Archive for the ‘Trenton Elections’ Category

I like small voter turn-outs!

8,297 people voted in our May local election this year out of 39,731.  That’s about 21% but if you factor in how messed up our voter rolls are (thanks Mercer County Clerk’s office) and assume 10% of the people on the rolls no longer live in Trenton, then it’s more like 23%.   Compared to an election day featuring the first ever black Presidential candidate, that’s a low turnout.   But then, every turnout is low compared to that.

If one reads the research “Local Elections and Small Scale Democracy” by J. Eric Oliver, you can get perspective on Trenton’s voter turnout.

Here are some of the conclusions that the research informs:

Average turnout for “local only” elections like ours is 18% nationally.

We were above average at 21%. If higher turnout were important we’d move our election to November. Our current crop of council members, including Marge, Zac and George: declined the opportunity to do that.

High turnout might not matter in a place like Trenton.

Our turnout numbers were statistically significant. Statistically speaking if 1000 voters had been picked at random they would have generally reflected the will of the entire city.  This is especially true when a population is not diverse. My previous research has shown than Trenton not at all economically diverse.   Of course voters were not picked at random but still 8,000 votes may well have been statically significant enough in a population like Trenton’s.

Depends on who you ask.

Older, educated homeowners (like me) are statistically more likely to vote and were likely over-represented in the turnout on Tuesday. To the extent that Trenton does have diversity, the low turnout favored the interests of people like me.   It’s not a bad thing and is to be expected that long tenured residents that own homes will be more committed to voting.  They have a lot invested in the city.   I’m OK with a turnout that’s homeowner heavy.

Low Turnout favors the organized.

It takes effort and organization to get out the vote. Simply being organized enough to ask voters to vote increases turnout dramatically. In my book, being organized is a virtue that we want in a candidate.

So according to Mr. Oliver, Trenton’s low turnout, was higher than average and worked in my favor.

Sure we’d all like to see everyone have a voice.  But you know what, if you can’t take the time to be an informed voter, I’m not so sure I want you to cast a ballot that affects my family’s well-being.

In the past, we’ve seen voters brought to the polls to vote for the promise of a gift card or a turkey sandwich.   We’ve seen large amounts of money out of proportion with our city’s size being used to influence the vote. We’ve seen un-substantive campaigns that were nothing more than beauty contests.

I’d rather have a small number of informed and committed voters determine the fate of our city.

It’s like a kiss of death when I support a candidate.   The plain fact is that the vast majority of Trentonians aren’t in favor of actually doing the hard work to reinvent the city.   If they were we would have never elected Tony Mack or Eric Jackson or Doug Palmer 5 times.  It was obvious to anyone who really looked at those campaigns that they would never do what it takes to really improve the city.

I haven’t gotten involved in any of the campaigns this cycle for a number of personal reasons, but I still live here and I have written about economics in Trenton for many years. Therefore, it behooves me to say something about this campaign and in particular the relative likelihood that each of the candidates will move the economic needle.

I’d encourage readers to review the platforms of each candidate and consider that if a candidate can’t publish a plan then they probably don’t have one.

My Criteria

In years past, I’ve developed complicated issue by issue spreadsheets to evaluate candidate positions.  I read all the web sites, read candidate questionnaires, went to candidate forums, etc.   It occurs to me though that while all that is useful the decision can be a lot simpler.

Instead this cycle I’ve boiled it down of a few basic questions with associated positive or negative points.

Are they an Incumbent (-5 points): The last 18 years have been riddled with monumental government failures from using government money to build a bankrupt hotel, to corruption and now stolen payrolls and dirty water.   Council members were charged with oversight through all of that.  They have failed time and again to either notice when things were going wrong or know what to do to fix a problem.   This includes people who’ve been on council before.

Support from Status Quo (-5 points): There are king-makers who have been shaping Trenton politics for many years.  They’ve clearly not been shaping a good city.  If a candidate is a product of these people, then they can’t be trusted to do the right things.

Are they supporting an incumbent (-3 points): A candidate who has the bad judgement to support an incumbent, can’t be trusted.  We’ve simply had enough failure.

No Web Site (-3 points): My gosh if you can’t put up at least a basic page to say hello, what are you doing.  This means you’re not really living in the 21^st century.

Focus on Homeowners (5 points): Homeownership in Trenton has declined 35% over the last 28 years.  That’s what happens in a failed city.   If a candidate doesn’t have their head around this then they shouldn’t be running for office.

New Governance Ideas (3 points): We clearly have a problem with how our city is run as evidenced by the poor annual report cards this site has given the city over the years.  Does the candidate have any suggestion on how to improve governance?

