JCMan8 wrote:
Quote:

La_Verdad wrote:
Who fired Akil in the Healy administration? My understanding was that he had a pretty senior role in the HHS department right through the end of the term.

There were several posts in this thread about the previous administrations that fired him. I don't think Healy was one.

But Fulop is the one who promoted this wacko to such a high post. Not to mention the defense of "well Healy hired him" isn't saying very much...

CAR285 wrote:
Who the hell has a petting zoo for a nighttime Halloween bash? The brainchild behind this should be fired!

CRV2 wrote:
And Althea Bernheim, Steve Fulop's former council aid, has the experience and skills to run the RRC? Sounds like a patronage job to me.





Quote:

dtjcview wrote:
Quote:

OneSkirt wrote:
Quote:

dtjcview wrote:
Quote:

OneSkirt wrote:
Has anyone heard why on earth they would propose to put Cultural Affairs & Senior Services under the Resident Response Center?? I don't get that at all!

What functions did they provide? If all they did was handle street festival permits, and senior transport requests, it would make perfect sense.

The mission outlined in the transition plan was to expand Cultural affairs into a dept. handling Arts, Culture and Tourism and making it more of a true driver for promoting JC and spuring economic growth. Moving it to the RRC is big step away from this mission, it would seem.

And the people in the existing department had the skillset to fulfill that mission? Sometimes it's easier to create a new department, than give an impossible task to an old one.

HeightsBrat wrote:
Quote:

Magnus wrote:
This view shows what Jerramiah Healy looks like outside Jersey City.

Moran: Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy likes a good fight - and he's found one
By Tom Moran/ The Star-Ledger
on May 05, 2013 at 12:02 AM, updated May 05, 2013 at 1:33 AM

Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy stared at his feet, his shoulders slumped, as if all his famous spunk was spent.
It was the final debate in a mayoral campaign Thursday night, and the young challenger, Councilman Steven Fulop, was pounding Healy over and over, drawing huge cheers from a crowd eager to see the mayor?s blood splash on the floor.

Finally, Healy lifted his microphone to speak, as if it were as heavy as a sledgehammer.

?You guys are real gracious,? he snarled.

This is rare. Politicians don?t usually insult an audience like that. But Healy is not your typical politician.

This is a guy who was photographed naked on his front porch at 2 a.m. during the 2004 campaign, and won the race anyway. People like him. A few years later, he was convicted of resisting arrest after scuffling with cops outside a bar his sister owns at the Shore.

In both cases, he insists he did nothing wrong and was framed. And no, he says, neither after-midnight incident is a sign that the rumors of his heavy drinking are true.

?Listen, I like to eat, drink, sing, dance and laugh,? he says. ?And I make no apologies for any of the above.?

It is tempting to get warm and fuzzy about Healy and his quirks. The man has a certain charm. He recorded a CD with his family singing Christmas carols, and still hands them out to visitors.

But know this: His administration has been proved to be thoroughly corrupt. Healy is one of the few survivors in his inner circle who was not convicted in the famous 2009 FBI bust known as ?Operation Bid Rig.?

That list includes his deputy mayor, three city council members who ran on his ticket, his housing commissioner, two senior managers in his health department, the building inspector and a commissioner at the utilities authority. In most cases, it was old-school stuff, cash in envelopes in return for needed permits.

Healy himself was not indicted, even though the FBI sent an informant with a cash envelope to give it a try. And he?s proud of that in a way that only a Hudson County mayor could be.

?No one in the state of New Jersey has been more thoroughly vetted than I was four years ago, and I came out clean,? he said at the debate.

The problem for Healy is that there are really only two possibilities. Either he knew what was going on, which makes him corrupt. Or he didn?t, which makes him clueless. There is no third way.

?I?m not with people 24 hours a day,? he said in an interview. ?If some in my administration veered off the righteous path, they did it foolishly.?

