New Hillsdale Council Members Take Seats, Kelley Named President
The Hillsdale Council held its reorganization meeting Sunday.
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Hillsdale's four newest council members took their oaths of office and Tom Kelley was voted as the council's president during the borough's annual reorganization meeting Sunday.
Officials were positive about the past year and optimistic for 2013. Mayor Max Arnowitz spoke about some of 2012's big issues, including Hurricane Sandy, improvements to the borough's finances and the decision to keep emergency dispatching in the police department. Despite some disagreements over appointees, Arnowitz was also positive about working with the four Democrats now sitting on the council.
"While the makeup of the council has changed, I'm sure the accomplishments of the past three years will continue and expand," Arnowitz said.
Council members also said they wanted to work together to do "the best things for Hillsdale" and unanimously voted for Tom Kelley to take the position of council president for the next year.
"I feel privileged to have been picked," Kelley said.
Still, there were some disagreements. Arnowitz said he was "disappointed" that the council replaced seven of his nominees for various positions with different appointees.
Councilman Doug Frank questioned why the council majority decided to replace so many of the borough's professional staff, including the borough labor attorney, who had worked for Hillsdale for more than 20 years, according to Frank.
"In business, you generally wouldn't get rid of somebody unless they were doing a bad job," Frank said.
Councilman Larry Meyerson defended the changes, noting that they had used the same process for hiring professionals that the council uses every year.
"The people voted for change, so we affected that change," Meyerson said, referring to the November election in which Democrats won all four seats.
Frank also raised concerns about new borough attorney Eric Bernstein, a lawyer who has lots of municipal experience but is based in Warren and also has represented pornographic websites. Bernstein has previously lost some of his positions representing municipal governments because of his other work, according to a 2007 report on PolitickerNJ.
Meyerson said he asked Bernstein about the issue while interviewing for the positon and was satisfied Bernstein's qualifications.
"As an attorney, we represent our clients," Meyerson said. "We don't vouch for what they do.".
Still, officials were optimistic about being able to get along as they begin working on the annual budget. Meyerson thanked Frank for "keeping us on our toes."
"I think we will find a lot more places to work together than to not work together," Frank said.
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Carole M
1:08 pm on Monday, January 7, 2013
Atlantic County Sheriff James McGettigan says GOP County Executive Dennis Levinson showed poor judgment when he used taxpayer funds to hire a lawyer for works for harcore pornography websites to serve as a labor attorney.
McGettigan, the Democratic candidate for County Executive, said that lawyer Eric Bernstein "moderates chat.ynotmasters.com, a website dispensing free legal advice to pornographers. @@@###$$x.com (Edited to eliminated link) is billed as the ultimate adult webmaster resource site, and is a one-stop-shop for peddlers of the online hardcore pornography industry."
In 2003, the Star-Ledger said that Bernstein, "the municipal attorney for five towns in Hunterdon, Warren and Somerset counties has been offering free legal advice to operators of pornography Web sites as a way to drum up business for the Internet law portion of his Warren Township-based practice." Bernstein has lost many of his government clients over the last four years.
“The public has a right to know why and how the Levinson Administration hired this porn lawyer, and whether he’s representing us on our dime, not pornographers," said McGettigan. "As of this morning there are 234 sex offenders in Atlantic County. We don’t need a representative of our government giving away free advice on how to skirt the law and access hardcore pornography,”
Carole M
1:08 pm on Monday, January 7, 2013
No doubt the members of the Hillsdale council will expect towns people to patronize local businesses, yet they had to go to Warren for an attorney with questionable moral practice?
Kat
2:32 pm on Monday, January 7, 2013
They couldn't find ANYONE in Bergen County, nevermind their own town?
Martin Ward
1:29 pm on Monday, January 7, 2013
I wish the new council members well. They were elected to keep taxes low, if these changes work towards that end, I am all for it. If these changes were made for political patronage I have a problem with that. The proof is yet to come and a lot of people are watching.
westwood kid
4:25 pm on Monday, January 7, 2013
jason was elected to do what? this is the guy who was thrown off the planning board for giving his friends permission to do things in town and then voting no for the people he did not like. if the town of hillsdale wants to have a great year they will keep an eye wide open on this guy and his shady dealing. using his power in the town to gain stuff is not helping the town of hillsdale only hurting the tax payers.
George
1:31 pm on Thursday, January 10, 2013
The choice of attorney certainly raises some issues, not sure why the new council would go this direction. Not really starting out on the right note here.
Martin Ward
3:43 pm on Thursday, January 10, 2013
I looked at our new attorney's client list and find no recent municipal work in Bergen County. I see a lot of labor work but not what they were hired for. Secondly, I understand Mr. Meyerson's comment that attorneys do not always pick their clients. However, going to a porno convention setting up a booth and soliciting clients is not what Mr. Meyerson represented to the borough. Does Hillsdale want to be represented by someone who also reps porn stars. There must be a better choice.