New Brunswick, NJ—Commissioners for the Middlesex County Board of Elections announced the unofficial count of provisional ballots Saturday morning in New Brunswick’s hotly contested municipal referendum.

The referendum question, if approved by voters, would change the way the City Council is elected to a ward-based system.

Ultimately, of the ballots accepted by the board at a public hearing yesterday, 81 were cast in favor of the question and 47 were cast against, narrowing the gap in the race to 82 votes.

The Coalition says the election is not by any means over until voters can be sure their voice was heard, including provisional or absentee ballots that were rejected in error.

“We want everyone’s vote to be counted and we will explore all avenues to ensure everyone’s vote counts in this important election, including a thorough recount if necessary.” said Martin Perez, spokesperson for the Coalition.

The unofficial tally of votes is currently 2,474 no to 2,392 yes.

While it was a little over a year now that I served, I feel like I was far more innocent and naïve then, but quickly began learning the ways of the real world as soon as I took on the position.  I worked closely with the Rutgers administration, student groups and even city-based groups.  The only organization that never formally reached out to me, was the city of New Brunswick.  Again, I went into this position with absolutely no biases, and like any human being, my biases slowly grew over time, but it was my job to keep them to myself.    Early on into my term I began learning about this campaign that had started with Rutgers students but was quickly catching on with seemingly everyone who felt like they were being taken advantage of in one way or another by the city.  I had a student columnist who every two weeks, wrote about the city in a most critical way.  And every two weeks I began receiving angry calls from Bill Bray, the City Spokesman, about our columnist’s most recent article that had run.  It became clear to me very quickly that the City wanted me to pull the plug on this columnist, and over the course of my term, I was provided with numerous different reasons why allowing him to remain on staff was unethical.  In fact at one point, the city went as far as to contact the Rutgers journalism school, to see if they could “convince me” to pull the plug.  I quickly realized that the city not only had something to lose by having this columnist write for us, but that their actions to try and have me ax him meant that he was clearly saying something pretty important.  And he probably was.

I will be honest with you.  From the day I began my term as Editor in Chief, my opinion on how the city regarded its citizens dramatically decreased with each interaction I had with city officials.  On the one hand, I had the public spokesperson of a major city cursing and screaming at me on the phone on a weekly basis, and on the other, I had a skinny white kid, dressed in second-hand suits coming into my office and talking to my face in a polite, cordial manor.   This was a stark contrast that spoke volumes to me.

Let me reiterate something, I am not saying I support wards, EON, or the Coalition for Democracy, I am simply saying from someone who started out impartial and oblivious to the political scene in our great city, I do not support the way this current administration, or the city council belittles and mistreats those residents that they are suppose to represent and that includes myself.  When you go out to the polls this Tuesday, before you vote Yes or No on Wards, consider for a moment whether this city has your best interest in mind, and vote accordingly.  I know I will.

The photos: these photos are from two different city events I have covered within the past two years; they were events where I got to see first hand, the interaction between the city and its residents.  Two are from Mayor Cahill’s press conference about the ward campaign that took place in the mid-summer.  The other two are from a city council meeting held in the spring.  You may have seen a few of them before, but I felt they help to document the progression of my feelings toward how the city treats its residents.

10/30/09
Alex Giannattasio and Matia Guardabascio interviewing Martha Guarnieri and Charlie Kratovil of Empower Our Neighborhoods:

Alex: We’re coming down to the home stretch on the Wards Campaign. You guys nervous?

Martha: Nope. We’ve got ‘em. We got the votes, they’re there.  All the hard work we’ve done over the last few years allows us to identify our voters by name, so we know our voters at this point.

Charlie: Nope. We’re winning right now, we’ve got ‘em on the run. When we say we know our voters, we mean we know their names and addresses and phone numbers and we’ve talked to them before and they’ve told us they’re going to vote yes. All we have to do is remind them to do it. We ran a real grassroots campaign.

Alex: That’s one thing that I wanted to talk about so lets start there. What are the main demographics in New Brunswick? Who are the registered voters that you’re speaking to and where are they located?

Martha: The big populations for us are the student population, which is huge, the black population, which is getting smaller and smaller, and the growing Latino population. And then there are old, white homeowners, and I guess younger white homeowners in certain parts of town, which are usually people who work for the city. Among people who are “Yes [for wards] Voters”, the two biggest populations that are going to bring us the votes are students and Latinos, which makes sense because they are two of the strongest parts of our coalition.

Charlie: And they’re also the two most disadvantaged, underrepresented groups in New Brunswick

Matia: That’s the Coalition for Democracy?

Martha: That’s right, EON is essentially a lot of students, and the Latino Leadership Alliance is a lot of Latinos, and these two are among the strongest groups in the Coalition, in addition to other community allies.

Alex: In which wards are those two bases–Latinos and students–mainly located?

Charlie: Students are located in primarily two different wards: ward six and ward two. Ward two is Cook/Douglass, Ward six is Rutgers Campus.

Alex: Talk about the general populations there.

Charlie: Over the past thirty years, as Rutgers failed to meet the need for student housing and people wanted to live close to the campus, the students had no choice but to start renting the off campus housing near campus.

Alex: When was that?

Charlie: It happened slowly, starting in the seventies. When the last ward election happened in 1986, first of all it happened in August, so no students were around, and in fact a lot of people were on vacation. So they purposefully picked the worst time to have it. But also, back then the sixth ward was predominantly middle class homeowners, and if there were students living there, it wasn’t ten to a house, but maybe, a landlord on the first floor renting the second floor to one or two students. So now, times have changed big time, especially in the past ten years, to the point where students constitute around 90% of the population. Homeowners don’t even live there anymore; the ones that do are generally elderly, people who are comfortable and for whatever reason want to stay there. But there are no NEW homeowners moving in and buying homes. The only people buying homes are people who want to rent them.

Martha: Except for over in Eagonville, which is what we call the area where Joe Eagon lives over by Saint Peter’s across from Bucchelic Park. Technically that’s part of the sixth ward, but its well separated, over on the edge of town. It goes to show how vastly different neigborhoods can be: you’ve got St. Peter’s, a big blockade, on one side of which you have beautiful homes, clean streets, no parking problems, no crime issues, and the most gorgeous park in Central New Jersey, and on the other side what essentially amounts to a ghetto, the student ghetto, or the Central Avenue ghetto.

Alex: I used to live in that ghetto.

