HOBOKEN – Mayor Dawn Zimmer said moving the Parking Utility office to the midtown garage on Clinton Street is due to quality of life issues in the current offices in the basement of City Hall.
“It’s true that for decades – at least since the Police Department occupied the space currently used by the Parking Utility – City Hall’s basement has had a very serious, unaddressed termite problem,” Zimmer said via e-mail. “Employees have been known to put chewing gum into the wall to keep the termites out, and swarms of flying termites are not uncommon. These conditions are not fair to employees and sometimes cause them to leave work early, which is why my administration has been looking for space to relocate the Parking Utility during repairs and renovations.”
Zimmer said that the midtown garage is a “potential building being considered, but it is still very early in the process and no decisions have been made.”
“Relocation of the Parking Utility to the unused space in the Midtown Garage has been contemplated since the garage was originally built, so exploring this idea is not new and certainly not news,” Zimmer said. “If Councilman Russo would like to seriously discuss the issues, I’d be more than happy to have that conversation, but this is nothing more than an election year political stunt.”
Councilman Michael Russo held a press conference earlier this morning at 330 Clinton St. to address the city’s interest in moving the Parking Utility office to the midtown garage.
Russo said in a press release that the decision shows a “lack of transparency” being displayed by the administration, and among other issues, will force residents to compete for parking with people who try to do business in the Parking Utility office.-Ray Smith