Think you know the candidates for Ward B? A link to learn more

Terrence T. McDonald has interview snippets from the Ward B city council candidates to help you, the Ward B voter a more informed voter. Never a bad idea to read up as a candidate you never considered touches on an issue important to you in a way you like. Take a few minutes and get your learn on this morning.

More debates, more politics and more citizen questions make for better city government

There will be quite a few more chances, though that window is closing due to the calendar, to hear from candidates in debates and forums all over town. If you'll simply click on this helpful link you can read about the who's and where's and when's of this Jersey City debate season.

Who wants a Monday night politics fix?

That's right citizen, you do. Terrence T. McDonald asks the question of some candidates, if you're a Steve Fulop ally, how do you stay independent and how do you show you're being independent. Some hemmed and hawed but none made quite the hash of the question Ward C candidate and Fulop ticket member John Hanussak did. We're not going to step on McDonald's journalism here, you go click that link and watch a slow motion car crash in real time.

The Journal Square city council debate is set

Loew's Theater will host the Ward C council candidates forum this upcoming Saturday from 10am til noon. We kind of like the breakfast with the candidates feel of this meet up. Ward C's rep, incumbent former JC cop Rich Boggiano, 74, is facing Janet Chevres, 53, a business administrator at JPMorgan Chase; John Hanussak, 48, who works for the city Resident Response Center; and Rekha Nandwani, 40, president of the Jefferson Avenue Block Association. More on the event here.

Somewhere Nidia Lopez is kicking herself for not getting on the ballot here as she packs her Florida home to flee Hurricane Irma.

The petitions are in...

...and it is indeed a two man race for Jersey City mayor between incumbent Steve Fulop and former Healy corporation counsel, Bill Matsikoudis.  Elsewhere Terrence T. McDonald reports there will be 7 candidates running in Ward F and 6 in Ward E with 48 candidates citywide. This link, it helps with the breakdown.

Ward F debate, coming fall 2017:

Hey, slackers, you have one week to get your paperwork in to run for mayor or council

Let's go you layouts, slug-a-beds, and ham and eggers, you only have one more week to get your paperwork in to run for council and mayoral runs. As far as your mayoral paperwork and money you plan to spend running against Steve Fulop you may well just go take that cash and go up on your roof and throw it into the wind. Trust Johnny, it'll have the exact same effect. You'd be better served to buy a 20x20 piece of property and go get a 20 year abatement on it. Those are automatic here.

Terrence T. McDonald points out it's a crowded council race in so many wards, but you're gonna have to go give him some click love to see some of the numbers of people running in each ward.

Why are you still here? Skedaddle!

We were going to cover other things tonight...

...that was until, for reasons unknown, the entire, and by entire we mean all 9 city council members, decided to vote against an ordinance introduced by Councilman Michael Yun that would have banned puppy mill puppies from being sold in Jersey City pet stores. Slam dunk in basketball, tap-in in golf, it's the easiest thing in the world to do the right thing and protect animals.

Nope.

All nine council members, all nine thought puppy mills were A-Ok (don't bother with technicalities about boutique breeds, such a minuscule number vs thousands of dogs and cats who can't get adopted, you're gonna lose that moral argument), or at least OK enough the sale of them is fine in Jersey City. It's beyond shameful. It's the most ashamed Johnny has ever been since he moved to Jersey City. The Humane Society has presented this same ordinance in hundreds of other places and it's been adopted in every single one, until now. It's beyond the pale.

It doesn't really matter if it gets reintroduced, it's not going to wipe the shame away of voting against the best interests of animals. Here are their names, if they're all in on their awful votes they won't mind this list, if it bothers any of them in the least, yeah, they know they fucked this up:

Council President-Rolando R. Lavarro, Jr.
Councilwoman at Large-Joyce Watterman
Councilman at Large-Daniel Rivera
Ward A (Greenville) Councilman-Frank Gajewski
Ward B (West Side) Councilman-Chris L. Gadsden
Ward C (Journal Square) Councilman-Richard Boggiano
Ward D (The Heights) Councilman-Michael Yun
Ward E (Downtown) Councilwoman-Candice Osborne
Ward F (Bergen/Lafayette) Councilman-Jermaine Robinson

As long as you serve you will never be free of this vote. By the way, Johnny's going to unleash hell upon you on the Twitter, gonna invite some animal rights groups to tell you why your vote sucked.