Charlie: Exactly. Now that’s ward six. On the other side of Hamilton is ward five, and in the past couple of years students have begun to spill over into that ward now, High Street, Plum Street, Division Street. When was the last time they built a dorm? They built Easton Ave. Apartments in 1994, they built Rockoff Hall in 2006…

Alex: …All the while the school continues to accept more students…

Charlie: …And they’re building more housing on Busch and Livingston, where people don’t want to live. I don’t have to tell you that College Ave. is the most coveted place to live, followed by Cook/Douglas, yet they haven’t built anything there to live in. The only thing they have built has been the luxury-apartment-style housing which costs more and isn’t as close to the campus as you’d want.

Martha: They’re doing some of it on Easton Ave, over by Century Apartments and across from the Shell Station. But it’s not Rutgers that’s doing it, its some contractors building privately owned living space.

Charlie: But to get back to the point, Wards two, five and six are increasingly becoming student occupied. As Martha accurately pointed out, unfortunately the African American population here has been shrinking…

Alex: Why is that?

Martha: Because they knock down projects.

Alex: Which projects?

Charlie: The New Brunswick Memorial homes. They were four high-rise project towers. They knocked them down and built something that couldn’t hold nearly as many families.

Martha: Watch the video of them knocking down the projects: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNeuppsmD_k

Charlie: That was in 2001. But in general, they’ve been destroying neighborhoods systematically, eyeing it up as a neighborhood they want to redevelop, and then they find the best way to drive people to want to leave for a variety of reasons, because there’s nothing good in the neighborhood, or they drive all the drug traffic there, or because the landlords there don’t maintain the properties. One of the biggest accomplishments of some of the people in our movement is we won rent control in New Brunswick, specifically eliminating something called vacancy decontrol for many properties. Basically, vacancy decontrol meant that if no one lived in your place, you could jack up the rent to whatever you wanted. So if you could force your own tenants to move out, and then leave the place vacant for a month, you were exempt from rent control law, which had been on the book since 1970-something. This actually destroyed so many neighborhoods in New Brunswick because the landlords actually had a vested interest in not letting the tenants stay, the tenants didn’t get any of the repairs they wanted or the services they wanted, and so they would move every year. Constant moving meant no sense of community.

Alex: What would you say to homeowners who might see the City’s redevelopment-by-whatever-means policies as a good thing in the medium to long run that will bring more wealthy homeowners to and raise property values in those neighborhoods?

Charlie: I would say, what we really need is to look at the specific instance of redevelopment and whether or not they actually helped anybody at all. Who benefited? Was it mostly the developers? The construction companies? Or was it the people in the neighborhoods, the tax payers. I would argue that in almost every case, it was the developers and the people who were in on the construction. The reason for that is that almost every redevelopment project in New Brunswick gets a thirty year tax abatement, which means that because we’re so happy that you’re gonna come to town and build your new thing, we’re not gonna make yo upay taxes for thirty years. So, all these arguments you hear from the machine about how “we’re bringing in all of this money, making things cheaper for the residents, and we can hire more police and fire fighters, and still keep taxes low”, is actually a misleading argument. Most of these redevelopment projects cost the taxpayers money. The City chips in to fix up roads and this and that, and gives away our most precious resource, our land.

Alex: The result of which is this puzzle-work of a city, where a gated community might be found right next to a low income area, separated by a busy highway.

Martha: Take for instance Ward One, which constitutes Rutgers Village and the Dewey Heights area. You can’t even access the place unless you drive down Rt. 18. It’s completely isolated from the rest of New Brunswick, and in fact, that’s where most of the cities people live. Thomas Peoples, a member of EON, has lived in New Brunswick for 51, his whole life. He visited the neighborhood for the first time this year; he said he didn’t even realize it was part of New Brunswick until now.

Charlie: There are 32 neighborhoods (depending on how you slice it) and four apartment buildings. All except for one of the City department heads live in four neighborhoods. The Mayor, City Council members, the Police Director, the Sanitation Director all live down there. Now while the city council is important in theory, in practice it basically functions like a rubber stamp for the Mayor, passing all the laws the Mayor passes to them. The people who actually run the City are the ten department heads, people appointed by the Mayor. All of these department heads live in those four neighborhoods, excepting one who lives in a luxury apartment complex just outside of town. And it’s no wonder that their streets are clean, and the cops protect their neighborhoods, and they don’t have the same problems having traffic improvements made. These people are in touch with THIER neighborhoods, they know THEIR problems, and they address them. They enjoy the benefits of ward-based government, without a wards-based system. They are granted the special treatment of being guaranteed someone in their neighborhood who cares about them.

Martha: I always tell this story, probably too much, about the time we tried to get a speed bump installed in Ward Four over by Joyce Killmer park. It’s a very dangerous area for children, and after a little boy was hit by a car, his grandmother, and the crossing guard from that corner came down to City Hall along with a few other people and petitioned for the city council. The City Council president, who lives down near Ward Four was very insensitive to them, and didn’t want to give them special treatment because she doesn’t rely on them for her votes, even though they’re her neighbors. In a wards based system, if she were the fourth ward council person, she would not have been able to do that without risking her reelection.

Alex: Let’s talk about the specifics behind EON’s campaign strategy.

Martha: As I was saying earlier, since we know all of our voters, basically the tactic now is to make sure that they actually do vote, particularly for the students. That might mean helping them to vote early, or getting them to the right polling stations on Tuesday. At this point, we are not canvassing as heavily as we have, except in those swing districts where we can still steal votes from the machine, for example, in the Pine Street Park area and Riverside, places where if we aren’t there, they’ll vote with the machine, but if we hustle, they could swing to us. So now we’ve targeted these areas and sent in our best canvassers. We also have people making phone calls to voters, and it’s important that our callers know their shit, know about the city and know their issues. Third is covering the city with literature, having people with Wards tee-shirts distributing information to potential voters and making sure the community is as aware as possible of the issue. We’re also always compiling a lot of information, trying to figure out who is going to the polls and when, so as to be able to follow up with the base on election day. We need to be able to communicate between polling places, headquarters and street teams, so that everybody is where they need to be. A really awesome –and daunting–thing about the next couple of days is that we have a group of about 75 people coming to help with the last few days of the campaign. We call them the “Weekend Warriors”. A lot of students who didn’t have time before, because of midterms or whatever else are calling us to be like “I’m in now!” so our street team is about to explode tomorrow morning.

Matia: How many people did you say you have working with you?

Martha: About 20 working full-time, and another 30 or so on the periphery, although like I said, that periphery is about to triple in size.

Charlie: People just keep coming in and asking us how can I help; this weekend we will have an unprecedented number of volunteers working with us. I just want to be clear that we do have a lot of people coming from different places, who have a special connection to New Brunswick for whatever reason. Maybe they went to Rutgers for a while and then left because they couldn’t afford it, or people who’ve lived in Jersey for some time and know how messed up New Brunswick is, and they really care and want to change things here for the better. That’s the difference between us and the political machine here: we bring people from other towns who volunteer because they’re committed to change, they bring people from other towns to vote–for instance, people who own property here but don’t live here.

