their histories right. Use facts, not the assumptions of others (which can be self-serving). Do your own homework on your opponent. Attack the record, not the person.
3. If a candidate "misbehaves", attack the behavior, not the character of the person.
4. When an overzealous supporter engages in personal attacks, his/her candidate disavows the unethical attack.

In this primary, the rhetoric and accusations escalated as we got closer to election day. There is one source of contentiousness that was so "over the top" that it needs to be highlighted as harmful to Plainfield and not just to the candidates. Jerry Greens mailer and blog exemplified the textbook use of scapegoating, guilt by association and distortion of facts. I know Rashid Burney very well and there is no way he had anything to do with the Assemblyman's attacks on Rebecca Williams.

Hard feelings will linger from this primary campaign. It is important that Rebecca, Rashid and all their dedicated supporters resolve differences and unite behind the cause that led us into politics in the first place: the betterment of Plainfield.

Rebecca Williams for Plainfield City Council

2010-06-03T08:37:00.001-04:00

I am voting for Rebecca Williams for Plainfield City Council in the June 8 primary election. Plainfield needs a strong, intelligent, independent voice to join the City Council at this critical point in time and Rebecca fits this description completely.

She is not reluctant to take a principled stand in the face of pressure from "the powers that be". This will be a very useful trait as we approach the new budget year. Plainfield is not out of the fiscal woods by a long shot, and the temptation to the Administration to outsource its way out of difficulties is questionable at best. It will take a strong Council to put the interests of Plainfield taxpayers first and make prudent budget decisions in the face of special interest groups. Rebecca is a person who will weigh the needs of Plainfield and not cave in to business as usual.

The City Council provides checks and balances to the Mayor and her administration. When the Mayor shows no willingness to cooperate with the Council as is sometimes the case, a strong City Council is needed to set Plainfield in the right direction. In the past few years we have seen wasteful spending, insensitive managers and ineffective services. Two examples are the Mayor's wasteful use of police bodyguards for herself and her inability to direct the Recreation Department to cooperate with the Queen City Baseball League. Rebecca would have made a difference in both situations. Only a strong City Council can stand up and help the administration make corrections that our residents need and demand. Vote for Rebecca Williams on June 8. Plainfield needs her.

A Bit of Campaign Season Silliness

2010-05-31T11:30:00.002-04:00

Assemblyman Green has cast aspersions again as he tends to do near the end of a local political campaign. This time Inez Durham is in his spotlight. Why would he insinuate that she has some responsibility for Plainfield's Board of Education woes and at the same time connect her to Rebecca Williams, challenger to Green's incumbent candidate for City Council? The answer is Steve Gallon. This is a campaign tactic that can be called guilt by association. I would like to set the record straight on Inez Durham.

Inez has a record of exemplary service to the Plainfield community. I know of her work directly through our joint service as Board of Education members. Inez has had a long and successful career as an educator and, I believe, she retired after serving as Assistant Superintendent of Schools in Piscataway. She was and is exactly the kind of person we need in Plainfield to strengthen our community. If we had ten more of Inez, Plainfield would be a lot better off.

It was her reputation and track record of community service that led Steve Gallon to offer her a job. She took it and served briefly, not because she needed the work, but because she saw an opportunity to once again help the Plainfield school system. If Assemblyman Green looked into the circumstances of her leaving this position, he would know how inaccurate and unjust his blog post is. But we are in what many call "silly season", when politicians twist facts and count on the voters accepting distorted viewpoints.

Cooler heads are part of the Assemblyman's campaign team and they need to set the record straight on Inez, unless of course if the Assemblyman himself does so first.

Earth Day in Plainfield

2010-04-22T22:44:00.008-04:00

Earth Day was Thursday and Adrian Mapp, Darlene McWilliams, City Administrator Bibi Taylor, Plainfield Planning Director Bill Nierstadt, yours truly and members of the news media converged on the Green Brook on the western border of Plainfield. We were there to celebrate a $229,000 NJ Dept of Transportation grant to begin construction of a multi-use trail along the brook. The Green Brook Trail project originated during the second term of late Mayor Al McWilliams and it was fitting that Darlene was present at the soon to be trailhead on Jefferson Ave.

Al McWilliams had the vision to pick up on the original 1920's concept created by the Olmsted Brothers, sons of Frederic Law Olmsted, planner of NYC's Central Park. It has taken 7 years of planning, grant writing and designing to get us poised for action. April Stefel and Bill Nierstadt deserve much thanks for their efforts over the years. Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs has kept the vision alive and it was a shame that she was not available to join us.

It must be mentioned that Adrian Mapp, Bill Nierstadt and I rode our bikes down Myrtle Ave which runs parallel to the brook and trail route. Check out the Courier News photograph above to learn which law-abiding cyclist had his helmet on.

Visioning Charette a Success

2010-03-27T17:51:00.007-04:00

70 people came out to the community visioning meeting today at Washington School. The presenters from NJIT described opportunities for development along the Raritan Valley rail line. The opportunities for investment in Plainfield's underutilized properties will increase as we move closer to dual powered locomotives and the completion of the new rail tunnel under the Hudson River.

Participants included residents, business owners and local officials including Planning and Zoning Board members, Council members, the Mayor and our Assemblyman. An informative presentation by the NJIT graduate students set the stage for the "charette". Participants circulated around 6 tables where they offered input on what development should look like. There were tables for each proposed development opportunity:

1) Grant Ave around the old train station
2) Clinton Ave around the old train station
3) Downtown station north - North Ave, Gavett Place, East 2nd St
4) Downtown station south - the area bordered by Watchung Ave, Park Ave, East 4th St and East 6 St
5) Netherwood Station
6) South Ave between Terrill Road and Leland Ave

I thought the participant input was excellent and will help Plainfield achieve several objectives. First and foremost, citizens need to be a part of the planning for important Plainfield decisions. When development deals are strictly behind closed doors, resident quality of life concerns take a back seat to outside interests. Involving all stakeholders in Plainfield's future is the only way forward.

Citizen involvement increases buy-in for critical land use and financial decisions. Translating our vision into reality means confronting the real world. What are investors willing to risk on downtown projects? What prices are home buyers, renters and new businesses willing to pay to become part of Plainfield. Taxpayers and voters may be asked to support tax abatements and will only do so if they feel there is something in it for them. They will need to feel confident in the decision making process, to be part of it.

Next blog will address the question everyone has asked me about the vision study: will it actually lead to real action or just sit on a shelf?

Plainfield Visioning Study

2010-03-18T12:37:00.006-04:00

Community Visioning Meeting Saturday, March 27 from 9 am to 3 pm at Washington School. Repeat - March 27 is the date, not this Saturday as I originally stated.

Why are we doing this?: to open up the discussion and planning for Plainfields development to residents and business owners.

Who will be there? Local officials, Rutgers and NJIT professors and students, the community.

What's in it for me?: you can have a say in creating the blueprint for the future of Plainfield. This is not a presentation. It is an interactive meeting in which your input will be solicited.

What is the focus for the meeting?: development of the areas around our downtown train station, Netherwood station and Plainfield West along the rail corridor. The new Hudson River train tunnel will increase access to Manhatten for Plainfield residents and businesses. A one seat ride into NYC will be one outcome of the tunnel.

How can I participate?: show up for the meeting!!

It is important to lend your voice to this discussion. The future of Plainfield is at stake.

Be Concerned about Next Years Budget This Year

2010-02-13T13:14:00.004-05:00

A 7 1/2% tax increase in this years municipal budget is something to be concerned about. Taking a multi year budgeting approach, we should make every attempt to average 3 3/4% tax increase for this year and next.

In other words, we need to aim for a 0% increase in the fiscal year 2011 (FY 2011)budget. Sounds unrealistic? Perhaps not. Here is what needs to happen:

1. Start working on the budget March 1 the latest. This part has to be done by the Mayor, City Administrator Bibi Taylor and their staff. Aim for a July or August budget introduction to Council.

2. Hold a retreat to get consensus between the Mayor, Council and senior management on FY 2011 priorities. This needs to happen in March or April. We can argue about details later but let's start with general agreement about what we want our tax increase to be and what is most important to spend our municipal revenues on.

3. The Council has consensus on a FY 2010 budget that has $1 million in budget cuts and sets the stage for savings in FY 2011 that could be full year savings. That will only happen if the Council sticks to its guns at the Tuesday 8 pm budget hearing.

4. The Council will have to direct the administration to reorganize some departments and offices in city hall to make them more efficient and cost effective. This will need to be done by resolution. The sooner this direction is given, the sooner the Mayor and administration can come back with recommendations. This part of the process would have to begin in the next month or two.

5. One thing working in our favor was pointed out by the city administrator recently. Last years pension deferral will be completely paid in the FY 2010 budget and the pension expense for FY 2011 should decrease significantly.

6. A wild card is state aid to Plainfield. We could very well see a decrease in this revenue source in FY 2011. All the more reason to work hard to hold future expenses in check and create the conditions for increasing tax ratables. One strategy would be to keep Plainfield's property taxes lower than surrounding towns. This would make Plainfield more attractive to home buyers, developers and new businesses.

We need a short term and long term budget strategy. The short term approach is up for a vote Tuesday at 8 pm. Please come out and support the Council. Naysayers will be present.

In the long term, there is cause for concern but each of the suggestions above are do-able. Previous city administrator Marc Dashield gave the Council a 5 year budget projection last year that showed a 50% increase in municipal property taxes over the 5 years. We don't have to go there but we will have some very difficult decisions to make. Employees will certainly be affected. Plainfield tends to protect their needs better than the needs of residents in general. Local elected officials have the challenging job of balancing the needs of all constituents.

It's Time to Approve the Budget

2010-02-07T12:55:00.005-05:00

We should have done this earlier in the year but here we are in February, preparing to vote on budget amendments, the next step in the municipal budgeting process. Unfortunately it has been a typical year - we are trying to reduce a high tax increase by cutting expenses. Revenues increases continue to be flat or down so we have no other method to attack the proposed tax increase.

So where are we?

1. the administration introduced a budget with a 9.6% tax increase.
2. the Council Finance Committee (I am a member) proposed $1.1 million in cuts.
3. the Council, as a whole, agreed with most of the changes proposed by the Finance Committee, leading to Monday's Council meeting: the consensus changes will be on the agenda in the form of budget amendments. The Council must vote to approve these amendments so we can advertise the budget to the public, hold a public hearing and (finally) approve the budget for the July 1, 2009 - June 30, 2010 fiscal year.

I hope the final steps in the process are not typical of some previous years decisions. Painful budget cuts have sometimes been beaten back by special interest groups. That would be a big mistake this time around. The Council budget truly spreads the pain to all concerned. Each group agrees that property tax increases are hurting our residents but fights to prevent the cut that affects them.

Expect some groups to be present as the Council works on the budget. Expect some to advocate in the spirit of constructive debate. Expect some to threaten the Council and to spread misleading rumors in the community (example - eliminating positions in the top heavy police division is a personal vendetta against a few captains).

I urge residents to attend our Council meeting Monday night. One of the interest groups that is always underrepresented is homeowners. When elected officials hear primarily from employee unions, budgeting for compensation, health benefits and pensions can and have become a burden that threatens the future of our state and city.

If the Council resists special interest group pressure the 9.6% tax increase reduces to around 7.5%. That is still too high but some of the budget cuts set the stage for more significant cuts next year when we can get 12 months of savings instead of only a few. If the Council bows to pressure, the tax increase goes back towards 9.6% and will mean a higher increase next year. That would be disastrous to residents struggling to make mortgage and rent payments. Come out and advocate for a balanced approach to Plainfields budget. That is what the City Council will be voting on Monday.

Plainfield Leadership at a Crossroad

2010-01-23T11:07:00.006-05:00

We have been here before. Rumors swirling, fingers pointing, people choosing sides, leaders hesitating. I am talking about proposed city budget cuts that could shake Plainfield residents and city workers out of the status quo.

Are we going to take an objective yet compassionnate look at our budget choices? Council president Annie McWilliams' latest blog is a good example of that approach. Or are we going to shoot first and aim later? That seems to be the recent response from our police union with their vote of no confidence in Martin Helwig.

