WEST ORANGE, NJ — This year’s Township Council election sees six candidates vying for three open seats and comes at a pivotal time for West Orange, with taxes remaining relatively high, redevelopment continuing to shape the future of the community and senior citizen needs coming to the forefront of public consciousness, and those running believe they are up to the task.
But with six people in the race, it can be difficult to keep track of who supports what; fortunately for residents, incumbents Jerry Guarino, Michelle Casalino and Joe Krakoviak, and challengers Susan Scarpa, Akil Khalfani and Monica Perkowski sat down with the West Orange Chronicle to discuss their views on the issues impacting the township they wish to serve.
According to Guarino, the Township Council is already making headway on preventing further tax increases through the pursuit of the Edison Village development. With Phase 1 well under way, the incumbent said businesses are showing a real interest in moving to West Orange, which would offset residents’ property taxes if they decide to set up shop. He promised to continue his efforts to attract businesses to the community if re-elected, as he has done as the council’s liaison to the Downtown West Orange Alliance, referring to the recent commercial Realtor Open House as an example.
“We need to do everything we can do for our residents to take the burden off,” Guarino said in an Oct. 28 interview. “Our goal is to stabilize the taxes to stop the increases and to make sure we maintain the level of services and the quality of life for our residents.”
If re-elected, Guarino, a financial consultant, vowed to resume his support for initiatives such as the jitney expansion, which he believes will increase property values.
Casalino said those with doubts about her commitment to fiscal responsibility need only look at her track record as a Board of Education member, which includes saving the township millions through implementing solutions such as reregistration policies and charging rent for facility usage. She pointed out that she also long advocated for zero-based budgeting — which the board and the council now use — and made it a point to scrutinize line items and ask departments about their costs. Though she has only served on the council for a relatively short time following predecessor Patty Spango’s resignation, Casalino said she used those same practices during the most recent budget season and believes she made a difference.
That difference can best be seen in the way the library funding was handled, Casalino said. The incumbent recalled that she urged library director David Cubie to meet with township chief financial officer John Gross after reviewing the WOPL’s budget and not seeing the same deficit he did. Cubie complied, and she said the two were able to rework the numbers enough so that no library employee had to be laid off. She said she also advocated for the council to bond for the WOPL’s capital improvements projects, which has allowed the institution to focus its monies on buying books and funding programming. And, along with Krakoviak, she even helped launch the Friends of the Library organization to further offset expenses.
Krakoviak’s philosophy about how to prevent tax increases can be summed up in two words: smarter spending. And that is not something that the council is doing, he said, when during the past four years the budget has increased by 7.7 percent, the tax levy has gone up 3.9 percent and the tax rate has increased by 4.8 percent. Things will continue to get worse unless the council members realize that they cannot continue to pay for “nice-to-haves,” he said. The incumbent stressed that the town can only afford the necessities.
“It’s just like running your household — you just say ‘no,’” Krakoviak said in an Oct. 27 interview. “The entire reason that I’m in this (race) is to try to return West Orange to the affordable, quality community that we want it to be. It used to be the place where you got the best value for your property, and now it’s not because our taxes and spending have gone up so drastically.”
The incumbent, who is a public relations consultant by trade, said that he is the only member of the council willing to make fiscally responsible decisions. And while he acknowledged that he has developed a reputation for being a contrarian as a result, he said he only votes against ideas that make no sense. He said that included bonding for school projects that the Board of Education should pay for, giving the recycling center vendor two years of free rent for “phantom” charges it claims the town owes and essentially granting Llewellyn Park property owners $550,000 to cover cost overruns for sewer and road projects. If re-elected, the sitting councilman promised to continue voting in the best fiscal interests of West Orange.
Fiscal responsibility is also a hallmark of Scarpa’s campaign. If elected, she said she would carefully assess the budget and trim any fat she finds. She added that she would push for safer and more walkable streets so that businesses will be encouraged to come to West Orange, thereby increasing the commercial tax base. She acknowledged that implementing Complete Streets, a holistic roadway safety and beautification plan, will not be easy since so many of the town’s main roads are controlled by Essex County, but she said the council can work with county officials while completing whatever projects it can on its own.
In order to improve its tax situation, Khalfani said West Orange must reduce its spending. But it also must introduce new revenue streams, he said. To do so, the Essex County College professor said he would call for a townwide development plan of action that would focus all future projects on bringing in money for the township. By doing so, he said, he would seek to increase the amount of revenue coming from businesses to 25 to 30 percent instead of the current 16 percent.
