Grassroots Groundswell

By Leslie A. Coder, North Plainfield resident; registered, unaffiliated voter; Co-chair Project Graduation and PTO for the 2008-2009 school year.

After being up all night chaperoning for Senior Smash (the all night party that is sponsored by Project Graduation for the graduating NPHS seniors), I was at the Street Fair handing out information pamphlets on what Project Graduation is in front of the High School PTO table. The goal was to increase awareness of the High School’s PTO and Project Graduation efforts and answer any questions.

Well, Mike Giordano comes walking down and I approached him trying to give him a pamphlet, well he nastily shoos me away and almost runs me over to go over to my friend who is thinner and prettier to shake her hand and then walks away.

I should not feel to bad, later in the afternoon, I observed him shooing away two little boys that had Alex’s lemonade stand (a charity) shirts when they approached him too.

I guess that Mike Giordano must think that he does not need to be pleasant to win a election. My take on it is, if he is that dismissive during a time when you should be campaigning then he will be dismissive in office.

Lastly I want to thank Frank D’amore Sr, Gary Lewis and Robert Gatto for their help in chaperoning senior smash until 2am, which I understand they have been doing for quite a few years.

by Greg Hatala

I wrote a letter to the mayor, police chief and council president a while back about the driving anarchy around the schools at pick-up times.

Council President Stabile responded to me and agreed that the situation is pretty bad each and every day.

Chief Parenti eventually emailed me back, and while he seemed to agree there was a problem, didn’t give me too much confidence that it was seen as anything more problematic than any other traffic situation.

There was a brief … and I mean brief … period where police were more visible and made a few more stops; then, things reverted to what they’d always been.

These are our CHILDREN. The complete arrogance of the drivers in this area is a disaster waiting to happen.

Today (June 9), I watched a car throw a ‘K’ turn and back directly into a parked car. This would have been right in front of a policeman, except there wasn’t one in his usual position on the corner. Then, the car took off down a side street, and completely blew a stop sign, nearly colliding with two cars on that street.

I don’t accept the information I’ve been presented. Contrary to the stats and figures, there does NOT seem to be more enforcement around the schools at dismissal; I don’t care about percentages and annual figures - they’re not there, and they’re not writing tickets.

I don’t believe there is a lack of manpower. I think it’s something else, and I wish to God someone would tell me why our children don’t deserve a half-hour of stern enforcement of traffic laws for their safety each day.

Editor’s Note: A friend told me recently that a young officer told her the officers are held back from doing the competent job performance they’d like to give to their work, by Police Chief William Parenti’s instructions.

Also, sorry this post is up so late (kids are out of school for the summer).

I don’t like to bury things far down the page so quickly, but if there are one or two big stories every day, the openings to put things at the top are very short-lived.

KEEP SCROLLING DOWN!

by Josh Lambert

Congratulations North Plainfielders!

The amount of available housing stock is about to go up in town thanks to the efforts of your Borough council.

If the numbers at Weichert Realty are to be believed, there are currently 139 single family homes for sale in North Plainfield. With the recently announced 55 additional homes to be built, there will be a 40% increase in the amount of available housing stock… not counting condos and multifamily homes.

I guess maybe you shouldn’t be congratulated if you’re trying to sell your house.

In fact, a 40% increase in available houses kind of increases the competition and makes the market that much more a buyers’ market.

But, I guess we should really all think about the extra property tax revenue that will come from all these new houses, and be thankful because surely this will result in lower overall rates for everyone, right?

Wait a minute, I seem to recall there was some uncollected tax revenue from the property in the first place. I think the numbers went up to somewhere around 1 million bucks. I also think that the borough has decided to not to try and collect this money from either the former owners (the nuns) or the new owner (Robert McNerney).

Since the developer didn’t have to pay those back taxes, then that lost revenue is kind of like a negative in the town checkbook. Since the other property owners presumably pay their taxes, then that loss will have to be borne by them. This kind of seems like the developer got a $1 million tax break that will be paid for by the homeowners in town…139 of whom are trying to sell their houses.

That seems like being forced to help finance the competition.

How exactly is Borough Council looking out for the townspeople? Why did I vote for them in 2004?

Perhaps condolences to the townspeople are more appropriate than congratulations.