Matia: So, approximately what percentage of the people working for EON would you say are students vs. non-students?

Martha: I’d say around 80% are students, [to Charlie] would you say that’s fair?

Charlie: I would say that 80% of the hours put in are done by students. I’d say it’s about 50/50 as far as people involved is concerned. Its just people with kids and jobs can’t come in during the day, but they help where they can.

Martha: There are also quite a few people out there talking to their neighbors and friends whose hours aren’t clocked, but who are still invaluable to the cause.

Matia: You mentioned to me earlier your policy for distributing funds back into the community. Could you talk about that please?

Martha: Well, while the machine tends to recruit school kids or out-of-towners to distribute literature in the area, we decided to hire people from around town to help with distribution. So we started hiring three or four people a day to go out and hand out our literature for us. We think it’s important that we put any money we have for the campaign back into the community. We could have called up some of our college friends who live kinda cushy lives and could have used a few bucks for beer money, but I’d much rather inject that money back into the communities that need it most, so that’s what we do.

Matia: One of the things that I think has gotten lost during this campaign is the people who are working it. Actions speak louder than words, and I think this is a prime example of just that happening.

Charlie: Well here’s another thing about the phones. I don’t know if you’ve heard the Mayor’s phone message to city residents, but it’s what is known as a robocall. Politicians who are out-of-touch with the people use them all the time. On our end, we have real people calling their neighbors and talking to them. It’s a two way conversation, we can hear what they have to say, they can ask us questions and we can answer them, whereas the Mayor is calling up every resident in the City, telling them how to vote and hanging up. Another thing was the push poll they recently put out. Push polling is a time honored tradition in politics, it’s where you call up, pretend to be an independent subject that just wants to know how you are going to vote, but ask the question in such a way that predisposes you towards one candidate or another. I actually got a call from these people. They said “Hi, this is Unite New Brunswick calling to let you know that the mayor wants you to vote against this new wards question on the upcoming ballot; the current system has kept taxes to a minimum and created better schools. Can we count on your vote?” So I said “Oh, that’s great! I just moved to New Brunswick, what has the current administration done to improve the schools?” She responds “Oh I don’t have that information.” So I asked “What exactly is the question on the ballot?” She responds “I don’t have that information.” So I asked “How many people are on the New Brunswick city council?” “I don’t have that information”. So I asked “Are you calling from New Brunswick or somewhere else in New Jersey?” And she says “No, I’m not in New Jersey, I’m calling from the South.” I said “The South, as in, of America?” These guys don’t know anything, they’re just an out of town corporation being paid to send the message out.

Martha: When they called me, they asked me whether I’d be voting with the Mayor, and when I told the woman I would not, she just wouldn’t take no for an answer. I tried to tell her I was the President of the opposition party, but she just said thanks for my support and hung up. So I don’t even know if the results of the push poll are accurate…

Alex: Obviously one of the most prominent claims the City levels against the idea of real student representation in New Brunswick is that we are transients, who don’t stick around long enough to deserve a say in policy. Charlie, how long do you plan to stay here in New Brunswick.

Charlie: I’m planning to stay around for the foreseeable future. There is no place I’d rather be. People give me shit for not being a lifelong New Brunswick resident. But obviously, I had no choice where I was going to be living before I turned 18. I’m fully committed to this city and its people, whether or not this question is passed. The entrenched political machine is not with the people. I’m gonna fight these guys until they’re done.

Alex: How about you Martha. You’re president of EON and campaign manager of the Wards campaign. Will you be here for the foreseeable future?

Martha: I really like this city a lot. If I move anywhere, it’ll be for a few years to go to law school before I come back. New Brunswick is such a story. It’s just so clear who are the bad guys and who are the good guys. I want to see it through.

Charlie: Yea, you know, in politics often times you doubt yourself and your not sure whether you’re doing the right thing, but here, every time I’ve never doubted it because the people here are SO crooked and so out of touch with the people they are supposed to represent. I’ve never had to doubt that by fighting them tooth and nail I was doing the right thing. By the way, the number one thing that makes people who love New Brunswick and would want to stay leave is our school system. Our school system is a miserable failure. You see the twenty-somethings and thirty-somethings walking around downtown with little babies in strollers. Mark my words, their days in this town are numbered, because when it comes time for those kids to go to school, those people are going to leave New Brunswick. They simply can not feel safe sending their kids to a New Brunswick school. Middlesex County just released a report that we’re number one for violence in our schools.

Alex: Since we’re riffing on that now, tell me some problems you have with the school system.

Charlie: Well, for starters, the kids living in my neighborhood are currently attending elementary school in a warehouse on Jersey Ave. Before that, they were attending school in this beautiful brick building, the old high school. The Mayor ordered that it be torn down, because he wanted to get state money to build a new school. The money fell through, and now they get bussed across the train tracks to attend school in a warehouse. That’s been the case for about six years now, so at this point, that’s what the kids know as school.

Martha: But the City just says it’s nice on the inside. City Spokesman Bill Bray calls it the “swing space”.

Charlie: It’s not just that school though. Every school in New Brunswick has trailers. The Schools are failing our kids.

Alex: What about the brand new high school the city is building?

Charlie: The new high school is a great initiative, but if the kids can’t read by the time they get to ninth grade, its useless.

Alex: Do you have a position on the specialization structure that the new high school will institute?

Charlie: I honestly like the idea. I know I would have liked it in high school because I was always in classes I thought were dumb, and I just wanted to take the classes I wanted to take.And honestly I think that’s the direction that education is moving in, and it’s a step in the right direction. But a bigger step in the right direction would be building an elementary school in my neighborhood so the kids there could learn to read.

Matia: After this whole wards thing i s over, would you say that the schools will be the next big issue on your agenda?

Martha: I can’t speak for the whole coalition, but personally, my big issue is the schools

Charlie: I think we need to elect our Board of Education in the town. It’s criminal that the Mayor can appoint them, leaving the parents no recourse to implement change. What do you say to a parent whose kid can’t get a good education because the Board of Education doesn’t need to listen to what they have to say?

Martha: I was really confused when I first came to Rutgers because it seemed that the students didn’t really communicate with the community at all. So what I wanted to do at first was to create the world’s biggest mentoring program, with Rutgers students mentoring New Brunswick kids. And it would encourage more New Brunswick kids to go to Rutgers. This is something we could do even without the coalition.