If elected to the council, Perkowski said she would take a “hard look” at the budget to see where she could push back against the administration and insist on cuts. While providing good health care to township employees is vital, she said it is also important to make sure that residents are not paying too much to fund it as prices continue to rise. She said it would be her goal to find a balance between them. And the professional marketer also wants to drive commercial businesses into town so the community can obtain increased revenue from them.
Development will undoubtedly play a large part in the township’s foreseeable future. As such, the candidates know exactly how they want to handle it moving forward.
The council majority’s support for Edison Village has not made it popular among some residents, but Guarino said many community members have told him they are excited to see progress being made on the project. Guarino said he is thrilled too, pointing out that the development will bring businesses to the downtown area. And he hopes that even more commercial development can be included in the future phases, admitting his desire to see the planned townhouses swapped out for commercial businesses. Its proximity to the Edison museum would make it an excellent destination for stores and restaurants, he said.
The area near the Turtle Back Zoo is another place Guarino feels would be a great spot for commercial development. And he said he has already started working on that idea, commissioning Essex County to conduct a study showing visitor demographics that can be used to attract businesses. McLoone’s Boathouse is too expensive for many people, he said, and that section of Northfield Avenue does not offer much else in the way of eateries. But he said having an affordable family restaurant nearby will make it a destination for zoo visitors and attract other businesses in the process.
Casalino has already made a big impact on the township’s push to bring businesses within its borders during her short time on the council, she said, explaining that it was her idea to host the commercial Realtors open house, which attracted approximately 50 real estate agents and investors. That was an important event, she said, because it enabled West Orange to show off its assets and demonstrate why vendors should set up shop locally while networking.
As a real estate professional with a marketing background, Casalino said she would continue to use her experience and contacts to attract businesses to town. She said her knowledge of the real estate business will also come in handy as the township moves forward with Edison Village. Likewise, she is looking forward to returning the Valley to its past life as a vibrant commercial area through the recently approved Central Avenue redevelopment area.
Hiring a full-time planner with business development experience would be an excellent way to attract businesses to the township, according to Krakoviak. The incumbent said that part-time acting planner Paul Grygiel is stretched too thin between the agendas for the planning and zoning boards, and West Orange needs someone with the time to focus on honing its commercial areas. Likewise, he said the Downtown Alliance needs more business professionals involved because it is not nearly as effective as it should be. And he said the township has to streamline its building processes because West Orange has the reputation of being a difficult community to do business with, causing vendors to stay away.
Above all, Krakoviak stressed that the township should get away from residential development. The school system is already stuffed to the gills with students, he said, and complexes like Edison Village will only add more. The constant mindset to expand the housing stock is truly “killing us,” the incumbent said.
Scarpa, too, thinks commercial development is the key to the township’s long-term success, and that it is necessary for the township to hire a full-time planner who could ensure that all projects complement one another. Developments today are approved “piecemeal” and often do not even come to fruition due to a lack of resources, but having a planner with a singular vision for the whole community would correct that problem, she said.
Meanwhile, Scarpa thinks she is the right candidate to help guide the Edison Village development due to her professional expertise. Having owned a telecommunications company before taking her current position as a speech pathologist in the West Orange School District, she said her project management experience will enable her to effectively oversee Edison Village and make sure that everything goes as West Orange wants. Additionally, she will push to have family-oriented businesses occupy the complex’s retail space in order to cater to locals.
Khalfani’s development plan of action is a big part of his method to offset the residential tax burden, and he accordingly knows exactly what such a plan would entail. The West Orange African Heritage Organization member said the plan would create a holistic, comprehensive vision for future development that would eliminate any up the hill/down the hill mentality. It would also seek to capitalize on West Orange assets such as the Edison museum and Turtle Back Zoo by recruiting complementary businesses to move near them. For instance, he said a family-oriented establishment like Funplex would have attracted museum visitors and earned the town revenue more so than a Kessler rehabilitation center.
A full-time planner is needed to create such a plan of action, Khalfani said. Additionally, he said the township needs someone like him involved if it is ever going to be successful.
“I’m a visionary,” Khalfani said in an Oct. 20 interview. “I have innovative ideas and ways of thinking, and I’m not tied to any one person or entity. And so I think that we need vision and visionaries in town to bring about a new way of doing things.”