Martin Helwig, Plainfield's Public Safety Director, has my full support. He has to be responsive to the residents of Plainfield and their safety concerns. He has to balance that with the needs of our excellent police force. That means he cannot possibly meet every demand of the public or the police union.

As we enter into union contract negotiations, his voice is crucial in approving the current year budget and positioning ourselves for next years financial challenges. I believe he is doing a good job of balancing the needs of residents and police employees.

Our police union has had very beneficial contracts over the years. They have negotiated with the city in a hard nosed manner. Kudos to their leaders. Our property tax burden has not been their concern. That is why we have a Mayor, Council, City Administrator and Public Safety Director.

Local governments all over New Jersey are asking employees to share the pain of our economy in recession. People living in cities are experiencing more pain than the suburbs and exurbs. If we can't find common ground with our unions, Mayors and Councils have little choice under state law and regulation but to propose layoffs. This can be a less painful process if local officials and unions work together.

It is most unfortunate that the police union voted no confidence in Helwig. Of course it is their right to do so. But a rationale and measured approach is needed from all parties in Plainfield government. Why not request a meeting with the Mayor, Helwig and the City Administrator? Why go public and "in your face"?

Followers of our municipal government know we have been here before and the results have been unsatisfactory. Lose - lose as some would say. Demoralized police, overburdened taxpayers, unempowered government officials.

There is still the potential for a solution but cooler heads must prevail. Larry Leveritt, Plainfield Schools Superintendent in the 1990's, came to town and immediately joined hands with the unions, school board and other stakeholders. He led us into interest based contract negotiations. After years of contentious haggling over pay and teacher prep time, he helped all parties to see their mutual interest: satisfaction at seeing students learn and grow. Negotiations revolved around that and the solutions for compensation and conditions of employment fell into place. Of course with different school leadership, the cooperation can slip away.

Why can't we do the same with our police unions. It will be a long, steep climb but good leadership on all sides can get us there. Unfortunately, in Plainfield the tradition is to divide and conquer. It is so ingrained that I honestly think some of our leaders who do this are not aware of it. All the more reason to get behind leaders like Annie McWilliams and Martin Helwig. Let's hear from some more leaders who want to unite rather than divide.

Gay Marriage Legislation

2010-01-05T18:42:00.002-05:00

State government is poised to enact legislation that would give the same rights to gay and lesbian citizens that other citizens now enjoy. Will it happen on time for Governor Corzine to sign it? We will know very soon. I hope this is not a last minute gesture not intended for approval.

Whatever the outcome, it seems like destiny to me that this will eventually come to pass. Young people are increasingly influential in electing our leaders and they are more and more accepting of gay rights than their elders.

Still it would be unfair to make people wait at least four more years for justice to be served and that is what Governor Christie's election could mean.

Speed Humps - more input

2010-01-02T10:46:00.006-05:00

The speed humps on Kensington Ave have triggered much reaction. Everywhere I go in Plainfield, people are telling me that this is a good idea. One of the most interesting comments came from a Kensington Ave resident who was originally opposed to speed humps but who has come to appreciate their effectiveness in slowing down vehicles.

Recently I have heard from residents of Kenyon and Putnam Avenues who want these traffic calming devices installed on their blocks. To these residents and anyone interested in this subject I have a few thoughts to share:

1. Speed humps have an important place in Plainfield's overall traffic management strategy but they must be used selectively.

2. With our budget problems, we must be extremely careful about where we spend our tax dollars. Installing speed humps selectively and at the time of repaving is a cost effective way to go.

3. There are other traffic calming methods that are cost effective and must be considered. An example is stop signs. One or two well placed stop signs on Putnam could be even more effective than speed humps. This would create intersections with four way stop signs. Another approach would be flashing yellow or red traffic signals at the dangerous Putnam intersections.

4. When we do use speed humps, they should be used judiciously. Some have commented on the number of street signs that accompany the Kensington speed humps and that they do not have an attractive appearance. Perhaps we could have installed one or two fewer humps or used less signage. I trust we will use our experience on Kensington to inform our future actions.

A photo from Councilman Burney's blog

5. Not everyone favors speed humps. One of my best friends called me last month to ask me who was the idiot whose idea this was. I did take responsibility! Residents who want them installed will face opposition from police and fire officials and from skeptical neighbors. I strongly recommend to any advocate that a neighborhood petition be circulated to demonstrate support. This was done to good effect regarding other road problems by the residents of Thornton Ave and Cedarbrook Lane. In each case they got what they needed.

The bottom line is we have taken a good step forward in pedestrian safety. Again I thank Mayor Robinson-Briggs and Councilman Burney for leadership on this. I urge the 2010 Council committee dealing with roads to take this up for policy development.

2010 - Predictions for Change

2009-12-27T19:43:00.009-05:00

Having heard a presentation from the Plainfield Cable TV Advisory Commission last fall, I was impressed by a vision, clearly defined goals and attention to policy details. The vision is to use the cable TV channel to showcase Plainfield. That would be a good antidote to the mainstream news coverage of Plainfield which likes to focus on crime. Our cable TV station has been an wasted opportunity crying out for fulfillment. I am hearing plans to teach Plainfield students about TV production and teach viewers around the greater viewing area about Plainfield's many assets. Maybe it is time for our TV station to become an asset to the city.

In contrast, the PMUA did not share a vision for the future when they came before the Council in 2009. They seem to be satisfied with their current performance. I have been satisfied with my service but as the costs go up, it is not good enough to say that because waste costs are escalating everywhere, that it is acceptable. I am waiting for the PMUA leadership to step up to the plate and repair its public image so surrounding towns will become purchasers of services. Business expansion and a composting program are my vision for PMUA. Composting and other strategies to reduce waste at the source are going to become more important than recycling as we know it.

Leadership will make the difference between a commission that anticipates the future and achieves its goals and one that does not. I am hoping that the Council will be presented with commission nominations that have vision and are serious about improving services to our residents and not merely politically connected people who will maintain the status quo. The Cable TV and PMUA commissions need people who understand the opportunities that exist to connect Plainfield with the rest of the world in useful and cost effective ways. I would like to be as hopeful about the PMUA as I am about the TV station. That is another holiday wish.

A Holiday Wish or Two for Plainfield

2009-12-20T11:42:00.004-05:00

If I could have it my way for Plainfield government, here is what would be wrapped and waiting for me under the Christmas tree:

1. A sincere promise from city administrators to give straight answers to questions from the Council and the public.

2. A Council that is willing to take the necessary disciplinary actions against administrators who engage in dishonest and unethical behavior such as the deceitful responses to questions about the city's new baseball/softball program.

3. A pledge from the Clerks office to immediately convert the Council packets from paper to email and put all agendas and minutes on the city website for all to see.

4. A commitment from the Council President and Mayor to hold a January retreat that would result in shared goals for 2010.

5. A new PMUA Commission that would set the PMUA on a more business oriented path. The new commissioners would have to be more than mere replacements. They would have to be strong and firm in insisting on changes in the performance of the PMUA staff leadership. Well intentioned "nice guys" need not apply. There will be resistance and the Commission will have to be on its game.

6. A real economic development plan to create jobs for our residents that treats the Special Improvement District and Chamber of Commerce as real partners with the city.

I have more wishes but they are for another day.

What Other Towns Are Doing About The "Budget Dilemma"

2009-11-22T11:54:00.004-05:00

More information gathered at the League of Municipalities Convention:

Clifton

- layoff plan - city administrator urged starting early so savings are not limited to a few months

- reduction in workforce - 102 positions including 20 vacant positions, 19 demotions, 49 permanent employee terminations and 14 seasonal terminations. This included 10 vacant police positions and 3 demotions.

- The savings from the reduction in force is reduced by increased unemployment benefit costs

- Non union employees absorbing increased co payments for drug benefits (from $10 to $20)

- 79 user fees increased

- Voluntary furloughs offered to save some employee positions but no-one came forward

- Superior police officers accepted 0% wage increase for 2010

Maplewood

- Council knew of $2.5 million shortfall early and worked closely with administration to introduce a budget

- layoff of 20 positions including 3 police positions

- Renegotiated FMBA contract (firefighters) to save $1.1 million and staff positions

- 12 furlough days per year (fire and police not included in this plan)

- raised user fees

- layoffs and furloughs resulted in staff morale problems

Montgomery

- county took over police dispatching, saving $600,000

- sharing IT Manager with Board of Education saving $50,000

- reduction in workforce from 166 to 137 over a two (or three?) year period

These towns are ahead of Plainfield in developing solutions to the fiscal crunch being felt all over New Jersey. At last nights Council meeting, the responsiblity for the budget shifted from the administration and Mayor over to the Council. There will still be a need for the Mayor and Council to cooperate in order to work with our unions to make the tax increase less devastating. We shall see.

Plainfield's budget - part three

2009-11-22T10:36:00.007-05:00

Or what I learned at the NJ League of Municipalities Convention

The last post, part two, explained how the state has capped the annual increase in municipal expenditures (the annual cost of living cap on expenditures is usually 2.5 % with significant exceptions allowed for pension, health benefit, capital and other costs). I also covered how this affects Plainfield.

Now to the all important revenue side of the budget. Municipal revenues are heavily dependent on property taxes to pay for local services. Important miscellaneous revenues in Plainfield are state aid and local user fees, both of which are not increasing along with our personnel expenditures. In fact the economy is taking its toll on these revenues and they are going down.

So property taxes have to increase more than expenditures on a percentage basis to compensate for the poor revenue picture. In other words, a 2.5% increase in Plainfield's annual budget (and allowing for all the cap exceptions mentioned above) may require a 10% property tax increase! That is, in fact, the situation facing Plainfield right now.

That's what motivated me to take a trip to Atlantic City to the League of Municipalities Convention (at no cost to the city), to learn about strategies used around the state to cope with our fiscal dilemma.

In one workshop Robert Casey outlined five ways cities can cope:
1. increase miscellaneous revenues - Mr Casey said that there are limited opportunities here and in fact, Plainfield has already done some of the things suggested in this category.

2. reduce expense - he said cities have to operate as businesses and seriously reduce ongoing expenses and not just use one time fixes

3. transfer costs to another entity - Plainfield has used this approach - can anyone guess what it is - the answer is at the bottom of this post.

4. shared services agreements - to get economies of scale. An example shared was a town that split the cost of an IT Manager so each paid $50,000 towards the salary.

5. advocacy - lobbying the state legislature to take action on binding arbitration and unfunded mandates.

The take home lesson for me is that in the near term, while Plainfield needs to pursue each of the five general categories above, the most important way to control property taxes is to reduce local expenses.

In the next blog post, I will share details from three towns that are working hard to get a handle on the difficulties we all face. Here is a sneak preview - layoffs, furloughs and increased user fees.

- Answer from question about transfer of services - Plainfield Municipal Utilities Authority
- Bonus question - who is Robert Casey? Winner gets mentioned on my blog. Awesome prize, right!

Plainfield's budget - part two

2009-11-14T13:06:00.000-05:00

The state legislature recognizes that New Jersey property taxes are too high and will continue to escalate. There is a state law to address this, ineffective though it may be. This law states that local governments cannot exceed the previous years budget by more than 2.5 %. Sounds good, right? Unfortunately there are so many exceptions allowed that taxes can go up 10 or 15% anyway. In addition to the exceptions, a municipality may pass an ordinance each year to increase its expenditures an additional 1% (from 2.5% to 3.5%) and establish a "cap bank" permitting a town to increase its budget the following year if it doesn't need the full 3.5% expenditure increase in the current year.

Plainfield has passed such an ordinance every year I have been on Council. I started voting against this two years ago but have always been on the losing side of this vote. Passing this "cap waiver" ordinance this year would allow us to add $588,000 to our expense budget. This year I spoke out against this at each of the four meetings required for its passage - two agenda fixing two business meetings. This year my one "nay" vote sent the ordinance down in defeat. 5 votes are needed for passage and it went down with 4 yes votes to my one vote of opposition. Two Councilors were absent. It is critically important to understand the implications of the defeat of this ordinance :

It forced the Plainfield administration to go back and make more cuts to the budget that will be introduced at the Council meeting this coming Monday, November 16.
There will be no cap bank next year (fiscal year 2011) which will mean more drastic action will be required to address the inevitable increases in wages and benefits. Employee lay-offs will become more a more important budget balancing strategy.
Proposing lay-offs will bring all parties to the negotiating table for serious talks about employee contributions to health benefit premiums, furloughs and wage givebacks.
Without a credible threat of layoffs, the unions will not engage in substantive negotiations or renegotiations.

