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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
 
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The taxes in JC are in no way representative of the services. Most of the taxes go to the schools, which are awful. And a lot goes to the county, which has no clue what it's doing.
I would say the city has a role in keeping the taxes at a level to bring people in and not drive people out- which it isn't now.
Posted on: 2013/4/3 19:26
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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2012/1/11 18:21 Last Login : 2019/12/26 15:30 From GV Bayside Park
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Lets not get it twisted, there are four candidates running and I have never at any point have considered Healy. I am appreciative of Bayside Park, but him and Michael Sottolano WARD A councilman did a poor job getting it done. Hamilton Park was started the same time as Bayside but Bayside was completed 2 years later. Also they built a huge day care facility on Ocean ave which is still surrounded by abandoned buildings, who wants to send their kids there? Not me. I have inquired about these building with the thought if the price is right I can perhaps purchase one of them. Instead this administration made it impossible, it was almost like they were saying we like them the way they are. My neighbor son was born when one of the buildings became abandoned and it is now 18 years later and it still sits empty and boarded up. Sorry Healy had his time, No one got time for another four years of this sluggish goverment.
Posted on: 2013/4/3 19:21
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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Personally I dont believe that the purpose of city government and its policies is to make condos more marketable. The purpose is to provide residents with municipal services and programs that (perhaps) as a byproduct may make your condo more marketable? Personally I dont have a problem with paying taxes, low or high, as long as I feel that the money is being spent well and benefiting the city, not just the friends and donors of politicians.
Posted on: 2013/4/3 18:09
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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What is your hesitation for voting for Fulop? Where is Healy superior?
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Posted on: 2013/4/3 17:32
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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I'm for Fulop but I have mixed feelings on the abatements.
The condos are going to get tougher and tougher to sell in the luxury buildings as the property taxes are totally out of control (and are WAY higher than Hoboken nevermind NYC). Granted the COL is overall cheaper but taxes are higher than some NJ suburbs with good schools and services. If we want to stop the abatements, there needs to be city wide relief. The best way to get change outside of downtown is to incentivize development there. Abatements are one thing, but how about the lack of 24-7 transportation everywhere but DTJC and JSQ? How about getting NJT to at least keep the elevator at 9th street open 24-7 to Heights? How about some business tax incentives to give people from DTJC and Hoboken reasons to explore the rest of the city? The problem with Healy lies with the company he keeps and his terming of downtowners as outsiders. If I'm an outsider for not growing up here, shall I forward my tax bill to Monmouth County? The establishment is afraid of thouysands of Steve Fulops- people from outside of hudson County who cannot believe the corruption and waste.
Posted on: 2013/4/3 16:41
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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Valid points, I will be headed to his headquarters Saturday to help with the signage here in GV I am 80% for Fulop but I am still a bit hesitant of casting my vote for him, but I am making progress I was only 40% for him when the race began.
Posted on: 2013/4/3 14:56
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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2012/10/12 12:58 Last Login : 2016/5/8 0:52 From Jersey City
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Hoboken has made rent control laws stricter. How would relaxing rent control laws, which are already more relaxed than Hoboken and other surrounding towns increase tax revenue? BTW, as for increased tax revenue leading to better services... it depends on the mayor. Tax revenues have gone up tremendously in the last 8 years and quality of life (services) have declined. Why? Because the administration uses the increased tax revenues for improving his patronage base not for improving or expanding services to residents.
Posted on: 2013/4/3 13:27
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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User1111. You described the exact reason why I was drawn to supporting Steve Fulop for Mayor.