As the blog’s URL contains the words, “Community Rights”, I was wondering why I had not been informed that I had lost one of my community rights: the right to sit in my yard without being bombarded by an amplified repetition of the “F” word.

What occurred in Greenbrook Park this evening [May 25] was a disgrace. There was some sort of county-approved gathering that entailed a large group of people listening to incredibly loud music.

I live half a mile away from the park, yet every syllable was clearly heard by by myself and my wife.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy rap music. Some pretty hardcore stuff. I can also swear with the best of them. I am a union stagehand; it’s a requirement of the job. But to be sitting in my yard on a quiet evening and hear foul language amplified across the neighborhood is not why I recently moved to this town.

I drove over to the park and confronted the police, who had been in attendance of the event the entire time.

I was told, “Well, it’s over now so don’t worry about it”.

Why did they sit back and allow this? Is the airing of obscenities in a family community an acceptable matter to the law in this area?

I won’t even mention the tremendous amounts of trash left behind by the crowd, or the large numbers of small children in attendance.

Is this the sort of community event that I can expect in the future? If so, then I have made a terrible mistake in my recent home purchase.

By Greg Hatala

For as long as I’ve lived in North Plainfield, I can recall people hiring disposal companies to place a large dumpster in their driveway when they needed access to such disposal. Whether the homeowner was having work done on their home, or was simply cleaning it out, there never seemed to be an issue with this very common approach. The disposal company charged the homeowner a fee for delivery and pickup of the unit, and also a fee for the weight/volume of refuse they hauled away.

Not too long ago, PODS and similar companies began offering the mobile storage service now in question. The units themselves are far cleaner and much safer than the open dumpsters used in the applications mentioned above. The homeowner still pays fees related to their use; this is not a free service. This is not a case of a homeowner parking, for example, a recreational vehicle (motor home, boat, etc.) in their driveway.

But now I’m seeing that, all of a sudden, Borough Hall is engaged in heavy debate over these PODS. Borough Hall seems to want to make some money off of these units. No one at Borough Hall ever seems to have felt it necessary to charge a fee for motor homes, boats or other luxury items. But this issue has grabbed their attention.

Why? Because of an anonymous letter? I’ve had some experience in the ‘anonymous contact with Borough Hall officials’ approach in the past, and the thing that I found most troubling was that whoever the ‘anonymous’ person is who complains seems to get a great deal of fast action and attention without the bother of having to identify themselves.

All of a sudden, after years and years of people using dumpsters without a problem, it becomes vital for Borough Hall to address this super-important ‘PODS’ issue, apparently because some important person whined.

Are they eyesores? No more than the dumpsters ever were. Are they all over the town? In this case, it seems that all it takes is one next door to the anonymous person with pull to get immediate and major action at Borough Hall.

And if the issue has to do with, yet again, the issue of single-family homes becoming apartment houses, why is Borough Hall’s natural solution to grab more money from homeowners? Why do they seem to be so deathly afraid of the illegal landlords?

I’ve tried many times to address issues with Borough Hall by name or in person, and in many instances, the only important thing that happened was that something happened to me.

I guess what I should have been doing all along was making anonymous phone calls and writing anonymous letters ratting people out in secrecy, because that seems to be the only way things get addressed.

And if I come to need to use one of these PODS, I’d like Borough Hall to first show me that they’ve collected money from each and every person who ever had any kind of storage or disposal unit in their driveway before they try to get a dime from me.

My love for our town runs deep, but it did not always. In light of major issues I had almost twelve years back while attending school, I used to tell myself to get out, and get out now.

Only to slowly wake up and realize that North Plainfield was always and will continue to be a great educational and cultural choice for my uniquely immigrant family.

My husband was an undocumented worker who crossed the border illegally. So yes, illegal housing, undocumented workers and student rights, and immigration issues are too personal for me to comment on. Especially racism, bilingual classes, and dual language learners.

I sit here in luxury as my husband returned to a “third world country” to a palm shack that lacked plumbing, electricity, and food.

I am a Stony Brooker. Class of 1998 alumna. And I love this town.

The diversity here and success of the Board of Education give me hope for our collective better futures.

In this context, I understand that I lack respect for this forum, your organization, and I apologize. I will plague this page no longer with typos and my given name.

