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JerseySmarts.com

Corruption in Ocean Township!

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Many years ago, when I was an undergraduate at Monmouth University, a group of students and I led a public relations battle against Ocean Township and their excessive abuse of our civil rights as residents of the town. Police officers routinely opened our front door at all hours of the day and night and walked through our house “just to see what’s going on.”

We had police officers come to our house with two or three cars during the prime party hours on the weekend and tell us to keep the noise down. When we invited them into our house to see the 3 guys who were hanging out playing Tiger Woods Golf on PlayStation 2, the cops would put their tails between their legs and tell us that they had better not have to come back. Yeah right. And we had better not have to get the FBI to investigate that police station (again). Oh yeah – we had the FBI investigating Ocean Township well before the township’s corrupt Mayor, Terrance Weldon, was indicted.

I am only bringing all of this up because of the recent corruption talk in New Jersey…and because the story hit recently that Ocean Township is considering suing their corrupt former Mayor:

The township is weighing the option of suing former Mayor Terrance D. Weldon for violating his oath of office in accepting $64,000 in bribes from developers.

“We actually have a firm that has approached us about litigation and we are considering that,” Mayor William F. Larkin said at a Township Council meeting Wednesday night. “There is actually a firm that wants to represent us without cost.”

That was from the Asbury Park Press. I feel compelled to bring this stuff up because seven and eight years ago a bunch of college students and I SAW the corruption, we lived through the corruption, and (most importantly) we publicly called these administrators out on their corrupt ways. And what did we get in return? A group of local residents and activist-for-the-sake-of-being-activist students who condemned us for using the word “corrupt.”

Bullshit on them. We were right. The Mayor of the town has been indicted and in his wake the Police Chief left his post and the housing inspector left, too (among other officials). All of these folks were in on the crap going on in Ocean Township and we saw it all before anyone else would believe it. Now we’ve been proven correct.

I want my apology!

Another Reason to Love Ocean Township…

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Some of you may remember last summer when I was repeatedly posting all of the bad things that happen in Ocean Township, New Jersey. My purpose was to constantly spin these “bad” news stories against the completely horrific manner in which Ocean Township singles out and goes after college students. Monmouth University students are – by and large – a credit to the community. They engage in mandatory community service for many of their on-campus organizations as well as bolster the economy by living in what would other be vacant housing. I’ve got news for all of the pompous homeowners that hate these rental houses…vacant housing doesn’t pay the property tax bill and the less property taxes that are collected, the more YOU have to pay to make up for it.

In any event, I digress. Another story popped up in my favorite local paper the other day, The Coaster. Seems that TWENTY-TWO underage kids were arrested at a “drinking party” during the last week or so of August. Now, I don’t condemn the kids as much as I condemn the parents in these situations. I do, however, think that there is an alarming situation in Ocean Township.

That is, I think it is absolutely crazy that these types of stories are looked at with wonder and amazement by the local adults. What? You guys were never kids? You never gathered at a friend’s house and got drunk when you were in high school? Okay, I submit that kids today are much stupider and generally more likely to drink and do experimental drugs than ten, twenty, and maybe even 30 years ago. I’ll give anyone that in the argument.

What I won’t give is that these kids are doing what kids do. Again, I’m no genius, but there has got to be a level of comfort between parents and their kids where the kids can hang out and begin to feel a degree of freedom, but are still safe in the process. I don’t have kids so I have little room to talk about what that level of comfort might entail.

I have, however, suffered through going to college while renting a house in Ocean Township and I have to make this point…

Maybe if the police and township officials and nosy neighbors didn’t spend September through May going after generally harmless (and of age) college students, they wouldn’t have a huge underage drinking problem with their “locals.” Just something to consider…

Governor Bans Dual Office Holding…Sorta

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Governor Jon Corzine signed a bill yesterday that bans people from holding dual elected position in New Jersey. This is great! Except for one little detail…

It’s not a retroactive bill.

In other words, all of the guys and gals who are in office TODAY that are abusing the dual office clause in New Jersey will not be forced to choose one or the other. Alright, so not all of them are corrupt, but let’s think about this logically for a moment.

This ban came into place because of guys like Sharpe James and others currently in the legislature who are not doing right by both of their constituencies. An ethics battle erupts in New Jersey’s legislature (thank God – because the people really wanted this issue figured out). Reforms are suggested, ironically enough, by Sharpe James (a poor attempt to save his political career and legacy). The reforms are passed! The people celebrate…then they realize that this applies to all incoming elected officials and not the ones who are currently in office – the ones who brought about the need for these reforms in the first place!

Here are the particulars of the bill, courtesy of the Asbury Park Press:

Ban anyone from holding more than one elected office at a time. The law allows current dual-office holders to remain in place until they retire or lose an election.

Make it a crime to knowingly misuse public tax dollars or other resources. The offense would be punishable by up to 20 years in prison and fines of up to $200,000.

Allow courts to impose fines for corruption cases involving state, county or municipal contracts.

Require legislative voting records to be posted online. The votes will remain online for two legislative sessions (four years).

