HOBOKEN – The three candidates campaigning to be the next mayor of Hoboken discussed their views on important issues facing the town, as well as themselves, at a debate held at the Hudson Reporter’s Hoboken headquarters on Tuesday.
The debate is now on the right of hudsonreporter.com. Scroll down to watch!
Among other issues in the debate, which is featured in a cover story in this weekend’s Hoboken Reporter, the candidates revealed that they are divided on how residents should vote on a public question regarding changes in the city’s rent control laws.
Asked if they thought voters should vote yes or no on the ballot question — which would remove rent control from buildings with four units of housing or fewer when a current tenant moves out, and add a one-time decontrol for buildings with five or more units — each candidate responded differently.
Mayor Dawn Zimmer, the incumbent, said that she supported voting down the measure, as she did last year when it first appeared on the ballot. Zimmer said that she believed a better solution could be found than the current referendum.
Fourth Ward Councilman Tim Occhipinti said that he thought voters should support the decontrol measure, but noted that his administration would hold a zero-tolerance policy towards landlords accused of intimidating or harassing tenants in an effort to force them to move so they could decontrol rents.
The third candidate, Assemblyman Ruben Ramos, said the measure should not be on the ballot. He placed the blame on the Zimmer administration, saying better governing could have found a compromise between tenants and landlords long before a referendum was necessary.
Each of the candidates was allowed a rebuttal to those comments, and they certainly gave one.
The candidates answered six other questions, some about policy, some personal, some political. We also asked them to discuss their opponents.
Take a look at the debate at the right! – Dean DeChiaro
Hoboken mayoral candidate debate is now on line