I resent people who cannot work within the system. I resent the fact that here we have resorted to name-calling. It is low, and has no benefits. I resent anonymity. It is degrading to our community.

Within the system and collective powers that be, one can effect change and be respected even in light of constructive criticism.

I detest purposeful miseducation, and those that do it, I find repugnant.

We should use our education for grand, moral and ethical purposes.

So with that, I cease and desist.

I really was only trying to build bridges. I guess my engineering was unwarranted, uninvited, unappreciated.

A heart-felt good luck in your endeavors.

QUESTION: When considering and conveying the perspectives of local Latinos, do you draw a distinction between the law-abiding behavior of large multi-generational Hispanic families who all live together because they’re all related and that’s a cultural tradition, and the law-breaking behavior of Hispanic (and non-Hispanic) property-owning landlords who partition and then rent illegal apartments to unrelated tenants? If so, describe the differences. If not, why not?

Yes there is a difference, but regardless of the reason, culture or economics, there is an ordinance preventing it and while the ordinance is in force, it is not justifiable. The ingredient brought by culture is the ability to live with many people, friends, renters, or families without taking into consideration the difficulties associated. The next ingredient is economics. We know the minorities are at the bottom of the economic ladder. Owning a home is a dream most have, but owning a home takes more than two people working two jobs, thus some rent to family, friends and total strangers. Then there is education. Homes and businesses owned by minorities are increasing at great speed. There is no time to dig through ordinances, there is not time to integrate (remembers to achieve this they have to work harder than you and I) and there is no time to consider the implications, debt have to be paid.

These may be some of the reasons why minorities are identified as the most cases of overcrowding and illegal housing in the DWP report. So, why not integrate emerging minority communities through education and immersion programs to ensure their fast assimilation into North Plainfield culture and to ensure that they know ordinances and why they are in place. Remember, immigrants are coming in at a great speed, by the time one generation establishes; there are three or more in the process. This is why I proposed the minority commission.

QUESTION: Would a bilingual brochure, mailed out with the next quarterly leaf-pickup calendar, be sufficient baseline public education for enforcement to be restarted again in earnest, assuming that by that time, DPW Director James Rodino will be fired or demoted for incompetence, and a new DPW director with good professional and interpersonal skills, and a solid understanding of the property maintenance and zoning codes, will be in place and responsible for implementing a respectful, properly-documented enforcement program?

It will be helpful, but no, it will not be sufficient. The kind of effort needed to deal with this and many other issues is an ongoing effort made up of different ways to reach the community. Remember, the new wave of immigrants is around the corner. I would not expect a program from the administration, if they had intention of doing it, they would have done it by now. I would support the commission because is a legally mandated and supported body run by volunteers not by intrinsically indifferent government. But again, every bit of effort helps.

“Some readers are concerned that I’m being “played” by Mr. Ortega. My take on Norman is not that he’s dangerous, but that he’s awkward - an awkward community organizer.”

Sheesh, I have never been described as an “awkward community organizer”. Thanks for the title though, I will add it to the rest. 

Yes, some readers may think I am playing you and I understand why. When it comes to thoughts and ideas, I am not a simple person. Like most, I am all over the place. At the same time, I am not that ambivalent either.

Here is my dilemma:

I believe that in terms of empowerment and political influence minorities are stuck between a rock and a hard place. On one side Democrats pretend to give us what we want and need, minority council, a minority member in a commission, etc. That is the end of it, given a selected few who have pledged alliance.

Then there are Republicans, don’t give opportunity to anything that is not GOP and goes further with attacks on language and immigration. This is no issue for those who are democrats or republicans including minorities. For them the issue is solved.

But there are those me, who do not want a show and tell from Democrats and who do not want attacks from Republicans. There are those me like who want meaningful participation for all, in particular minorities whom are the most disenfranchised.

Where do we fit?

So, I tried with the Democrats, it did not work.

I tried with Republicans, not even a reply.

Now I am trying with NPCCR because, whether some readers like it or not, we have common goals.

But before I did that, I had to test the water. NPCCR is mainly Republican and our experience with Republican had not been productive, it has been the contrary.

What should I do? Nothing specific, lets engage and see what happens.

I had private emails with Ms. Watt and discovered that she is as serious as I am about empowerment and participation. Yet, I was afraid of the Republican connection. So, I engage her privately and subsequently publicly; brought in Republicans along with everyone else to solve our differences.