I do not like to see reduced compensation for city employees. But I do not like to see families lose their homes because property taxes are unaffordable. And the fact is that for many years government workers compensation increases have outpaced all other workers and are exceeding working families ability to pay. Unless we rebalance government worker compensation, we will see more and more city job positions eliminated. That would be most unfortunate.

I believe serious and painful action must be taken to bring property taxes under control. If we don't act at the municipal level, we are postponing the inevitable and it will be even more painful that what we face today.

Life Just Got Safer on Kensington Ave

2009-11-07T15:27:00.004-05:00

Speed humps have been installed on Kensingtion Ave! This street has long been a speeders paradise in spite of the 25 mile speed limit. The only traffic calming device this street had up till now was potholes. With the much needed paving of Kensington winding down, speeding would have become an even bigger concern.

Speed humps are different than rumble strips or speed bumps. They are more effective because failure to slow down will damage the underside of your vehicle. They make walking and biking more safe and so must be a part of any successful traffic circulation plan.

Speed humps are not preferred by fire and police officials. They don't like to slow down when they are driving to a crime or fire scene. They have successfully prevented installation of speed humps in Plainfield until now. Elected officials must balance their concerns with the need for pedestrian safety in residential neighborhoods. And it is true that speed humps must be used judiciously - good examples are streets like Kensington or Belividere Other towns including Westfield and South Plainfield have made good use of speed humps.

I have been an advocate for speed humps for my five and a half years on the City Council. So this is especially gratifying to me. I want to thank those responsible for the decision to use speed humps on Kensington. Rashid Burney was a strong advocate and Mayor Robinson Briggs dealt with the barriers posed by public safety officials. My advocacy was stalled until they jumped on the band wagon.

It's important to celebrate progress in Plainfield. Going forward we will have to make major changes to our roads program to keep it moving and make it more affordable. I am happy to say that traffic calming is now part of the plan.

Plainfield's 2010 budget and property taxes - part one

2009-10-17T19:29:00.005-04:00

I have a lot to share about the municipal budget, having served as an elected official through 5 city budgets and 6 school board budgets in the last 15 years. This is the first of three blogs concerning the Plainfield 2010 budget and will serve as an introduction to the process.

The budget process starts with with the Mayor and administration drafting and introducing a budget to the Council. At the time of introduction, this budget is sent to the NJ Department of Community Affairs. From that moment, the budget is in the hands of the Council. Its final form and adoption is the responsibility of the Council.

It is mid October and the City Council has yet to see a budget or even get an estimated property tax increase. The final adoption typically takes place in October, November or December. In a particularly difficult year, it might take until January. By the way, the budget year starts in July - the previous July, not the following one. To be fair to local government, the state rules make it impossible to strike a budget before the year begins and almost impossible with the first three months of the year! Still, it is worrisome that the Council hasn't seen or heard anything about the administrations budget.

Once we get the budget, the City Council will hold budget hearings to review each departments requests in depth. In my five years on Council, these hearings have led to the Council making various adjustments, mostly to cut expenditures. Examples include reductions in police and fire overtime pay and many cuts to to non-personnel budget lines that were underspent in the previous year. There were a few areas where Council increased expenditure such as staffing for road repair crews.

One aspect of the budget that often gets overlooked is the capital budget for expenditures having an expected life of at least 5 years. I did get a look at the 2010 proposed capital budget Thursday night at the Planning Board meeting (Planning Board reviews this first and sends its recommendations to the Council). The administration is proposing bare bones capital expenditures, probably a good idea in the current economic climate. Most expenditures are for grant funded projects, with the exception of engineering for next years road paving program which would be bond funded.

The second part of my budget blog will be more exciting - I promise. Something unusual happened at the last Council meeting that went under most people's radar. I will need a little more time to post on that.

The City Council and the Mayor

2009-10-15T12:34:00.004-04:00

When Plainfield government does something good, the credit is shared by elected officials. Then things are not right, the blame must be shared. More importantly, the solution must be a shared decision.

Those of you who follow local government may see that something has changed with the Council. Concerns about the performance of city hall are increasingly expressed by Council members. Some of these concerns come out at public meetings and others must, by law, be addressed privately.

You will know how well the Council is working together and how well we are working with the Mayor by tracking some current issues between now and early 2010:

2010 budget - how will we rise to the challenge of reducing expenses to stay within the state requirement of a maximum 2.5% increase in expense over 2009. This will require more cooperation between the Council and Mayor than ever.
If lay-offs and union contract give backs are part of our budget solution, will the Council speak with one voice. Will the Council and Mayor speak with one voice. When there are differences in strategy, will all parties put their cards on the table respectfully and make compromises to achieve real solutions?
Will the Council get straight answers by the next Council meeting to questions regarding the transfer of Dudley House to a private not for profit organization?
Will the Council and the Mayor ensure that the Muhlenburg Community Advisory Group has a fully operational complaint procedure so that citizens know where and how to make complaints and that they are resolved within specified time frames?

These are some of the current concerns/issues that our city government is charged to deal with. Get out your score cards to measure the performance of each Council member, the Council as a whole and the Mayor. We all need to be held accountable individually and even more importantly, as a team. It will take a team approach to navigate Plainfield through some very challenging problems and times.

Monday night Council agenda

2009-08-16T17:12:00.002-04:00

I am posting to alert citizens to the fact that there are two new items on the Council's agenda for Monday's business meeting:

1. A resolution for the transit oriented vision study. The city will apply to use $80,000 from our Urban Enterprise Zone (UEZ) fund to pay Rutgers and NJIT to assist Plainfield in creating a vision for our downtown and along our rail corridor. I plan to vote yes for this resolution.
2. An ordinance creating an IT position including a salary range and job description. I will vote yes for this also.

These items should have been on the agenda for last Mondays meeting. I was expecting to see them at that time. It is unfortunate that we are not following our normal procedure for these important and necessary initiatives. I hope an explanation is provided for this. Nevertheless we need to move forward on both fronts.

Since I have been very involved with the vision proposal I can shed more light on that process than on the IT initiative. We have been working hard with Rutgers and NJIT to craft the vision proposal so it meets Plainfields needs. There has been input from the Council, the Mayor, City Administrator and the Planning Board members. This proposal has received attention from the Courier News (a favorable editorial this past spring) and I have reported on it at several Council and Planning Board meetings. In addition to meeting Plainfields needs the study needs to align with the academic calendars of both partner institutions. We have a timetable that all parties agreed to and it includes an approved Council resolution by 8/17. That sets the stage for an application to the state UEZ office and eventual approval so that all partners can get to work this fall and into 2010. So I am not happy that this was not up for discussion last week and I promise to have a full discussion this coming Monday. But we need to approve this resolution now.

I should also note that there is a lot of speculation that the Monarch tax abatement will be put back on the agenda Monday. I have not heard this and I do not believe that a group of Council members would orchestrate such a move without disclosure to the rest of the Council. Call me naive but we will know for sure on Monday. This has become a hot button issue because people are upset about their taxes and PMUA fees. When this does come back to the Council and if we do vote on it, many will say a yes vote puts you in the developers and Jerry Greens pocket. All I can say is that neither Jerry Green or the developer has lobbied me for this tax abatement. I am not categorically against tax abatements and am still gathering and weighing the facts in this particular proposal. If I do vote against it, I will still be open to the possibility of tax abatements in the future if I think they will help Plainfield.

Lets focus on the facts and not the personalities.

The Passing of Rick Taylor

2009-08-02T12:09:00.002-04:00

Rick Taylor was a unique figure in the history of Plainfield. As Lois and I became more involved in the 1990's in the political life of Plainfield, we saw Rick as larger than life, a media star who was not content to see Plainfield as a small, out of the way place. We came to know him first through the Courier-News, the Star-Ledger and even the network tv news.

In some ways he put Plainfield on the map with his amazing ability to use the news media to promote his interests. The details of local government he left to others but he worked his way onto a bigger stage with his connections to Jesse Jackson and other African American leaders. To his credit many residents and people who worked for him during his time as Mayor of Plainfield were helped to see Plainfield in a broader context.

Lois was involved in one of his mayoral campaigns (she was into local politics more than I was in those days) and I also knew Rick as a fellow not for profit executive director from his work at Grant Avenue Community Center. I always liked that after his government service ended he stayed connected to city government and attended Council meetings. I will miss his blunt manner and sometimes poetic way of speaking. I liked how he carried himself - like he knew he had to be reckoned with and you'd better know it too. I didn't agree with everything he did as an elected official but when you wanted some action or decision to happen in Plainfield, you wanted Rick Taylor on your side more than anyone else in town.

My condolences to Mayor Ricks family and close friends.

Tax Abatements

2009-07-26T18:31:00.005-04:00

Generally speaking Plainfield should not be categorically for or against tax abatements. Each situation should be carefully analyzed for benefits and disadvantages to Plainfield. The best tax abatement is a wise investment of taxpayer resources for current gain and increasing future benefits. The worst is an ill conceived special interest benefit that saps resources from our city. The two tax abatement proposals on the July City Council agenda are somewhere in the middle.

First the senior citizens apartment tower proposal on Park Avenue. I voted for this and it extends the current tax abatement by an additional 16 years and increases the owners annual tax payments. So property tax payers are seeing this apartment building pay a larger share of taxes but for a longer period of time. I did not like the idea of adding the 16 years, even with the increased tax payment. But I voted yes. I am not a fan of apartment towers. They have a higher potential for crime and drug dealing when located in low income neighborhoods. We are seeing some demolitions nation-wide and I think it is a good trend. The tower in question is for senior citizens and with proper maintenance such an apartment building has good prospects for staying a good neighbor. This tax abatement, I am told by our city administrators, will inject needed funding for building upgrades. So my yes vote is an ambivalent one but based on the future benefit of a well maintained, viable senior citizen apartment building.

The more controversial tax abatement is proposed for the Monarch on East Front Street. I voted yes on first reading to keep the door open. It is in Plainfields interests to do what we can to support this project. We have already contributed the land with the benefit of a new senior citizen center. No additional assistance was requested by the developer when this project was approved. Now we find ourselves in a down economy and the developer has come back wanting more from Plainfield property tax payers.

I have requested a cost-benefit analysis from the City Administrator. That will be a major influence in my vote on second reading. It has to be clearly demonstrated that the 5 year tax abatement cost to taxpayers will be more than offset by the increased taxes from more rapid condo unit sales. I also have to be convinced that this ordinance will truly prevent a significant trend towards renter occupied units.

While I await more information from the city's administration, I have proposed to my colleagues the following amendments to the ordinance, should it be approved:
1- require unit owners to prove they are occupying their units on an annual basis
2- make the tax break available only for owners who keep their units for the 5 year period the abatement would be in effect.
Thanks to Dan Damon for posting these ideas on his blog.

Last but not least, I asked questions at the last Council meeting about the property taxes on the land and improvements for the Monarch and when the taxes on the building units goes into effect. Those questions could not be answered so I requested the Tax Assessor be present at the next meeting. This ordinance requires clear factual answers to the Councils questions. Anything less needs to result in the defeat of this tax abatement.

The November Election

2009-06-24T13:39:00.002-04:00

Maybe its the history of fighting political factions in Plainfield. Or maybe its bad feelings in the aftermath of a spirited mayoral contest. Whatever the reason, I have heard that some local politicians are concerned that I am not supporting the Democratic ticket in the November election.

I am a Democrat, always have been and always will be. I am disappointed in the local primary election outcome. But that is water under the bridge now that the primary election is over. I am supporting the whole Democratic ticket from Governor Jon Corzine on down. That includes Mayor Robinson-Briggs.