We get to start Monday morning on a good note

We'll be able to start tomorrow out on a good story that shows a great effort to bolster city resident safety by a city council member. Johnny's gonna get back to his birthday weekend but yes, make sure to start Monday off with us on a good note.

Guess what city council did last night

Go on, guess. If you said spend money on a fuzzy math budget AND lay the groundwork for a few more abatements, you control the board and get to go again.

The council passed Steve Fulop's magical no tax increase again and we're pretty much basing our budget outlook now on tourism at local hotels. What do we expect from Mr. Goldman Sachs and his Merry Band of YesFolk? Let's not plan for, and or save for the future because the good economic times, they always last. A whole 700K for a budget of 572 million. Yeah, sure, OK. Lost in this is the uptick in municipal fines. Is Jersey City starting to head down the Ferguson Mo. road and increasing revenue in the poorer neighborhoods for annoyance fines? We'd need to see that broken out as to what this climb in fines is for and what part of Jersey City it's increasing in. A $2.2 million increase in municipal court fines is a lot in one year, no?  yet,

Once again the fact abatements are due to come rolling off the books did nothing to stop council from rezoning and almost begging to set up abatements for the old Emerson Radio Factory.

The massive, five-story former factory, now a storage warehouse at 16th and Coles streets, would be part of a roughly 60-acre redevelopment zone in an industrial area of the city that sits in the shadow of the New Jersey Turnpike, blocks from the Holland Tunnel.

The plan also requires the developer of the Emerson factory to build a new, 20,000-square-foot public space that the city says will be a new Downtown police station (so how is that a public space?). Meanwhile, an existing parking lot between 13th and 14th streets just west of Coles Street could eventually become a park (there is currently a 20-year lease on the property). COULD.

Johnny knows you regular readers realize we're not done prepping for more PILOT programs (with no money going to say, schools):

The developer chosen to rehab the old factory would have to keep that structure intact but would be allowed to build 26-story high-rises around it. Current zoning limits height in the area to five stories.

There you go. We DARE any city council member right now to say they'll not vote for abatements for this (AND the Kushner/KRE/KABR horseshit properties). Do it. Be the hero. Say you're done pissing taxpayer money away willy nilly. Jersey City real estate can stand on it's own. Try it and see. Let the developer build it on their dime and keep the profits and pay proper taxes on it. Does council realize we make more money this way? They won't ever know unless they show some spine and try.

Merry Band of YesFolk, lol, Johnny cracks himself up sometimes.

Steve Fulop and the Jersey City Council art of the $10 deal

Well, the gang that never met money they couldn't spend did it again last night only on a scale SO GRAND it defies belief.

You know the story, Liberty Science Center (they of the soft-porn "science" nights) wants a new science-based school (SciTech Scity,) on their land but the problem was this land, worth millions, was something they'd never afford so Steve Fulop and 6 council members gave it to them. Actually, Johnny's wrong on that and supporters bristle at calling the millions in real estate a "giveaway."

The city paid 10$. Yep, a Hamilton for land worth millions. Fail. Yes, really, ten bucks. That's their level of contempt for you taxpayer. They just gave away millions you were part owner of. Forget the fact we're being slow-walked to a Reval and here's more property that won't be collecting money.

But, we got 10$.

The supporters claim, this school will bring kids in from all over falling over themselves to get in. The claim this one school will transform Jersey City educationally. That's kind of the problem isn't it? Jersey City kids, those of normal means won't see this school unless they drive by. This school (Hear Johnny now and believe him later) is not for kids from Greenville or The Heights or Journal Square, it's for the richies and well-connected. Make bet on that.