Fleshed Out Platform online (3 points): Does they candidate thoughtfully address the important issues, especially the list of issues identified by the Fans of Trenton’s Irresponsible Blogger election group.

Follows Reinvent Trenton (2 points): I’m partial, but Reinvent Trenton has been discussing economic policy for  a long time.  Even if you don’t like the policy, to not be engaged enough in the discussion to keep up with the page means you’re not a serious policy candidate.

Tiebreak – I like them (1 point): I know most of the candidates so if there’s a tie, I’ll do what everyone does. Vote for who I like.

And now the races.

Mayor – Paul Perez

Think long and hard about what your expectation of a Mayoral candidate is.  I have.  I expect a thoughtful platform that explains how they will get good governance and improve the economy, especially how they will improve the attractiveness of Trenton to homeowners.   I expect that the candidate assumes all voters are serious minded about policy and the important decision in from of them.

For the most part my review of this year’s candidates demonstrates a disregard for the intelligence of the voter.
Most web sites have very scant platitudes about the economy with limited policy ideas:

Reed Gusciora, Walker Worthy and Darren Green fall into this category with Reed at least saying something about downtown and promoting a resident incident line (which is sorely missing).

Some candidates have absolutely nothing to say:  Annette Lartique and Alex Bethea are in this category.  At least one has a website that doesn’t appear to work (can this be true?): Duncan Harrison’s site loads so slowly that its unusable.

And then there’s Paul Perez.
Paul and his team have written a book on economic development, linking issues with home ownership and rentals to the fundamental attractiveness of Trenton as an investment choice.  They’ve created a treatise on good governance and took the time to research model governance that would be helpful

His web site deals with economic policy on how to fix abatements, some specific issues about downtown, our abandoned property policies and citizen engagement among other policy ideas. I was wrong when I said a couple of weeks ago that none of the candidates are addressing our decline in home ownership directly. Paul is.

Some of the other candidates mention good government and economics but compared to the detail and thoughtfulness Paul has put into his policy, the others look silly and trite.

Two of the candidates are incumbents and as such have presided over our failed government. Duncan Harrison is backed by the same person who backed Doug Palmer and gave us the failed city hotel.  Walker Worthy is back by the Democratic establishment, including Doug Palmer, who have stood by and watched Trenton fail.

Paul, Darren and Reed have no obvious loyalties to Trenton’s political establishment.

It’s not close, Paul Perez is my strong recommendation for Mayor of Trenton.

Points	Total
Paul Perez	13
Darren Green	2
Reed Gusciora	0
Annette Horton-Lartigue	-3
Alex Bethea	-5
Walker Worthy Jr	-5
Duncan Harrison Jr	-8

At Large Council – Blakeley, Rodriguez, Montero,

You’ve got to pick three candidates and admittedly that was tough to do.

Over the years I’ve not seen eye to eye with Jerell Blakeley.   Quite frankly he comes across as interested in something other than economic revitalization.  He’s more of a “lift up the people” guy.  My problem with that is, that without economic revitalization, who’s left to do the lifting.

That said, he checked a few boxes in my candidate criteria.  He’s included a fair bit on policy, some of it good, some of it not so much (for instance, you have to be a Tier 1 city to collect a commuter tax).  He does go in to good government issues which is great but he doesn’t address home ownership.   He’s not an incumbent and as far as I know, no one’s pulling his strings.

After Jerrel it drops off dramatically and we immediately get in to bad candidates.   Santiago Rodriguez doesn’t have a web site so that means he doesn’t have a platform.  His one saving grace is that he actually follows Reinvent Trenton which has lots of policy ideas.

The next batch include two candidates that have used terrible judgement in supporting and co-campaigning with failed City Council President Zac Chester.  Between Elvin Montero, Rachel Cogsville-Lattimer and Nathaniel McCray I had to pick one, so the tie went to Montero.  He at least mentioned a few issues on his web site though it was in the most shallow of terms.

Points	Total
Jerell Blakeley	6
Santiago Rodriguez	-1
Elvin Montero	-2
Rachel Cogsville-Lattimer	-3
Nathaniel McCray	-3
Kathy McBride	-8

North Ward – Algernon Ward

I’ll vote in the North Ward and am very familiar with two of the candidates.

Marge is the incumbent and though she’s frequently been useful in constituent services, that’s just not the real role of a City Councilperson.  Rather, it’s to oversee the administration.  In that capacity she’s overseen failure after failure.  She can blame it on others but she was there and the failures happened on her watch.   Also, bizarrely, she doesn’t have a working web site so we don’t even know what kind of platform she’s pitching.