Charlie: I was in the RU Big Buddy program. There were 100 big buddies and 100 little buddies. And the new Principle of the school, who is one of the highest paid members of the Board of Education, Susan McGinty, didn’t like the program, didn’t like Rutgers students coming to her school and talking to her kids. She wanted to exercise some control over the situation, so she said, this year, we’re only going to have 20 big buddies and 20 little buddies, and only for special ed students. We ended up negotiating to 30. So 60 Rutgers students who came out to a general interest meeting, who were willing and able to help out New Brunswick schools were turned away, and told “maybe next year”. There are people who say “Oh, well there must be some reason they did this”. Well, keep in mind, this program is free, it doesn’t cost any money and is completely volunteer-based. It’s just that the administration and the Board of Education actively fight to keep students out of the schools. This is what we are experiencing in New Brunswick: a divide and conquer tactic. The use negative attacks on me, on EON, and on students getting involved. They actively fight to keep the communities apart. They tell the students “don’t go into those neighborhoods, you don’t want to go in those neighborhoods, and they spread all these crazy scare tactics in the community, telling people that the students are all socialists, are all drunks, only want to piss on your lawn, and they continue to succeed election after election. But what’s happening now is the students and the community are starting to work together, and once that happens, the sky is the limit. Things like this mentorship program will happen, and will happen on a massive scale. Because the students do want to get active and do want to make New Brunswick a better place.

Alex: Let’s change gears here. What is it going to take for you guys to win this election? What are the necessary ingredients for victory?

Martha: We need 75 people here, working hard Saturday Sunday Monday, and we need about 200 people on election day.

Matia: What is the expected turnout for this election, and how many votes do you need to win?

Martha: We expect a turnout of around 6000. 3100 votes will win. We expect to win between 2700 and 3300 votes.

Matia: So you think it’s going to be close.

Martha: We do. I think it’s gonna be close, and I think we’re gonna be dragging people out to the polls by their hair, down to the last minutes.

Matia: Are you providing transportation to the polls?

Charlie: Of course. We are working with Amigo Taxi. Not only will they be carrying “Yes for Wards” signs on their taxis but they’ll give anyone a ride to the polls for free.

Alex: I’m glad you guys are realistic. I came in here expecting to hear about how you were gonna win 80% of the vote.

Martha: I spend all my time looking at databases and talking to staff and I think that if we hustle in the next few days I think we can take it. Clearly they’re beating us on the lawn sign front — they got more of them and they’re bigger. And they can pay people to put out their lit, so they got more of that…

Charlie:…and they can mail out their stuff to everyone…

Martha:…and in those swing districts, we are out there all day. We put our literature somewhere, leave and come back, and they’ve covered it up with their literature. It is literally war like that. You also have people like Councilman Jimmy Cook and Aide to the Mayor Kevin Jones, who are the two black leaders in the City government who are out there canvassing for the city a lot.

Alex: So you’ve really got mobilize those two bases: students and Latinos.

Charlie: Yea, well, they are organized and ready to go so, well see.

Martha: One thing to keep in mind is that those two groups are the groups that are going to get F-ed with the most on election day. Even if its pollsters being particularly or purposefully slow, long lines will deter students, so we have to be mindful.

Matia: Where can we find out the results?

Charlie: The votes are counted at 8pm. But we’ll work on getting the results posted in real time online.

Alex: Do you think they will call for a recount?

Martha: Sure, if it’s super close…I wouldn’t put anything past them at this point…

Charlie: I don’t think there will be much room for gerrymandering this time; we’ve got it on the ballot, that’s what counts. It isn’t over after the election. But the fact of the matter is that ours is a movement that is growing, theirs is a political patronage machine, and it is shrinking.

Alex: What are some rookie mistakes you guys made during the course of the campaign?

Martha: Internally, the biggest mistake was the difficulty of getting the coalition, which was in charge of running the campaign, to communicate effectively with the army of campaign volunteers. It can make for a situation where you are duplicating work, so coordination is key. There was a point two weeks ago where the campaigners did not endorse a decision made by the coalition, and that caused some confusion, and we had to get the groups together to resolve the issue. Externally, it is very very hard to organize the black community. I don’t know that that is exactly a fault, it’s just the truth, and it’s something we are going to have to work on in the future.

Matia: Why was it so hard?

Charlie: It’s because black people have been systematically targeted by the current administration, to the point where they don’t feel there is any way they can make change. They’ve seen so many candidates come and so many people go. It’s because they’ve been here so long and they’ve never gotten their fair say. And they’ve actually been booted out of town by the hundreds, by families after families, moving to Virgina, moving to South Carolina, moving to Franklin, moving to North Brunswick, because the current administration has actually made quite an organized effort to facilitate that movement.

Matia: Would you highlight the demolition of those projects as evidence of this?

Charlie: Yea, there’s that, but it doesn’t stop there. The area where the Hyatt is now, Hiram Square, the oldest part of the city where New Brunswick actually got its start was all torn down under the leadership of Mayor John Lynch, the currently incarcerated, formerly most powerful politician in New Jersey. He made the unprecedented step of taking a trip to Washington to lobby the US Congress to remove the historic designation from that neighborhood–because it was occupied by black and Puerto Rican populations. That area was home to the largest collection of historic architecture in New Jersey and perhaps America, a fact that almost made it the home to the John Rockefeller-funded colonial city (second only to Williamsburg, VA). There’s still some colonial architecture on George Street, but the vast majority of it was destroyed by John Lynch.

Matia: Are you calling him a racist?

Charlie: I’m saying his policies were racist. He might have had the best interests of the city at heart, but his policies were discriminatory and they lacked compassion for the people he was supposed to represent.

Alex: We’re about to run out of tape, so I think we’ll end it there. Charlie Kratovil and Martha Guarnieri, thanks for your time and good luck on Tuesday.

Charlie & Martha: Thank you.

A great deal of Rutgers students affectionately call New Brunswick “home,” at least for eight months out of the year. While the city certainly isn’t without its quirks (we like it that way), it has been a model for growth and development, dating back long before any of us were students. The city of New Brunswick and Rutgers University have together enjoyed over two decades of vast revitalization and enhancement, and that’s no coincidence.

To put this in perspective, students can now walk safely from Cook to College Ave. and back without thinking twice. Remsen Ave. and French St. no longer carry their sordid reputations. People can go downtown to enjoy anything from a couple slices to renowned fine dining; from locally brewed beer to upscale lounges. And believe it or not, driving in and out of New Brunswick is not only simple, but also quite smooth thanks to the recent completion of the Route 18 construction.

We take these things for granted, no doubt. Most of us hardly consider the history of our city, but then again, why should we? The vast majority of us will go through school here and relocate within a year or two of graduation.

Here’s why it’s important: while we are here, we are residents of this city, and decision-making in New Brunswick directly affects us, even if it goes unnoticed.

