On Nov. 4, Guttenberg voters will head to the polling booths to vote for the office of mayor and three members of the Town Council for the two-year terms up for grabs.
Incumbent Mayor David Delle Donna, the Democratic candidate, is seeking his second term as mayor and is joined on a ticket by incumbent Councilman Gerald Drascheff and new ticket members Adela Martinez and Efrain Velez.
Independent candidate Thomas Rizzi, who has been Delle Donna’s fiercest political foe over the last three years, heads a ticket that features Vasilios “Bill” Scoullos, Louis Lopez and Johanna Delgado. Rizzi and Lopez are registered Democrats, while Scoullos and Delgado are registered Republicans.
Last Tuesday, the Reporter asked the two mayoral candidates to come to the offices of the newspaper in Hoboken to participate in a candidates’ forum, much like they did two years ago when they faced each other with a third candidate at the time, Ramon de la Cruz.
Each candidate was asked a question, then given a chance for rebuttal after the other candidate answered. The forum proved to be enlightening. Here are some highlights of the forum.
What do you feel are the real issues in this campaign and what has caused you to seek election again?
Delle Donna: “The issues are the same as they are in most Guttenberg elections. Taxes are always an issue. Parking is an issue. The overcrowding at Anna L. Klein School [the town’s only grade school] is an issue. I’ve been in office for four years [two as a councilman, two as the mayor] and the taxes have always been a tough issue. When I came into office, I walked into a $1.3 million deficit that was left by our predecessor, due to his overspending tendencies. Under our administration, we’ve been able to lower taxes and erase the deficit and turn it into a $2.5 million surplus. To combat the parking problem, we built a municipal parking lot and established a parking ordinance. If you want to park in town, you need a resident sticker. There are no more visitors’ passes. I’m seeking office again because I feel I’ve done a fairly good job addressing the issues and if the people think I’m doing a good job, I want to continue.”
Rizzi: “The real issue in my opinion is the quality of life, rather the decline of the quality of life in the town. We have a tremendous amount of construction going on that is not being regulated properly. Parking is always a problem, but the more we build, the more we increase the density of the town. We have to look at development and really have a plan for the future. We can’t build on every square inch. There are no parks for our children. The sidewalks are their parks. I know that residents are concerned about kids who are hanging out on the corners and creating nuisances with noise at all hours. These kids come here from other towns and cause problems. We have taverns in the town that continue to be nuisances. I’m seeking election because I’ve been a resident of the town for 27 years and we need to have someone who is more active about the future of the town. We need a goal oriented administration who have the long-term positive ideas in mind. This can’t be short-term. Where do we want Guttenberg 10 years from now? We need long-term vision.”
Delle Donna: “I find it odd that Tom talks about the density of the town, because when he spent time on the Planning Board, he voted for a 71-unit building that had 19 parking spots [a plan that has since been denied]. No three-family homes are being built, only two. We’re having responsible building going on right now, like on Jackson Street, which was the ugliest block in town and now has new two-family homes. What choice do we have but to let it be developed and bring up property values. As for the problem taverns, there wasn’t a single ABC hearing before I was elected. Since Aug. 13, 2001, we’ve had 18 suspensions of licenses totaling 764 days. The state of New Jersey does not allow us to revoke liquor licenses until there are four serious violations. The long range plan is to revoke any license that has four offenses. We’re weeding out the ones that give us problems.”
Rizzi: “It is true that I did vote for the 72-unit building when I was with the Planning Board, but it was for affordable housing, which is needed throughout the state, not just Guttenberg. It took a lot of research and every member of the board voted that way. I find it interesting that Mr. Delle Donna says that there are responsible two-family homes being built. But if you knock on the doors of garages, many of these homes are three-family. People are living there. We have to enforce our ordinances more strictly. In many cases, third apartments are being built. We have to make sure the ordinances are being enforced. As for the ABC hearings, the bars are still operating. I know some of the problematic bars have more than one pool table. We have to review all ordinances.”
Most residents believe that overcrowding is the biggest problem to plague Guttenberg, that there are too many two-family homes being turned into three-family, that there are a lot of illegal apartments and illegal dwellers. What are your plans to stop this problem?
Rizzi: “I think it boils down to enforcement, that the building department has to be more aggressive and has to be more organized. They have to go into each neighborhood, each block and find the illegal apartments. We can’t be passive. We have to be aggressive and active. If you look at the Hudson County master plan, there are roughly 1,500 residents in town with no correlation to housing.”
Delle Donna: “We’ve petitioned the state Department of Community Affairs to be able to take back home inspections. Right now, we have our fire inspector who does inspections and by getting back home inspections, it’s our only access. The fire inspector is going around and documenting illegal apartments as they find them. We’re checking every single home in Guttenberg. I understand that illegal apartments lead to overcrowding and we’re being aggressive and actively going after them. I know that we had nine or 10 summonses on our court docket last week.”
People also complain about the sewerage rates that Guttenberg pays to the North Bergen Municipal Utilities Authority, that the rates are ranked among the highest in the country for such a small town. What are some of the ideas you have to contain these rates?
Delle Donna: “The agreement we have with the North Bergen MUA has been in effect for quite some time. In the past, we sued to bring the rates down and we were unsuccessful. I cannot sit here and say that we can lower the MUA rate. That would be unrealistic. We can check to see if the money is being spent wisely. We’ve worked on fixing the sewers to make sure that there is less flow, so that can ultimately lower the rate somewhat. But it’s unrealistic to say there will be a tremendous drop in the rate.”
