This is why spending the first 3.5 years of your mayoral term basing your decisions on how they'd be viewed if he ran for governor not only hurt Steve Fulop, it hurt Jersey City. Fulop went before the assembled group at New Jersey City University Monday; he had to admit his administration had fallen short on this and promised to play catch up. Three and a half years worth of catch up mayor? Matsikoudis who has previously released his plan on affordable housing won huge cheers from the crowd on Monday when he said:
"It's out of control," Matsikoudis said. "I'm hearing about people that are getting pushed out of Jersey City, who've had to move from Downtown to the Heights or from McGinley Square to Greenville and the next step is out of Jersey City."
"Right now there's no door to knock on, there's no phone number to call," Matsikoudis said on Monday. "If you need help finding affordable housing, well, it's up to you to figure it out. Well, we're going to change that."
Johnny railed on this forever, all of Fulop's decisions were filtered through the idea he'd run for governor and how decisions on Jersey City issues might impact him outstate. Now those delays in focusing on the city play out in the numbers. Terrence T. McDonald pointed out the mayor was claiming construction or approval of 1,444 affordable units. When only units completely built are included, the number of affordable units is 173.
Playing catch up indeed, just not in the mayor's race yet.
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