So, when a group called Empower Our Neighborhoods (EON) began canvassing around the city, it caught my attention. It was led by young people, mostly students, who wanted to change the form of city council. No matter what, students deserve the right to speak out and let their voices be heard, and EON did just that. Unfortunately, EON’s plan is full of flaws.

New Brunswick has enjoyed its recent period of success under the five member at-large system of council. This means that all five council members are elected by all of the voters in the city. You can vote for anyone that runs for council, regardless of your class, creed, ideology, or location. The at-large system is designed to ensure that the most pressing interests of the voters are represented on council.

Earlier in EON’s campaign, they advocated an expansion of the council to nine members, either elected at-large or through a ward system. When they were pressed to pick only one of these options, they chose to promote the ward system.

Now, the same people that proposed an expansion of the at-large council are vehemently opposing that same kind of change. This begs the question: Is this EON group really concerned with how council works, or are they simply trying to seize a seat on council for one of their own?

Let’s just assume it’s the former, and that EON simply wants what is right for the city and its residents. Still, for New Brunswick, and students especially, the six-ward system represents the wrong kind of change—it’s the kind of change that will divide the city and hinder our progress.

In EON’s the six-ward system, you vote for four out of nine council members: your ward representative and three at-large candidates. That means that, even if all three at-large council members support your ward (which is a dicey assumption), you are still in the minority in council. In an at-large system, you can vote for every candidate.

Think about it: students aren’t a traditionally integrated part of the city. They’re renters, they’re transient, they’re young, and they’re mostly confined to one area, known as Ward 6. Why would other wards vote in the interests of the students if it means less funding for their neighborhoods and the rest of the city? Their interests don’t lie with the majority of the student population—simple as that.

Students have benefited from an at-large council system that forces members to consider Rutgers and its students in the context of the city as a whole. Rockoff Hall, Bloustein, Cook Campus additions, renovation projects on College Ave, rent control—all of these plans flourished under the at-large system, and would probably flounder under a ward system.

After reading some of the misguided rhetoric and dubious promises made by EON about the six-ward system, students may be especially confused about what this all means. In the end, it’s about representation, and it’s about being considered in the decision making in this city. The at-large system allows for that, and the ward system will only damage our influence.

Don’t lose your voice, and don’t move New Brunswick backwards.

Mr. Bray is, in fact, the very reason why mainstream outlets such as the Home News Tribune have mysteriously remained silent about EON and wards, despite their vehement support for putting the ward question to a vote during the summer. In July, the Home News called the City’s attempts to de-rail the question “disgraceful” and “arrogant”. [1] Only after Mr. Bray and Mayor Cahill paid a visit to the Home News, and every other newspaper that wrote positively about the campaign for wards (or even wrote about it at all), did the media change their tune and hush up about the arrogant and unjust behavior of the New Brunswick city government.

Before I dissect the misguided and rhetorical arguments made by Mr. Bray and the political machine that forced him to make them, allow me to first index the numerous factual errors in the article that appeared last week:

1) To my knowledge, no one in the campaign has ever claimed that the City switched to an at-large system in the 1970′s. We have known for some time that 1915 marked the change from ward-based to at-large elections in New Brunswick.

2) Referring to the fact that our petition to change the city back to a ward-based system had two questions, Mr. Bray claims that “legally, the two questions … cannot be on the same petition.” That is completely untrue. While both could not be adopted according to state law (the one that gets more votes wins), they can and have been placed on municipal ballots together in Middlesex County.

3) The second question on our petition does not specify “at-large” as Mr. Bray leads you to believe. In fact, the second question merely makes for a larger City Council with four more seats, but does not specify how they would be elected. The first question encompassed both of our goals, a larger Council and ward-based elections, while the second addressed only the former. So, our questions were not contradictory, but rather complementary. Voters could feel free choose one, both, or neither.

4) Mr. Bray callously contends that “none of the people who signed the petition could have understood what they were signing.” While I cannot guarantee that all 1,116 signatories fully understood the the petition they signed, I assure you most did. I am unaware of any statute that specifies one must understand an issue to any degree in order to sign a petition. In fact, I have heard many stories from the campaign about voters who signed our petition simply because we are a political movement seen as a challenge to the hated Cahill administration. Additionally, many voters signed the petition merely because they knew and trusted the person who had asked them to sign, or because the person who knocked on their door was polite and knowledgeable about the city. Perhaps if Mr. Bray ran the world, everyone who signed a petition to change their government would be subject to an interview and a short quiz afterwards to make sure they fully understand the messed up system that they want to change.

5) Bray attempted to argue: “If we were really duplicitous and corrupt, and trying to pull one over on EON, we would not have said anything about the petition, played the old shell game with them.” He once again is incorrect. He, and the political machine he represents, are most certainly duplicitous and corrupt. In fact, they did play a shell game with us. Knowing they did not have what it took to win an election they knew they couldn’t control because of the “Obama factor,” they settled for a judge they knew they could control. The judge in our case was Heidi Willis-Currier, wife of Randall Currier, a Vice President at Devco, the city’s quasi-governmental redevelopment authority. This connection explains why she ruled in our favor on September 2, only to change her mind September 23, the day before the ballots were printed. The old shell game.

6) One of the more revealing and laughable claims Mr. Bray makes is that, if, hypothetically, the administration was corrupt and duplicitous, that the move they would have made would be to get “a couple hundred of our friends to tip the scales in favor of at-large.” Not sure if he saw the election results, but over 12,000 people voted in New Brunswick on November 4. The reality is the political machine in New Brunswick is dying quickly as its base erodes and, apparently, according to Bray himself, they really can only muster a couple hundred votes when it counts nowadays.

7) According to the article, the City objected to the inclusion of an interpretive statement on the ballot on the grounds that “the time for certainty… is not at the ballot box.” In fact, the City made no formal objection to having an interpretive statement on the ballot. They may have grumbled to each other, but objecting to it would have been stupid. Many ballot questions in New Jersey are accompanied by interpretive statements. They are frequently used to explain complicated or confusing issues, such as ours, in plain English.

8 ) The article also claims Judge Currier issued a stay because there was a group of people who did not know what they were signing. I am assuming this refers to the 10 individuals who came forward, most of whom were closely connected to the city machine, and claimed they were duped into signing our petition over the summer. In fact, these arguments got almost no traction in the courtroom or in the court of public opinion. Judge Currier issued the stay because state law specified that our petition needed to be certified by August 25 in order to appear on the November 4 ballot. Our case was heard before Judge Currier on August 14, with 11 days to spare, but Currier elected to take a three-week vacation before ruling. When Currier returned to the bench September 2, she ruled in favor of EON and ordered the City Clerk to certify our petition which he did the following day. We began our long-awaited campaign, only to find out three weeks later that, despite turning in our petition almost two months before the certification deadline, the machine’s legal wrangling and Currier’s vacation had delayed the process just long enough to disenfranchise 1,116 voters.

