Charter-change opponents find another reason to say nay

Commission members claim they knew about 1992 report

By John Tredrea
   A grassroots group of Hopewell Township residents who oppose changing the township’s form of government say their view is supported strongly by a 1992 state report recommending that the mayor-council-administrator form of municipal government be scrapped as an option under New Jersey’s Faulkner Act.
   It is the Faulkner Act that enabled the township to place a question on switching to the mayor-council-administrator form on the Nov. 8 ballot.
   The proposed change comes with the unanimous recommendation of the five-member township Charter Study Commission (CSC). That recommendation has been the focus of increased controversy over the past month.
   Jim Moore, chairman of the grassroots group — Citizens for Sound Township Government, which opposes the change of governmental form — said Monday that the CSC "failed to live up to its obligation to township voters" because the CSC did not alert the public to the 13-year-old recommendations of the State Commission on County and Municipal Governments. That commission’s report is a public document. Its recommendations have not been enacted by state government.
   The report cited by Mr. Moore reviewed all state laws pertaining to county and municipal forms of government, including the Optional Municipal Charter Law, also known as the Faulkner Act. The report recommended the elimination of the mayor-council-administrator form of government as an option under that act.
   The 1992 report stated: "Experience under this form is limited, since only one municipality, the Township of North Brunswick, has adopted it. The original intention of this form was to bring the mayor and council into a closer relationship, but it is quite possible that the administrator could be pulled in two different directions, since the mayor and administrator share executive powers while in contrast the administrator serves at the pleasure of the council. Because of this built-in conflict, the Commission recommends that this form be removed from the rewritten Optional Municipal Charter Law."
   Since the report was written, the mayor-council-administrator form has been adopted by West Milford Township – located in northern Passaic County – in addition to North Brunswick, which still has that form of government.
   Mr. Moore, a longtime township resident, who also is a member of the citizens Finance Committee that advises the Township Committee, says the CSC was remiss in its duty by not alerting residents to the 13-year-old recommendation of the state commission to eliminate the mayor-council-administrator option under the Faulkner Act.
   "Why didn’t our Charter Study Commission mention this recommendation in its report?" Mr. Moore demanded. He said that the CSC "was seriously deficient in its research" if it was not aware of the state Commission on County and Municipal Government’s recommendation that the mayor-council-administrator form be discontinued as an option under the Faulkner Act.
   ASKED TUESDAY to respond to comments made about their work by Citizens for Sound Township Government, commission Chairman Jim McGuire said: "The Charter Study Commission is aware that the New Jersey Legislature rejected the recommendation about the mayor-council-administrator form contained in the 1992 report: ‘Modern Forms of Municipal Government.’ Perhaps the reason the Legislature rejected the recommendation was because of the report’s incorrect interpretation of the law when it states that: ‘The council does not have the critical task of preparing the budget.’ In fact the council, by law, must work with the administrator and treasurer to prepare the budget (NJSA 40:69A-149.12).
   "The report opines that the administrator will be pulled in two directions between the mayor and council. We view the role of the administrator to be that of honest broker who must deal with both mayor and council in a straightforward manner." Mr. McGuire said.
   "The Charter Commission believes that the mayor-council-administrator form is one that maximizes cooperation and minimizes conflict among the mayor, council and administrator. We were mindful that conflict among committee members, some of whom remain on the committee, was a major concern when voters decisively voted in favor of a charter study commission," the chairman said.
   "We note that in the 13 years since this report that North Brunswick Township has functioned will under this form. Moreover this form was recently adopted by West Milford Township and is also on the ballot in Berkley Heights this year." Mr. McGuire concluded.
   Commission member Jon Edwards also responded, saying: "As the NJ Legislature determined, the 1992 recommendation was based upon a misstatement of fact and therefore not worth mention in our report. The recommendation was based upon the premise that the administrator in mayor-council-administrator might have to serve two masters, the mayor and council, and that this might be a flaw in the form of government.
   "We and other towns know that the administrator’s position in this form represents a key part of the balance of power and a significant additional check and balance. Unlike other forms of government, In mayor-council-administrator, the administrator will not be in the hip pocket of the mayor or the council. The mayor will appoint the administrator with the advice and consent of the council. Both can dismiss. The council would simply require a majority vote," Mr. Edwards explained.
   "Note that the legislature declined to act in 1992 upon that recommendation, and that mayor-council-administrator remains the most used and most popular form of government in the state of New Jersey. It is essentially the borough form made available to townships like ours. It remains a popular option, as evidenced by the fact that it appears this November on three ballot questions in New Jersey," Mr. Edwards added.
   "Finally, it is all too common in our town that groups, desperate to win or to preserve their influence, will stoop to misinformation campaigns," Mr. Edwards concluded.
   Commission Vice Chairman Pat Tieman added: "The commission used a vast amount of research material during our nine-month study. These materials included books, reports from different studies, statistical data and academic work from Rutgers Center for Government Services. We gathered information from the New Jersey State League of Municipalities, the Municipal Managers Association, and scoured the internet for additional reference material. In addition to the written materials, we interviewed more than 40 elected officials and municipal employees, and consulted with professors from the Rutgers Bloustein School of Public Policy and Planning. Our decision to recommend the mayor-council-administrator form of government was based on the totality of this research, not on one report.
   "We did find, in our research, that the 13-year old report on the mayor-council-administrator form of government by the State Commission on County and Municipal Government contained serious factual errors and was never acted upon by the state Legislature. The state commission was later disbanded and no other reports were made," Ms. Tieman noted.
   "If we would have considered this one report important enough to cite in our final report, then we could also have cited the report’s finding that the mayor-council-administrator form of government is a ‘weak mayor’ form — an argument that nullifies the opposition’s statements that the mayor will have ‘unprecedented power’ and can hire or fire municipal employees ‘on a whim,’" she said.
   "The commission considered the report in the context of all of the other research materials and interviews and decided that what the state commission found as a flaw in the mayor-council-administrator form of government was actually a positive check and balance. The administrator must work honestly with both the mayor and the council. In writing our report and presenting our recommendation, we set forth our findings with factual information on the different forms of municipal government available to Hopewell Township. We did not choose to cite small sections of reports; instead, we chose to convey a comprehensive summary of our research," Ms. Tieman concluded.