Former mayors support Molnar

Gary Bleacher, William Comly, Edward Hawley, Bernard Meader and Carolyn Deal
    As former West Amwell mayors of both political parties, we are outraged at the brass knuckle and underhanded political activities of Ron Shapella.
   As a fairly new resident of our community, you would think he would respect our customs and traditions of mayoral succession and public participation.
   However, at the January 2007 reorganization meeting, Mr. Shapella immediately used his newly found partisan leverage to pass over a very experienced, popular and twice former mayor, effectively appointing himself mayor in the second year of his own term.
   This action was in violation of many decades of township tradition where a committee person only serves as mayor in the third and final year of his term.
   This “weak” mayor system has served the township well in that the mayor appoints people to various boards and committees. By having a different and experienced mayor each year, the committees were staffed by people of diverse views, which is, of course, very important in setting township government policy.
   When asked about the mayoral coup, he remarked “The vote was 2 to 1 (counting his vote) so how much more democratic could it be?”
   Mr. Shapella obviously feels the only opinion that counts is his own. He has also shown this attitude in holding a record number of meetings closed to the public, nearly 300 in his three years on the committee, this despite the fact that his main campaign promise was “no more backroom deals.”
   He has also used procedural tricks to gut several other committees and staff them with people more to his liking and on board with his agenda.
   Tom Molnar has assured us that he will respect the customs and traditions of West Amwell. He will also limit closed session meetings to only those absolutely necessary and encourage broad-based public participation in forming township policy.
   He has our support.
Gary Bleacher
William Comly
Edward Hawley
Bernard Meader
Carolyn Deal