9) Ordinances of the City Council must be introduced, passed once (first reading), and passed again at a later meeting (second reading). Last summer, the City Council attempted to pass an alternative ordinance that would supersede our petition for wards, known as the Charter Study Commission (CSC). State law clearly prohibits two simultaneous attempts to change a municipality’s form of government, so whichever comes first is given precedence. The law is clear that the submission of a citizen’s petition to the City Clerk prevents the existing government from passing any competing proposal, such as the CSC, even if it has already been introduced and passed on first reading. In blatant disregard of that law, and in the face of vocal opposition from angered citizens who packed the Council Chambers, the Council passed the CSC ordinance officially two days later. Mr. Bray continues to purport that the CSC should take precedence because it was introduced and passed on first reading before the petition was submitted. This was an argument the City’s lawyers made in court as well. However, they lost because the law clearly states that the defining moments are when the petition is turned in and when the ordinance is passed on second reading. We beat them. Fair and square.

10) Bray continues with his flawed legal knowledge to contend that, by our logic, we (or anyone really) could “kill every ordinance the city tried to pass.” Wrong again. He is sorely mistaken as the statute we cited and used to win this particular argument in court applies only to charter change ballot questions, such as the wards vs. CSC situation. Other ordinances would not be prevented from being acted on by the Council regardless of any petitions filed.

11) Bray cites unnamed lawmakers who have claimed that the current system of at-large Council elections was “adopted as a means of unifying the city, in order to avoid certain neighborhoods bargaining with each other at the expense of smaller or weaker ones.” While lawmakers may have cited this logic before, it is precisely the opposite of the truth. In reality, at-large systems specifically permit just the type of bargaining these advocates feared. New Brunswick is a prime example, where student and poor neighborhoods are systematically disenfranchised by powerful, more affluent neighborhoods on the edge of town. Bray continues “It was hoped that by uniting the city under an at large system, political back scratching could be circumvented—or at least kept at a minimum.” I think anyone who has a basic knowledge of New Brunswick politics knows that the hope of those lawmakers is far from reality in our city today.

12) Bray’s ultimate downfall is his anti-student rhetoric and aloof, holier than thou attitude. He flippantly asks about student involvement in Piscataway politics, which has a ward system. I and my colleagues in EON cannot speak to that because we do not live in Piscataway, nor do we care about it like we do our hometown of New Brunswick. Bray continues to hate on Rutgers students: “A lot of people who signed the petition are in dorms. A lot of them are new registrants, 18 or 19 years old.” So what, Bill? What more should theses people have to do to be counted by their government? Students who want to get involved in the town they call home are treated as outsiders who need to pay their dues before having a say in Bray’s world.

13) Bray also made unsubstantiated claims about our campaign rhetoric. While I can’t speak for everyone in our movement, I always try to represent our campaign and our arguments with the facts to back them up. I do not say things like “all city council members currently reside in one or two wards” because I know they live in four of the five wards. I would contend, however, that the current City Council members miserably fail to represent the vast majority of their constituents in Wards 2 and 4, as well as Ward 5, which has not had a representative on the Council in decades. Along the same lines, the Council fails to represent the majority-student neighborhoods in Ward 6, which are rundown and suffering from countless fixable problems, but they are sure to cater to residents of the affluent, predominantly white Bucceleuch Park neighborhood.

14) Bray calls redistricting, which will be necessary when the ward question wins, a “daunting administrative task, at great expense to the taxpayer.” This is a complete mischaracterization. Redistricting is a process that the county undertakes every few years as is. It does not cost any money as it is a part of the job of county and city officials to do this when necessary. He also tries to claim that because ward lines will eventually be redrawn, that by associating one’s self with their ward somehow means that they “misunderstand” wards. Guess what Bill? I understand this issue pretty damn well and I proud to call myself a resident of Ward 6. What ward does Bill live in?

15) It is said in the article that Bray “takes issue with the assumption that students would be better represented by the implementation of wards.” I contend that students in New Brunswick are treated as second-class citizens by their own elected officials and city government hacks like himself. Any change to the current system only stands to benefit students, especially ward. I mean, it can’t get any worse for us, can it Bill?

16) Towards the end of the conversation, Mr. Bray begins pontificating about what life might be like with wards, “New Brunswick has always been a port of entry city. The constant flux and movement of people in, out and around the city would make it difficult to fairly implement a solid ward system.” I believe very truly that New Brunswick is a special and unique place, but I’m sorry, it’s just misleading to pretend that this is the only city in New Jersey where people move into, out of, and around frequently. In fact, I’ve seen a connection between residents and their neighborhoods that I have yet to experience elsewhere.

Mr. Bray is the textbook definition of a hack. While he preaches incessantly how New Brunswick has improved so much since his time at Rutgers, he is not even a resident of New Brunswick and has not been for years. He is, in fact, an elected official in his suburban hometown of Oxford, over a hour away.

Furthermore, Mr. Bray, an RU journalism major and former reporter, has built up a reputation around town for intimidating and mistreating journalists who report negatively on the Mayor’s administration. I’ll tell an example that affected me personally as a journalist, but there are countless other stories of Mr. Bray’s manipulation of the press.

I had a bi-weekly column in the Daily Targum last year. Almost always, the day after my columns appeared, my editors would inform me that Mr. Bray had screamed at them for an extended duration, either in person or on the telephone. When the editorial board of the Targum expressed support for me, he became so desperate to stop my column (on grounds that my work with EON was a conflict that prevented me from writing objectively, even on the Opinions page) that he actually issued a “news embargo” against the Targum. For over a week, Bray refused to give quotes, event access, or information to the student newspaper. When the President of Mexico came to speak at Lord Stirling Elementary School during the “embargo,” a Targum editor was told by the Press Secretary of Mexico that he had “specific instructions from the City” to deny the newspaper access to the event.

So, what this means is that Mr. Bray, who is paid a salary from the city budget to serve in the role of “City Public Information Officer,” actively withheld public information from a major newspaper in the City. There are emails to the Targum’s editorial board from Bray’s city email address that prove this allegation. In addition to failing to perform his duties as a public official, the motivation for the failure is even more damning.

Ultimately, Bray and the machine succeeded in getting the Targum to bring a premature end to my column. He, with the help of the Mayor, has also succeeded in essentially silencing the Home News and Star-Ledger on the ward issue.  However, in the twenty-first century, online media like the Johnsonville Press will finally provide a real outlet for those who see this manipulating machine for what it is.

