Dear Editor:
As we begin a new year, I would like to take a moment to reflect on the past 18 months that I have served as your Mayor. This period has been a great honor for me and a challenge I eagerly look forward to every day.
On July 1, 2001, I gave an inauguration address outlining an agenda for a new Hoboken — a city of born and raised residents and newcomers, families and singles and a community encompassing all races and religions. Our plan was simple; to meet each and every challenge we face with integrity, honesty and with respect for one another.
And Hoboken, like many urban centers, is a community facing a multitude of challenges. The agenda I outlined a year and a half ago focused on improving the quality of life by taking a few simple measures; creating additional open space, improving our educational system, developing a new Master Plan, scaling down oversized development and re-engineering our parking policy and structure.
I am pleased to report that we have initiated positive movement on all of these issues and are in the process of tackling new ones.
We’re improving the quality of life by creating open spaces and improving those which already exist. We will soon be opening new parks such as the Jackson Street Park, the skateboard park, and in a few months we’ll have a refurbished Soccer Field. We’ve awarded the design contract for a new Pier C and most important, we’ve negotiated an agreement to restore the site of America’s first baseball game, Elysian Fields.
We’re improving the quality of life by linking public school curriculum with Stevens Institute of Technology to create a dynamic program of science, math and technology to benefit all of the city’s school children.
We’re improving the quality of life by developing the city’s first Master Plan in over 15 years. This “smart-growth” blueprint will chart the physical and economic development of our city for years to come.
We are improving the qualify of life by scaling down oversized developments like the south waterfront’s Block B site to provide more public space, view corridors and streamlined architecture. We successfully fought to prevent 1600 Park Avenue, a massive highrise, at the northern entrance of the city.
We are improving the quality of life by completely overhauling the city’s parking structure. We have created a Parking Utility which makes the city accountable for parking policy, not an autonomous authority. We have created thousands of Hoboken resident-only parking spaces by creating alternate side parking exclusively for citizens of our community.
Working together we can make progress. We have and we will continue to do so. This year our local tax rate will be stable with no impact on city services or initiatives. We will continue to move forward with new initiatives like “Project Dignity,” designed to help our homeless residents empower themselves through a public/private sector work-to-home program
We are looking forward to furthering our agenda and seeking new initiatives to better our community. I truly believe that we can all continue to make Hoboken the best possible city to live, work and explore just by challenging ourselves to do so.
Mayor David Roberts