Keeping projects downtown, instead of actively integrating housing in a way that makes sense, will just hold Jersey City back.
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AlexC wrote:
You can model any HS in Jersey City to McNair, but if you do not get the top ranked, motivated, dedicated high achievers, PLUS, parents who are committed to the program and are willing to get involved in their child's education and the institution, it's not going to work. It's a partnership between the teachers, the administration, the student and their parents.

I think in this particular incident, those kids parents are to blame. They should be the ones held accountable. How? I don't know.

but I still think some kind of non-lethal, physical beating should be an option


[quote]
JasonLLEE wrote:
In response I would like to point out

Dr. Ronald E. McNair Academic High School on
123 COLES ST. is ranked #50 for the best High School in the United States.

So to answer your question, why don't the mayor use this H.S as a model to set the standards for the rest of Jersey City H.S?

as a newly transplant for San Francisco, the board and SF mayor's used a similar standard model of having underachieving H.S. follow Lowell (nationally ranked H.S.)as an example. Currently, San Francisco now has over 3 H.S ranked in the top 500 US schools.
[quote]

heights wrote:
Quote:

RUinHamiltonPark wrote:
I'm as liberal as they come but no one has a "right" to a parking spot and below market rent. The city and state can provide but it should be on the best terms of the city and the rest of the residents as well.

Can the same be said for driveways ?

RUinHamiltonPark wrote:
I'm as liberal as they come but no one has a "right" to a parking spot and below market rent. The city and state can provide but it should be on the best terms of the city and the rest of the residents as well.

gstorm17 wrote:
Wow there has been a lot of responses to this thread since I posted and I feel that some of thread may have gone off topic a bit and that I should clarify some things.

First I want to reiterate that while the incident did take place near the low/affordable income housing I am in no way implying that the incident was caused by anyone who lives there. Quite in fact I walk by there enough to talk with residents when I walk by with my dog and to know the the very same stoop they were sitting on has a sign in the door from the resident who lives there asking people not to sit on the stoop.

These types of places exist for a reason and I am not going to assume that just because it happened in proximity to them that they are to blame. More than likely these were individuals from a different part of the city who wandered down here as this type of thing I have not seen happen and I've been here for awhile.

Now to the people saying that I should "man up" and that this type of thing happens in a city I say this. In my 36 years I've had to talk my fair share of abuse both physical and verbal from bullies and assholes. My skin is thick enough that I don't go crying home because i'm called a name and my ego is secure enough that I don't have to bash someone to prove my worth. Which is why we walked away.

As to why we called the non-emergency line. It's because I am a citizen of this city and have manned up to not simply ignore or become apathetic to things that are not right. I know that I am not the only one who walks by and this sort of incident won't be isolated to me, and it is for those others that I did it. If I wanted to see vengeance or retribution I would have stayed to make sure someone came and what became of them or would have concocted some erroneous story to make it more worse than it was to insure someone check it out.

I am fully aware of how big this city is and that the police can be busy but this why cities have precincts and patrols; to divvy up the city so that its more manageable and can respond to a range of incidents. My anger was more directed at the response of what do you want us to to do attitude. To allow this activity to continue unchecked or unchallenged effectively promotes the behavior and stalls any growth this city has of turning itself around. Yes it seems like a small incident but there will never be a large scale incident that makes things better. Change will only come from small incremental change very day and it must be persistent. I care enough about my city to make the call and I'm a bigger man for just walking away in the end.

JCbiscuit wrote:
guess I'm in the minority, but I think they're doing something right at that housing complex. it's clean, well-kept, kids are often outside playing. yes, the harassing teens are assholes, but then teenagers in general are pretty unbearable.

and I agree, subsidized housing should be reserved for those in need. I've got a cousin who won't marry the father of her child because their combined incomes make them ineligible for the sweet deal they've all been sharing for years in Chelsea. a deal she gets as a "struggling single mother."

meanwhile, they just bought an eleven-hundred-dollar French bulldog puppy for their kid. chaps my hide.