Algernon Ward is a geek.  That’s a good thing.  He’s a scientist and a history buff which you’ve got to love.   He’s got positions listed on his web site but unhappily they’re also of the “lift up the people” variety and not “fix the city”.   In fact, Algie once told me that he thinks corporations are evil and that he hopes that big business never relocates to Trenton.  On the other-hand he worked with me on the “Fix Trenton’s Budget” group, so that’s good.

My criteria favors having written opinions and not being an incumbent.  Algie’s an independent guy and also fairly experienced in Trenton politics.

Points	Total
Algernon Ward Jr	5
Eboni Love	-3
Marge Caldwell-Wilson*	-8

South Ward – Damian Malave

Although, I can’t imagine anyone outdoing George Muschal in constituent services, that’s not the real job.  His Council (and he was Council President during the Mack years) was a failure in government oversight.

Neither Damian or Jenna say much useful on their web sites but at least they have them.   Jenna, unhappily has joined up with the current President of the failed City Council, Zac Chester.   This is a big knock against her and therefore pushed my vote to Damian Malave (if I lived in the South Ward).

Points	Total
Damian Malave	0
Jenna Kettenburg	-3
George Muschal*	-8

East Ward – Joe Harrison

None of the East Ward candidate web sites say much at all.   That’s obviously a disappointment.   However, two of the candidates do follow Reinvent Trenton which is like saying they at least get exposed to policy thinking.   However, Taiwanda lied to me about her support for failed Council President Zac Chester.   I was disappointed that she’s supporting him but really disappointed by the lie.

Trenton East Ward candidate called out for ‘lying’ about support of Chester

Joe Harrison has been participating in Trenton politics for a while and quite frankly would be a breath of fresh air on City Council.

Points	Total
Joseph Harrison	2
Perry Shaw III	0
Taiwanda Terry-Wilson	-1
Elmer Sandoval	-3

West Ward – Robin Vaughn

Obviously, the incumbent is out of the running.  Two of the candidates don’t even trouble themselves to have a web site that might explain their platforms.   Robin Vaughn and Atalaya Armstrong have web site but they fail to discuss issues at all.

That forced a tie.  I give the nod to Robin because she’s at least dared to stick her toe in the hotbed of Trenton’s political policy discussion, the Facebook Group, Fans of Trenton’s Irresponsible Blogger.  In that forum she’s gotten beaten up a bit for not being specific, but she’s still there and that’s a good sign.

Points	Total
Robin Vaughn	1
Atalaya Armstrong	0
Dr. Shirley Gaines	-3
Zachary Chester*	-6

——————————————-

The full article with point allocation for each candidate can be found in the pdf linked below.

Full Election Selection Criteria Article

Candidate Evaluation Spreadsheet with Web Site Links

For the past 28 years, home-ownership in Trenton has been on the decline.  This isn’t me saying this, it’s the U.S. Census Bureau who tracks this statistic for all American cities.

Since 1990, home-ownership in Trenton has declined by 5,500 units or 35%.  In 1990 the housing split was 51% home owners and 49% renters.  By 2016 the split is 37% home owners and 63% renters.

This picture should scare the living daylights out of anyone who owns a home in Trenton.  It’s very possible that you may be the only one left to turn out the lights when Trenton closes.

Most people would say home-ownership is good for a city and its residents. I have no reason to dispute that.  It only makes sense that a homeowner would be more vested in the state of their home, the cleanliness of the area around them and the future of the city.

This idea is borne out by research conducted by J. Eric Oliver in his book Local Elections and the Small-Scale Democracy. Mr. Oliver found that homeowners voted in almost double the proportion than did renters.  Let me say it again, homeowners vote at double the rate of renters.  According to his statistics, 70% of homeowners will regularly vote while only 40% of renters cast a ballot.   This makes sense as the value of a homeowner’s largest investment is directly tied to the fortunes of a city.

Trenton politicians run against this trend.

None of the 2018 Trenton Mayoral candidates have established a strong position on how to make Trenton attractive for homeownership.   This, despite the overwhelming evidence that homeowners vote in big numbers.   The results shown in the above graph bear this trend out and suggest that previous candidates and Mayors have given scant attention to owner-occupied neighborhoods like Hiltonia, Hillcrest, Mill Hill and Franklin Park.  They’ve been oblivious as Chambersburg and South Trenton have become predominantly rental.Trenton has steadily become less attractive to homeowners during the Palmer, Mack and Jackson tenures.   It seems counterintuitive that this would have happened.

Mr. Oliver’s book suggests an answer to this puzzle.  His research analyzed positions taken by candidates and the factors that drive them in small cities arranged by three characteristics of the city: size, scope and bias.  Size is self-explanatory.  Trenton is on the big side of small cities (< 100,000 in population).   Scope is the range of services the city provides.  Some cities may rely on county or states to provide services.  Some outsource services.  Trenton has a large scope in that most of our services are provided directly by the City of Trenton (water, police, etc.). One notable exception in Trenton is that the school system is quasi-independent.  Bias is how uniformly resources are distributed and is probably the most important characteristic to consider for Trenton.