More than ever, Plainfield needs all levels of government to work together for the good of the city. One example is the need for City Council and the Mayors office to work as partners to engage the community in creating a vision for our Downtown train station area and the whole rail corridor. There is no other way forward for Plainfield.

A Victory for Plainfield

2009-06-21T13:11:00.005-04:00

Readers have probably seen Rashid Burney's blog on the sale of the Catherine Webster Home on Franklin Place. His kind words about the selling agent are deserved (Lois Mattson is that agent -she happens to be my wife). Considering the flack she took during the lengthy sales process (2 years!) Rashids' comments are appreciated by my family.

At the risk of sounding self interested, I feel compelled to say a few things in response to those who made unfair accusations about Lois and her role in the sale:

1. To Jerry Green who made tasteless and untrue insinuations about my "real estate family", if you were more in touch with your community, you would know that there is no-one more dedicated to her community than Lois. She has never asked for recognition for the volunteer work she has done over 30 years for the Plainfield Youth Soccer Club, the Plainfield YWCA, the Plainfield Symphony and the Cook School Parent-Teacher Organization, to name a few of her causes. Assemblyman -Lois and I are still waiting for an apology.

2. To the Crescent Ave neighbors who pressured the city and the Webster Home owner to address property code violations, you were right to express those concerns and it was to Lois' credit that she did not take those complaints directed at her personally. She was not the owner but as the owners realtor, she did everything she could to deal with those concerns. I think we can all agree that the new owners intention to make the Webster Home a single family home is a near miraculous outcome. They will be responsible for code compliance and I believe they have a serious commitment to improvement of their new property and the neighborhood as a whole.

3. Lois was bound, as a realtor, to keep certain real estate information confidential during this lengthy sales process. Some criticized her for not violating her business code of ethics because they did not understand. Others did understand but criticized anyway.

I look forward to meeting the new owners and wish them success as new neighbors. The Crescent Avenue neighborhood has had its ups and downs over the years. The soon to be renamed Catherine Webster Home is an encouraging example of how this neighborhood can be revitalized, much like the property around the corner on East 7th Street renovated by Faith, Bricks and Mortar. Our new neighbors have gone through an arduous process to buy their home and if they are as persistent as Lois in meeting their goal, the Crescent Avenue neighborhood will be moving in a positive direction.

Plainfield Primary Election - what does it mean?

2009-06-06T17:52:00.004-04:00

The people have spoken. In this case I am referring to the people of the Democratic Party. Sharon Robinson - Briggs won. Congratulations to her and to Bridget Rivers, our incoming 4th Ward Council representative. Jerry Green also won and although he may face a bit more competition in November, he has to be the heavy favorite to win.

Here is how I see it. I will try not to spin this as heavily as some have done, but readers know my bias.

1. Assembly - Jerry Green received roughly twice as many votes as Rick Smiley. Jerry received 38% of the total votes and Rick had 18%. Rick ran a campaign with very little money and he concentrated almost entirely on one town in the election district - Plainfield. His Plainfield total was very close to Assemblyman Green's, a remarkable achievement in my opinion. I looked at the Senate and Assembly races state-wide. Of all the Democratic races, Rick Smiley had the highest percentage of votes of any challenger. This seat is up again in two years. The Assemblyman has some serious exposure.

2. Mayor - another close race. Along with Smiley, Adrian Mapp had much less money and a disadvantageous ballot position. For those of you who did not vote (shame on you), column B had the Governor, state legislative, state committee, Freeholder, Mayor and local committee candidates. Column F, all the way over to the right, had Smiley, Mapp and one or two local committee candidates. Visually a real advantage to the incumbents. The bottom line is that Mayor Sharon gets another 4 years. I hope she is thinking about doing more than counting to 4 votes on this years City Council, considering what the future will bring.

3. Plainfield Democratic City Committee - the New Democrats held 10 seats in the outgoing committee and will now have 28 seats. There are 68 seats and 35 are needed to elect the new chairman. It would appear that Jerry Green will continue as chair. This is the most powerful position in Plainfield politics although Jerry does not like me to say it. He is sensitive to the term "boss" when applied to him. When I say it, I do not mean to insult but merely to call it what it is. An interesting test of how much a boss Jerry is will be the approach he takes at the City Committee re-organization meeting this coming Monday. I have asked him to have the election of chairman done by secret ballot. Then if Jerry's 40 votes hold, he can claim that the committee members truly support him for reasons other than intimidation.

4. Bob Ferraro and Tom Turner for Mayor got virtually no votes. It is widely believed that Bob was running as a favor to Jerry Green. You may remember my comments from a previous blog.

5. I thought Carol Brokaw for Mayor would do much better than the results showed. Was it the PMUA concerns or that she hardly campaigned. Probably both, I think.

6. The Martin Cox mayoral campaign would be an interesting story if I knew for sure why he ran. Time may tell.

I am feeling more hopeful for Plainfield even though the people I supported did not win. I was part of a campaign that affirmed the goodness, talent and commitment in Plainfield that I have always appreciated. To my fellow campaign team members: there is no losing team I would rather be on than this team. Let's win next time.

Rick Smiley for State Assemblyman

2009-05-24T10:53:00.002-04:00

Rick Smiley is a good man who is an Assembly candidate in the Democratic primary for the right reasons. He really wants to put Plainfield first. I served on the school board with him and he was a positive influence at a time when the school board was divided. Ultimately, he helped unite it and was instrumental in bring Dr Larry Leverrit to Plainfield as the Superintendent who set the Plainfield schools on the right path.

The one argument against Rick and for the incumbent, Jerry Green, is Mr Green's experience and seniority in the state legislature. Until recently I believed this argument for Jerry Green's tenure myself. That is until the closing of Muhlenberg Hospital and the state take back of Abbott school funding. It's not that Mr Green is at fault for the closing of urban hospitals. And the new school funding formula, while increasing Plainfield's property taxes, does have it's merits when viewed from a state-wide perspective.

The problem is that Mr Green is reactive. He doesn't have a vision for Plainfield. So when larger, state-wide and national forces hit home, he isn't ready to help his local constituents. He jumps into action when it is too late, when the only thing to be achieved is protecting his own public image. One of his strategies for self preservation is attacking others, even when they have no jurisdiction over a problem.

Mr Green -stop complaining about Dan Damon's blog. Simply respond with some facts if you don't agree with his. Stop attacking family members of local officials, people like the wife of Christian Estevez. Chris is an asset to our community. And don't you realize that attacking his wife opens the door for people to attack your sons who to my knowledge are doing real work for local governments. Stop making insinuations about real estate families. What are you talking about! How dishonest it is to hint about improprieties with no facts whatsoever. Put your cards on the table.

As for your attacks on me, please continue. My constituents think more of me because of them.

This brings me back to Rick Smiley for Assembly. Even if he wasn't a good, honest man, even if he didn't have a Masters degree in Public Policy from Rutgers University, even if he didn't have years of government experience, he is the right choice because he will represent Plainfield first. Jerry Green represents his own survival first and in the most divisive way.

Mapp is the Leader Plainfield Needs

2009-05-18T18:38:00.004-04:00

In my last blog I explained why the PMUA issues offer leadership opportunities and only Adrian Mapp stepped up to the plate. Here are some other reasons I support Adrian:

1. He was one of the council members who initiated the road paving program five years ago. Mayor Sharon dropped the ball on it and we are only just getting to the roads, after a 3 and a half year delay.

2. Municipal finance is one of the weakest aspects of city hall performance. Mayor Sharon has had a revolving door of finance management staff, leading to budget mistakes, misinformation and missed opportunities. Adrian has a strong finance background, including municipal finance.

3. Adrian would bring honesty and transparency to city hall. Mayor Sharon and her coach, Assemblyman Green, have been anything but transparent. Sharon was a no show at a debate organized by Shiloh Baptist Church. Her campaign literature has no credible facts supporting her accomplishments with the exception of completing the Monarch/Senior Center. That's not much to show for 3 and a half years.

4. Mayor Sharon has yet to disclose that as Mayor she is on the Board of Trustees of Muhlenberg Hospital and has not attended one meeting, not even when the hospital was operating.

5. Adrian has a positive approach to serving the public. Contrast that with the strategy of Sharon and Mr Green, who are waging a negative campaign through his blog. Jerry Green's Page is used for insinuation, misinformation and personal attacks. Sharon allows the Assemblyman to make her attacks for her. A leader would disavow and seperate him or herself from such vindictiveness.

This is a choice between business as usual and positive change. There are other mayoral candidates but it comes down to Adrian and Sharon. Plainfield needs Adrian Mapp.

Election Issues in Plainfield

2009-05-10T16:27:00.008-04:00

A recent poll by Monmouth University/Gannett Polling Institute indicated that property taxes are the issue of the day. Monmouth U. pollster Patrick Murray states that most years there are more than one top issue for candidates to campaign on. But New Jersey 2009 apparently is the year of tax concerns: 36% of those asked said so. For a gubernatorial election year that is the highest percentage for "top concern" since 1972!

It would make sense that 2009 New Jersey legislative candidates would tune in to property taxes. And it seems that our very own Assemblyman Jerry Green is doing exactly that. He is on record as opposed to all kinds of spending, but it all seems to be municipal rather than county or state spending that has captured his attention. He is against spending for municipal information technology, visioning study and most recently has called for the state to investigate the spending habits of the Plainfield Municipal Utilities Authority.

I support all serious efforts by elected officials and citizens to question government spending. A healthy debate on government finances is needed to improve efficiency of services and eliminate waste. But it needs to be more than election season rhetoric. Lets consider how serious Assemblyman Green is about local spending.

The Assemblyman has called for the state to investigate local finances on numerous occasions. Over the years he has claimed to call for investigations by the Attorney General, the County Prosecutor and the Department of Community Affairs, always targeted on his political opponents. It always seems to be a request reported in the news media and during election season. There have never been any findings announced on these investigations and some people have questioned whether he has actually made any formal requests for these investigations. It is possible that his requests are merely election campaign tactics. Mr Green could clear that up for us by releasing his written communication with state and county agencies on these matters.

Mr Green's PMUA "investigation" is more interesting yet. Echoing the call of others for transparency on PMUA travel and conference expenses, Mr Green presumably is opposed to any wasteful PMUA expenses such as patronage jobs. So why did he call me several times to ask my support for the PMUA to hire Bob Ferraro? The quid pro quo, according to Mr Ferraro, was that he promised Mr Green not to run in anymore City Council elections. At least that is the message Mr Ferraro left on my telephone answering machine at the time of his hire as PMUA inspector. Now he is running for mayor so maybe he wasn't telling me the whole deal he said he made with Assemblyman Green.

Just because a candidate states opposition to property taxes or PMUA rate increases, it doesn't mean they can deliver an effective solution to the problem. Jerry Green's PMUA message is not consistent with his past behavior and his timing looks self serving. Sharon Robinson Briggs has been silent on these matters. Adrian Mapp made a proposal to address PMUA concerns and he did so before all the Courier News headlines about PMUA trips to California. I am supporting Adrian Mapp for Mayor and this is one example of his offering a serious solution to a Plainfield problem. In contrast, our Mayor and Mr Green don't look like leaders. Leaders are what Plainfield needs.

Transit oriented visioning study

2009-04-11T12:09:00.002-04:00

Plainfield is considering a community visioning study for the land around our two train stations. This study would be a partnership between the city, Rutgers and NJIT. Some of New Jersey's leading development and transportation experts would work with graduate students, local residents and business owners to shape a blueprint for the future of Plainfield's land around the downtown and Netherwood train stations. Here are the arguments against doing this study and why they can't be allowed to derail the community visioning process:

We've studied the train station development options to death. In fact there has been much planning done around the downtown station. Thanks to the current and previous city administrations and the Planning Board, we have the North Avenue redevelopment areas, Phases One and Two. We also have a redevelopment agreement with a designated developer, Landmark. We have not, however, created an overall plan for the whole train station area. Doing this is extremely important if we want a well coordinated plan for this area, which is the centerpiece of all future Plainfield development. We will need to include the following into our overall vision:

1. the downtown station south area,

2. the area around Union County College (with the college as a partner)

3. the huge and mostly vacant parking lot between the Green Brook and Front St between Roosevelt and Watchung

4. Furthermore, the overall downtown plan needs to mesh with planning around the West End study area (aka the POWER study) and the Netherwood station.

