To the editor:
Have you ever wondered about that? Why don’t we vote for our
mayor here in East Windsor? Hamilton does it. Trenton does it. So
does Robbinsville, Hopewell, Pennington, Monroe, and even our
neighbors in Hightstown. The truth is that the majority of townships in
the area do.
Now, what do I mean by “vote for our mayor?” We have a mayor,
right? An elected official chosen by the voters. Well…not exactly. We
have a mayor, that much is true, but what I mean is that we don’t vote
directly for our mayor. No one in East Windsor is running for mayor on
the ballot this year. Everyone is running for Town Council positions.
After each election, at the January reorganization meeting, the council
members choose amongst themselves who is going to be mayor.
I have to be honest, that sounds like a very strange idea to me. I’m
not sure if an equivalent exists anywhere else in politics. It would be
like voting for your senator and they chose who was president. Person´
ally, I would like a little more say in the matter, don’t you?
The reason that it’s done this way is because of our form of govern´
ment. East Windsor is organized under the Faulkner Act. Under the
Faulkner Act, townships have a small variety of options available as to
how they want to function as a government. East Windsor is considered
a “council-manager” town, where as Hamilton is a “mayor-council”
town.
That doesn’t mean that it can’t be altered. Initially, I thought it
would require a change in our form of government, but it appears that
even under our current council-manager form we have the option to
vote directly for the mayor. It would most likely require a ballot ques´
tion on the general election ballot. A ballot question can be brought by
either the Town Council voting on it or by completing a lofty
600-signature petition campaign.
So, to answer the question as to why we don’t vote for our mayor,
it’s because our current elected officials don’t want us to and the peo´
ple of East Windsor aren’t demanding it yet. Now I’m not saying this is
something we absolutely must do, but I’d like to get the conversation
started about it. Are there any costs involved? How would this affect
future elections? I think it’s something that as a town we should discuss
and I’m more than willing to hear how the other residents of East
Windsor feel about this.
Steven J. Uccio
Republican candidate for Town Council
East Windsor