Bias happens when special interests or political machines can unevenly distribute resources to their own constituents.   In other words, they redistribute the winner’s spoils.  Mr. Oliver gives a New Jersey example in his book that I found illustrative.

“As an example, consider the political importance of a garbage contract for a rich township like Princeton, New Jersey, compared to its impoverished neighbor Camden. With a median family income above $125,000 a year and an average home value of over $1 million, it is highly unlikely that many of Princeton’s 16,000 residents work for garbage companies (although they may own one). When the township hires a garbage company, it is probably importing all its labor and services. On the other hand, a garbage contract for an impoverished place like Camden (with an unemployment rate well over 30 percent) means dozens of good jobs for its residents. When Camden hires a garbage company, its leaders will thus be under considerable political pressure to hire Camden residents and to employ a locally operated firm. Camden officials who decide the garbage contract will, in turn, probably expect continued support from the company and its workers. The garbage contract, simply by virtue of Camden’s poverty, will be a major source of political contestation whereas in Princeton it is simply a contract to be filled.”

Oliver, J. Eric. Local Elections and the Politics of Small-Scale Democracy (Kindle Locations 661-669). Princeton University Press. Kindle Edition.

Does that sound familiar?  It should.  You can’t talk about a project in Trenton where someone with an interest in city employment won’t make that argument.  Our Mayor and City Council generally consider whether a contractor will employ city residents and therefore de-prioritize the importance of cost and service.  When they do this, they de-prioritize the interests of home owning taxpayers.

Size matters because voters in a larger city like Trenton are more disengaged than in a smaller city like Hopewell as voters are less personally connected to office seekers, according to Mr. Oliver. Scope matters because a larger city has a lot of money to throw around.  But bias is also a factor as it provides the reason why homeowners can be left out of the political calculus.  In Trenton, homeowners are ignored because a Mayor and City Council can become beholden to special interests (city service providers, affordable housing developers, and labor unions, etc.)) that feed off of bias in our city government. The problem is made bigger by our large scope and is enabled by the relative size of the city and disengagement of its voters.

Is there a way out for Trenton?

Yes.  Let me explain.

If you’re a homeowner in Trenton, then you must know that we are more Camden than Princeton in that special interests not aligned with your own are hard at work.   While all you really want are low property taxes and a high level of city services, including water, police, schools and public works, others don’t share your concern.   It’s natural.

However, even though the ranks of homeownership in Trenton have been decimated, they still vote in higher proportions than renters.  Voting still matters though candidates can and do certainly still lie to us about their vested interests (i.e. who’s funding them now and in the future).

For a candidate to be believable as a pro-homeowner candidate then their platform, fundraising and speeches need to put homeownership front and center. Making Trenton attractive for residential investment must be their only “focus”.   They must stand out as the “homeowner” candidate.

This means trimming non-essential services that don’t directly benefit homeowners.  It means investing more in making it easier to develop and improve property. It means increased school choice. It means more responsive police and public works departments.  It means new economic development. And, most of all, it means that there is a plan for the tax rate to eventually go down.  Trenton’s tax rate is the highest in Mercer County and as high as a mortgage rate.

This is hardcore stuff, but Trenton is in decline and has been for some time.  We are losing population.  Our per household income is losing ground vs. the rest of the state.  And obviously homeowners are leaving.

Voters will have to understand that they have a very real threat  if we continue to elect politicians who can’t or won’t address the issues of homeowners, they will likely never recoup the investment in their houses and  the situation will only get worse.  Taxes will continue to rise as property values decline or stay stagnant.   Services will continue to deteriorate until we hit rock bottom and look even more like Camden or Detroit.
It’s hard to say whether our decline is already too severe to recover from without an existential catastrophe like Detroit’s bankruptcy or Camden’s worst in the nation murder rate.  However, not trying to elect leadership with a real focus on reversing the homeownership trend just isn’t an option.

Notes from the first gathering of Fans of Trenton’s Irresponsible Blogger

Members the “Fans of Trenton’s Irresponsible Blogger (FOTIB)” Facebook group met in person on November 8, 2017 at Trenton Social to the upcoming municipal election in May 2018.   We created a prioritized list of issues that our candidates should be prepared to have positions on and plans for.   Also, given that the position of city councilperson is so poorly understood, we created a list of virtues the candidates should have.

The group of over 20 activists gathered at Trenton Social included some of the city’s best thinkers and doers, including 3 bloggers.

