By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Former Princeton Borough Mayor Marvin Reed never thought he’d live to see the day.
Anton Lahnston thought it was glorious.
Whatever emotions the merger of two Princetons brought, the community celebrated the accomplishment Tuesday morning in the municipal building. An overflow crowd, one that included state and county politicians, filled the main meeting room in the municipal building to hear then Mayor-elect Liz Lempert and others speak before munching on some celebratory cake donated by local supermarket McCaffrey’s.
The celebration was designed as a thank you time to everyone those in government and those outside of it who helped make two towns one community.
Mr. Lahnston, who was the chairman of the consolidation study commission, recalled the first attempt to merge was in 1953; two subsequent attempts, in1979 and 1996, also failed. During his remarks, he asked anyone who was part of those past efforts to stand or raise their hands.
”A big thank you to you, you paved the way,” he told them.
Elected and municipal staff spent the past year working on merging governments.
”And I kind of liken the voyage we went through to the Apollo missions. And today, ladies and gentlemen, the Eagle has landed,” Princeton business administrator Robert W. Bruschi told the audience.
Politicians from both political parties, including members of the state Legislature and the County Freeholders, attended.
Mr. Lahnston read a letter from Gov. Chris Christie to mark the occasion in which the governor wrote the “historic merger of the Princetons will hopefully set an example for other municipalities that are searching for ways to cut expenses and streamline services for the benefit of their residents.”
Later Mercer County Executive Brian M. Hughes recalled growing up in Princeton as the son of former New Jersey governor and later state Supreme Court Chief Justice Richard J. Hughes.
”I have a love affair with this town,” he said.
He joked that when the family lived on Westcott Road, near the old dividing line between the borough and the township, the family’s “active and inventive” Irish setter did not know the borough had a leash law and that the township did not.
”So my father, the former governor of the state of New Jersey and soon to be chief justice of the Supreme Court, had to go and defend our dog in Borough Court several times and pay several fines,” he said. “I am glad today to see that dogs all over Princeton will not have the same” plight.
Though Princeton’s history dates to Colonial days, the borough and the township became towns of their own in the 19th century. The borough was created by an act of the Legislature in 1813, while the township followed in 1838. The borough, however, did not become completely independent of the township until 1894.
”So today we cross that threshold. We were two, now we’re one,” said former Borough Councilman Mark Freda.
Mr. Freda served as the chairman of the Transition Task Force, the 12-member group that last year provided the Township Committee and Borough Council with recommendations on personnel choices and other merger-related decisions.
In his remarks, he thanked people who were on both sides of the issue of merging, those for and against.
”Without that vigorous discussion, without the listening to and the understanding of all the different perspectives, I wonder if we would have done as good a job as arriving here as we did,” he said.
Mr. Freda also challenged the new governing body to be bold and open-minded and to “resist the urge to make decisions based solely on short-term cost savings.”