But Johnny's isn't this slated to be a "public school?" Yes, suuuuure it is. The only public school our city council expects  TURN A PROFIT!:

City officials have argued that the deal isn't a giveaway, citing a revenue-sharing portion of its agreement with SciTech Scity. Once the complex turns a profit beyond $78 million, the city would share in the profits, initially getting 50 percent and, once the value of the city's land is paid off, 20 percent.

A school complex, turn a profit. $78 million. WTF?!

This was one miserable deal that NOW Jersey City can't control once the JCRA gets the property. Seems only Ward C Councilman Michael Yun noticed that:

"...once the land is transferred to the JCRA and "it is completely out of our control."

"The JCRA, their own board members, (are) not elected by people but appointed by the mayor. They're going to do what the mayor asks them," Yun said.

There are city council members that need primary opponents. Good solid citzens who realize planning for the long-term beats panicked giveaways. Thank the lord Frank Gajewski isn't running again. A complete waste of a seat. Daniel Rivera, champion of cars in yards, needs a serious wake-up call. Rubber stamp is no way to go through life. Candice Osborne, who actually said last night this deal won't make dime one STILL voted for it. There's some solid thinking. Remember this about Osborne, she'll vote for anyone's abatement or construction variance -- except those in HER own Paulus Hook neighborhood. Rolando Lavarro, who sees Fulop as his meal ticket will never do anything to upset the mayor because for some reason Lavarro thinks he'll be mayor after Fulop. Great he's voting like it's 2021 on issues today. Also, remember when Lavarro said he was going to curb spending? Yeah, he's holding the city back and needs to go. Joyce Watterman has been failing JC taxpayers for far too long, she needs a swift exit through a side door too. Jermaine Robinson, we're watching you. You voted poorly last night but it's just too early to see if you're going to be a yes man like the rest listed here, but we're watching you. You blew it last night Mr. Robinson.

So, Jersey City taxpayers, unless you take matters into your own hands, by either running a primary campaign against one of these rubber stamp council members, supporting a primary opponent or simply voting against those in their seat now, you're at least able to say you, if nobody else, is looking out for the long-term financial health of Jersey City. Look at their track records, it's not going to happen with Fulop, Rivera, Lavarro, Gajewski, and Osborne in their current jobs.

It's not. We're going to give the Jersey City Desk famous last word to Daniel Sexton former Jersey City attorney under Bret Schundler. When it comes to long-term planning and why it's important:

Daniel Sexton, a former city attorney under Bret Schundler, called the land transfer "scandalous."

"You saw it's swampland. Well so was Newport, swampland. So was Harsimus Cove ... so was Liberty National," Sexton said. "This is a valuable asset."

Well, back we go to the woodshed with Council tomorrow

They went ahead and gave away millions in free real estate (and a loan) to build a new public school next to Liberty State Park at Steve Fulop's behest. Ya know, if we'd fucking commit to taking a fixed amount of PILO--wait, that's for tomorrow...

Rather than committing to a real number on PILOT money...

...Mayor Fulop and Jersey City will now just hire an attorney to fight any plan to make Jersey City pay it's fair share of school funding since there always seems to be enough for tax break after tax break for friends of Fulop and those get rubber stamped by city council. Jersey City taxpayers pay more for the inevitable change that will be forced upon our fair city by the New Jersey legislature unless responsible people somehow figure this out at 280 Grove St.

We'll have some fun tomorrow...

Of course it's the Music Series but time permitting we'll dig into the money pouring into the Jersey City mayor's race from outside Jersey City.

Oh Fuck all.

Yet another waste of Jersey City taxpayer money

Developers can say they'll do a lot of things "for" Jersey City when they come hat in hand before the planning commission, city council et al. Some say they'll build a small elementary school downtown, in the richest area, a school kids from Greenville have zero hope of attending. Some say they will do something down the road, like Toll Brothers who probably lied when they said to get their abatement for The Morgan said they'd build a community theater. Word on that from sources downtown say it'll never be built, Toll will cry poor but Johnny digresses. A lot of promises are made to take your tax money "in lieu of payment" ie taxes like you pay.

