Hoboken's biggest website exposing corruption and bad pols
After the break in the forum yesterday, corruption finally made an appearance. Well it was part of a question anyway but here’s how it was addressed along with the first question about the police reorg last fall. This is maybe the most interesting segment as it breaks down into some rather familiar and clear lines.
Hoboken City Council Forum: 2nd and 5th wards
The following letter was submitted in response to the incident posted on MSV yesterday by a Stevens student and Beta Theta Pi member.
As you can see by my signature, I am a graduating senior and well respected member of the Stevens community and the Sigma Chapter of Beta Theta Pi. I would like to formally apologize for one of my brother’s actions. He did not realize what he was doing and we as a fraternity did not realize what was going on. I would like to propose that you kindly remove our fraternity from the article, but please leave the article in general up, so students at Stevens do not make this mistake again. As a student who was attending Stevens during the Peter Cammarano incident, it was disgraceful to my university and myself as I did not like the feeling in the pit of my stomach knowing that our cherished university was being linked with a criminal. This time, the incident hits home as our cherished fraternity, that has been in Hoboken since 1879, and even lives at the original mayor’s home, has now been linked with a criminal like act of Beth Mason.
A little birdie sent along this nugget in advance of tonight’s forum. Beth Mason is looking to create a show of support from paid Stevens students. This person apparently equates supporting Beth Mason for pay to crossing a picket line.
I was wondering if you could forward this to the rest of your house.
I am a brother of the Beta Theta Pi Fraternity and I have been working for the Beth Mason campaign for the past couple of weeks trying to get people to register to vote in Hoboken. Tonight there is going to be a debate tonight at 7 to a little after 9 or so and basically the gentleman I am working for would like 100 people or so to stand out side of the debate and hold up signs for Beth Mason and picket line. You will be payed 25 dollars to do this. If you would like to do this we will be meeting outside of the Beta House at 6:40 tonight. Also if you want to do this please email me with your full name and phone number at (name removed)@gmail.com. We need a good showing for this and its an easy 25 dollars to hold a sign. Hope to see you tonight.
Last night’s city council forum featured eight candidates divided equally among the two wards until minutes into its start. Then the unexpected happened right out of the gate. Perennial candidate Patricia Waiters came out blasting on corruption saying she had enough. “I refuse to participate tonight…. with the same old corruption…. The corruption must stop. It’s not fair to the voters of Hoboken.” She completed her statement and then announced her departure saying, “Remember May 10th, no more corruption.”
The seven remaining candidates: 2nd ward council candidate Franz Paetzold, 2nd ward Councilwoman Beth Mason, 5th ward candidate Leonard Luizzi, 2nd ward candidate Tom Greaney, 5th ward council candidate Scott Delea, 5th ward councilman Peter Cunningham, and 5th ward council candidate Perry Belfiore.
To say tonight was no pleasure would not quite put the right feel on the event. We’ll explain that more at an appropriate time. There were a few surprises, some staged prop uses and some hiding out on the big C word. It did not go unnoticed.
| Beth Mason digs up last year’s movie satire depiction claiming her victimization. “Putting me as Hitler,” she claimed. You see Hitler anywhere on the left with her picture? |
The word corruption was raised and the reactions by various candidates was very telling. As in if you play poker you take the pot down but oddly no one quite did to the tremendous relief of some, and the lackadaisical response of others. Too cryptic? You’re a smart bunch and Da Horsey will never take that for granted. Ever.
City of Hoboken announces:
NJ TRANSIT ADDS ADDITIONAL RUSH HOUR BUS SERVICE
Beginning on Wednesday, April 13, NJ Transit will add five additional trips to the #126 bus line along Clinton Street on weekdays. The additional trips were added to address overcrowding concerns and will depart Clinton Street at Newark Avenue at 8:32am, 8:35am, 8:36am, 8:40am, and 8:42am.
“I thank NJ Transit for being responsive to the needs of our growing community by expanding bus service during peak periods,” said Mayor Dawn Zimmer.
From the desk of Mayor Dawn Zimmer: =&0=& Yesterday, I received an extremely troubling telephone call from Union City Mayor Brian Stack, who is also Hoboken’s State Senator. Senator/Mayor Stack, who over the past year has almost never returned my phone calls relating to important governmental matters like our hospital, was calling to threaten me politically. Apparently, Mayor Stack was angry that Politickernj.com had reported on the backroom deal through which he and Hudson County Democratic Party Chairman Mark Smith agreed to try to turn over the Hoboken Democratic Party to the Russo family. This occurred just one week after an FBI surveillance tape revealed that Councilman Michael Russo had agreed to accept illegal campaign contributions while offering to expedite development projects. Mayor Stack, who has a history of interfering in Hoboken politics by funneling large sums of money into the campaigns of the developer friendly candidates who do his bidding, threatened to get involved in Hoboken politics once again if I continued to tell the truth about the shady deal that was struck at the expense of the honest Democrats of Hoboken. In this case, the Hoboken candidates who Mayor Stack would presumably support are Councilman Russo and his allies. This is the same group that recently voted down anti-wheeling legislation that would have stopped out of town developers and politicos like Mayor Stack from interfering in Hoboken elections for their own personal gain.I was particularly disappointed by the brazen and inappropriate behavior of our party leaders, who are better described perhaps as “political bosses.” Sadly, their actions put machine politics over the important ideals of the Democratic Party that I proudly support. In fact, last Friday during a breakfast gathering, I had the pleasure of hearing Senator Menendez speak directly from the front lines regarding our Country’s budget negotiations. During his briefing he highlighted the fact that while the debate may appear on the surface to be about money, it is really about our commitment to women’s issues, senior and children’s issues, environmental issues and other core Democratic values. His talk sparked a commitment in me to work as hard as I can to support him on women’s and environmental issues in particular. At the request of the candidate, 6th ward candidate Jen Giatino’s opening remarks have been submitted for publishing here on MSV: |