I would end by saying that Bray and his shenanigans must be stopped, but the truth is that he is a self-important, arrogant ass (as his last name suggests) who actually gives the entire administration a bad name. By building such a poor reputation with the media, the public, and even his own colleagues at City Hall, he actually does more to bring down the machine and further distrust than to build it up and garner support for Cahill’s policies. So, to Mr. Bray, thanks and keep up the great work!

The candidates, running under the common slogan “Democrats for Change,” represent the full range of city neighborhoods in all five New Brunswick wards and include such notable residents as Thomas Peoples, leader of the Fourth Ward Crime Watch and Angela Salazar, 2002 New Brunswick High School valedictorian.

“Democrats for Change” candidates want each neighborhood to have representatives that will put the real-life concerns of their neighbors first on the city’s agenda.

Noting that current city leaders have grown aloof to the needs of residents and are unknown to most of the city, Thomas Peoples, candidate for committeeman for Ward 4, District 5 said: “There is no communication with the Councilpeople. They never come to the neighborhoods. The only way we can have change is if real people step up to represent that actually LIVE in all neighborhoods.”

Adam Gold, a Rutgers graduate and candidate for committeeman in Ward 6, District 6 added: “I just want people to be able to answer a simple question: Who is representing you?”

“Democrats for Change” plan to address citywide issues that impact all residents such as the lack of representation for many constituencies in the city (by supporting ward-based elections) and the need to improve the city’s schools and to make them more accountable (with an elected school board).  Additionally, candidates plan to tackle specific issues impacting their neighborhoods such as improving street cleaning, alleviating parking and transportation problems, offering greater access to affordable and safe housing, expanding and improving city parks, and providing activities and programs for local youth.

“I’m running because I am sick and tired of this city building new condominiums, apartments, and hotels when our schools are falling apart,” said Marge Kerber, member of the Second Ward Crime Watch and candidate for Ward 2, District 4. “I can’t imagine how much more money New Brunswick would have if, instead of providing tax abatements to those that have no ties to this city, they used the tax’ money from these projects to improve our schools.”

Added Brent Klokis, Rutgers graduate and candidate for committeeman for Ward 6, District 5: “We are about more than just downtown.”

The grassroots campaign for seats on the Democratic Party County Committee was initiated by Empower Our Neighborhoods (EON), the New Brunswick community organization that spent most of the past year organizing to return the city to a ward-based election system.  The campaign, still being fought in the courts in the face of stubborn opposition from City Hall, brought EON organizers in touch with thousands of residents.

William Simmons, candidate for committeeman for Ward 2, District 2 said, “This diverse group of men and women embody the spirit of the Obama Movement and the ‘Yes We Can’ attitude that brought change on the national level. Now, we want to bring that same change to the local government here.”

In November, EON organizers and volunteers helped bring thousands of voters to the polls where President Obama won New Brunswick in a landslide.  The “Democrats for Change” campaign is a natural next step for the community group and marks a unique opportunity because every seat on the committee is up for re-election June 2.

“We are in touch with the residents of our neighborhoods,” added Angela Salazar, candidate for committeewoman for Ward 4, District 4, “and they are not happy with the way the city is being run. We are ready to take back our city by any means necessary. Our nation was able to institute change in our federal government, now it is time to do the same in New Brunswick.”

Cedrick Goodman, a lifelong resident and candidate for committeeman in Ward 4, District 1 summed up the campaign: “The time has come for new leadership.”

There are 28 election districts in New Brunswick.  Each will elect a man and a woman from the district to the Democratic Party County Committee in the June 2 primary election.

LIST OF “DEMOCRATS FOR CHANGE” CANDIDATES

FOR DEMOCRATIC PARTY COUNTY COMMITTEE:

Ward 1, District 1: Nona Dempsey & Sam Romero

Ward 1, District 2: Ginile Weeks & Eddie Rodriguez

Ward 1, District 3: Danielle Stransky & Anthony Fuscaldo

Ward 1, District 4: Keisha Jordan & James Woodley

Ward 1, District 5: Olga Martinez-Sanchez & Cristhian Flores

Ward 1, District 6: Greg Davis

Ward 2, District 1: Lily Naha & James Mona

Ward 2, District 2: Kate Feeney & William Simmons

Ward 2, District 3: Caitlin Ferrer & Thomas McKeon

Ward 2, District 4: Marge Kerber & Michael Nazzaro

Ward 2, District 5: Barbara Cepeda & Jaimie Skinner

Ward 2, District 6: Carmen Azcona & Shaun Belton

Ward 2, District 7: Trudia Jones & Corpus Guante

Ward 4, District 1: Sharon Mitchell & Cedrick Goodman

Ward 4, District 2: Angela Porrespita-Jones & Charles Jones

Ward 4, District 3: Yolonda Baker & Jose Solano

Ward 4, District 4: Angela Salazar & Jim Walsh

Ward 4, District 5: Lyndel Myles & Thomas Peoples

Ward 5, District 1: Ruth Mercado & Ian Campbell

Ward 5, District 2: Amy Braunstein & Sean Monahan

Ward 6, District 1: Meredith Neely & Carmen Rao

Ward 6, District 2: Yelena Shvarts & David Harding

Ward 6, District 3: Stacy Milliman & Patrick Lee

Ward 6, District 4: Leor Tal & Michael Shanahan

Ward 6, District 5: Carolyn Selheim & Brent Klokis

Ward 6, District 6: Adam Gold

]]> http://johnsonvillepress.com/new-brunswick-residents-unite-for-change-in-local-democratic-party-an-eon-press-release/feed/ 0 http://johnsonvillepress.com/wards-wards-wards-a-sample-of-eons-ward-campaign-literature/ http://johnsonvillepress.com/wards-wards-wards-a-sample-of-eons-ward-campaign-literature/#comments Mon, 13 Apr 2009 06:21:48 +0000 Alex G http://johnsonvillepress.com/?p=234

The following is a content-copy of an Empower Our Neighborhoods brochure, designed for the propagation of EON’s position on the wards question. We have included it here, in the same issue as our conversation with New Brunswick City Spokesman Bill Bray, in order to juxtapose the two viewpoints. Hopefully, access to both sides will provide the reader with a clearer understanding of the issue as it is presented to the public.

EON

EMPOWER OUR NEIGHBORHOODS

Check out our website at:

EMPOWERNB.COM

Email any questions or comments to:

info@empowernb.com

Empower Our Neighborhoods

P.O. Box 3115

New Brunswick, NJ 08901

(908) 295-8909

THE WARD SYSTEM

THE RETURN OF CITIZEN POWER TO NEW BRUNSWICK

Sponsored by: EON

(Empower Our Neighborhoods)

Dear New Brunswick Resident,

We at Empower Our Neighborhoods would like to formally introduce you to the Ward System. Our goal at EON is to help you, the citizens of New Brunswick, regain your collective voice so that together we can make the city council a true government of the people.

