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Checking in on Mt. Arlington’s Election Results

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As an engaged voter, I always like to take a look at the election results in the small town where I am registered to vote – Mount Arlington, New Jersey. The following election results are from the Roxbury Register (my comments below):

Republican Borough Councilman Bill Doran easily won re-election to the council Tuesday, and first-time Republican Dr. Stephen Sadow will also be joining the council in January.

Both Republicans bested Democrats Robert Silkes and David Karpman in Tuesday’s election.

Doran received 1,052 votes, while Sadow garnered 1,068 votes. Silkes received 920 votes while Karpman received 834 votes.

According to Borough Clerk Linda DeSantis, there were also a total of 513 write-in votes, which were not tabulated Tuesday night because they did not add up to enough to denote a winner. Republicans Steve Lardiere and Christopher Kelley both waged unsuccessful write-in campaigns, posting signs around the borough urging their election to the council.

Sadow will replace Republican KerriAnn Mulligan on the borough’s governing body. Mulligan did not seek re-election to the council.

In the race for U.S. President, Sen. Barack Obama received 1,034 votes while Sen. John McCain received 1,449 votes.

Of about 3,600 registered voters, a total of 2,483 cast votes Tuesday. That’s a voter turnout of about 69 percent.

Nice to see a voter turnout of 69 percent – that’s not bad in America, though I expected it to be higher given that this is a Presidential election year and given the historic race where both a woman and a black man were on opposing tickets. As is usual, Mount Arlington voted decidedly Republican in this year’s elections. I find it interesting that write-in candidates for Borough Council received 513 votes. That’s nothing to scoff at and since the write-in candidates were both Republicans, they certainly helped to close the gap between the Republicans and Democrats in this race. In fact, the Democrats only lost one of the elections by 149 votes – a very impressive vote tally for the Democrats in Mount Arlington.

Anyway, with all of the posts and discussion about the Presidential election I just wanted to comment on the local election, too!

More on Long Branch’s Redevelopment Process

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Finally, Kevin Brown has been removed as a squatter at 162 Broadway in Long Branch! The Asbury Park Press ran a story today talking about how the City of Long Branch has taken over the property. My favorite part of the story is below:

Jones said that after touring 162 Broadway, he came to a certain conclusion: If there was no redevelopment there, the city still would have condemned the building and demolished it, as an unsafe structure.

A portion of the ground floor, which had been home to a commercial tenant until late in 2007, was in the best shape, but the rest of the building was suffering from a lack of maintenance, he said. There were holes in the walls, ceiling, roof and windows, which had allowed rain to enter, deteriorating the structure further, and the items and materials that had been stored there were literally moldering where they sat.

Yeah…that’s not “blight” at all! Ha! What was most disturbing about this situation was the way that Brown tried to piggyback on the the MTOTSA folks – people who had a real gripe with eminent domain abuse. But (dare I say this), the legal system actually worked in this process! The MTOTSA organization won their battle against Long Branch (as they should have) and Brown lost his battle (as he should have). There is justice in this system!

For more background on this situation and some interesting comments from guests to this blog, feel free to visit a previous post on the subject.

A Major Ruling in the Eminent Domain Arena

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Do you know what eminent domain is? I will refer to our friends at Wikipedia to provide a simple definition, though if you want a more detailed one feel free to click on the link. From Wikipedia:

Eminent domain…is the inherent power of the state to seize a citizen’s private property…with due monetary compensation, but without the owner’s consent.

In simpler terms, the process of eminent domain allows the government to take private property so long as they pay you a decent sum for the property. If you dig a little deeper, the property is supposed to taken only to be used for the public good. For example, if you are familiar with Deal Road in Ocean Township, you’ll know that the museum sits towards the end of the road closest to Route 35. You’ll also know that there was some road work performed to widen Deal Road near the entrance and exit areas of the museum. In order to widen the road, the township had to acquire some two or three feet of a homeowner’s lawn. The homeowner cried eminent domain abuse, but no one listened because this is exactly what the law is in place to do!

However, you may have heard the cry of eminent domain abuse in connection with some other developments along the Jersey Shore (or whatever neck of the woods you’re in). In the City of Long Branch, for example, the MTOTSA (Marine Terrace, Ocean Terrace, and Seaview Avenue residents’ association) fought against Long Branch’s designation of their properties as “blighted.” And you know what? They won.

Due to my current and immediately former employment situations, I’ve worked with many organizations that work both for and against the use of eminent domain. The biggest common denominator that I’ve found in every discussion is the lack of understanding of what eminent domain is all about. In fact, I HAVE uncovered many cases of eminent domain abuse…but in the opposite direction – where homeowners have literally extorted development companies who wanted to acquire small parcels of land for developments. It’s gross, really.