I like the legislative voting records being posted online. Of course we all know that the biggest consumers of this information will be newspapers and political campaigns (which is a real shame). I also like the fact that misuse of public money is punishable by up to 20 years in jail or a fine of up to $200,000. Good!

So, as always in New Jersey, we’ll settle for a bill that has some good parts and some bad parts. The saving grace here is that the bad parts will eventually expire as either the bad officeholders die out, retire, or lose an election.

While we wait for that, though, check out New Jersey Carpet Cleaning for the best carpet cleaning in the Garden State!

Another Reason to Hate the Bennies in Deal

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So, I’m boarding a pug dog for my Mom this week because she’s on vacation. This means, obviously, that I have to walk the little guy which is fine with me. I actually like the dog and I think he likes me, so it’s a win-win relationship here!

Now I have a large, 95% unused CVS parking lot next to my building. As one would imagine, this is where I walk my dog. And, as anyone who lives here year-round knows, this is also on Roosevelt Avenue which seems to turn into the Tourist Speedway in the summer months. In other words, once the end of June comes, these ratty brats from New York come and use our local roads racetracks.

I guess that most of you see where this outrage is going…

I was just outside walking the dog and as we’re crossing over the entrance to this largely unused parking lot, two bastard little bitches come speeding into the entranceway in a little woman-colored gold piece of shit car. They stop short to avoid hitting me and – more importantly – the dog. I really didn’t move and the dog could have cared less, but the high school-aged scumbag driver had to be a tough guy and yell, “Get the fuck out of the way!” As he yells this I see a look of dread in his friend’s eye – turns out that the teenage, idiot 120-pound punk bitch driver forgot that his window was cracked and I could hear him. So I stop, turn and look at the little bitch and say, “What the fuck did you say?”

Bear in mind, folks, that I’m on the plus size of 300 pounds and that most of these little bitches who “summer” in Deal are afraid of us locals who are larger than the front end of their car. I know this for a fact – I’ve lived and/or worked in Deal for almost a decade. There are two things that are certain about these idiot tourists. One, they fear large people with a bit of a whacked out look in their eye. Two, they fear dogs. I don’t get the second one, but I’ve seen young idiot tourist children jump from the side of a building, across the sidewalk, and into the street to get away from a dachshund. Really. And I won’t even get into how the tough-guy teenagers react when they see rottweilers and even bigger dogs – let’s just say that the tough- guy bullshit seems to end when they’re out of their safe zone!

Anyway, after I asked the kid, “What the fuck did you say,” in a calm, yet seemingly maniac tone, he just sort of whimpered, “Uhhh, move…” Poor little bitch was scared. So as I walked away, he honked his horn, I gave him the one-finger salute, and continued to walk away.

As fast as the little pugs’ legs could take him across the street and up to my apartment, I got the pug upstairs and ran back downstairs and back over to the CVS parking lot. Unfortunately, the big tough guy in his beat-up piece of shit car that was too scared to step out of it when he actually looked me in the eye and his boyfriend were gone. Too bad, I wouldn’t have minded putting them through the pavement for a while.

The moral of the story here (other than my rage) is that if you’re a summer-time tourist somewhere, has some fucking respect for the place that you shit on 3 months out of the year. Don’t go bitching about how your summer dollars sustain our local economies because that’s patented bullshit and anyone who knows anything about rental markets can tell you such. And if you see a big dude walking a dog…slow the fuck down! Because that big dude might be me and I might just not be too fucking pleased with two guys who, combined, weigh less than left leg telling me to get the fuck out of the way. Not smart, benny…not smart.

Non-functioning School Districts in New Jersey

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The Asbury Park Press ran an article this morning talking about how Governor Money Bags signed a provision into law that can lead to the elimination of non-functioning school districts. What is a non-functioning school district? These are districts where a school board exists, but there are no schools.

For you non-New Jerseyans out there: Yes, we have school districts and school boards with no schools for them to “district” or “board” over. Welcome to another example of New Jersey’s fiefdom mindset.

The newspaper presented a case where there is a school district with 5 or 6 kids, all who are placed in local schools outside of their district. The most interesting quotes that I found in this article are as follows:

“They want to shut down the nonoperating school districts because they don’t realize how efficient we are,” a borough resident said. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

and

“Keep your hands off,” said the president of the Lake Como school board. “It sounds good in the newspaper (to cut nonoperating districts). In reality, it’s ridiculous.”

I would never take anything away from the arguments that these fine citizens are making, but in reference to the first quote – did it ever occur to this resident that the school boards are running efficiently because there is NO SCHOOL for them to preside over? “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it?” How can something be broken when it doesn’t even fulfill its primary goal to begin with!?

And with respect to the Lake Como school board President, I’m sorry but it is not ridiculous to eliminate egregious expansion of government bodies in New Jersey. It’s just not, period.

So as this battle seems ready to rage in New Jersey, I wonder what the rest of the nation is like with their school boards. Anyone with any information is more than welcome to add their thoughts.