Rizzi: “Up to now, I don’t see anything that the town is doing to see that the money is being spent wisely. There are a lot of questions that need to be answered. They amassed a $12 million surplus and then we’re told that none of the surplus is entitled to Guttenberg. I don’t know how. We pay a lot of money for the service. We pay $5.75 per 1,000 gallons of water served. North Bergen pays $4.41 per 1,000. I also question how many people are needed to work at the Woodcliff [sewerage] plant. If I’m elected, I’ll make sure that the money is used wisely.”
Delle Donna: “There are other factors why North Bergen’s rate is lower than ours. Garbage collection is involved. The MUA collects North Bergen’s garbage. We have a private firm collect ours. I’ve been hearing for 15 years that he’s going to check where the money is going. I know that the best we can hope for is about a 65 cent difference. I don’t like the price as much as anyone else does. Maybe we should have scrutinized the agreement when it was made 15 years ago, but an agreement is an agreement.”
Rizzi: “I know that the North Bergen garbage budget is the same total since 1992, so something’s wrong there.”
Quality of life is always an issue. Discuss your plans to uphold Guttenberg’s quality of life.
Rizzi: “I’ve addressed the kids hanging on the street corners. There are gangs of kids hanging out, being loud and boisterous and bothering people. I’m a little concerned about the residents’ safety. I met a man on 68th Street and he said that he was accosted by a gang. He didn’t want to call the police. The police would have a hard time dealing with the situation. Most of the kids are from out of town and they use our corners as a hangout. I think we should work hard to develop programs to give the kids a choice, to give them things to do other than hanging out, to keep them active and interested and off the corners. We have to utilize the school more to give kids a choice. We also have a lot of unbridled construction in the town. Basically, anyone who wants to develop can develop. I would call for a moratorium of three months on all construction, that we wouldn’t accept any new applications. Things would change and it wouldn’t be business as usual.”
Delle Donna: “His statement that the children are from out of town and that the police are outnumbered – That’s a ridiculous statement. The kids are hanging out late night and the police are chasing them. It’s more of a social problem that kids are hanging out later now. But the police have been aggressively chasing the kids. The school is being used every single night. Our recreation program is second to none. We’re giving our kids something to do within reasonable hours. If there are kids who don’t leave the corners, then they are brought in by the police. We have programs to help all kids, including those who are considered at risk. The issues about quality of life are always the same. We’re aggressively going after the bars. We’re not allowing the taverns to rule and will continue to do so. The building going on has been responsible. I’m not ready to call for a moratorium. The issue of overcrowding and the illegal apartments have nothing to do with what’s currently being built. I agree we need more open park space, but so does every inner city. We have a park (North Hudson Braddock) that is relatively five minutes away.”
What do you feel are your qualifications for being mayor of Guttenberg?
Delle Donna: “I stand on my record. I think I’ve shown the people of Guttenberg that I can be a good mayor. When I got into office, the county, state and federal governments paid no attention to Guttenberg. We had a budget deficit. The streets had potholes everywhere. I think my qualifications are what I have shown and what I’ve been able to bring to this town. I’ve helped to get nearly $2 million in discretionary aid. We’ve made sound fiscal strategies. The budget is sound and stable and will be in the future. We don’t have a plethora of wasteful spending. The reason why we’re getting grants is my relationship with the state legislators like Sen. Bernard Kenny, Congressman Bob Menendez and Speaker Albio Sires. You don’t get that kind of money unless you have people fighting for you. My qualifications are what I’ve been doing. I don’t think unrealistic thoughts and will continue to improve the town. It’s pretty obvious that the town we inherited four years ago is a much better place today.”
Rizzi: “I’m a very focused individual and I can attack and prioritize problems. I concentrate on solutions. I’m an educator in the Newark public schools and I work with budgets in the school. I’m very active in prioritizing needs and gained a lot of experience in budgets and proposals. I know that there are grants out there that we’re entitled to, so I will be involved with grant proposals. I’d look into whatever money was available.”
Delle Donna: “We’re not entitled to anything. We have to work for it. It never happened in the past. We just received $625,000 from the state Department of Transportation to refurbish Boulevard East. That’s a big number for a town our size. These are all competitive grants. They just don’t say, ‘Let’s give this money to Guttenberg.’ I’m sure others want it as well.”
Why should the residents of Guttenberg vote for you on Nov. 4?
Rizzi: “I think it’s time for a leadership that has the welfare of the people in mind first, that they have a vested interest in the community. We have to take our community from being negative by default into being positive by design. We really need goals. The future of our community is at stake and I don’t think we have a goal. We need a vision for 10 years from now. We need a leadership that has a design and a plan for the community.”
Delle Donna: “The people of Guttenberg should vote for me because of what I’ve done for the last four years, two years as a councilman and two years as mayor. I worked very hard to turn this town around and I’ve done so. We were in a terrible financial situation. Every department in the town was in disarray. Now, we have a $2.5 million surplus and responsible government. I’ve proven to the people that I will go the extra mile. Now, Guttenberg is a town we can be proud of again. When they chose to vote for me before, I worked to earn their respect. Now, I’ve earned the right to be re-elected.”