Not a discouraging word is heard (officially, that is)

Jersey Journal
Political Insider Column
Saturday, February 23, 2008

Peace is in the air over Hudson County. Or is that mustard gas?

While the upstart Democrats for Hudson County publicly seems in frozen stasis, leaders among the Hudson County Democratic Organization have been active and happy about the d?tente they believe is in full swing.

As mentioned before, Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy, chairman of the HCDO, wants a peaceful county going into the June primary and following general election. He has U.S. Rep. Albio Sires in the fold and on the HCDO primary column, and it appears everyone on the Hudson County Board of Chosen Freeholders, except District 5's Maurice Fitzgibbons of Hoboken, is a shoo-in to return to office, with possibly six out of the nine seats controlled by the HCDO - most of the time.

Everyone was on a high at Healy's fundraising event Thursday evening at Casino in the Park in Jersey City's Lincoln Park. Sure enough, there was Sires, almost an attached twin of North Bergen Mayor and state Sen. Nick Sacco of North Bergen. Loyalty was pledged to Healy at the event by most all the mayors of the county.

As one member of the party noted, there was a lot beer muscle flexing going on with calls for taking on Stack and those other ingrates. It is not the sort of thing Healy wants to hear. Peace is part of the plan.

OK, in the real world, political operatives have been busy. HCDO "buddies" have been busy trying to pick off Stack backers in Jersey City. For example, Jimmy King and his civic association has been a prime HCDO target. The idea is an old one. Isolate Stack and anyone still with him.

While the HCDO "buddies" are busy, apparently, so are Stack and his ninjas.

Monday is the filing deadline for submitting nominating petitions for candidates in the upcoming school board races. It will be interesting to see if a slate of Guttenberg trustee candidates, backed by the Union City politician, files for the April election. If this happens, it would be easier to just throw torches at the North Bergen Township Hall.

Guttenberg trustees sit on the North Bergen Board of Education because the small North Hudson municipality sends its children to the neighboring high school. In effect, Stack would be infiltrating a board that employs Assistant Superintendent Sacco.

Suddenly, the county's second smallest municipality is becoming important, politically speaking.

Guttenberg Mayor David Delle Donna and his wife Anna are expected to go to trial in 2008 on federal charges of extortion, mail and tax fraud, and conspiracy to commit mail fraud. They both pleaded not guilty.

Authorities say the couple accepted bribes that included cash from a local bar owner in exchange for help from the town. The indictment did not identify the bar owner by name and federal officials declined to do so - but we all kinda know, don't we. (Just assume that this is followed by the usual legal disclaimer.)

Now, for argument's sake, should a jury find the mayor guilty, there will be a need to select a new chief executive for the town. What happens is the 12 county Democratic Party committee people for the municipality recommend to the Town Council three candidates for mayor. The council has 30 days to select one of the trio. Should the panel fail to act, then the committee people pick the mayor to complete the term in office.

It gets interesting because Stack supported nine of the 12 committee people elected in the last primary.

County Dems will be selecting local committee candidates for the primary very soon and the question is whether Chairman Healy puts the committee winners of the last primary on the ballot or lets the mayor, still Delle Donna, pick the candidates?

Yesterday, Healy said he is not certain how it will be done although he leans to letting the town (mayor) pick its own and will speak to Delle Donna and others (hmmm) about it.

Who knew that Guttenberg could be so interesting and the litmus test for peace?

FITZ A GO-GO

Is there a reprieve for veteran Hudson County Freeholder Maurice Fitzgibbons' future as an elected official? No.

Hoboken politicos have been meeting with Stack about running someone in place of Fitzgibbons. In the so-called peace initiative, the HCDO has left it up to them to pick the candidate.

The incumbent freeholder says he'll decide his own future when it comes to whether he will run again. Still, the political heat has not stopped Fitzgibbons from working to put together Monday's annual Hoboken Democratic Organization shebang, the Annual Lincoln's Day Dinner. Mayor David Roberts, Assemblyman Ruben Ramos Jr. and Fitzgibbons are hosting the $150-a-ticket dinner. The conversation at Frankie & Johnnie's Restaurant should be interesting.

"Mr. Democrat" City Clerk James Farina is being honored.

Ironically, the event was founded by former state Sen. Bernard Kenny, whose reluctance to step down as senator led to the party split.

This dinner tradition was never held last year while the civil war was openly engaged. The last person honored at the Lincoln's Day Dinner was in 2006 when West New York Mayor and Assemblyman Sal Vega was the man of the evening. Vega lost his Assembly seat when he lost to Stack for the Senate seat in the 33rd District.

The only other time the dinner was suspended was in 1999, when the plan was to honor Union City Mayor and Assemblyman Rudy Garcia, but Garcia got into a row with Stack, and lost.

We are told that Farina is not nervous.

THE MANZO-CATE

Former Assemblyman Lou Manzo of Jersey City is out of elected office. What can he do to stay busy? Easy, he will advocate.

Manzo opened his own Office of Public Advocacy. It is almost as if he did not close his Assembly constituency office. His new place of public business is at 107 West Side Ave.

So what was the first thing he did in his new role. He continued to do what he did as a member of the Legislature, he met with a group of senior citizens at the Hank Gallo Center in Lincoln Park and bashed Gov. Jon Corzine's toll roads plan.

While the former assemblyman should be able to help a number of local people in this created post, it is easy to see that this private advocacy stuff provides him with a nice platform should he disagree with any actions taken by the city administration.

Do you think Manzo is interested in running for mayor again?