DeFUSCO ON THE RECORD
"My understanding is that the property owner is willing to begin a good faith negotiation, but not with this current administration and not before the upcoming election when our city’s leadership for the next four years will be decided."
GIATTINO ON THE RECORD
"This is very important to all of us," said Council President Jennifer Giattino, who cast one of the eight votes in favor of invoking eminent domain on first reading. "To make sure this is policy not politics, the second reading will be after the election."
DEFUSCO FOR MAYOR CAMPAIGN PROMISE
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| Xanadu-on-the-Hudson |
Hindsight is twenty-twenty-- or is it?
Michael DeFusco's statement in September 2017 and Council President Jen Giattino's one month later were aligned like the sun and moon in full eclipse.
In September, DeFusco "understood" that the UDD property owner would not enter a "good faith negotiation" for sale of the property with the Zimmer administration. Ever wonder how DeFusco knew about the UDD property owner's willingness to negotiate?
In October Jen Giattino executed on Mike DeFusco's "let's wait until after the election" strategy.
The rest is history.
Well, the gal looking to replace Jen Giattino on the Council, Cristin Cricco-Powell ("CCP") is rallying folks to come out to tomorrow night's City Council meeting. Why? Because...
It's back!
Mayor Bhalla's is putting eminent domain for the UDD site up for a Council vote, and CCP hopes that public sentiment will help persuade a council majority who seem to reflexively vote down whatever Bhalla puts up.
Today, CCP sent out a statement, which I'll publish in full.
Dear Neighbors and Friends,
My family has lived here for four generations and our city has transformed drastically in that time. I moved back to Hoboken at age 8, in 1982. Back then, the waterfront was dominated by dying shipyards, rotting docks, and working factories. The water quality and air quality were terrible, and there was very little opportunity for residents to safely enjoy our slice of the mighty Hudson. It has taken nearly 3 decades of fighting to get our waterfront to where it is now, a battle valiantly led by the Fund for a Better Waterfront.
Our waterfront park is 80% complete. I don't want to compromise our long-held dream for a contiguous waterfront park, and neither should you. Please come out and join me at the August 7th council meeting at 7 PM and ask the Council to support eminent domain on Union Dry Dock.
I believe that granting Mayor Bhalla authority to use eminent domain is the right thing to do. A quick history for those who are new to the issue: In 2017, Mayor Zimmer learned that the Union Dry Dock was closing down its operations and tried to initiate negotiations to purchase the property. UDD refused to talk to the City. Mayor Zimmer feared that without quick action, the opportunity to acquire the property for open space could be lost forever.
She asked the City Council for immediate authority to use eminent domain to protect the City's interests, specifically telling the Council that the matter was urgent. Then-Council President Jennifer Giattino, who was running for Mayor at the time, postponed the vote despite the strong objections of Mayor Zimmer, then-Councilman Bhalla, and Councilman Jim Doyle. Giattino openly admitted that she was concerned about politics and postponed action until after the election. Shortly after the vote’s postponement, New York Waterway took advantage and purchased the land.
We can't be 100% certain what the end result would have been of starting eminent domain proceedings in October of 2017, but we lost the opportunity to find out. Now that NYWW's lawsuit against Hoboken has been thrown out, we have another chance. We can't afford to postpone or vote down authorization for eminent domain again and put our acquisition of UDD at risk.
NYWW has consistently behaved with bad faith in negotiations attempted by the City. The city offered NYWW an alternate location at Erie Lackawanna, a location that two independent studies found was better than the Union Dry Dock location. NYWW turned the location down. I suspect, and I'm not alone, that the end game for NYWW is to push for rezoning and try to develop the site the way they developed their land in Weehawken.
I hope that the City Council will support Mayor Bhalla’s proposal for eminent domain to purchase Union Dry Dock for us, the residents of Hoboken. This is about what we want our city to be. And having grown up with an industrial waterfront, I can tell you that I'd rather watch my children ride their scooters along an unbroken stretch of the Hudson River than sacrifice this land to NYWW to use as a refueling station.
I hope to see you at the August 7th council meeting for the vote’s first reading. It starts at 7 PM. Let's raise our voices and let the council know that we won't go back to an industrial waterfront.
Thank you,
Cristin Cricco-Powell
Candidate, 6th Ward City Council
"Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it ." - George Santayana
ReplyDeleteAnybody who would play politics with the City's vital interests the way Giattino Fisher and DeFusco did in 2017 doesn't belong in public office.
ReplyDeleteAny Council Member who voted to delay eminent domain in 2017 thereby opening a window for NY Waterway to snatch up UDD, has no right to present themselves as champions of an open waterfront, because their actions not their words demonstrate they were playing politics when Hoboken needed them to be legislators interested in Hoboken's interest not their personal political (at the time Mayoral) interests. Jen and Mike played politics when they were running for Mayor and as a result Hoboken was royally screwed. So here we are, almost 2 years later, voting to authorize eminent domain when it should have happened in 2017, before New York Waterway, and all their ability to fund politicians with dark money came into play.
ReplyDeleteWho knows what was going on behind the scenes when that 2017 vote was irrationally delayed. We all know dark money Mike loves taking in that dark money. Did NY Waterway offer Mike dark money in exchange for killing an eminent domain attempt by Mayor Zimmer in 2017? I don’t trust dark money Mike as far as I can throw him. Same with Ien who has completely fallen in with him. Mike will never change. Jen should retire before she falls deeper into a pile of crap. I don’t know why she’s running only to be humiliated where she lives, again. #4thPlaceJen
These tweets tell the story of the lead up to Giattino, Fisher, and DeFusco selling out the City by allowing NYWW to purchase the property before the City Council voted on ED:
ReplyDeletehttps://mobile.twitter.com/dawnzimmernj/status/915221470950957058
I am not sure all three were in on the sell-out. There is a healthy dose of stupidity, blind ambition and spite that tends to drive their politics so that could have also played a role. What is clear is the three of them don't give a hoot about what is best for the town as a whole.
