Candidate's Blog: Transcript Nine

[Disclosure: This blog is written from my perspective as both a candidate for a seat on Gloucester Township Council and as a concerned citizen of Gloucester Township with questions and concerns about reckless spending and business as usual in Gloucester Township.]

It’s happening more and more in Gloucester Township…it starts out as dissatisfaction and/or disagreement over the way something is, or was, handled and then it turns to outright anger over what is going on around here. I have recently seen lifelong Democrats who would normally want nothing to do with me as a candidate for township council suddenly begin to express interest in what the Gloucester Township FIRST mayoral/council team is all about.

Residents come to council meetings to air their views about a problem they’ve seen or are experiencing and realize they are being ignored or worse. The same thing is happening at the Board of Education meetings and I recently witnessed the same behavior at a Planning Board meeting as well. Concerned parents and residents are ignored or ridiculed by so-called public officials and citizens are beginning to step up and fight back.

Recently a local resident, and concerned parent, thought it was time to get involved in the school board so he naively gathered only the minimum requirement of 10 signatures on his petition to run for a seat on the GT school board. Anybody familiar with politics in Gloucester Township could have warned him that was a mistake and sure enough…I’m not exactly sure what the brouhaha was over but it seems that one of the signatures belonging to a local business owner and lifelong resident was rejected. Okay, I get it; maybe there was a question because the signature looked somewhat different than the one on record that was collected ages ago. The problem was that when attempts were made to clear up the misunderstanding the applicant was informed that it was all moot because the deadline for filing had passed. That political shenanigan got more than a few people enraged. But guess what, that is not an isolated incident rather, that is business as usual in Gloucester Township.

Consider what happened just two weeks ago when the application for a liquor consumption license transfer to the Tuscan Tavern was turned down over similar technicalities. A question arose over where the funds for the purchase of the liquor license were originating and regardless of how many phone calls were made and how many attempts were made to clear up the misunderstanding it appeared that the fix was in on this one. Consider that certain statements were made “off the record” that indicated the license in question would never be placed in GT under its current ownership. It’s all back-room escapades and nothing anybody who wants to keep their job would ever own up to saying.

Did you know that Gloucester Township recently purchased a quarter-of-a-million dollar armored vehicle? Did you also know that the county already owns one available to all that sits in the Lakeland complex? Whether you or I think GT needed its own vehicle is not the point right now, rather the problem concerns the transparency that Mr. Dave Mayer promised when he took office? Was there any real interaction with the community over this purchase with a public justification of the need for such so that we could all understand what is going on?

Look at what is happening with the Field of Dreams? What a political football that is turning into. There are actually parents in town desiring to start a fund to build such a site but were told by the Field of Dreams organization that GT already had an approved site and only one per area is allowed. So, under the auspices of Mr. Glen Bianchini, current president of council and Rotary Club member, the Field of Dreams was awarded to the Rotary to be set up in GT in fulfillment of Glen’s dream for such. While the township can provide land for such a site the actual physical site has to be built with private funds. BTW, this is an idea that has been fermenting for over a year and it is estimated that the project will cost $500,000 dollars. Word is that only $30,000 has been collected to date yet our friendly Democrat operatives were all up at the Gloucester Township Community Park on April 20th, 2013, for a photo-op where they were all trying to get their hands on the shovel that was used to “break ground”. To date, however, that shovelful is the only dirt that has been moved at the site. In the meantime somebody took it upon themselves to dedicate the whole park, it seems, to Mayor Mayer as evidenced by a new wall constructed along the Little Gloucester Road perimeter of the park where a statue has been erected and a plaque honoring the infamous Dave Mayer; for what, I’m not sure. Were you aware of this dedication? Can you name the reasons why such an honorific was placed for Dave Mayer?

Yes, I can understand why people are beginning to sit up and take notice. Now we have the election-year promise of a Gloucester Township Outlet Mall off of Route 42. Does anyone other than me think that heaping kudos on Dave Mayer, as I’ve seen some do here, might be a little premature? Consider the list I am collating of what I have termed Dave Mayer’s “Failed Successes”. You might not know about the 2011 election-year promise concerning the revitalization of the Nike Base (Erial) that was going to be home for the Hit Doctor and bring GT a Little League World Series competition. You most likely fall into one of two groups: one group never even heard of the Hit Doctor and the Nike Base and the other group is saying, “Yea, what happened to that?”

The answer is the same for both groups; the idea vanished into thin air. Actually it vanished only to re-appear in Voorhees and the whole debacle can now be recorded in the annals as another Dave Mayer “Failed Success.” (We might forget but the Internet doesn’t and the web page that was constructed to trumpet the whole debacle can still be seen here: The Hit Doctor Sports Complex in Gloucester Township.)

So, can we hold off with all the high-fiving until something actually happens over at the Cooper site and the proposed GT Outlet Mall off of Route 42; you know, just this once? BTW, recent talk of a 25-year tax abatement to the developers has some residents, understandably, up in arms.

Yes, I get the anger that some of my neighbors are beginning to exhibit because I feel it too. As a candidate for township council myself, I am, frankly, tired of the election-year political shenanigans that I see being carried on here in GT. Every time there is any event in the township it becomes a hand-shaking photo-op for all the usual suspects, that is, the back-slapping local office holders congratulating themselves. Witness the April 20th, 2013, Ground-Breaking ceremony for the Field of Dreams and the attending honorific for Mr. Mayer. How about the Mainstage Center for the Arts grand-opening in the center of Blackwood on July 10th? And would you expect Mr. Mayer to arrive at a church he does not attend, as he did recently, and ascend the pulpit with two of his office-holding operatives in tow to present a local teen with an award that really did not involve anything Mr. Mayer did? I’m not sure why he had to do it during a church service but he added insult to injury by making it a political event when he felt compelled to introduce his two political cronies and not only announce their names but name their political office as well.

Yea, it’s well past time to get involved and make a change in the one-party rule that has brought GT to its present state. Come on out on November 5th, 2013, and cast a vote for real change and real transparency in government by pulling the lever for the Gloucester Township FIRST team of Tanya Brown, Paul DiBartolo, Patricia Kline, and Joe Pauli. See you then.

Visit us at: http://www.gloucestertownshipfirst.com