A legal complaint against the City of Bayonne, and individually against at least nine municipal employees charges that these employees are in violation of a local residency ordinance. Mike Morris, a community activist, and Peter Cresci, local attorney and former Bayonne Business Administrator, filed the complaint, contending that the employees should be either terminated or required to move to Bayonne. The ordinance (20-16.1) on which the complaint is based is pliable, acknowledging that if the City deems the local pool of applicants insufficient, it should look elsewhere according to a list of preferences, which includes Hudson County residency, residents of counties contiguous to Hudson County, and the state. Police officers, firefighters, and teachers are already legally exempt from local residency requirements, and municipalities rarely enforce residency requirements, especially for senior staff. The system that allows mayors to appoint much of the senior staff usually results in mostly local employees.The argument for a stricter interpretation of the ordinance is twofold: that residency promotes responsibility and accountability, and that the local economy would benefit by residents spending their salaries in Bayonne. Click here for more.
Art is coming to Bayonne, in the form of streetscapes, utility boxes, fire boxes, statues, and wall murals, from a variety of local artists in many locations, primarily in the Urban Enterprise Zone (UEZ) Special Improvement District (SID) along Broadway. The Bayonne City Council voted to use $60,000 of UEZ funds to facilitate the project. The initiative will not only to beautify the shopping district, but attract visitors, renew old streetscapes, and prevent vandalism. Terrence Malloy, Chief Financial Officer for the City of Bayonne, said the ordinance is modeled after the Central Avenue SID in Jersey City Heights, another Urban Enterprise Zone that pioneered streetscaping in 2009 and has installed street art and murals. Residents can expect weathered, old, and otherwise boring traffic boxes and the sides of buildings to become eye candy instead of eyesores. Click here for more.
Leaders convene for criminal justice reform. Prisoner re-entry reform attempts to recognize deficiencies and inefficiencies in the current criminal justice system that undermine both prevention of crime and enforcement of the law. Reformers at the conference offered some prescriptions for the myriad problems in the re-entry system. They include expungement (the legal process of removing felonies from criminal records); bail reform (policy that holds accused criminals in jail based on flight risk rather than ability to pay); ban-the-box laws (regulations on the use of criminal history for employment purposes); issuance of identification (so that formerly incarcerated people can get services they need); housing; and addiction. The idea behind most criminal justice reform is simple: that punishment rarely fits the crime, and better policies should be in place to help people recover and re-enter society, not just punish them. Reformers are trying to bust countless myths in American society about poverty, incarceration, work, and addiction. Click here for more.
