Overheard at City Hall last November: Two attorneys, one a native who has worked closely with the city, the other an out-of-towner, speaking near the first floor lunch counter.
“Jersey City’s really turned around,” said the out-of-towner, while admitting he rarely comes to the city from his suburban home.
“Yeah,” responded the native, “on the waterfront. But once you get west of Jersey Avenue, it’s the Third World.”
How much you agree with that assessment will likely shape how you vote in this Tuesday’s election.
Voters will have a choice of five candidates for mayor. They include former U.S. Marshal Glenn Cunningham, Current Council President Tom DeGise, Former Freeholder Louis Manzo, current Department of Public Works Director Kevin Sluka and Ward A Councilman Robert Cavanaugh. Some 60 candidates will make their bids for the nine-member city council. All the council seats are up for grabs in the city’s non-partisan elections.
One of the most hotly contested wards, Downtown (E), will also have the most council candidates: nine in all, followed by Bergen-Lafayette (F), with eight.
Several mayoral candidates point to accomplishments of development and improved services in the past several years. Still others level withering criticism and point to neglect in city’s neighborhoods, saying there is still a lot of room for improvement. To which extent these visions resonate with voters will go a long way toward deciding the new mayor.
Current Council President Tom DeGise, who is running for mayor, summed it up this way: “If you think things are horrible, you may vote for Louie Manzo, Bob Cavanaugh or Glenn Cunningham.”
That’s a bit of an overstatement, but it is true that both DeGise and, to an extent, Kevin Sluka are running on the record of outgoing Mayor Bret Schundler, who is seeking the governor’s mansion. The other candidates are running on platforms charging that the city is not headed in the right direction, and have called into question abatements – or tax breaks – given to development, along with city services and crime.
The election will have to do without Gerald McCann, the former mayor and ex-convict who had his hopes for a political rebirth ended by the state Supreme Court. The court refused on April 26 to reconsider an earlier decision to ban him forever from holding public office. He continues to support his slate of council candidates, but his other supporters are now adrift, and where they land could tip the scales of the race.
Most observers believe that no candidate will garner one more than 50 percent of the vote on Tuesday. It’s an important number, since a run-off between the top two vote-getters would have to take place June 5.
The 50 percent rule applies to all candidates. Run-offs will likely involve council candidates as well. For each ward, (there are six ward slots), the top two finishers would go to a run-off. For at-large (or city-wide) council candidates, for which there are three slots and eighteen candidates, six could make it to a run-off.
A surprising majority of voters remains undecided in this wide open race, and most handicappers see a three-way jostle at the top among Cunningham, DeGise and Manzo, all of whom are the best-funded of the candidates. Yet both Sluka and Cavanaugh could pick up votes.
Polls will be open on May 8 from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.
The Reporter has written in-depth profiles of the mayoral candidates over the last two weeks. To check them out on the web, look up www.jerseycityreporter.com. You may also come into our offices during business hours at 14th and Washington streets, Hoboken.
The independents for council are briefly profiled this week. In addition, the Reporter recently participated in an election debate