An avid fan of the New York Mets, County Executive Tom DeGise said in his State of the County Address on Feb. 23 that the county – like the baseball team – is undergoing a rebuilding year.
“If you are a Mets fan as I am, you probably recoil at the word ‘rebuilding,’ DeGise said before the Board of Chosen Freeholders. “So as we consider the state of the county in 2012, let’s just say that Hudson is healing. That healing can be seen in all of the key economic indicators monitored by the federal government. They show that in Hudson County, unemployment continued to decline over the last 12 months. It’s significant to note that this job growth came entirely from the private sector. Overall government-related employment, as defined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, declined by 1.5 percent in our region. It was the only statistical category over the last year that saw any significant decline in hiring.”
Transportation, hospitality, and manufacturing showed the greatest area of job growth, although construction job growth remains flat.
“New construction permits are on the rise again, however – a hopeful sign for the future,” he said.
Environment and open space
To help further the healing process locally, the county has tried to control its costs and manage better. It continues to deliver critical services while shrinking the workforce by attrition, not layoffs. County officials even underwent a retreat in early April to improve services, raise performances, and develop new policies.
In the address, DeGise asked the freeholders to restore the Open Space Trust Levy that had been cut in half two years ago. Taxpayers pay into the levy, which generates funds for purchases or upgrade of parks and other facilities, as well as historic preservation. It was cut to provide short-term tax relief, but DeGise finds it a worthy levy.
“Over the last decade, the Open Space Trust has helped increase the amount of green space from Bayonne to Secaucus,” DeGise said. “Its historic preservation component aided in restoring and supporting heritage sites such as the Apple Tree House [in Jersey City] and the Bayonne Museum.”
DeGise said the county has finished 50 projects last year including about $50 million worth of new investments in the park system, 40 percent of which were paid for by grants.
“We continue to work with local community groups to improve our park system,” he said.
The Department of Roads and Public Property reduced energy consumption in county buildings even further, installing new energy efficient elevators and lighting in its various buildings.
“We also saved nearly a quarter of a million dollars this year by taking part in an energy curtailment program with Energy Connect Corporation,” he said.
The county has identified 40 sites for its solar power initiative, overseen by the Hudson County Improvement Authority.
“New construction permits are on the rise again – a hopeful sign for the future.” – Tom DeGise
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Social causes
DeGise said the county is ahead of the state in providing re-entry programs for people coming out of jails. This includes drug treatment, counseling, and other programs. The county’s re-entry program tracks former offenders for a year after their release.
“The recidivism rate for the jail as a whole was 47.6 percent in 2011,” he said. “The recidivism rate for participants in the Community Reintegration Program was just 24.5 percent. Going forward, we need the state to allow county jails to be licensed as residential substance abuse treatment centers. Currently, our jail is licensed as an outpatient center.”
“Helping Hudson County heal also demands we do more to help our partners in progress, the business and non-profit communities,” DeGise said, pointing to two programs launched within the last 15 months, and one that will begin this year to help Hispanic community contractors and small businesses.
“To better support the county’s non-profit community, we will undertake an evaluation of our non-profit sector’s needs with assistance from the Washington-based NGO Consulting firm Community Wealth Ventures,” DeGise said. But he noted that there have been cutbacks on the federal level and the county must help non-profits find alternative funding sources.
“One clearly unsustainable situation is the ongoing decline in state support for community and para-transit services like those offered through our Transcend Program,” he said, referring to transportation cutbacks for seniors and the disabled.