Yes, I have changed and you have changed. We are learning about you and you, NPCCR, Republicans and participants- are learning about us.

The good effects of good old American debate! Now we are collaborating in some things and I hope it goes further. I am happy for that. I mean who would have thought? It would not have been possible without you Ms. Watt, that we would get word from Gatto about immigration and overcrowding and how it is affecting one aspect of the population.

Yes, most of it was cryptic and it had to be solved- but again, nothing was planned things just had to run their course.

My objective is integration of minorities which is good for everyone. North Plainfield is mostly of Italian descent, aside from Italian restaurants which have become part of the American landscape, they integrated though generations. Well, let’s speed up that boat and get everyone integrated as soon as they come.

As far as ass-kissing, don’t hate Ms. Watt. It’s unnecessary. If I wanted to kiss your or anyone’s ass, I would have proceeded in a different way and I would have accepted all the offers of power for loyalty I have gotten through the years. My father says am an idiot, but I know is his way of beating himself on the head because when it comes to integrity, I don’t compromise it for power or anything that is not the good of the public, neither did he.

The compliments have merits so let me tell you why so there is no confusion. You, whatever the reason, brought Republicans to support a totally liberal, left from the far left and more than left ordinance and you sorted through my arguments simply to understand.

So don’t be modest, take them- you earned them.

“Now, in its entirety (so I can’t be accused of being hypocritical by pulling things out of context) is an article from the Courier-News, December 1, 2000.”

You are right on context here Emory, but not as much as you want to be. The claim of hypocrisy (I have not used this word to describe your positions) may be because Republican candidates and some members of the NPCCR keep using issues of illegal housing irresponsibly. The issue is being use to score political points against the administration. This is fine, but there are implications which are not being taken into consideration.

For instance, a look at the DPW’s list of property maintenance violations in North Plainfield for 2007 gave a clear picture of these implications. In North Plainfield, 32% of the population is Hispanic. One would assume or think that the DPW’s list of property maintenance would reflect this; none of that. There are 86 entries under the categories of overcrowding, illegal renting, etc. Of those 86 instances where illegal housing has been allegedly detected, 75.5% are in homes belonging to Hispanics. This is counting 9 entries which had no records.

Based on the numbers, this issue affects Hispanics more than any other ethnicity or race in North Plainfield. In other words, it could be argued that the extremist political views behind illegal housing and how they are being used is because they may be related to this fact or because politicians don’t have a clue of the underpinnings of this issue. I prefer the latter, but it is common knowledge that it is a mixture of both.

Let’s be clear, no one supports illegal housing and everyone knows it happens here and everywhere regardless of who is running City Hall.

Yes, it is understandable that some politicians and residents are concerned with this issue.

But here, in this particular municipality, this non-issue is being used preposterously. It’s agitation. Why? Because, as you asserted in your post, the administration is currently addressing issues of illegal housing, apparently in an appropriate manner while current candidates, to their advantage, are advocating tougher insensitive measures which could lead to a debacle similar to that which took place in Bound Brook.

Let’s be responsible. If any candidate is going to address this issue, they should do it in good faith, expressing good intentions to resolve any issue of illegal housing. Education, training, awareness, and assistance are the most effective ways to resolve this issue. Threatening jail time, tougher penalties and other such irresponsible measures is practically acknowledging a specific disdain for those affected and not a good faith intention to resolve the issue.

Part of the Minority Commission was to address such issues through awareness, training, assistance and education. Please, be responsible and sensitive when addressing this and any other issue. The implications merit it.

By Gary Lewis

Let’s see if we can get a committee of 12 local residents to regularly attend school board meetings: four people that are retired, four with no children in the system and four with children in the system. Each subgroup could report on their assessment of the meetings.

We’d need people who will commit on a regular basis; attending one meeting will not give anyone a feel of how the School Board runs their meetings The feed back I have heard is that the only things on the agenda are what the school administration wants on the agenda.

Sounds like they took the same classes as Borough Hall did.

I personally don’t believe a teacher/educator that’s in any school system should sit on the school board in that system: it’s the “good old boy” game. “I’ll scratch your back, some day I need mine done.” I am not saying that an individual is looking for personal gain, but it’s how the whole system is played out. It stinks.