Anyway, the people of MTOTSA fought a valiant fight and I’m glad that they won. Their property was NOT blighted and for Long Branch to call it blighted – so it could building another multi-million dollar development on the beachfront – is a bastardization of the eminent domain laws. Some people argue that taking these properties was in the “public’s best interests” because it could generate tax revenues many multiples in excess of what it currently generates. Yet there is no discussion of the increased costs associated with high-density development. The idea is that with higher tax revenues from this one part of town, the rest of the town’s property taxes would be lowered.

One only needs to look at Pier Village (right down the street from the MTOTSA area) to see that you can have all of the tourists in the world coming to your area, but it does not guarantee that the increased revenues will lead to lower taxes. Long Branch’s property taxes went UP this year! And that’s including all of the excess revenue coming from Pier Village. Talk about being sold a bill of goods…

Congratulations to the MTOTSA organization for scoring a well-deserved victory in a very tough fight!

The Epitome of a Scumbag

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Former Ocean Township Mayor Terry Weldon is getting what’s coming to him. Ocean Township is doing the only good thing that I’ve ever seen them do in filing suit against Weldon for extortion. I’ve actually had interactions with this son of a bitch through his former employees/henchmen (all of which have left Ocean Township by now). This man is a bad person and he did bad things to Ocean Township and the surrounding areas.

This guy tried to bribe my former boss (who was also a dolt). He wrote down a number on a napkin, passed it to my boss, and after my boss told him to shove his napkin up his ass Weldon ordered his henchmen to make life a living hell for my former company. I used to work in the rental business and we couldn’t get Certificates of Occupancy without threatening a lawsuit. Our college houses were put at the top of some indefensible “list” created by Weldon and his former Chief of Police. Our tenants received citation after citation. We would have tenants receive parking violation citations while the house NEXT DOOR would not receive them.

Terry Weldon is the epitome of a scumbag and I’m glad that the FBI stung his ass. I only hope that they keep digging deeper and go after the rotten bastards that worked underneath him and acted as his henchmen. Slimy, scuzzy, no good idiots.

And now many of you see where my disgust for Ocean Township stems from… 🙂

More on COAH’s Bungled Round Three

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About a month and a half ago the Atlanticville (a local Long Branch-area paper) ran an article about Eatontown’s decision to file a complaint against the state regarding the latest round of COAH regulations that were issued. This type of stuff makes me bang my head against the wall and wonder why any of us pay taxes to such a ridiculous system. What’s the problem here? Well, even though it is a bit long, I’ll let the article explain:

According to a series of proposed amendments to COAH’s current round-three regulations, Eatontown’s affordable housing obligation jumped from 92 units to 447 units, Tarantolo said.

“Where are we going to build [the 447 units]?” Tarantolo asked, adding, “I have no idea.”

According to Tarantolo, COAH officials used a geographic information system (GIS) to map out the available land in the borough where affordable units can be constructed.

A GIS is a system that collects various forms of statistical data and maps it according to its geographic location.

“When they worked out the new numbers, they did it using the GIS to determine the number of acres that were still green in particular municipalities,” Tarantolo said.

“As it turns out, COAH just arbitrarily took green space and said this should be developed and some of it should be for affordable housing.

“The GIS labeled some of our parks and open space as buildable land. We suspect they made a mistake.

“The parks and open space are already registered with the state as not being able to be built,” Tarantolo said.

If COAH removes the acreage from the borough’s parks and open space from the vacant-land calculations, Eatontown will see a significant reduction in its affordable housing obligation, Tarantolo said.

Let me put that in layman’s terms for everyone out there. The state used a system that said designated “green spaces” (i.e. parks and protected wildlife area) are okay to build affordable housing units on. Are you f’ing kidding me? Someone at the state was paid to sit down and figure out a new formula for affordable housing and they produced Round Three of COAH by saying that green spaces are legit for building on? What?!

This is the kind of stuff where in ancient Rome you’d find yourself in the Colosseum with some pretty big cats. In New Jersey, though, we reward our morons by giving them taxpayer-funded raises and one of the most ridiculous publicly-financed benefits packages in the nation. Way to go, New Jersey!

Why is this so hard for people to understand? If you want to provide increased housing options for our existing residents, then you need to start redeveloping brownfields across the state. For those of you that don’t know, brownfields are former industrial lots that need serious environmental attention before they can be rebuilt. Many community based groups are doing a magnificent job of making former warehouses into usable community facilities or housing units. Just look up in Paterson where there are a growing number of housing options (yet still not enough).

As for COAH – it might be time to throw it out the window. The system is obviously broken when we are counting our preciously scarce open space in as “buildable lots.” Frankly, it’s that type of idiocy that gives this state a bad name. Fire the person that dreamed up this farce and start again. Now!