DeleteAgreed - between the three of them, it's clear they've been blinded by ambition, greed and pride to ever putting the city's interests above what they perceive to be their own.
DeleteIn 90 days, 9 hours and 39 minutes, they will be out of office.
ReplyDeleteJust thinking about all that time, hot air and dark money... Wish we could just skip all that noise.
DeleteThank you for posting this contemporaneous account from Mayor Zimmer @numberscruncher. Quite insight. Notably, Dawn at the time was a lame duck Mayor at the time with no political interest in the outcome, regarding what went (or didn’t) go down in 2017.
ReplyDeleteMay I ask a provocative question? What was going on with Fund for a Better Waterfront? Why were they for eminent domain before being against it. So strange, curious, even worrying. Why did they first, in writing, in public, on video at a City Council meeting, urge Dawn to purchase UDD, then call the move they requested "ill-advised"? I don’t get it. I’m not a city politics insider. What happened here? What we’re the players up to and how could Fund for a Better Waterfront miscalculate so terribly that they are now again urging the use of eminent domain? Something feels fishy in the Hudson but perhaps I am missing something???
From their website:
DeleteFBW letter to Hoboken City Council re: Union Dry Dock/eminent domain
October 3, 2017
Re: Eminent Domain Ordinance
Dear Council President & City Council members:
The ordinance coming before the Council this Wednesday night “authorizing the acquisition by purchase or condemnation of . . . 901 Sinatra Drive . . . owned by Union Dry Dock and Repair Company” is ill-advised and misguided for a number of reasons as follows:
• Eminent domain, the government’s power to take an individual’s private property without their consent, is a drastic action that should be used sparingly and judiciously, and only as a last resort. It is ill-advised to threaten its use at the inception of a complex land transaction such as this. This ordinance could jeopardize the ultimate success of this effort or delay its resolution for a number of years.
• The Mayor has taken this action without consulting with any City Council members or the Council Subcommittee on Community Development North. Nor has she consulted with neighborhood residents or FBW who have a vested interest in making this site part of Hoboken’s waterfront park.
• Turning this important and complicated matter into an open political issue a month before a mayoral election is certainly poor timing at best. On January 1, less than three months away, there will be a new mayor and two or three new City Council members. Since the acquisition of this site could take a number of months, even a number of years, it makes sense for the next administration develop the path forward in how to secure this site as public open space.
• A year ago, FBW retained Andrew Strauss of Andrew Strauss & Associates-Planners of Trenton, New Jersey who has specialized since the 1980s in the acquisition of land for public purposes. We have consulted with him on a regular basis for the past year and acquired considerable knowledge about the Union Dry Dock property and the owner’s attempts to sell over the past 16 years. Through Mr. Strauss, we have learned that there are a number of options for securing the site as public open space. Direct acquisition by the City of Hoboken is only one of several potentially available options.
It is critical that the City Council not just table this item, but also resolve to work swiftly to find the most cost-effective way to acquire UDD as part of a master plan to keep Hoboken’s shoreline a continuous public park.
https://betterwaterfront.org/?page_id=7354
And also from their website:
Delete9) Isn’t it an abuse of power for the City to exercise eminent domain at this site?
Under normal circumstances, acquiring a site such as this for public purposes would be done without the City resorting to condemnation proceedings. But the NY Waterway acquisition and negotiations with New Jersey Transit to become the ultimate owner were all conducted behind closed doors without notifying local officials or providing a public comment period. NY Waterway is now moving equipment to the site without first obtaining permits from the NJDEP and Army Corps of Engineers, and has ignored the overwhelming opposition from local residents and public officials. At this point, the City’s use of eminent domain may be the only tool available to prevent an unwanted and undesirable use of this part of Hoboken’s beloved waterfront.
https://betterwaterfront.org/?p=7820
Vance and the FBW are what they are. They have made significant real contributions to the City over the years, but have also been major "players" in the Hoboken political scene, often seeming to be more interested in personal agrandizement than in the issues they purport to champion.
DeleteIn 2017, Vance was supporting Mike DeFusco for Mayor and put what he saw as DeFusco's political interest ahead of the issue he claimed to be champion for.
It's truly a shame that . Vance seems in apable of saying " I was wrong" even when in hindsight he clearly was. He also opposed a far better Monarch settlement in 2016. Everyone makes mistake. The test of character is not whether you make them but whether you acknowledge and learn from them.
Fisher, DeFusco, Giattino and Vance were wrong on UDD in 2017, and they were very wrong about the Monarch settlement they sabotaged in 2016.
In real time, and even more so in hindsight, their actions are simply indefensible. Yet, not one of them has owned up to their mistakes.
Some people get so blinded by their political ambitions, spite and desire to sabotage those they see as their enemies that they will do anything including sell out their neighbors in the name of payback. This seems to have been what motivated people who dealing with UDD in 2017 or the 2016 Monarch Settlement. I personally think those folks have lost any legitimacy they earned based on their prior deeds and have no business being involved in politics any longer. Time to ride off into the sunset and go buy a BNB in some flyspeck town six states away.
Delete