FOTIB 2018 Election Issue List

Some issues are grouped for with similar or closely related items.  (n) indicates repeated issues, therefore high priority.

New blood/thinking in the governing process (6)

• Structure of the administration – departments (2)
• Setting measurable goals
• Budget before fiscal year starts

Cleanliness and Appearance of City (4)

• Presentation and upkeep of parks
• Litter / Dumping
• Road conditions / lights

Specific plans to attract commercial ratables (4)

• Processes for assistance to new business
• Property tax rates for commercial

Change to the governance structure. Currently strong Mayor (2)

• Staggered Council terms
• Changing form of government
• Term Limits

Other Top Issues

• Accountability to ethical standards
• How to make Trenton Schools appealing to citizens who send kids out of district
• Position on current police/law enforcement contracts
• Police residency options
• Vacant property plans
• Position on the State plan for office buildings downtown
• Workforce preparedness and vocational training.

City Council Candidate Virtues

• Moral compass (2)
• Honesty/transparency
• Knowledge of Trenton
• Open minded
• Tenure
• Understands the job
• Ability to negotiate / diplomacy
• Understanding budgets as policy instruments
• Understanding policy and how government works
• Ability to creatively solve problems
• Being available
• Ability to use technology
• Follow up
• Courage to do the right thing

Living in Trenton its easy to understand the appeal of Donald Trump’s message.

As a city, we’re losers so often that it just feels normal. So when we hear a guy talk about turning that around and being winners again, or just doing things well (as a government) it’s attractive. You wonder, what would that feel like?

What would it be like if we didn’t have our money stolen, if we could hire a real IT firm, if we could enforce our laws (big ones and small ones), if we had a tax policy that didn’t punish new investment?  What would it be like if we could communicate and enforce trash disposal policies instead of seeing it thrown all over our streets?

What would it be like if we didn’t get confused by letters saying our buildings were vacant, our water bills were past due and our taxes weren’t paid when they really were?  What would it be like if our water department weren’t running one illegal scheme after another out of their building?

What would it be like if our leaders could be transparent about the city’s issues? What if they didn’t brawl at public meetings?  What would it be like if we didn’t have to file Open Records Act forms to get information from the city, what if they just posted it online?  What if our Mayors didn’t get sent to Federal prison?

What would it be like if our snow was plowed, our potholes were fixed and our broken sidewalks and streetlamps were restored to their original state?

What would it be like if the only hotel in town weren’t about to close and taxpayers hadn’t spent $65M to build it?  What if hockey teams and arena football teams didn’t fail in Trenton?  What if we didn’t give away prime real estate to “connected” non-profits that don’t pay property taxes?  What if we could have a budget passed before the fiscal year starts?  What if we could pay for our own schools?  What if they actually graduated most of the kids?

What if the contaminated dirt at MLK school had been dealt with honestly?  What if we didn’t invite corrupt developer Robert Kahan in to Trenton? What if we didn’t fall for the Manex ponzi scheme? What if we hadn’t turned the historic Douglass House in Mill Hill Park into a drug den? What if we hadn’t forced the Broad Street Bank to be rent controlled? What if we hadn’t ignored Chambersburg’s concerns before the restaurants left?

What if simple building inspections only took 4 hours (like in Philadelphia) instead of 3 weeks?   What if you could communicate with the city through its web site and via email?

What if our property tax rate wasn’t the highest in New Jersey (the state with the highest property taxes in the nation)?  What if drunks and drug dealers didn’t infest our streets?   What if thieves were actually afraid of being caught?

What would it be like if we could recommend that a friend move to Trenton?

What would it feel like to live in a city of winners?

Historically (before Mack and Christie) the state funneled four main sources of revenue to Trenton:  Capital City Aid, CMPTRA, PILOTs on State Buildings and Energy Tax Receipts.

Two of those sources, CMPTRA and Energy Tax Receipts, are meant to be pass-through payments the state collects from corporations on behalf of every city in NJ.  CMPTRA includes business taxes (but in the case of Trenton also included some ill-defined PILOT payments). Energy Tax Receipts are paid from utility company fees.  It turns out that the State has been shortchanging cities across NJ for many years in both of these revenue streams.  Neither of them have transparent funding formulas.  The NJ League of Municipalities has taken the State to task over this but Trenton has been silent up until now.  Support for A-2753 to end diversion of Energy Tax Receipts is especially important.

There is no very accurate measure of the level that we have been shortchanged but experts in Trenton estimate the amount to be in the millions.  The next Mayor of Trenton will add his voice to those of other municipalities in formulating a better mechanism for transferring the money that rightly belongs to the cities.