MonmouthMan wrote:
PEC0905 "Villa Boriquen and the surrounding low rises are not projects."

You are wrong, Projects is short for Government Housing Projects. They may not be as run down as some, but the same bs still goes on there....generations of able bodied folks getting to live downtown for next to no rent thanks to my tax dollars. I worked with a woman who lives here...her mom just bought a new Lexus, paid for half of it in cash. They need to audit that place and charge market rates those those who can afford to pay it.

vindication15 wrote:
This discussion is very interesting. First off, no one should be harassed and no, it doesn't come with living in the city. City living does not equate to being harassed. "City" is generally an urban settlement with a large population and with that comes more pollution, more cars, more restaurants, more people, etc as compared to the suburbs or rural areas. Harassment is not associated with "city". That is like saying terrorism is associated with Muslim which is also blatantly biased and completely subjective.

As far as project housing, I think it is safe to say that although the idea might be noble, the implementation and "checks and balances" has been a colossal failure.

But to get right to the point, our schools in JC are failing our children (any viable measure of this proves my point - test scores, graduation rates, reading level, math level, etc.) so when these children grow up to be delinquent teens and delinquent young adults, are you really surprised?

Forget about your tax dollars funding public housing, how about your tax dollars funding these failing public schools - Dickinson, Snyder, Lincoln, Ferris? By any reasonable measure, they should all be closed down ASAP.

And yes, I'm aware that there are bright kids at these schools and hard working teachers but when overall, you have a failing institution, one or two kids or teachers does not justify failing the majority of kids. It's like a company with 1 or 2 hard workers and 99% failures. Would that company ever last more than a day? Can you imagine having your tax dollars pay for that company to stay open and produce a piss poor product? Unfortunately, the piss poor product that our JC public schools produce are the delinquents you see in the streets.

So far, no one running - Healy or Fulop - has really addressed what they will do to make our children more competitive.

vindication15 wrote:
This discussion is very interesting. First off, no one should be harassed and no, it doesn't come with living in the city. City living does not equate to being harassed. "City" is generally an urban settlement with a large population and with that comes more pollution, more cars, more restaurants, more people, etc as compared to the suburbs or rural areas. Harassment is not associated with "city". That is like saying terrorism is associated with Muslim which is also blatantly biased and completely subjective.

As far as project housing, I think it is safe to say that although the idea might be noble, the implementation and "checks and balances" has been a colossal failure.

But to get right to the point, our schools in JC are failing our children (any viable measure of this proves my point - test scores, graduation rates, reading level, math level, etc.) so when these children grow up to be delinquent teens and delinquent young adults, are you really surprised?

Forget about your tax dollars funding public housing, how about your tax dollars funding these failing public schools - Dickinson, Snyder, Lincoln, Ferris? By any reasonable measure, they should all be closed down ASAP.

And yes, I'm aware that there are bright kids at these schools and hard working teachers but when overall, you have a failing institution, one or two kids or teachers does not justify failing the majority of kids. It's like a company with 1 or 2 hard workers and 99% failures. Would that company ever last more than a day? Can you imagine having your tax dollars pay for that company to stay open and produce a piss poor product? Unfortunately, the piss poor product that our JC public schools produce are the delinquents you see in the streets.

So far, no one running - Healy or Fulop - has really addressed what they will do to make our children more competitive.

That real estate is valuable, might as well put our property taxes to better use and get in some market rate residents to join us in paying.

I think it's the ugliest series of blocks in all of Downtown JC.

And do not tell the folks who were harassed to pay these thug's no mind and to ignore them. That mentality is why the ghetto stays the ghetto. Folks litter, no ones says anything, kids don't go to school, no one says anything, folks rape and beat their kids, no one is punished and the, cycle continues.

Frank_M wrote:
?There is no right in the world not to be offended. That right simply doesn?t exist. In a free society, an open society, people have strong opinions, and these opinions very often clash. In a democracy, we have to learn to deal with this.?
-Salman Rushdie