Sayreville’s four-term mayor officially received the nod to seek a fifth by turning away a primary challenger for the Republican nomination.
Mayor Kennedy O’Brien, who was first elected mayor in 2000, defeated his challenger, former Councilman Frank Bella, 437 votes to 129, garnering 77 percent of the vote, according to the unofficial results from the Middlesex County Clerk’s Office. Those numbers do not include mail-in or provisional ballots.
O’Brien took all but one of the 35 districts in Sayreville, tying Bella with one vote each in District 33, the southernmost district in the borough.
“I’m honored and I’m humbled to have been selected by the people of Sayreville to run for a fifth term,” O’Brien said in a June 4 interview.
In the November general election, he will face Borough Council President David McGill, who ran unopposed in the Democratic primary.
“It was really unsurprising,” McGill said of the GOP primary results. “Mayor O’Brien has a firm hold on the Republican Party. There were no second thoughts on that at all.”
In addition, two three-year terms on the majority Democratic council are up for election. On the ballot are Councilman Ricci Melendez and candidate Steven Grillo, who would replace McGill on the council if elected.
They will campaign against Republican challengers Pasquale “Pat” Lembo and David Lewis, who is also the treasurer of O’Brien’s campaign fund.
Lembo narrowly lost a bid last year, when he ran alongside former Councilwoman Lisa Eicher and they were defeated by Democrats Mary Novak and Victoria Kilpatrick. O’Brien said he will run on his record, touting accomplishments like the establishment of the 500-acre Julian L. Capik Nature Preserve, securing the O’Neill Properties’ Luxury Point development and keeping the size of the municipal government constant.
Moving forward, O’Brien said he would like to preserve more open space and work closely with the Luxury Point developers in order to shepherd the lengthy, 8-millionsquare foot redevelopment project along.
“I think the single biggest thing is going to be working on the redevelopment program,” O’Brien said. “That is a 10- to 15-year program that is going to require a great deal of attention to make sure it will benefit the people of Sayreville without overly impacting services.”
McGill said in a June 3 interview that the Democratic campaign would largely center on investments to modernize local infrastructure, physical and digital, as well as retaining residents and attracting new, younger ones.
“I want to make Sayreville safer and enjoyable for the people in town,” McGill said. “It’s a community where there is a lot of cohesion …
“I don’t want to see that cohesion go away, and the way to keep that cohesion is to get people wanting to stay in Sayreville and get younger people to want to move into Sayreville.”
According to McGill, investing more in schools and public safety services could maintain and foster that cohesion. But, he added, attracting commercial ratables like the Luxury Point redevelopment project would be key to stabilizing municipal taxes, which have risen at an average rate of 3.62 cents per $100 of assessed valuation over the last five budget cycles. McGill said he would seek to attract additional commercial ratables by revitalizing Main Street.
The initial cash advantage in the race goes to the Democrats, whose local party organization maintains a sizable war chest relative to their indebted Republican counterparts. While McGill, Melendez and Grillo’s election funds only maintained $100 between them as of May 22, the local party organization had more than $750 on hand, according to public records filed with the N.J. Election Law Enforcement Commission (ELEC).
The Republican organization, on the other hand, had $115.62 as of May 18 and owed $3,860 to O’Brien for a previous loan, according to N.J. ELEC records. However, O’Brien has proven to be an adept fundraiser in past elections, garnering substantial donations from the county and state levels, as well as the Washington, D.C.-based political action committee “GOPAC” in his 2011 campaign, records show.
Just before the June 2 primary against Bella, the “Kennedy O’Brien for Mayor” committee reported a balance of $455.09.
Freeholder, state Assembly races set
Incumbent Democratic Middlesex County Freeholders Ronald Rios and H. James Polos are set to face Republican challengers Jose Alonso and Sharon Hubberman. Each party’s candidates ran uncontested in the primary elections.
The Borough of Sayreville is located in the state’s 19th Legislative District, where Democrats hold both Assembly seats and the state Senate seat. Incumbent Democratic Assemblymen Craig Coughlin and John Wisniewski, a Sayreville native, both ran unopposed. They will face Republican challengers Thomas Maras and Reyes Ortega in November, both of whom also ran uncontested in the primary election.