The State discontinued the Capital City State Aid program in 2011.  It was essentially replaced with Transitional Aid though, at a lessor amount as you can see in the revenue charts below.    Capital City State Aid was a very undependable source of funding because it had no formula and was supplied through a yearly act of Legislation.   Obviously this Governor has decided that this outright grant is untenable.  I agree with him.

Transitional Aid was meant to be transitional, a gradual decrease in State funding with a lot of conditions monitored by the Dept. of Community Affairs (DCA) but really, the State wanted a plan to revitalize the city, a plan that it never got.  All of us in Trenton are aware of how that has gone under the Mack administration.   Because DCA and the Governor couldn’t trust our former Mayor, funding was cut and the restrictions became tighter.

The final form of funding is what’s most important for our future relationship with New Jersey.  Several State owned buildings in Trenton have had negotiated PILOTs with the City.  There is no rhyme or reason to this other than it was a mechanism in which to transfer additional funding to the City for various reasons.  Only a handful of State buildings have PILOTs.  The total amount comes out to about $9M.   This is an ad hoc approach to funding.

No State in the U.S. has any obligation to pay a City anything.  Governments can’t tax each other.  However, many States understand that especially in Capital cities the state is a major property owner and employer and must behave more like a corporate landowner.   I propose that we formalize this approach through negotiation and State legislation to generate a funding PILOT based on either the assessed value of State land in Trenton or the proportion of land owned by the State.   The Fix Trenton’s Budget group has analyzed this issue by examining the city’s tax rolls and report that the State of NJ owns roughly 19% of all property value in Trenton.  However, we have reason to believe these values are under-assessed by quite a bit (perhaps 50%).   Additionally, the State owns about 28% of the acreage in the City.

The question is, if the State were taxed like a corporation, what would it pay?

Let’s say that after a reassessment the State is found to own 30% of the land and property value.  Total values in Trenton are roughly $4B.   Our current tax rate is 3.85%.  Therefore the State could theoretically pay 30% X $4B X 3.85% = $46.2M.   This is more than it pays today in Transitional Aid and PILOTs (roughly $32M) but less than it did in 2010.   This is a good formula.

Trenton is in a dire situation though and we do need the State of NJ’s help in recovering from this.   Our next Mayor will do well to ask for State assistance in many areas mainly around legislative relief to overhaul our tax system and create incentives to invest in Trenton.   In the meantime we will request that Transitional Aid be maintained until our economic plans can begin to bear fruit, likely 4-5 years.

Jim Golden’s Trenton Forward plan is unique in that it includes a detailed plan to revitalize the city that specifically seeks to rid us of the need for transitional aid as long as our funding formulas can be formalized.   The BIG goal in that plan is to make Trenton much more self-sufficient.   Our lack of self-sufficiency puts us all at risk because our budgets will be uncertain.   We’re entirely too dependent on the whims of a Governor or Legislature.

Trenton Revenue Source Comparison

Source:   Trenton City Budgets, Fix Trenton’s Budget.

Trenton Forward “Asks” to New Jersey: Beyond the Funding Formulas

• Support for consulting project to define and implement Best in Breed
• Seek a Land Value Tax capability to replace PILOTs and Vacant property registration fees
• Allocate $50M to a Residential Investment subsidy over 10 years
• Enact enabling legislation for Income Tax Credit Zone that caps state income taxes in Trenton
• Continued funding for temporary police assistance

No clever new policy idea today.  Because what would it matter?  Trenton is governed, at least legally, by the worst Mayor ever.   I’m mad.   All Trentonians should be mad.  Our City Council members should be furious, except for the worthless three who’ve propped up the Convicted Occupant of the Mayor’s Office, Tony Mack.

I’m so mad that I think of storming City Hall often. I imagine thousands of angry citizens with torches and pitchforks, busting through security up to the Mayor’s office and knocking down the door. I think of riot police with tear-gas being forced into duty.

I envision CNN, ABC and the BBC covering the riot with choppers and camera crews.

Then, after days of international media coverage, the Attorney General refers the matter to the State Supreme Court. Out of fear of more public backlash, the court rules on the matter and sends Tony Mack to the deepest pit of prison hell, takes away pensions and for good measure re-writes our statutes concerning succession. Out of fear for their political futures (and a bit for their physical well-being) the legislature pass it in a week so this travesty never happens again.

You’ll excuse the vitriol.   It’s been 3 ½ years of suffering this fool and I’m tired and angry.

Few Americans will ever see civic corruption as up close and personal as Trentonians have recently.   Now that our 3 ½ year ordeal has been ended by the Federal Government our first inclination as citizens is to react.   I know I have already, especially at the public figures who supported or refused to denounce Tony Mack even in the face of his obvious misconduct as Mayor, even before his arrest.