The questions we will address in this pamphlet are:

• What is the Ward System?

• What is the current electoral system in New Brunswick?

• Why is the Ward system better for me and my community?

We hope that you are inspired by this pamphlet to join us. Please refer to the reverse side for our contact information.

Sincerely Yours,

The Members of Empower Our Neighborhoods

WHO IS EMPOWER OUR NEIGHBORHOODS?

Empower Our Neighborhoods [EON] was created in early 2008 by a diverse array of student activists, recent college graduates, and longtime members of the community.

EON seeks to restore democracy to New Brunswick to ensure that the Mayor and City Council truly represent the people of New Brunswick.

Our goal is to reform the way local elections are run in New Brunswick so that the people are fairly represented in the city government.

EON encourages the people of New Brunswick to become involved in this movement by:

· Attending city council meetings and speaking up about the issues in your neighborhood;

· Coming to our meetings to learn about the problems in New Brunswick;

· Talking to the people within your community to encourage awareness of the issues in your neighborhood;

For more details about how you can get Involved please see our contact information on the back.

WHAT IS THE CURRENT ELECTORAL SYSTEM IN NEW BRUNSWICK?

The city of New Brunswick elects the city council as well as other city officials by way of the At-Large System.

The At-Large System is:

· A city wide election process where the people elect the five city council members to represent the city as a whole.

· This system is ideal for smaller cities or large towns with a less diverse population.

Important Effects of the At-Large System:

· The members do not come from every part of New Brunswick, so only a portion of New Brunswick residents are represented;

· The people tend to be disconnected from their government;

· It is difficult to run for office in an at-large system because of the cost of campaigning throughout all of New Brunswick.

WHAT IS THE WARD SYSTEM?

A ward is a district, or neighborhood within a city.

Under the Ward System:

• Each ward in New Brunswick would elect a representative from their neighborhood to the City Council;

• There would be six representatives for the six wards in New Brunswick;

• In accordance with the law, there would be three representatives would be elected at-large to represent the city as a whole;

Important Effects of the Ward System:

• The issues from each ward would be addressed directly by the City Council and they would be more efficiently handled;

• Every neighborhood would be represented on the City Council;

• The people of New Brunswick would be more connected to the government;

• Because the ward representatives come from each neighborhood it will be easier to hold them accountable for their decisions;

WHY IS THE WARD SYSTEM BETTER FOR ME AND MY COMMUNITY?

The Ward System would be better for you and your community because:

• New Brunswick is already divided into wards for the purpose of:

- garbage and recycle collection;

- on-street parking;

- mail distribution;

• The representatives from each ward would be members of those communities so the people can talk to someone from their ward about their ward;

• Problems within each ward would more likely be solved because the issues would be at the forefront of the City Council agenda;

The Ward System gives the people of New Brunswick an opportunity to improve their communities and makes it easier to take care of the issues in each neighborhood.

We at EON hope that you found this pamphlet interesting and helpful. For more information or to get involved in this community movement please refer to our contact information on the reverse side.

By Mike Stuzynski

Editor in Chief

As read at the Demarest Coffeehouse on 2/26/09

With an increase in air, water, and light pollution since the industrial revolution, transparency in many forms is in shrinking supply.  It is only natural for such problems to carry over to the social sphere from the environmental, and so we have come to accept a lack of transparency in our University, our city, our state, right on up to infinity.  Most are willing to concede that this is undesirable, yet few are motivated to do anything serious to change the situation.

There is a fatalistic, almost apocalyptic, attitude that often follows this pattern of thinking.  The popular buzz about global warming essentially holds no hope for humanity’s future-our longstanding neglect for environmental wellbeing having irrevocably altered the future of the planet.  Granted I’m no meteorologist, but the water isn’t exactly coming up around our ankles just yet.  Even if you buy YouTube’s trash 2012 end game theories, there are still the better part of three years-why not at least make the effort?

If the staggering $787 billion stimulus package were an environmental phenomenon, it would be the London fog on a midsummer day in the 1870′s.  The bill ambles on for 1,400 pages, so chances are none of us will ever claim familiarity with the mechanics of Obamanomics.  Even the legislators can’t understand it in full-only five printed copies were provided for review less than 24 hours before the measure passed through Congress.  But rather than pressure our representatives by writing letters or soliciting signatures on petitions, we are largely content to express our discontent through inactive cynicism.

The politics of fear rule the day in times of crisis-Bush’s ability to galvanize the public in support of the oppressive PATRIOT Act following 9/11 being a glaring recent example.  It’s happening again in the government’s rhetoric surrounding the economic crisis.  Most of the discourse is predicated on the notion that our nation must act, and act fast, to avoid further exacerbating current problems.  In this light, any action on behalf of the government is in large part perceived as being for the best.  In this situation, the more drastic the action, the more support it is likely to generate.  Our recent actions concerning the environmental crisis also mirror this philosophy: cheap buzz words like biofuel and hybridization are thrown around without much thought about efficiency or feasibility or sustainability.

In times of crisis, we tend to think and communicate using epic metaphors.  It is easy to let our minds wander and associate people and events with terms like hero, Armageddon, prophet, etc, because we have let ourselves be tricked into believing that we are helpless to address the problems of modern life without seemingly divine intervention.  That is why you’ll hear the government talk about printing more money before you’ll hear them talk about raising taxes and increasing civilian oversight over the private sector.  You’ll hear CEO’s talk about increasing fuel efficiency by 35% (wow, now I get 28 miles per gallon?), but you’ll rarely hear a governor give a speech about the pressing need for a comprehensive system of public transportation.  We have the vocabulary for those things already-trains and tax-hikes-what we’re looking for is a miracle.  We’re looking for something that is too original to have a name-something that’s too big to fail-or we allow ourselves to be fooled by statistics that prove to be negligible under serious analysis.

In the interest of doing something to clear the air in our own back yards, the Johnsonville Press will be making an effort in the coming weeks to explore the two sides of the New Brunswick Ward Campaign, a conflict which has been ongoing in city politics for over a year, but about which there is a noticeable lack of specific information made readily accessible.  We are of the opinion that a more complete understanding of political situations is the only way to make informed decisions, and we will attempt to bring light to Empower Our Neighborhood’s position and past actions as well as those of the City of New Brunswick.

Based upon our populist philosophy, aside from the usual suspects, we are also soliciting the opinions of our readers in order to fill in the big picture.  As always, we welcome any submissions, suggestions, and contributions from the residents and affiliates of Johnsonville. Together, we can see through the fog.