Pundits weigh in on town council elections

By Lea Kahn, Staff Writer
   For years, neighbors of the former Trent Motel put up with drugs and crime at the Brunswick Pike business, until the Democratic-led Township Council purchased it and made its redevelopment the centerpiece of revitalization efforts in the Brunswick Pike Redevelopment Area.
   But the Trent Motel, which was bought by Township Council in 2002 and subsequently demolished, nearly cost Democratic Township Council members Michael Powers and Pam Mount their seats on the council last month, according to some Lawrence Township political observers.
   In a close election, Mr. Powers and Ms. Mount were re-elected by votes of 3,468 and 3,441, respectively, while Bob Bostock, a Republican challenger, got the third spot with 3,264 votes.
   Only 14 votes separated third-place finisher Mr. Bostock from running mate Falk Engel, who received 3,250 votes to place fourth among the six candidates. Democrat Jim Kownacki got 3,245 votes and Republican Marie Tagliaferri earned 2,897 votes.
   Steven Goodell, a longtime Republican political observer, credited Mr. Bostock with identifying election issues, such as the Trent Motel purchase, to attract the voters’ attention.
   Democrats have a “sizable” voting majority in Lawrence, Mr. Goodell said. Of the 17,339 registered voters in Lawrence, 4,680 are Democrats, 2,482 are Republicans and 10,163 are unaffiliated.
   ”For the Republicans to do well,” Mr. Goodell said, “they had to have some good issues or some recognizable personalities. Mr. Bostock did a good job finding issues and the Republicans were very aggressive with them.”
   Nevertheless, Tom Wilfrid, a Democrat, Planning Board chairman and former Township Council member, said he was pleased Ms. Mount and Mr. Powers were re-elected despite the campaign that was waged against them.
   ”I am not surprised the campaign for the third seat was so close, because these guys (Mr. Bostock and Mr. Engel) are smart,” Mr. Wilfrid said. “They have experience. They waged an energetic, well-financed campaign.”
   Joseph Cermele, president of the Lawrence Township Democratic Club, agreed. “The way I see the results of this election, the closeness of the race was because our campaign did not respond to things from the other side,” Mr. Cermele said. “In particular, we did not respond to the Trent Motel and everything associated with that. The Trent Motel is a big reason why we didn’t do better.”
   During the campaign, Republican candidates charged that Township Council spent $2.2 million of taxpayers’ money to buy the Trent Motel and two adjacent properties, then sold them to a hand-picked redeveloper for $500,000.
   However, Township Council — which included Republican Councilman Rick Miller — unanimously approved a $1 million bond ordinance for the purchase and allocated $1.2 million from its Affordable Housing Trust Fund to buy the properties. Money in the Affordable Housing Trust Fund is generated by mandatory donations from developers who do not include affordable housing units in their development or who build commercial developments.
   Township Council unanimously awarded a redevelopment contract to Community Investment Strategies for the Trent Motel and two adjacent properties in 2003. Christiana Foglio, a principal of CIS, contributed $1,750 to the Lawrence Township Democratic Club in 2004. CIS is one of four developers that sought the contract to redevelop the properties.
   Ms. Foglio’s husband, Trenton Mayor Douglas Palmer, gave $5,000 to Democratic candidate Paula Sollami-Covello’s campaign for Mercer County Clerk on Nov. 5, 2005. The next day, her campaign gave $5,000 to the campaign fund of Democrats Michael Horan and Mark Holmes, who were running for Township Council at the time.
   ”You have to give credit where it is due,” said Mr. Cermele, the Democratic Club president. “The Republicans took a positive, which is the redevelopment of the Trent Motel site, and turned it into a negative. During the next election cycle (in 2009), people (who live near the former Trent Motel) will see what has been done in their neighborhood.”
   Mr. Wilfrid agreed. “The campaign Bob Bostock mounted was slick,” Mr. Wilfrid said. “It was an aggressive and slick set of communications that distorted the truth. The distortions and half-truths, spread primarily by Mr. Bostock, were not aggressively countered. It took the Democrats by surprise. It’s not the way campaigns have customarily been done in Lawrence.”
   Mr. Wilfrid pointed to what he said were the Republicans’ distortion of the purchase of the Dyson Tract on Princeton Pike and the dumping of dredged material from Colonial Lake on a portion of that property.
   The Republicans claimed the township paid $2.2 million for the Dyson Tract in 1997 and then dumped contaminated dredged material from Colonial Lake on the property.
   Mr. Wilfrid said Township Council — which included Republican Councilman Miller — unanimously approved an exchange of the township-owned Cranstoun Farm for the Dyson Tract, which was purchased by The Lawrenceville School for the express purpose of the land swap. No taxpayer funds were involved, he said.
   The state Department of Environmental Protection also gave Lawrence Township permission to clean up Colonial Lake and deposit the dredged material — which was not considered contaminated — on the Dyson Tract, he said.
   Lawrence Township Republican Club President David Snedeker did not disagree that the Trent Motel was a campaign issue for some voters. Neighborhood residents questioned why it was taking so long for the project to get off the ground, he said.
   Mr. Snedeker also said he thought the election was close because voters wanted to see a change on Township Council. If people were satisfied, all three Democrats would have been elected, he said.
   ”We had some good candidates who brought a lot of good things to the table,” Mr. Snedeker said. “There was a lot of party cross-over votes (Democrats who voted for the Republicans).”
   Mr. Goodell, who was not involved in the Republican campaign, said Republican candidate Falk Engel drew some of those “cross-over” votes. Mr. Engel is well-known in Lawrence for his advocacy of pay-to-play campaign finance reform and for seeking a living wage ordinance for employees of large stores such as Wal-Mart, he said.
   But Mr. Cermele and Mr. Wilfrid said they believe that while the Democratic candidates knocked on residents’ doors to introduce themselves and their campaign, the Democrats did not campaign aggressively enough.
   Democrats’ effort to make their case for election to the voters was not as effective as it could have been, Mr. Wilfrid said. Mr. Powers, Ms. Mount and Mr. Kownacki entered the campaign thinking that voters were generally appreciative that Lawrence had been “well-governed” by Democratic management for the past 12 years, he said.
   ”They thought they had enough of a base of support to wage a campaign against the Republicans,” he said. “When all of this stuff was thrown at them, they were not prepared to respond in kind. Despite all of that, the fact the election was so close tells me there is still a broad base of public appreciation for the way local government has been run.”
   ”It will be interesting to see the dynamic that develops on the new Township Council — the extent to which the two parties will work together or be more partisan. I hope they will work together for the good of the residents,” Mr. Wilfrid said.