But we have only 5 months until we elect a new government.   That new Mayor will have all the latitude in the world to reorganize and reinvent Trenton’s administration.  He will be able hire new people and perhaps let some poor performers go.  He will be able to close down operations that don’t make sense anymore or aren’t critical to our functioning as a city.   He’ll be able to put in place systemic changes to our tax, development and policing policy.

What we need now is an Acting Mayor who will allow his Directors to be open and transparent, who will question spending and who will put on a trustworthy face to the rest of the world, especially the State.   We don’t need new policy from an Acting Mayor.  We don’t need new programs.  There simply isn’t time.   With the exception of a few dismissals of employees who have deliberately ignored Council’s directives and needlessly withheld information, there should be no mass firings.  Instead, an Acting Mayor would do well to help the candidates prepare their policies by opening up the books and processes to those campaigns.

All indications so far seem to indicate Council President Muschal will take the “steady stewardship” approach.   Let’s hope he keeps a cool head and does his part to insure the public makes the smartest choice it can for our next Mayor.

The news of Trenton City activist Pat Stewart’s passing has hit me hard.

It’s difficult to let a friend go, especially one that you’ve stood beside for so long and in so many capacities.  I can’t remember exactly when I first came across Pat Stewart.  I was new to Trenton’s political scene and Pat seemed to know everybody.   Everybody.

But no matter who she was talking to, whether friend or not, she spoke her mind including to me.  Pat would not tolerate what she saw as foolishness.  And frankly we’ve had more than our fair share of that in Trenton.

The Reinvent Trenton blog owes quite a bit to Pat Stewart.   My first foray into real politics was with the Lamberton Historic District Committee over Doug Palmer’s plan to tear down the Kearney homes and replace it with a new government housing project.   She  couldn’t understand  why we’d  tear  down  one  housing project which, in her words “was strong enough to withstand  a nuclear war”  just to build  another one.   We like to think that our efforts helped defeat that project.  Because of that effort we now have very nice market rate (non-government) housing on that site.

Pat, along with that same group, rallied the South Trenton neighborhood in opposition to Leewood  Development’s proposal (again with Doug Palmer’s support) to bulldoze 8 square blocks of historic housing stock along Centre Street.  Though  hers and  the group’s  efforts   over 300 residents showed up  at several citizen’s  meetings to oppose  the  project.   The opposition was eventually too intense for Palmer and Leewood and they retreated.

With these successes under her belt she encouraged former City Councilman Jim Coston   to organize an urban studies book club for residents who wanted to be better educated about revitalization issues.   For many of us, this group was our education.  We read the literature on urban revitalization and invited guest speakers of national renown to talk with us.   It’s an education that led directly to this blog. Pat Stewart was a ring leader of that group.

My affiliation with Pat has continued throughout almost all of my civic endeavors.   She was a leader in the Trenton Council of Civic Associations and was vocal with the Trenton Republican committee.   She joined me in Fix Trenton’s Budget and Majority for a Better Trenton. She put her hat into the ring in the 2009 Special election for South Ward Council and as everyone with an ounce of familiarity with Trenton politics knows, Pat Stewart was a fixture at City Council.

Pat, who was self-admittedly intimidated by technology, even started her own blog, Lamberton Lilly.  She made short and to the point comments about the goings on in Trenton.  She had a following.

Pat was everywhere and so much a part of Trenton for me that it I’m sure I will think of her often in the years to come.    I know that when our next administration finally crafts a real strategy for Trenton and it includes a real marketing plan for our city, I’ll probably shed a tear and hope that Pat knows that her constant admonition has finally come to pass.

In many ways Reinvent Trenton has been written with Pat in mind.  It puts into words the ideas she had in her head.   I know this because she constantly encouraged and commented favorably on my articles.       I knew I was on the right track if Pat liked the article.

Of course Pat’s influence goes far beyond what I know about personally.  She was a leader in the STARS civic association for many years, sat on the Zoning Board and was recently appointed by City Council to sit on the Ethics Commission.    These are places of honor in Trenton.

I know that her son Nicholas knows how we all feel about his mom.   I also know that the most important thing for a family member to know when a loved one passes is that the loved one will be remembered.   Nicholas, that is a certainty.

After 24 years of mayoral leadership that has gone from bad to worse, we once again have the chance to change direction in Trenton.  Like we did in 2010, we’ll have a crowded field of candidates.  Unlike 2010, in 2014 we have several viable options.

In this very difficult time in Trenton’s history, we as citizens need to be equipped to make a smart choice.   We’ve all seen how poor choices at the voting booth can materially damage our city.  This time around:

• Voters need to consider all aspects of what will make a good Mayor, and
• The campaigns need to communicate clearly to voters.