About 2 years ago I went to a city council meeting (because I was bored and from the descriptions in the Jersey Journal they sounded like brawls). At the meeting I went to the council was getting ready to vote for or against an abatement. Only one council person, Fulop, voted against the abatement and the reason he gave is what got me to look more in to his background and get involved in his campaign for mayor once he announced it. His reasoning was essentially as follows: Fulop said that he isn't against builders buying land and developing downtown further (the market will dictate that) but that abatements should be used to help develop the rest of the city where developers arent currently incentivized by the market to build in. The way abatements have been used has led to "a tale of two cities" (his phrase) and that for Jersey City to move forward we need to move forward as a whole - we cant have one area, downtown, becoming a gleaming metropolis while the other 80% of the city watches banks & supermarkets close and business shut down leaving long stretches of vacant store fronts. If we are going to give abatements for luxury buildings downtown, developers should be required to make a portion of the buildings affordable rate so that we can have a diverse and thriving neighborhood. We can't let the current administrations policy where abated developers donate money to a trust fund to one day build affordable housing in the west half of the city, further exacerbating the tale of two cities. As I went to more council meetings and read his policy papers on his website I gained a greater understanding of how everything in Jersey City completely revolves around abatements & development. For instance, abated building's property tax revenues are diverted away from the schools, forcing the schools to rely on state aid and a smaller tax base - he wants to revise that policy so that abated revenues go towards the schools as well. When Rolando Lavarro introduced his crime bill that would enforce a law that requires a low cost 3rd party audit of the PD so that we could find out if there were available resources sitting behind desks that could be better utilized on the streets, Peter Brennan said it was a waste of time and that he supported a tale of two cities (he said it with way more racist language than I imply though). Viola Richardson sold out her constituency for her own personal ambitions and agreed with Brennan. In the last 8 years approximately 40,000 people have been arrested at least once in our city. They all have arrest records, but when Councilwoman Coleman made a comment about how a jobs program being introduced to the council was going to completely ignore the 15% of residents with arrest records... Richardson, Healy, and their allies scream for her to apologize for sticking up for a huge chunk of our city that need jobs but otherwise can't earn money without either lying on a jobs application or turning to crime. We have a tale of two cities in Jersey City. Only one candidate (Fulop) and his slate wants to improve the quality of life and opportunities for residents in the whole city and has a plan to do so. The incumbent wants to keep milking the part of the city that has risen up despite his poor planning and organization until it runs dry.
Posted on: 2013/4/3 13:24
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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People on this forum want to hold on to the grittiness and ghettoness in areas like GV and even in some parts of DTJC and at the same time complain about the crime, poor school systems, and lack of services and business investment.
People label the gritiness and ghettoness as "artistic" and "character" and "not cookie-cutter." I find it surprising, if not amusing, that people do not connect the two. let's have a row of liquor stores and 99 cent stores and expect there to be business investment, great schools, and no crime. It's almost laughable. People made fun of me because I once said that the best thing to happen to JC is having quality stores like a whole foods come to JC. I said that because I don't remember the last time I saw thugs hanging in front of a whole foods. However, I see people of questionable intentions hanging around 99 cent stores and liquor stores all the time. Go on, keep complaining that GV and other parts of JC are being neglected and then in the same breath, talk about how much character or history those areas have and how sad gentrification is and how negatively it affects neighborhoods. I need comic relief at work.
Posted on: 2013/4/2 16:49
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Neighboring towns of Hoboken and Bayonne have relaxed their rent control laws, JC should do the same. This will translate to higher tax revenue and better services.
Posted on: 2013/4/2 8:26
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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I tend to lose tenants when their kids reach school age. At that point they head for the suburbs.
Posted on: 2013/4/1 17:01
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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I think the person who wrote the letter was referring to Bayonne, when she says a few short stops away, not necessarily dtjc. Lots of us here use Bayonne for shopping and its like night and day how clean the streets are there. Also there seems to be more law and order there compared to JC.
Posted on: 2013/4/1 16:39
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Newbie
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Posted on: 2013/4/1 16:39
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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Posted on: 2013/4/1 16:34
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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When I saw it, I thought it was an attempt at a cute misspelling of "wretchedness".
Posted on: 2013/4/1 16:30
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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A popular slang used.... A diva, mostly from urban cities and ghettos, that has reason to believe she is every mans eye candy. Unfortunately, she's wrong.
Posted on: 2013/4/1 16:25
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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Ratchetness?
Robin.
Posted on: 2013/4/1 16:14
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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I think that the sentiments apply to downtown Jersey City as well. my husband and I decided to purchase a condo in downtown JC and we have a young baby. It's not always peaches and cream in the downtown area, and it still shares many of the same problems as other areas of Jersey City. Notably, very high taxes and very little in the way of services in return. Many of the streets here are still dirty and grubby.Crime is certainly a concern - I wouldn't let my child walk around the area by herself even as she gets older. Most importantly, the public schools, even in downtown, are less than great. Most don't even have any outside green spaces for the children to play. That is pretty depressing. And not everyone that lives in downtown can afford to send their kids to private school. We certainly can't. So at a certain point, especially when you have children, you have to start asking yourself if you are doing right by your children by staying here. I don't know the answer yet.