We already have input from the community. After all, our hard working Planning Board meets in public and advertises its activities in the Courier-News. But if you have attended a Planning Board meeting in any town, you know that the usually small and devoted public struggles to follow the highly technical discussions and often has to wait several hours to ask questions or state concerns. Not exactly a community oriented process. It is safe to say that new Planning Board members (myself included) need about a years worth of meetings to get up to speed. So how difficult it is for the average citizen to influence the process? Very. And how many have the perseverance to stay with the process? Very few.
We can't afford it - the only valid concern in my opinion. Considering that we spend over $70 million each year on city government and property taxes continue to escalate, we should think hard about any new initiatives. They need to be either: 1) absolute necessities, 2) expenses that lead to cost savings or 3) investments in Plainfield's future that will bring significant value to residents. This study definitely fits the investment criterion and also the cost savings one when you think about an engaged, supportive community as opposed to a fearful, resistant one that creates roadblocks to Plainfield's future plans. Funding for this study can come from the UEZ fund, not from property taxes. We have spent UEZ funds on things with much less lasting value than the proposed study.

The new Manhatten tunnel is coming with a one seat ride from Plainfield. Development and economic growth opportunities will arise in advance of its expected completion date in 2017. Unlike the past, this time Plainfield must be ready. I say to my fellow Council members and to the Mayor: our leadership is needed to create a vision for Plainfield's future, a future that holds much promise as long as we are ready for it.

Plainfield Political Power

2009-03-23T23:59:00.012-04:00

Sorry for the delay in posting the answers to my quiz. Let me say up front - Old Doc got it right! 100%

1. Which position has the most power in Plainfield? The answer is "d" - none of the above. The real power in Plainfield is in the position of Plainfield Democratic City Committee chairperson. "No way" you say, it has to be the Mayor. Guess again. In the last 20 years, no Mayor has been elected to a full four year term more than once except Al McWilliams. That list includes Sharon Robinson Briggs, Mark Fury, Harold Mitchell, Rick Taylor and Everitt Lattimore. On the other hand, Jerry Green has been the Plainfield City Committee chairman for almost all of these Mayors combined years in office. The exception, once again, was the 2 year period that Al McWilliams served as City Committee chair. Whenever the Mayor builds a constituency and starts to flex some muscle, he (she?) gets taken out.

How can that happen, you ask? If you accept the reality that Democrats will get elected to every city council seat and to the mayoralty for many years to come, then the second question becomes all important.

2. Which election is most important in shaping local political power? The answer is "a", the primary election. Whoever wins the primary for the Dems wins the November general election. The only place with an outside chance of a Dem loss is for the 2nd Ward Council seat. The 2nd Ward has a high percentage of independent voters, not affiliated with a political party, but who may choose to vote in a primary election. That is my seat by the way. That's why I wore out my shoes going door to door when I ran for election and re-election. Another way to look at this is to understand that, with a few notable exceptions, you can coast to victory as the local Democratic Party candidate.

So the Plainfield Democratic candidate chosen to get the party line on the ballot will have a huge advantage over all challengers - in ballot position and campaign financing and, if elected, in the power of incumbency. A self perpetuating system, similar to the U.S Congress, with the added advantage in Plainfield of having an essentially one party system.

You might be wondering how the first two questions tie together. It's all about how local Democratic candidates are given the party line in the primary election. That brings us to

3. How many local elected positions are on your ballot for the June primary election? This applies to Democratic voters for 2009. The answer is "b" or "c", three or four positions. Everyone gets to vote for a Mayoral candidate. Everyone gets to vote for two city committee candidates. And in the 4th ward, you can vote for a council candidate.

So we are back to this mysterious entity called the Plainfield Democratic City Committee. It's this committee, 68 people from 34 voting districts, a male and female from each district, elected to a two year term every other June primary, that decides who gets the party line in the upcoming primary elections.

To make matters more interesting, this committee re-organizes the Monday after its election and chooses a chairperson by majority vote. The committee by-laws invest great power in the chairperson. The current and longstanding chair, Jerry Green, has used his power to shape city government. If you want to run for Mayor or Council on the party line, you have to go to Mr Green. The chairman can ask the whole committee to participate in selecting local talent for elected office. Or the chairman can change the selection process to meet his needs. I have been on both sides of this process, both willingly and not, in order to get my two cents in about Mayoral and Council candidates.

Our primary election is June 3. On the party line, you will see Governor Corzine, Assemblyman Green and Assemblywoman Stender, Mayor Robinson Briggs and two city committee members from your voting district. They will be in one column. In a contested local primary, you might see another column with other Democratic candidates competing with the local party line candidates. This is good. This is the purpose of a primary election - to give you some choice in who represents you from your political party. This June you might see some competition among Democrats. It is exactly that primary election competition that gave Obama the opportunity to beat Hilary Clinton as the Democrat for President. That's what will be happening in Plainfield come June. I'm for that.

And pay attention to the bottom of the ballot. That's where you will find the city committee candidates. Think hard on your choices here. It very well may determine who holds the political power in Plainfield.

Real Political Power in Plainfield: A Quiz

2009-03-15T11:44:00.003-04:00

Question 1:

Which position has the most political power in Plainfield:
a) Mayor
b)City Council President
c) local Assemblyman
d) none of the above

Question 2:

Which election is more important in shaping the local government:
a) the June primary
b) the November general election

Question 3:

How many local elected positions will be on your ballot in the June primary? (Local means strictly Plainfield elected positions)

a) two
b) three
c) four

The answers will be in my next blog along with explanations and some Plainfield political history.
Stay tuned!

Hard Times. Downtown. Plainfield. Opportunity.

2009-03-14T10:57:00.021-04:00

The good and the bad in downtown Plainfield(see below for the ugly)

Recently I attended the New Jersey Future annual conference on development. This conference brings together hundreds of the best and brightest leaders for residential and commercial development and redevelopment. One session was about temporary infill opportunities. Not having a clue what that meant, I sat in.

The speaker reviewed extensive research on shoppers habits and downtown dead spaces. Essentially, shoppers gravitate towards activity and away from empty spaces. They shop more when there is more sight, sound and people. When leaving a store, a shopper will turn left if the shop in that direction is open and the one to the right is closed. Dead space discourages shoppers and makes them feel less safe.

In Highland Park, a vacant corner store on the main street was considered bad for the rest of the merchants. The city approached the building owner and asked if he would leave the lights on the nights shops are open late. They also asked him if the storefront windows could be used to advertise chamber of commerce and municipal programs and activities. Keep the store from being a dead space until it could get rented.

In New Brunswick, a vacant downtown lot became a temporary sculpture garden for high school art students. Vacant stores with huge "for rent" signs were replaced with smaller signs. Empty storefront display areas were hidden with attractive posters fully covering the glass storefronts.

Speaking of visual impacts, some towns have a program to subsidize shop owners who want to replace their ugly full metal security gates with see through gates. There is research indicating that the see through gates improve business owners bottom line in comparison to the "prison" style gates.

Another speaker described the business trends in downtown New Jersey. 2008 was a bad year for store vacancies. 2009 will be worse. How is all of this relevant to Plainfield:

the bad news is we are starting to see vacant stores again downtown. The trend will continue.
the vacancies create the temporary infill opportunities
we in government must be good partners to the business community to support them in these hard times
one way is to bring together the downtown business people, the public schools and city hall to capitalize on the temporary infill opportunities

I could be accused of putting a smiley face on a bad situation. After all "temporary infill opportunity" is another way of saying "unemployment, boarded up stores, hard times". But the most outstanding accomplishments come out of adversity, by finding opportunities in unlikely places, by facing the problem and chipping away at it.

I promise to use the City Council Economic Growth Committee to promote the approach described above, one that is being used by a few progressive and creative towns and one that is very well suited to Plainfield.

Economic Growth Committee minutes, March 2 2009

2009-03-07T11:38:00.004-05:00

Present: Cory Storch, Rashid Burney, Marc Dashield (city administrator), Jacques Howard (city staff), Ken Robertson Planning Board), Jeff Dunn and Jim Uffer from Plainfield Chamber of Commerce, members of the public and Mark Spivey from Courier News

1. Discussion of NJIT/Rutgers community visioning process for transit hubs/rail corridor - the purpose of this visioning study is to get input, support and full engagement of local residents and business owners to create a guiding vision for future development at our two train stations and along the rail corridor. The resulting study would position Plainfield for future development opportunities and grants. While the economy is slumping, we can make preparations to "hit the ground running" with all stakeholders on board. It was noted by Councilman Burney that development means job creation as well as residential development.

Input was received from Marc Dashield and Ken Robertson to help tailor the proposal to Plainfields' needs. Members of the public were supportive of the proposal, feeling that it would be an opportunity to engage the community to educate, get their input, and to get buy-in and active support for Plainfields future development efforts. Cory Storch will follow-up with Marc Dashield and the proposal writers to address the concerns expressed at the meeting including the need for articulating specific deliverables/outcomes of the visioning process and to clarify the roles of the graduate student facilitators, the city administration, the council and the planning board. It was expressed by the council members present that this is an investment in Plainfield's future.

2. Discussion of the downtown summer concert series - the goal of this initiative is to stimulate business activity in the central business district. There was consensus around the table that consideration should be given to having some of the concerts in the early evening. One idea was to schedule one of the events on Thursday shopping night and recruit downtown restaurants to offer promotional deals for dinner. Having more than one venue was discussed with the possible locations being Park Madison Plaza and the North Ave block in front of the train station.

Cory Storch mentioned that the SID president was invited, could not attend but expressed a desire to have the SID participate in the concert series planning. Jim Uffer from the Chamber mentioned that their membership was from more than downtown businesses, that there are overlapping memberships with the SID and that the SID represented many more downtown merchants. Marc Dashield indicated that the administration was already considering the evening concert idea.

It was felt by all present that the concert series presents a great opportunity to unite city hall, the police department, public works and the merchants in a concert series that would provide new shoppers, many of them Plainfield residents, a positive experience in the downtown shopping district. There was discussion on how to engage hispanic business owners and shoppers in the concert series. Cory Storch agreed to reach out to the SID president and the SID Council representatives to share the ideas from this meeting.

Meeting adjourned at 7 pm.

City Council Economic Growth Committee Meeting

2009-02-25T08:14:00.003-05:00

The Council created the Economic Growth Committee to to facilitate communication and cooperation between the Council, the administration and the business community. The first meeting of 2009 will take place on Monday, March 2 from 5 pm to 7 pm at City Hall. The Council members on this committee are Bill Reid, Rashid Burney and myself (chairman). We will be discussing a proposal from Rutgers and NJIT to do a community visioning study for Plainfields' transit corridor and transit hubs.

Members of the public are welcome. I have invited representatives from the Special Improvement District and the Chamber of Commerce. We will also be discussing plans for the downtown summer concert series. The goal of these concerts is to entice more shoppers to come downtown and spend money in Plainfield stores. Stimulating the local economy is an important feature of a sustainable community.

So join us.

Social capital is alive and much needed in Plainfield

2009-02-08T16:15:00.003-05:00

Last Thursday I attended a meeting of Friends of Sleepy Hollow (FOSH). When I arrived at the Plainfield Public Library for the meeting I was pleased to see that other community oriented activities were happening in full force. I stepped into the main meeting room downstairs only to find the literacy volunteers organizing an all out attack to promote basic reading skills of local residents. In another room a group of church members were strategizing on a search for a new minister. When I was directed next door, I was surprised to find, not FOSH but the League of Women Voters Board meeting. Finally I found the right meeting.

My evening at the library demonstrates what is good about Plainfield. Dedicated citizens working together to improve the community. In contrast to staying home watching television, we have social connectedness of the best kind, teams of people working for the common good.

According to Robert Putnam, author of "Bowling Alone", the term social capital originated in the early 1900s when the state superintendent of West Virginia schools wrote that it meant " coming into contact with neighbors so there is an accumulation of social capital which may satisfy individual social needs and have potential to improve living conditions in the whole community".