Shuster, when they wanted tax money to build their very unnecessary igloos on First St., (Shuster is, by the way, complaining about the new city law that requires them to pave side to side after tearing up a street -- how's that for gratitude?) the Art House and The Jokeman said they would provide the city with parking out front of both places, roughly an entire city block they would dedicate to parking and charging of electric vehicles, ie Chevy Volts, Nissan Leafs etc. This was Shuster's "giveback" to the city for getting huge abatements.

Problem is, the spots are never in use. By never we mean never -- as far as EV's are concerned. Shuster contractors and employees now get FREE PARKING out front of their buildings because NOBODY is using the 30 or so electric spots. Shuster guys just move the cones for their own contractors and workers and YOU pay for that. Yes Jersey City, YOU pay for Shuster employees to park for free on city streets.

Now, the city in it's infinite wisdom was using this EV charging location as a test case, ie can we do this elsewhere and have it work. No doubt developers all over Hudson County would line up to get the abatement deal Shuster got, we'll GIVE you the parking spaces, just contract someone to come put in chargers. That's it. Simple.

Johnny is going to make a bold statement but he's pretty certain he can back it up with his long history in auto media; Nobody from Jersey City got down and did the full research on exactly how many EV's there are in Hudson County, how many are registered in Jersey City or the surround. Nobody did a count, nobody thought to look around message forums or boards looking for EV drivers around the Tri-State looking for downtown plug-in parking. If the city did any of this Johnny would be A) Surprised B) Our subpoena for JC's data on this would be immediate from the Jersey City Desk legal team.

Bottom line, somebody THOUGHT this would be a great idea. But, instead of running a test program in another slice of downtown, they built in millions in abatements around a failed plan. Instead we have an utter waste of millions of taxpayer dollars.

FAIL to city planning (again), FAIL to City Council (again) LOSS for Jersey City taxpayers who had a block of parking taken away and handed to a contractor to collect money off your street that has no cars.

Johnny has one more prediction on this; When someone from the city government does read this (and they do, Johnny sees their IP addy's coming in) they'll simply think the program is an even bigger hit than they'd hoped because someone is talking about it, it's how Jersey City government works.

Jersey City councilmembers sure can be duplicitous

We've seeing before, hell, this city was built on dodgy mayors and councils ready to do the wrong thing at a minute's notice.

Now Johnny's dealing with one who he dealt with on an original topic/story that has been covered here, and it's funny how in the public world of Twitter some will say things about a topic that just aren't true in comparison to what they have previously emailed private citizens, like Johnny.

Somebody better get their head on straight or those emails are going public city counsellor.

Another 4 million dollars from the council and the Reval is back on

Remember this people of New Jersey, when Steve Fulop throws hit hat in the rong for governor and starts touting his business and budget record here, his good news will be heavily glided. He's wasted yet another 4+ million dollars as City Council will approve a new Reval contract with Appraisal System in their meeting tomorrow night.

Another 4 million, great fucking job everyone. What petty shit from a mayor who'd happily let others pay for his schools while he cuts sweetheart deals with his developer friends that further tax city residents.

Sure would have been nice to elect a mayor in 2013 who truly and Johnny means truly gave one shit about the city he was going to serve. It ain't Steppingstone Stevie.

Nothing like spending more needless money eh Jersey City?

The state mandated and court ordered reval is going to cost Jersey City taxpayers another $5 million dollars as City Council, who haven't yet met something they wouldn't overspend on, will Wednesday approve asking for yet more money on the childishly delayed reval, no doubt because Mayor Fulop wants it.