I know the answer certainly isn't more of the same with Healy. We need a mayor that is going to DO SOMETHING, even if I may not agree with every issue.
Posted on: 2013/4/1 16:14
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Re: Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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I found this letter on the JC-Greenville site and thought I post it here since its election season and so many candidates read this forum. Jersey City is attracting more and more NYC residents due to its closeness and prices.
However most people will come here and save a bunch of cash and then leave. I been only in GV for a year in half and we have old timers and newbies but the newbies seem to tolerate the disregard of services for a short time before they move on. Around the corner from me was a nice family who lived here for 2 years then sold and went to Clifton, NJ due to the poor schools and drugs being sold in the open on MLK and Ocean and no services provided in the area. I witness many people who have no car, take the lightrail downtown with a shopping cart just to get groceries. This is insane! JC can not survive on dtjc alone, if you want people to buy property and stay for the long haul, all the candidates have to give a flying fuk about the entire city. I am an undecided voter and each day I move closer to one of the candidates. I hope this letter inspires you all to vote
Posted on: 2013/4/1 13:44
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Living in the Midst of Ratchetness and Other Thoughts on Gentrification
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Home away from home
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After the housing drama[/url] we had at our Manhattan apartment, we were in a hurry to get outta there and find a place in Jersey City that would not only be much closer to Mr. Love Bird's office, but also save us money AND give us substantially more space. Our last place had 1 1/2 bedrooms and our current apartment has 3 bedrooms. Although our last apartment was in a luxury building (Viking appliances package, Bosch washer/dryer, and deep soaking tub in the bathroom with a heated river stone floor), the amount of space we have in our new place more than makes up for that.
There were definitely some trade-offs, however and one of those was the neighborhood in which we live. We're in Jersey City, but more on the outskirts in an area called Greenville. It doesn't take much research to see that it's a high drug/crime area more so than Harlem which is becoming more and more gentrified. Where we live is sandwiched between two higher-income areas of Bayonne and downtown Jersey City. We're just off the light-rail not far from Liberty Science Center, and while it's so nice not having to climb subway stairs to get around (and risk spraining one's ankle), I definitely do miss the city although I can see downtown Manhattan just steps from my front door. Our neighborhood has scared some of our visitors and honestly, I make sure to walk quickly especially when coming off the light rail at night, but not once have I felt threatened by anyone personally and our fellow neighbors have treated us with respect and kindness (despite that noise complaint issue we had from our downstairs neighbors a few months ago who, as fellow parents, must've forgotten what it's like having a toddler). As we travel throughout Jersey City we're floored at the dichotomy of goods and services available just a couple, short train stops from where we are and even simple differences such as clean sidewalks and substantially less noise pollution. I was reading this article on Clutch about gentrification, and I have to admit I'm torn especially having witnessed it in Harlem. Our current neighborhood reminds me of Harlem in the 90s - making progress but still a lot of work left to go and by "progress" I don't mean white people moving in, but improvement like new parks and beautification projects. Services definitely have a very long way to go. There is no bank, post office or quality grocery store within walking distance, and I greatly miss the walk-ability that we had in our Harlem neighborhood (click here to see some of the latest developments). Mr. Love Bird and I debate living in this area - he having grown up in a gritty neighborhood like this and I having grown up in the suburbs of Columbus, Ohio. I understand that he may be used to growing up in an area like this and many people have survived and thrived in such places, but that doesn't mean it's an ideal location nor that I want to stay here and raise my family (especially after reading this story today which brought tears to my eyes). I believe gentrification can be a good thing (what I wouldn't give for a bank branch around here!), but it has to be handled carefully and thoughtfully. As I look ahead to the future, I tell myself that where we're at is (very, very) temporary and that it serves a purpose for our family at this time. I'm thankful we have a wonderful landlord, kind neighbors and a great space to spread out affordably Read
Posted on: 2013/4/1 12:12
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