What does it look like in Plainfield:

parents at a PTA meeting
citizens speaking at a City Council meeting
healthy attendance at Plainfield High School boys basketball games (by the way, we are ranked 4th in the state)
a full house at church services on Sunday

Social capital can be for destructive causes as well. Gangs and the Ku Klux Klan are examples. So social scientists distinguish between kinds of social capital with bridging and bonding being the most beneficial kinds. We certainly need more of both in Plainfield.

The need for bridging was illustrated Thursday at the four library meetings. There was a good mix of male and female, young and less young, black and white. Not many Hispanic residents in attendance though.

The presence of gangs is a clear indicator for lack of positive social capital. In its absence young people create their own. The solution can't be just increased law enforcement. It needs to be more adult role models, mentors, a stronger role for educators in children's lives and job opportunities.

Today I attended a meeting of the Hillside Avenue Neighborhood Watch. At the meeting, Herb Green, a passionate advocate for Plainfield children, urged residents to get involved with the local school, Evergreen School. Bob Chanda urged the Public Safety Director to create volunteer opportunities for citizens at the new video surveillance center when it is up and running. These volunteer actions are not just cost saving measures. They will increase buy in for good causes and the interconnectedness of all Plainfield stakeholders.

Honoring Al McWilliams

2009-02-02T12:51:00.007-05:00

I read the following statement into the record at the February 2 City Council meeting:

"It is very fitting that the City Council is approving a resolution honoring Al McWilliams. Al exemplified what is good in the city of Plainfield. The Al McWilliams Memorial Plaza will serve as a reminder of all he accomplished in Plainfield. We see his accomplishments everyday: the Park Madison complex, the elimination of the blight at the Teppers site, the downtown streetscape, putting abandoned and dilapidated residential properties back into service. Some of his projects continue: the Senior Center and the restoration of City Hall to name a few.

Mayor Al with wife Darlene

In a way he is a local predecessor to President Obama in that he stood for change when Plainfield desperately needed a new and progressive direction. When he was first elected, most Plainfielders felt that local government was not working for them. He brought us hope and a new attitude about public service being for the people.

He will be remembered as Mayor but let's not forget that he also served as Councilman and as Chairman of the Plainfield City Committee and part of his legacy is sitting here tonight – four City Council members that he ran and now a daughter following in his footsteps.

On a personal note, Al was the reason I ran for office. I had been considering a run for City Council but I wanted to spend more time with my children. But when Al became Mayor I could see we finally had a leader with a vision for Plainfield. Plainfields time for progress had come and although it was too early according to my plans, I decided to jump into politics to support Al's vision. I look forward to the day that we dedicate the Al McWilliams Plaza. He truly deserves the recognition".

Hard Times Trigger Responsible Proposals from Elected Officals Around the Country

2009-01-24T10:40:00.003-05:00

The following Associated Press story by Julie Carr Smith is very timely as the Plainfield City Council prepares the final budget for the current fiscal year:

Governors across the nation are seeking significant concessions from public employee unions in hopes of helping to balance their
teetering budgets during the economic downturn.
From Maryland to California, Ohio to Hawaii, governors have asked or ordered state workers to accept furloughs, salary reductions, truncated workweeks or
benefit cuts. They say the concessions are a better alternative to further job losses in the face of record-breaking unemployment.
Unions argue their members shouldn't be singled out and are even more vital in hard times -- securing neighborhoods and prisons, educating children and
providing social services to growing numbers of citizens.
In hard-hit Ohio, Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland has been a friend of the unions. But as the state's budget woes have intensified, he is asking unionized state
employees to consider a 5 percent pay cut, a 35-hour workweek and the elimination of paid personal days and holidays, to save the state hundreds of millions
of dollars.
According to a union memo obtained by The Associated Press, the Ohio Civil Service Employees Association is waiting to see Strickland's upcoming budget
and the state's share of a federal stimulus package before making a decision. Executive director Andy Douglas declined comment because the union is in
negotiations.
The memo noted there's no guarantee that accepting concessions will preclude later job cuts.
Democratic Gov. Martin O'Malley of Maryland, another state facing an unexpectedly deep budget shortfall, imposed furloughs and salary cuts on thousands of
state workers in December, a move expected to save an estimated $34 million.
In November, New Jersey trimmed two paid holidays from state workers' annual allotment: Lincoln's Birthday and the Friday after Thanksgiving. Eliminating
the former required legislative action, while Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine cut the latter on his own.
Utah eliminated one paid holiday a year and is experimenting with a four-day state workweek.
Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle, a Republican, has raised the possibility she will pursue furloughs for the islands' 36,000 state employees and ask them to pay a
larger share of their health insurance coverage and forego raises.
On Thursday, Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell -- facing down a widening budget gap -- said layoffs and unpaid furloughs are likely in that state as
well. He braced state workers for sharing in the "universal pain."
In California, Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger imposed furloughs two days a month beginning in February as a way to curb costs for the 230,000-
member state payroll amid a budget deficit projected to grow to $28 billion by 2010.
He has had less success shaving two paid holidays off the current 14 state workers receive, an allotment that is among the most generous in the country.
Spokesman Aaron McLear said the governor is "looking under every rock" to cut costs and believes it's only a matter of fairness for state workers to do their
part. "The governor doesn't believe it's fair to increase taxes and cut programs on Californians without reducing state government spending first," he said.
Kerry Korpi, director of research and collective bargaining at the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union, said members
understand that governments are in economic crisis.
"The entire country is in a dire situation," she said. "Our members, though, haven't quite been lifted back up from the last fiscal crisis in 2002 and 2003, so
we've been asking governors to sit down with us and let's look at all the spending, instead of going straight to the people who provide these vital services."

Comment on comments on my blog

2008-12-31T11:55:00.006-05:00

My practice has been to post all comments unless they are personal attacks on anyone or if they are off topic. Lately I have been receiving numerous off topic comments that clearly have a political agenda. Dear readers, I welcome your comments but I will not post it if I am writing about the city budget and the comment is about how certain Board of Education members who supposedly oppose Jerry Green are harming our school district.

As an ex-Board of Ed member, I know how hard that job is and how important it is for the whole community to lend their support to the Plainfield schools. Lets do everything we can to depoliticize our school district and focus on the academic performance of Plainfield youth.

Regarding personal attacks, they are not welcome. I have excluded numerous personal attacks or non specific blog comments on Ms Robinson Briggs and Mr Green. Read my blog carefully and you will see that I am critical, not of Mayor Sharon or Assemblyman Green as people, but of their performance as leaders of Plainfield. I try to make specific criticisms and offer alternatives. And I give credit when it is due.

To my recent and frequent off topic commenter, either get in the spirit of my blog or try another blog, perhaps the Assemblyman's, for publication of your comments.

Tough Times Ahead for Property Tax Payers....and Renters

2008-12-27T15:45:00.000-05:00

And workers and business owners. People are losing their jobs, pension funds are shrinking, shopping is down and development has slowed almost to a halt. The impact in Plainfield is showing with an increase in home mortgage foreclosures. Increasing unemployment will surely hurt Plainfielders and we in city government will have to reckon with dipping property values.

Watching the actions of elected officials prior to my election to city council, I've been most interested in decisions made under difficult circumstances. Why did Governor Jim Florio raise income taxes knowing the price he would pay politically? Why did Governor Whitman raid the pension funds, knowing that New Jersey citizens would eventually see a day of reckoning? In Plainfield, why did the City Council squander in one year a huge payment from other towns for the sale of the sewer system?

The simple answer is that when elected officials are between a rock and a hard place, they often blink. The rock is usually angry tax payers who vote and the hard place is often workers protecting their hard won wages and benefits.

Where does that leave us in Plainfield? We are facing a 9.5% tax increase on the municipal budget and the school tax increase will continue to rise after decades of remaining flat. County taxes, the third component of our tax bill, have also increased most every year.

I will only speak to the municipal portion of the tax bill because it is the major part of the total. Also, the school tax increase, which started in 2008, is mandated as a decision made in Trenton regarding Abbott school districts. The City Council is deliberating on proposed cuts that could reduce the tax increase to around 7%. Beyond that, proposals for further budget reductions have been strenuously opposed by City Administrator Marc Dashield. These further cuts, he rightfully says, would have to be the elimination of jobs and consequently, services to residents.

The other side of the coin is property owners and renters, some of whom will get squeezed out of their homes by taxes and rents that exceed their incomes and ability to pay. So to blink or not to blink. Here is my version of the two options:

If the state legislature approves the pension payment deferral plan and the City Council actually defers a payment - that's a blink. Putting expenses off for future Mayors, Councils and taxpayers has a long history in our state but it is unfair and bad policy.

If the Council requires that non essential city workers go to a reduced work week for the last few months of this fiscal year (ending June 30, 2009), we will save money - it would be very unpopular among many city workers but that's not a blink.

If Plainfield elected officials continue to say "there are no sacred cows in our budget" but refuse to consider cuts in our police and fire division budgets - that's a blink.
If we eliminate out of state travel for staff and elected officials and food for staff and public meetings - that's not a blink.
If we freeze salaries of non union employees earning $80,000 or more - that's not a blink.

A good principle for budget action is that everyone shares the pain.

All budget decisions will be made knowing that the all important primary election is coming in June. This is an opportunity for Plainfield stakeholders to make your feelings known. The local budget process has not generally had as much input from the people who pay the property taxes as from the employees of government. This years budget advisory committee has stimulated some advocacy from residents. Lets see what the new year brings.

Going Green

2008-12-13T15:07:00.000-05:00

No, I am not referring to an elected official. Green is the new buzz word in New Jersey government, referring to anything about sustainable, healthy communities. It means a lot for the future of Plainfield. That is why, come January, I will be working with my City Council colleagues to move Plainfield in the "green" direction.
There are many aspects to sustainability:

preserving open and public spaces
growing the local economy and keeping local money in the community
local jobs for our residents
energy saving buildings and vehicles
recycling
transit oriented development
walkable downtowns
teaching our young people to live sustainably

One of the first steps is to do energy audits of Plainfield's public buildings. This is a really good deal for Plainfield as the audit will lead to saving money every year. Money wasted on heat and air-conditioning leaking through windows, doors and poorly insulated walls can be re-invested in services that residents need, or tax relief. We will ask the Public Schools, the Housing Authority and the PMUA to join the city on this initiative. Along this line, we need a better plan for selecting city vehicles, ones that are fuel efficient.

We have already taken some steps in the right direction with energy savings. Look for Plainfield and other communities to pick up the pace in 2009. We can't afford not to.

Solar panels could be in Plainfield's future. Last Monday I attended a meeting to organize Union County towns for a group purchasing arrangement. Solar technology has improved to the point where the up front cost of the panels is recovered in about 7 years in the Northeastern USA. Under a creative new financing arrangement, a "purchase power agreement" would eliminate all costs for purchase, installation and maintenance of the panels. Plainfield would still save money on the monthly energy bills but we would share some of the savings with the solar panel installer, who would own and maintain the panels. Plus, having a group of towns and school districts do this together would help us negotiate a better deal. I spoke with School Superintendent Dr Gallon and he is interested in exploring this with the city.

Going green is not just about acting locally to help the planet. Its about making Plainfield a better place to live, work and visit. Creating local jobs for our people reduces traffic congestion and greenhouse gases but more local jobs also strengthen our tax base and stimulate local businesses. Each aspect of sustainability is connected in a synergistic way.

Imagine this: we hire an energy audit firm for our municipal and school buildings. The contract states that Plainfield High School students will taught to participate in energy audits. They also learn about the growing green economy and green jobs. Then they go home and help their families save money on the PSE&G bill.

Hot Topics for New Jersey Municipalities

2008-11-22T11:15:00.000-05:00

I attended the NJ League of Municipalities Convention this week. Two areas of interest stood out from the rest for the thousands of local officials.

The first was not surprising. When I showed up for the "Multi Year and Long Range Financial Planning" session (in the unpopular 9:00 am time slot!), I could not get in. Correction - I could not get near the door. Several hundred people were crowding in to hear about the scary prospects for city budgets and taxes and how to project expenses and revenues to anticipate problems. Walking towards the next hot topic workshop, it occurred to me that this is a job for the 2009 City Council Finance Committee.