Healy is 62 years old, and it?s been a grueling stretch leading to the May 14 mayoral vote. He?s never faced a challenger like Fulop, a 36-year-old whiz kid who resigned from Goldman Sachs after the Sept. 11 attacks to enlist in the Marines, served in Iraq, and has worked tirelessly for years to build a following. His allies now control the city council and the school board, and he has good-government plans to fix everything.

PAST PRIME TIME

The pressure may be getting to Healy, because he seems to be losing a step.

Take the naked photo incident. At the time, Healy acknowledged he had been drinking and said he could not remember what happened. Last week he offered a new version of the story with a bizarre sexual twist.

Now he says three young women woke him by banging trash cans outside his house, so he rose from bed, wrapped a towel around himself, and went to investigate.

?Three Hispanic girls, young kids,? he says. ?So I go out on the porch and they pulled the towel off me. Now I start laughing, and then they started doing other stuff. I said, ?I?m old enough to be your grandfather.???

What other stuff?

?It was filthy,? he says. ?I chased them away, and I just sat down.?

And that, he says, is when a political enemy snapped the photograph. Why he would be changing this story now, in the final stretch of the campaign, is anyone?s guess.

SEEING ENEMIES

As for Bid Rig and corruption, Healy sees that as a conspiracy executed on behalf of a former prosecutor by the name of Chris Christie. He remembers watching TV as the FBI discussed the arrests of all those Democrats a few months before Christie won the election.

?I?m screaming at the TV,? he says. ?I was saying this is a (bleeping) campaign commercial. And that?s what it was. I don?t want to throw stones at the governor, but all that stuff was extremely helpful to his campaign.?

So much for any hint of repentance over his senior staff?s acceptance of all those envelopes.

Another bizarre viewpoint: Healy believes David Tepper, a hedge-fund billionaire who is funding school-reform efforts across the state, is helping Fulop in this race so he can execute a secret plan to take over the public schools in Jersey City and operate them as for-profit enterprises.

?It smells a little to me, okay?? the mayor says.

Really? Tepper earned $2.2 billion last year on the market. Isn?t it possible he is impressed by Fulop?s long-standing efforts to reform the city?s failing public schools?
strong challenger

Is Fulop the real deal? He?s smart, hardworking and makes good sense on every issue, so there is hope. But his TV ad accusing Healy of corruption is flatly unfair, and swimming in Hudson County?s political waters is hazardous to one?s ethical health. So who knows?

But you can feel the changing of the guard coming. It seems inevitable that Fulop will be mayor, if not in this election then in the next.

Healy has endorsements from President Obama, Newark Mayor Cory Booker and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Healy endorsed Obama early, so that is payback. And he has worked hard on gun control.

Still, Healy personifies the Jersey City of the past, a rough-edged place where you can still find the legendary wooden desk used by Mayor Frank Hague, rigged to allow him to push the center drawer outward so that visitors could deposit bribes without witnessing him touching the cash.

That Jersey City is slipping into history as surges of young professionals like Fulop settle in, along with ethnic groups of every type.

Healy is still talking up his long love affair with the city, where his children and grandchildren remain.

?I have roots in this city, blood in this city,? he says. ?Steve?s been here just 12 years.?

That might help the mayor with the natives. But with Fulop pounding on the door, it sounds more like the last stand of the old guard.

Can this get any sadder & more pathetic? Jerry, there are weekly AA meetings at Pershing Field every Sunday. You & your WIFE need to look into attending & soon. People will have a little more respect for you.

BrightMoment wrote:
Dan, I was happy to volunteer yesterday to help you get voters out to our voting poll in our mutual shared neighborhood, Harsimus Cove. You have my support anytime I might help as you are a leader with a clear vision, ideas, transparency, honesty and integrity. What we discussed last night will happen.

Besides the above you are a great neighbor and terrific friends, both you and your wife. Thanks for the campaign coffee, it kept me warm last nite.