Friday, February 17, 2012

An interesting commentary about the Mayor's State of the City speech last night

Political insider at the Jersey Journal, Agustin C. Torres, made a whale of a point about Mayor Healy's state of the city address last night. He felt with all of Healy's talk about the great new business and restaurant expansion, new construction, and the Sixth Street Embankment as High Line that the true heart of the city, Journal Square was being ignored.

Torres noted Healy was asked about this and didn't seem any too happy to respond.

Healy has done a lot of things for the city........from Grove St. to the river, but what of Greenville, The Heights, Journal Square, India Square et al. Has Jersey City under Healy, like Torres suggests, become 1789 Paris in A Tale of Two Cities? Have most of Healy's building and business initiatives favored downtown?

How much is being spent where mayor? Where are the police assets being spent? Downtown? The problematic Greenville area? Journal Square? What about the tax breaks? What part of town is getting them and are they equitable?

Last year at this time we were all hearing about the grand new development plan for Journal Square. Huge condo towers with businesses on the ground floor surrounded all throughout the neighborhood by newly opened supporting businesses and a grand new upgrade of the Journal Square PATH station. If you bring up this issue today you get the sound of crickets on a warm summer night.

A fair point by Mr. Torres should lead to a fair and lively discussion we think. Tell us your opinion in comments.

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