Editor’s Note-

There are two open seats on the seven-member School Board. The nonpartisan school elections will be next week, on Tuesday, April 15, and the two incumbents running for re-election are David Branan and Thomas Allen. 

Last year’s school board election generated a lot of youth enthusiasm and organizing to elect Drew Smith and Edwin Estevez. But so far, I haven’t seen much evidence that Mr. Smith and Mr. Estevez are making any headway changing the closed, resident-patronizing culture and tone of the School Board.

As always, information to the contrary welcome.

This blog is available to any readers who want to organize a write-in campaign to place two new people on the School Board, people with fresh ideas and a willingness to challenge the school administrators’ dominance of the board.

Talk amongst yourselves, send along two write-in candidate names, and persuade those two candidates to write up and send along in their ideas for the School Board for posting here, and we’ll see what comes of it.

If there are challengers to Mr. Branan and Mr. Allen already, I apologize. I haven’t heard of your candidacies yet, and welcome your writings on your plans for your School Board service if elected.

UPDATE ONE HOUR LATER:

Here’s why a write-in campaign between now and next Tuesday might actually have a shot at getting new people not just monitoring skills, but actual voting seats on the School Board.

The NPCCR e-mail list now reaches at least 160 people. The blog is getting about 550 hits per day. Other community members have other local e-mail lists with up to 200 people on them. And all of you have extremely powerful word-of-mouth information networks among your friends and neighbors.

Total voter turnout at the April 2007 School Elections was 927. The vote counts for each candidate were Edwin Estevez (482), Linda Bond-Nelson (426), Drew Smith (412) - those won their seats, beating Nancy Szaroleta (410), Kent Thompson (351) and Michelle Wallace-Ixim (188). For the candidates running to fill an unexpired term, Sandra Dodd (397) beat Carlene Grace-Starks (315). (Apologies for spelling mistakes. Please send corrections.)

Those are small margins, amounting to dozens of votes that made the difference. And serving on the School Board is not something you need to be an expert to do.

By the way, the budget passed last year by 466-422, another narrow margin of 44 votes.

So, if you’re interested in organizing a write-in campaign, use the blog and the NPCCR e-mail list to launch and describe your candidacies and let’s see what happens next Tuesday. 

By Norman E. Ortega

The difficult part of examining local budgets is not examining the document for pork. You will not find it, ever. The only way pork can be found is by matching what is in the budget to what is actually taking place; what is being done with the money spent and whether we are getting our bang for the buck.

However, this is just one aspect of streamlining a budget. There are a few more. My favorite is economized through innovative implementation of measures specifically designed to save.

As you know, in government, things are cumbersome. To do a simple job, studies and reports of all kinds have to be produced. Heck, there is even a bid process, which is ineffective most of the time. However, this does not mean it cannot be done.

After reading your post on the budget, I browsed through it and found a few things. I bet that if the users of this site would do the same, each and one of them will find something to improve or a least a suggesting on how to improve and eliminate spending.

Electricity: $300,000 were appropriated for 2008: A solar panel on the roof of City Hall may do away with more than half of the electricity consumed by the Borough.

Crossing Guards: $160,000 were appropriated for 2008. This might be ambitious, but the crossing guards programs can be run through a volunteering program.

Borough Supply: Often Boroughs use companies to provide it with supply, technology, and computer systems. As you know, in government, through this service, a hammer is a thousand dollars. The Borough should reexamine how buying supplies is. If the Borough is using a company to provide it with supply, it might as well use a local store and negotiate the purchase of supplies based on volume.

Paying Bills: Another thing that should be reexamine is how the Borough paying its bills. Is it monthly, bimonthly, or quarterly? A lot could be saved in stamps and processing time.

Overtime: I could not read it well, but there are $39,000 dollars appropriated for overtime for the Fire Department. In 2005, $42,000 was requested. If the Fire Department is requesting overtime it is because it does not have enough men, with the $39,000 add additional man at $25,000 a year; use the rest to cover benefit expenses.

I am sure there is more- keep looking.

In the meantime, the administration should consider bringing extra eyes to the budget process. Non-partisan and nonprofit organizations can provide expertise to streamlining a budget and innovative thinkers can bring new ways to prevent misspending.