It's mandated to be done in November of 2017, hey look an election date, and somehow the Fulop Administration who has no interest in it ever happening courts be damned. It has already fallen behind in the timeline. You have to love Fulop mouthpiece Jennifer Morrill who was sent out to pick the scab yet again that despite the courts consistently saying the first reval was done properly and it was Fulop acting childishly (in practically these same words) by making sure Mr. Petulant gets in some kind of imagined last word:

"We have always said this is a tight timeframe established by the state and we are working within that to comply, however, it is important that the best format and practices are followed, which was not the case previously," Morrill said.

Again, yes it was fair whether you think so or not. Anyway the judge decided you have no point there Jennifer and that's the only funny thing about this.

This here Jersey City, this is a hell of a price to pay for Steve Fulop's donor-class staying happy and that is ALL.THIS.IS.REALLY.ABOUT:

If the city's $4 million estimate holds, the cost to taxpayers for the reval will be at least $7.6 million. That includes the cost of the canceled reval ($3 million), legal fees Jersey City has been ordered to pay Realty Appraisal ($115,000 so far), costs for the firm Jersey City hired to defend itself in the case ($450,000 so far) and, to date, $26,954 in interest the city has been ordered to pay Realty Appraisal.

So we're begging $5 million for a job estimated to take 4, yet we're still loaning money to Bruce Rater to develop the Pep Boys site, the city spends money like a drunk teenager, the city doesn't raise taxes because we have such a surplus, so why not bond this out? Why take a high price loan with a quick turnaround payback if the city is only planning on doing revals every 20--30 years at gunpoint? What a poor use of city money.

It's like Donald Trump is somehow running 280 Grove St with his idiot minions with the kind of money decisions being made.

A very good letter to the editor

Always nice when we can reference the Sunday paper and all so here is a very thoughtful and informative letter pointing out where the city council and mayor are giving away your money in the form of really unnecessary 20 and 30 year tax abatements they are giving them STILL based on the 1988 reval. Ruinous!

Read on friends.

True Fulop believers are beginning to leave reason behind

The Fulop believers, the true, 'we have a young hip mayor and as part of this aspirational without sacrifice generation, we'll overlook basic math'. Fulop supporters in real life and online now argue a 30 year abatement on undeveloped land is proper because it wasn't making any money before so it'll bring in $$ amount now. True.

Now here's the part they willfully ignore, another 30 year abatement will cost SSS.

You might as well have taken a bag of $ and buried it in the property never to be opened again. At least the mayor's true believers could play PokemonGo around it.

The contemptible Chico Ramchal has resigned in disgrace

Contemptible? Oh you bet. He has contempt for taxpayers and the people in his ward when he cuts a plea deal to not go to jail for five years for falsifying job records for his no-show job. Yeah, a no-show job and some still say this clown really works hard for people.

Horseshit. The people saddest to see him go are the ones in Ward B who see a chance to make a buck trading off his name. The people who he boldly protected by stopping fines for parking across sidewalks and non-running cars in front yards.

Contempt for anyone and everyone in his CHOICE to drive drunk. He didn't think there'd be any consequences for it because of who he is. If it weren't for the award winning reporting from the Jersey Journal's Terrence T. McDonald we never would have found the incredible level of contempt Ramchal has for Jersey City residents (or anyone else in his path that night). He's probably stunned it went this far. Johnny's quite happy it went this far and is upset it didn't go further.

Let's face facts, Chico Ramchal got a special deal in all this because he had a Jersey City council job to forfeit and make the judge look good. He should be in jail. Time on both counts. Judges sentence for contempt of court well how about jail time for contempt of city? Contempt of taxpayer?

Johnny's very outspoken on drunk drivers and their lazy self serving choice to do so because he was the victim of one. Especially out here, in the land of taxis and Ubers and Lyft. Again, Ramchal didn't think the rules applied to him so these ideas probably never even crossed his mind.

Selfish contemptible lawbreakers shouldn't get special treatment as Ramchal did here because they have a shiny object to barter with. Johnny will never get used to nor accept the politicking and the blind eye turned as it is here in Jersey City. Hell, he half expects Rolando Lavarro to wait two years and try and name a park after Chico.

Jersey City, make it yours.