Up next, the session on "The Green Future Roadmap - How to Go Green in NJ". Actually there were many workshops on sustainability and going green throughout the three day convention. I attended most of them and was happy to see my council colleagues Burney and Simmons in attendance as well. As Trenton Mayor Palmer said, this is not a fad. And its not just about polar bears and climate change. Its about changing the climate in our neighborhoods and making our communities sustainable. What does that really mean?

keeping residents money in the local economy
creating local jobs for our residents
city government and the Board of Education leading the way to energy efficient buildings and vehicles
educating our young people to live sustainably and prepare to join the green economy that President-elect Obama is talking about
using transit oriented development to maximize pedestrian friendly living, shopping and working

I also learned about Citi-Stat, a data driven city management system that measures the effectiveness and efficiency of city services and helps government become more accountable to the people. Neighboring Union Township is using this tool. We need this kind of change in Plainfield and 2009 is right around the corner.

A session on affordable housing detailed the convoluted and not very effective process of meeting New Jersey's demand for housing for working and lower income families. An important regulation for Plainfield is "Growth Share". Even if we think we have our fair share of affordable housing, we will create new obligations when we build new housing units - 1 new affordable unit for every 4 new units - and another affordable unit for every 8 new jobs created. Clearly, we will have to move away from our developer driven approach. What is needed is a city wide comprehensive plan that integrates the housing, job creation and business development elements. And residents and business owners will have to be welcomed into the planning process.

I will also share some information on property tax exemptions, immigration and language access, road paving (by far the most exciting topic) and energy audits. That will have to wait for my next blog.

The Obama Administration and its Influence on Plainfield

2008-11-09T11:36:00.000-05:00

"The Obama Administration" - words that still have me smiling 5 days after this historic election. Enough time for some of the euphoria to wear off and get me thinking about impact on Plainfield. Here is what I see in my crystal ball:

1. Young people of color will become more interested in public service, government and politics. Look for more Annie McWilliamses at the local, state and national levels.

2. Much credit is due to some local elected officials for helping turn out huge numbers of voters for Obama. Rashid Burney was there from the beginning. Will this help his political career? One can hope so, for his sake and for the sake of our city.

3. Obama ran for change. What does that mean at the local level? Certainly not the municipal budget mess we are currently dealing with. Certainly not the inadequate website and overall communications between the city and Plainfield residents. Not the inability to move on a shared services agreement with the Board of Education. I hope Obama's recent words about the economic downturn - "swift action needed" - is heeded in Plainfield, 3 years into the Mayors 4 year term.

4. Obama ran on tax relief for poor and middle class citizens. In Plainfield, we are facing property tax increases that are double the cost of living. The people who struggle the most are retired homeowners and working people in the middle income brackets. Will the City Council face up to some hard budget decisions this year and for the foreseeable future? I believe President Obama will. Will we in Plainfield have the courage to think out of the box about police, fire, inspections and public works services? Two new Council members, Adrian Mapp and Ms McWilliams, will help.

5. I think the tone of political campaigns is changing. The McCain campaign tried some desperate negative messages, especially near the end of the race. The people didn't buy it and Obama remained focused on his positive message. In Plainfield, it's the same. Dirty tricks, whisper campaigns and last minute smears will backfire on those who are foolish enough to try.

Plainfield was a leader in providing a huge plurality for Obama, for change. Can we now show leadership for change within local government? I urge you to listen carefully to elected officials. Important elections are coming in June 2009 that will decide Plainfield's leadership for years to come. Lets support the elected officials and candidates who are for the kinds of changes that Obama embodies:

environment friendly strategies that create jobs, save on energy bills and make our cities healthier places to live
using electronic media for meaningful communication with the people
grassroots campaign fundraising that shifts the balance away from big business and towards the average citizen who can give $10, $25 or $50 for the candidate he or she believes in
making public service a commitment to the greater good rather than a private club for pay to play contributors, family and friends

Plainfielders take note: November 4 is now glorious history. The all important June 2009 primary is before us. Everything said and done by local officials will be influenced by that event. We will select a Mayor and all 68 Democratic City Committee seats. This Committee selects a chairman who becomes the most powerful person in Plainfield, bar none. Lets hope the 2009 primary election results are as good for Plainfield as the November 4, 2008 result. Plainfield deserves it.

Plainfield Budget 2009: Information Technology

2008-10-23T18:20:00.000-04:00

Our city is far behind when it comes to the efficiencies created by information technology (IT). We have yet to enter the tail end of the 20th century, to put it kindly. The current administration acknowledges this and has spoken about the need for an IT plan and a major investment to bring us up to speed.

The problem has been hearing the words but seeing little action. There was cause for hope last year when the city announced a shared services agreement with the Plainfield Board of Education. This was a contract valued at $125,000 for a year of services including help desk and system maintenance. There was also an IT grant in our 2007 budget to help us move ahead. Then, just last week, the City Council heard that the agreement will not be renewed and that the Mayors team wants to go ahead without the help of our school district. We also heard that the grant hadn't come through. Unfortunately, the Council, including it's IT Committee, hadn't heard that news before. And the shared services agreement expired in June 2008. Left in the dark until the last meeting, I could only look on in amazement as the administration asked for a last minute budget change to let the city go it's own way for IT development. No plan was offered to get us on track.

At last weeks budget meeting, City Administrator Mark Dashield did not give a clear reason why the agreement was not renewed or why the grant was lost. I was left with the impression that the shared services agreement fell apart on the Board of Education's end. I decided to do my own research.

My sources at the Board of Ed tell me that there is interest in continuing the shared services agreement. Our Mayor even corresponded with the Board of Ed regarding a contract renewal. So what happened? We deserve answers, on the grant too. I hope they come at tonight's (Thursday) Council meeting. Unfortunately I am out of town and will have to catch up with this tomorrow.

We need a major investment in information technology for Plainfield. Speaking for myself, I will need to see a plan, not just for spending, but for a multi year roll out of hardware, software, staff development and technical assistance. I will also need to feel more confident in the ability of city government to spend our money effectively.

Plainfield Budget 2009: Dudley House

2008-10-21T06:17:00.000-04:00

Dudley House is one of only two half way houses in Union County for people recovering from chemical dependency. The other one, Flynn House in Elizabeth, is privately funded and uses no government monies. They are both much needed.

Dudley House is disadvantaged in that it is run by a city. The kind of mission driven leadership, volunteers and private donations that are needed for an operation like Dudley House are most likely found within not for profit organizations. Dudley House, in the hands of Plainfield municipal government, has been able to tread water at best. This year Dudley House is experiencing city management at its worst. I feel strongly that Dudley House needs to either transition into a not for profit corporation or be taken over by an existing one.

Dudley House is facing a $150,000 operating deficit because it has lost two Union County grants that have sustained it for many years. Mayor Robinson Briggs and her team are proposing that Plainfield taxpayers take on this burden, even though not all of the half way house residents are from Plainfield. They propose this as bridge funding until we can get our county grants back. City Administrator Dashield recently assured the Council that "it looked very positive" to get the grants again. I decided to do my own research. My sources tell me that getting county grant funds back for 2008 will not happen. 2009 funds will only be available from the time of ADA compliance - so not anytime soon.

There are 15 organizations in Union County that receive alcohol-drug abuse services funding through the county. All were informed over 5 years ago that continued funding was contingent on obtaining a state license from the Division of Alcohol. Each was given until 2007 to comply. All the other grant recipients were able to get their licenses. Plainfield did not comply because Dudley House did not meet the handicapped access requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Plainfield asked for an extension but was refused because no steps had been taken in the direction of compliance.

This problem came to light at a Council meeting in early 2008 when the Mayors team said the future of Dudley House was uncertain. This led to a groundswell of community support from half way house graduates who explained it's positive impact on their lives. At that time the Mayor made a promise to address the problem at hand. That was the last the City Council heard until last weeks budget presentation when the administration asked for $150,000 on top of the traditional city contribution of $28,000.

What is the future of Dudley House? How can we bring it from it's current budget crisis back to financial health. In the long term, the city must act quickly to engineer a take-over. I know some qualified organizations that are capable of running Dudley House. Failing that, a new not for profit can be formed. There are many people in the community who feel passionately about it.

Meanwhile, Dudley House needs to be sustained in the short run. Perhaps our state legislators can come up with emergency funds. Think of all the charity care dollars that are no longer available to Plainfield residents due to the closing of Muhlenberg Hospital. This is a cause worth fighting for but should Plainfield taxpayers shoulder the whole burden?

Plainfield's Money: Who's In Charge

2008-10-18T12:09:00.000-04:00

Saturday's Courier News lead story was about the $1.66 million dollar mistake in the Plainfield 2009 proposed budget. This mistake is disturbing for two reasons. One is the potential tax increase, an additional 3% added on to the already high 9.5% proposed increase. The second problem is that our city administration's official position is that this is the fault of the audit firm that does Plainfield's municipal annual audit. Just when we all want to take responsibility for a serious problem, we get finger pointing. Who was checking the numbers? The Mayor and her team obviously did not.

Is she saying that our audit firm created the budget that the administration introduced to the City Council. Whatever she was thinking, this incorrect budget has been submitted to the Council. It is now our mess to deal with.

To make matters worse, our City Administrator stated that we will use surplus to address this mistake. That may well be but only the Council can decide that, not the Mayor or her staff. And the Council has not even been consulted, let alone requested by the Mayor, to use surplus to fix this huge budget hole.

When there are performance problems in city government, the first reaction should be to be constructive and not just critical. Some will want to close ranks around the underperforming city officials and do patch work. That may be fine for minor potholes but not when the road is in need of total reconstruction. That is where we are right now with the city's fiscal operations and budget.

This $1.66 million mistake is, unfortunately, indicative of the Mayor's budgeting process and more. I will provide details in my blog later this week to explain some of our problems and possible solutions.

Dear Anonymous

2008-10-09T10:49:00.000-04:00

Thanks to Maria Pellum for her response to my blog on the Mayors security detail. Not only for her thoughts but for her name. Most responses have been signed "anonymous". Actually I have received some really good comments from anonymous. So I say to you mystery people: don't be afraid - give us your names. There is too much fear in Plainfield but it evaporates quickly when you stand up to it. Bullying is a shell game when you dig beneath the surface, if you know what I mean.

I am considering posting only signed comments in the future. What are your thoughts, reader?

Mayors Security Detail

2008-10-08T07:15:00.000-04:00

Thank you Mayor. Its never too late to do the right thing. Your opponents were salivating over this issue and now you beat them to the punch. I was astonished when you arrived at the Hillside Avenue Neighborhood Watch block party last weekend with one of your officers in tow. Now I am thinking more of you as a politician.

The Star Ledger reporter had it right when he wrote that local elected officials were reluctant to criticize the security detail, even though it has cost the city hundreds of thousands of dollars. The only public challenges I am aware of are when Annie McWilliams brought it up during a debate at the library and when I asked for a risk assessment at a council meeting. What we got today was a political assessment from the Mayor in preparation for the contested June primary election.

Muhlenberg Hospital: How Politics and Help (and Hurt) - Part 1

2008-09-13T12:18:00.000-04:00

Before dealing with the real and only important issue here, the future of Muhlenberg, I need to put to rest some local political silliness. Assemblyman Green, in his blog, uses Dottie Gutenkauf to attack me for "abstaining" from the Council vote to support the Mayors recent legal action regarding Muhlenberg Hospital. The Mayors action was to serve notice of appeal on NJ Health Commissioner Howard's decision on the closing of the hospital.

You should have called me Dottie. Or checked with any Councilperson. Then you would have known that I left the meeting (personal business) before it came up in public. Being absent is not "abstaining". I was present for part of the discussion in executive session. When the minutes and audio tape are made available, you will be able to note my saying to the Mayor that her action has given the Council more time to adequately address the Commissioners decision. You will also be able to hear that I was unhappy that the Mayor filed her notice of appeal without telling the Council, not even telling the Council's committee on Muhlenberg Hospital. We first heard this the day of that Council meeting.