The question I have for myself is, what can I do to help this process?  What can I do differently in 2014 to help elect a leader that will chart a more productive direction for Trenton?

I’ve tried quite a few approaches to improving Trenton.

• I’ve blogged for years trying to bring new ideas for revitalization to the city.  The evidence will show that my blogging hasn’t helped.
• I formed Fix Trenton’s Budget to provide an economic point of view in the 2010 election and later assist Mayor Mack in setting budget and economic policy.  The evidence shows that didn’t help.
• I helped form The Majority for a Better Trenton in order to create an unaligned political force in the city.  It turns out the group had organizational challenges, so that didn’t help.
• All along I’ve been an outspoken critic on Facebook, in the press, at City Council and on my blog.  Sometimes that makes me feel better, but it hasn’t helped.

As I’ve often said, doing the same things over and over again in Trenton and expecting better results is the definition of insanity.  So this election cycle I’ll do something I’ve not done before.

This election cycle I’m going to choose one candidate to not only support but also to volunteer for during the campaign.   This implies quite a bit.

It implies that I will have to make my own informed decision about the candidates well ahead of walking into the voting booth.   I’ve done some homework in preparation for my decisions.  I have:

• Talked to each of the candidates I would consider,
• Read their websites, and
• Reviewed their track record in Trenton.

To put all of these conversations, impressions and histories into perspective I created an objective scorecard to help.  The scoring approach rates the candidates along several dimensions and weights the scores based on how important that dimension is for a good Mayor.  It’s like coming up with GPA for the candidate but allowing the flexibility to weight one course as more important than another.

Being numbers driven seems appropriate for me as I’m constantly encouraging city leaders to be objective, unemotional and fact driven in their approaches to our problems.   It’s sometimes hard to do but often provides clarity where a muddle of data and opinion cloud the issues.

For each dimension I scored the candidate 1-10.  The dimensions and weighting are as follows:

Table ‑1 Candidate Selection Criteria

Dimension	Weight	Description
Approach to Strategy	9%	Thinks critically about cause and effect.  Is data and fact driven.  Results focused.
Planning	15%	Organized, clear and thoughtful about actions and timing.  Considers risks.
Campaign	12%	Well run campaign with people who share a focus on revitalization and diversity.
Motivations	9%	Setting an example for urban revitalization in small post-industrial cities.
Management Style	12%	Disciplined.  Has an air of gravitas.  Reads people well.  Transparent.
Track Record	12%	Has participated in thoughtful activism in Trenton.
Budget awareness	15%	Understands the budget and what drives it.  Appreciates its role as the central policy tool.
General Capability	9%	Smart.  Hard working.   Well written and well spoken.  Well educated.
Sacred Cows	9%	Has revitalization minded positions on regionalization, residency, reassessment, etc.
	100%

To be fair I didn’t talk to all of the candidates.  Walker Worthy’s strict partisanship and lack of presence in Trenton politics ruled him out as an option.   Kathy McBride’s frequent missteps, support for Tony Mack and lack of interest in policy rule her out.   Bucky Leggett was so uninspiring the last time he ran that I voted for Doug Palmer.  Each of the other four candidates:  Patrick Hall, Eric Jackson, Jim Golden and Paul Perez are fine people by all accounts, including my own.   They deserved serious consideration.

Of course, whoever I support may very well not win the election.  That’s not the end of the world and we have good options.   I certainly hope that even if I wind up on a losing campaign team, the winning Mayor will take me up on my offer to do whatever I can to help his administration succeed.  I made that offer to Tony Mack, he just didn’t follow through.

Also, I’m not going to say anything negative about any of the other candidates except maybe to critique a policy idea here and there.

After several months of talking and thinking about the next Mayor of Trenton I’ve decided I’d like to support Jim Golden to be our Mayor.

Jim is seeking to bring the best thinking in the country to bear on Trenton’s revitalization problems.  He has good initial insights especially on our crime issues. He has good experience in running large organizations.   He’s been openly committed to setting measurable goals and setting up feedback mechanisms to track our progress.

Jim was an early and vocal critic of Tony Mack and actively supported the recall effort.  He’s conscious of the budget and its limitation, especially the biggest component, police.

In every conversation I’ve had with Jim, he’s sought to think through pragmatic steps towards making Trenton more livable while eventually lowering our tax burden.  Finally, his motivations are simple and clear, he’s a retired resident of Trenton who wants a better town in which to live, so do I.

I’ll enjoy working with him both on the campaign and the transition into office.   I know his heart is in the right place and that he has the right skills and temperament.  Most importantly for me, he did the best in my candidate qualification scorecard, earning 7.7 out of 10 points.

I look forward to working with Jim and his campaign but wish all the candidates well.