So much for strength in unity. Lucky for the Mayor that the Council got past this oversight and supported the legal action. I was not ready to do so on such short notice. I needed time to understand if this was a serious step or just a political gesture. Given a few days, I decided that I would join the rest of the Council in supporting the Mayors appeal.

Notice of appeal is a step but it does not solve the long term challenge of providing medical services for Plainfielders. That is a tricky subject. When Assemblyman Green first mentioned "Plan B" to anticipate the hospital closing by bolstering services, he was attacked for giving up on Muhlenberg. Actually he was doing the right thing, but saying it in public was bad timing. Likewise, when I told Dottie Gutenkauf that, should Muhlenberg close, the financial health of neighboring hospitals such as JFK in Edison would be important to our residents health and safety.

I am very upset with the Solaris decision to close Muhlenberg. I am even more upset with our Governor, who disregarded the recommendations of his own NJ Commission on Rationalizing Health Care Resources. This blue ribbon panel recommended that essential hospitals that are financially stressed be given state support to remain open. I could ventilate about state legislators also who did not come to the rescue of our hospital (and who accept contributions from hospital systems). Maybe some other time.

Unfortunately, health care decisions in New Jersey are political, not rational. And we Dems are in charge. The heat is on, especially for those elected officials who are running in next years June primary (the Mayor, the Assemblyman, to name a few).

Citizens, you will have to carefully analyze our actions to see if we are just posturing, avoiding blame by pointing fingers at others, or if we are doing whatever we can to solve the problem of providing good health care in Plainfield. More on that in part 2.

Pay to Play Feedback

2008-08-22T08:02:00.000-04:00

After my blog about municipal audits and their relationship with pay to play in New Jersey, I received an interesting phone call. An influential state legislator who shall go nameless reached out to me, scolding me for "going after" Plainfield's audit firm.

It's as if he wanted to confirm my problem with the way Plainfield selects its auditor. Clearly his constituent for this phone call was the audit company and not the taxpaying citizens of Plainfield. That's the problem in a nutshell. The interests of the few come before the interests of the people.

For the record, I have absolutely no problem with the work of this audit firm. They have always answered my questions about the annual audit and budgets in a professional manner.

I do have a problem when a local political leader who does a good deal of fundraising calls to pressure a Councilman simply because that Councilman is advocating a position for limits on pay to play. I have an even bigger problem when that state legislator admits to me that he has received contributions from the very same audit firm I mentioned in my recent blog.

Let me be very clear: my problem is not with the audit firm. They are in the same boat as all New Jersey audit firms serving the public sector. My problem is with the few legislators who get the benefits of pay to play at the expense of the citizens of New Jersey.

Muhlenberg For Sale: clarification needed

2008-08-20T09:54:00.001-04:00

Today's Courier News front page story is about Muhlenberg Hospital as discussed by City Council members and citizens at last nights Plainfield Council meeting. At the meeting I stated that the sale of the hospital is a private transaction but that the hospital and the Solaris system is so heavily funded/subsidized by taxpayer monies and supported by a property tax exemption that citizens have a financial interest in the sale. I asked the Council committee on Muhlenberg to take this into consideration as an issue to pursue. I stated that this could be an action item to bring to the regulators and legislators who have oversight on the hospital.

After the meeting I was asked by the Courier News reporter to explain my statement. He quoted me in the news story accurately. Unfortunately he mistakenly said I was calling for legal action by the council. I have called the Courier and asked for a follow-up correction to be made to clarify my position. News flash - after writing this blog the Courier reporter called to acknowldge the mistake and said the correction would be printed in Thursdays paper.

My position is that the Council committee on Muhlenberg seriously consider recommending back to Council the following: we request the Commissioner of Health to work with us and Solaris to make the hospital sale a more public process. This can be done in a number of ways. One would be to have an appraisal done to set a minimum bid for Muhlenberg and then do a competitive bidding process - all bids to be opened in public. There are others options such as legislative action by the New Jersey Legislature to make this sale process transparent. That will be up to the Council's Muhlenberg committee to consider.

Another point of clarification: when I say "minimum bid" I am referring to more than just the dollar amount. I mean medical services as well.

Pay to Play and audit firms

2008-08-15T17:20:00.000-04:00

I read with interest a story in the Ledger about cosy deals between local governments and the firms that do their annual independent financial audits. It triggered some thoughts about Plainfield's audits:

1. Suplee Clooney have done Plainfields' municipal audits for many years. Are they a pay to play vendor? In order to be a successful government contractor in New Jersey, which they are, the answer is almost assuredly yes. Check the ELEC campaign contribution reports for Assemblyman Green, the state Democratic and Republican parties, etc. They should be there. Don't get me wrong. They seem to do a good job in Plainfield.

2. There are many good audit firms with municipal experience in New Jersey. I think Plainfield should go out to bid. Nothing against Suplee Clooney. Maybe when we've used a different firm for a number of years, we might want to go out to bid again and Suplee Cloney would win. And they are good enough that if pay to play was abolished, they'd do just fine. My guess is they would probably appreciate life without pay to play. But my concern is not just pay to play - see next.

3. Our city financial audit reflects on the entire municipal operation. It reflects on Mayor, Council and staff. But practically speaking the staff handle the fiscal transactions so the audit, to a large degree, is about the staff performance. And when the same audit firm is used for many years, a friendliness, even a cosiness develops between auditor and the staff. For that reason, fiscal oversight experts recommend changing audit firms every so often. I suggested this a few years ago. The response - why change when they do such good work. What do you think, reader?

4. Which brings me to my last thought. I said the audit is mostly on staff performance. It also reflects on the governing body's fiscal oversight performance. We, the City Council, vote to approve the annual audit and corrective action plans for any "findings" by the auditors. We could take it one step further. We councillors could initiate a bidding process for the audit contract and actually select the audit firm. It doesn't quite seem right that the staff recommend the firm that is mostly paid to audit them. This approach is not required by state law but it does pass the test of good fiscal oversight.

So pay to play and familiarity are obstacles to a truly independent audit. The first problem is more complex and ultimately needs a system wide solution. The second could be solved locally any given year.

Pay to Play, continued

2008-07-19T14:29:00.000-04:00

Sorry for the long delay. It's a hectic time of year.

Since my last blog, the City Council has taken up several agenda items related to "pay to play". First is approval of the list of administration recommended professional services vendors under the so-called "Fair and Open" option of the state pay to play law. I always refer to this as "so-called" because it is not what it says it is.

Professional services provided to government entities in New Jersey do not have to go out to bid. This is a gigantic lapse in government ethics that allows the exchange of campaign donations for lucrative legal, engineering, architectural and accounting/auditing contracts. Our state legislature has been under pressure to do something about it thanks to negative press and good government advocacy groups. The legislature came up with this "Fair and Open" process to mollify the public.

Under this option, Plainfield can advertise professional services opportunities in the most minimal way. If most vendors are unaware of the brief window in which we advertise, they are out of luck. And Plainfield doesn't even have to advertise in the Ledger or Courier-News. We use the city website, notorious for its inadequacy and infrequent usage. But we do seem to attract the interest of vendors who have already made donations to certain political campaign funds. Competition be damned. Adam Smith would be rolling over in his grave if he knew.

At Monday's Agenda Fixing meeting, I asked the Council to table this list of vendors so we could do more advertising. No takers.

The second Council item of business is a $1,000,000 engineering contract to Remington and Vernick. No typo, that is a million dollars. Not going out to bid. On Monday, I suggested a competitive bidding process. No takers. It would slow down road construction, it was said. That is a valid point. Another Councilman commented that we consider competitive bidding in the future. Here is why I am not happy with that response: I have brought this up before and heard this response. There hasn't been a real interest in follow-up from previous requests for action. So would that change going forward?

Why is it difficult for elected officials to confront pay to play directly. Two reasons. One is that high level officials and party leaders benefit from pay to play , leveraging large election war chests into real power. This is perfectly legal under current law. The party in power generally benefits more.

The other reason, more applicable in Plainfield, is that elected officials low on the totem pole like Plainfield City Council members, are under pressure from party leaders to keep the flow of pay to play contributions going. There could even be consequences for trying to close some of the loopholes in our current pay to play laws.

There is some good news. The Center for Civic Responsibility is holding education sessions for citizens who want to learn about citizen empowerment and good government. Google them to learn more about their campaign and the date of their next session in Plainfield. I think it is August 12 in the Public Library at 7 pm.

Next blog on pay to play: solutions.

Pay to Play, Part 1 - the corruption tax

2008-06-14T12:35:00.000-04:00

We all read the headlines with great anticipation when US Attorney Chris Christie indicts yet another public official for breaking the law. Yet the cost to the public for fraud and other illegal activities in actual dollars is very small compared to the total cost of government. A much more significant cost to the taxpayers comes from legal and "necessary" campaign contributions from the companies and individuals that do business with state, county and local government. This is true all over New Jersey.
Common Cause estimates the cost to New Jersey taxpayers to be close to $1 billion a year. One needs to go no further than Plainfield to illustrate the costs of pay to play.

But first, for the uninitiated, a little q & a:

1. Is pay to play "necessary"? - from the perspective of vendors, it is a necessary evil. Many government contracts do not require competitive bids and donations to the party in power can lead to lucrative business deals. A prominent New Jersey business cut back on pay to play donations a few years ago and lost significant business. They had to get back in this game to keep their business afloat (I did not have permission to use their name).

2. I thought that there are limits to campaign donations that level the playing field in the struggle for influence? - there are loopholes that allow companies to donate through each business partner, spouses and other family members. Donations can also be maximized by giving money to many campaign committees that are affiliated. Last but not least, there are a few campaign committees that have no limits for donations - these are the state Democratic and Republican Committees and the committees for the legislative leaders of each party.

3. What is wheeling? - that is how money, coming through the loopholes mentioned above can be funnelled from all over the state into select election campaigns. Big money was wheeled into Plainfield from south jersey Democrats to defeat Mayor Al McWilliams 3 years ago. I heard estimates of $100,000 to $200,000 but its hard to confirm facts given the convoluted paths this money follows.

4. What does this money get spent on in election campaigns? Mailings, robo-calls, lawn signs, television commercials, political polling, campaign consultants and much more.

Ok - so how does pay to play work in Plainfield?

In a mostly one party town, the primary, especially a contested primary, is where the action is. The Plainfield 2008 primary was a battle between the Regular Democrats, with pay to play money, and the challengers who got mostly local donations from residents. Why did the Regular Dems get all the pay to play money? Very simple. The Mayor and Plainfield Democratic City Committee chairman are Regular Democrats. The Mayor signs city contracts. If you want to get elected in Plainfield, it really helps to have support from the City Committee chair. That person decides your fate in the primary election: he or she decides who gets the party line on the ballot, a huge advantage in Plainfield.

The vendors know this and of course they want to back the winners. So when they have to choose between attending the Jerry Green fundraiser for the Regular Democratic candidates or the challengers event, its a no brainer. So if you were wondering why the incumbents could run numerous tv commercials and the challengers could not, wonder no more. In my 6 City Council campaigns, I've been on both sides of this situation. Feast or famine. But I was very careful not to take money from the party for anything more than lawn signs. Didn't want to owe too much to people whose agenda was not clear to me.

This kind of political fundraising is part of the American landscape. Why should we care? Because cost are high and guess who pays?

We taxpayers do in several ways. First, the vendors must build their donations into the cost of doing business with government. That road project includes the cost of engineering, a profession well known to make big pay to play donations regularly. Attorneys and auditors get no bid contracts so they have to play this game, like it or not.

The second way taxpayers/citizens are affected has to do reduced value for the services we pay for. If a business can get the contract through donations rather than offering the best price and value, there is less incentive for high performance to get and keep Plainfield's business.

To sum up, pay to play results in paying more and getting less. This is the corruption tax and it is perfectly legal.

In my next blog I will provide some details on local pay to play. If you like internet research, google NJ ELEC for a search engine that will locate the money and you can start to understand how it flows. Warning - you may get the feeling you are only scratching the surface by doing this.