Bringing in new businesses is also essential to Perkowski’s goal of preventing higher taxes. She agrees that the council must hire a full-time planner who will update and maintain West Orange’s master plan while also shopping the town to desirable businesses. In addition, she said, building better relationships with the community’s largest property owners is a good idea.
“They obviously want to rent their space, we have an interest in having their space rented from the tax perspective,” Perkowski said in an Oct. 21 interview. “So if we can work together to drive good partners (to West Orange) — not ones that are coming in and fleeing in six months or nine months or a year — I think that would benefit us all.”
The needs of resident senior citizens have become a hot-button issue this election season ever since Krakoviak’s ordinance for a senior advisory board was shot down by the council in a rare first-reading rejection. That ordinance might be dead, but the six candidates have plenty of ideas about the direction senior services should move in next.
Guarino said he was not opposed to the idea of a senior board — just the specific one proposed by Krakoviak, saying that having 15 members in the group was excessive and adding that he wished Krakoviak had consulted with the rest of the council when crafting the ordinance. He said he would be willing to approve a senior advisory board if the council could come together and devise one acceptable to all.
But Guarino feels West Orange’s seniors do not lack services; the incumbent said the township offers plenty of benefits to its elderly, and he has refused to cut any senior funding during the budget process. He said brings suggestions from seniors at Community House meetings to the rest of the council, which often puts them into action. Moving forward, Guarino said he wants to continue working with the township’s grant writer and the county to initiate even more senior services. He also intends to keep pushing for Complete Streets to become a reality through his Pedestrian Safety Advisory Board, stressing that safe roadways make it easier for seniors to age in place.
Like Guarino, Casalino said she supports the concept of a senior board but did not think anything would come of it if the township administration was not on board, so she voted against the ordinance. She admitted that she did not like how the vote went down and said she wished the council members could have discussed the measure before deciding its fate. In the end though, she did what she felt was best.
“If I was a political person just looking for votes, it was a no-brainer” to vote in favor of the ordinance, Casalino said in an Oct. 21 interview. “But it wasn’t right. It wasn’t being rolled out right. The premise of it wasn’t right.”
Casalino stressed that she is a staunch advocate of senior needs, adding that she is currently pursuing a grant to have Montclair State University conduct a comprehensive aging in place study for West Orange. She said she is also looking into a grant to fund a senior newsletter, and is in favor of making the senior services section of the town website much more informative about the many services already available. She is even working on a program that would give local seniors the chance to become mentors.
But Krakoviak said the resident seniors to whom he has spoken want far more than the current services offered by the township, which is why he had proposed the ordinance for a senior advisory board. Such a body would have given voice to a large part of West Orange’s population, he said, allowing the council to hear exactly what it needs. Yet the measure was rejected by a majority that the incumbent believes was only acting at the behest of the administration. Now that it has been defeated, he said he is in favor of establishing a group outside the town’s purview, though he admitted that doing so will be a more difficult process.
Helping senior citizens was one of the major reasons Scarpa decided to run for Township Council, she said, because their needs are not being met. After talking with numerous seniors at the Renna House, she said she learned that the township’s elderly have a lot of concerns that could easily be fixed for little cost. For instance, she said one woman cannot bring all of her groceries home because the town’s senior jitney has a three-bag limit. But she does not feel that the council is doing anything, and she wants that to change.
“These are simple things and if we were more aware and tuned in as a community, we could make a difference,” Scarpa said in an Oct. 27 interview. “We want to think that everything is OK because we all want to do our best for seniors. And we like to think that everything’s OK, but if you really talk to them you’ll find it’s not.”
Scarpa said she would be in favor of reworking Krakoviak’s ordinance so that it is acceptable to all council members because she believes a senior advisory board is necessary. A board would allow the council to know exactly what senior residents’ needs are, the candidate said, and that will make it easier for the township to pursue grants. Additionally, she said she is interested in looking into a shared housing model in which seniors can take renters into their homes. That way, she said, they will have a means of offsetting their tax burden.
Khalfani pointed out that he has spoken in favor of senior citizens’ needs at past Township Council meetings. Considering 40 percent of West Orange households contain at least one person over age 60 — plus the fact that these seniors pay taxes despite not having any children in the school district — Khalfani said that he does not know why the elderly should not have a board of their own. If elected, he said he would put forward another ordinance for such a body on top of calling for more accountability on behalf of local seniors.
Perkowski said she is also in favor of a senior board for three reasons: a board would contain volunteers who could take on work that exceeds the senior services division’s limited resources; a board would be able to provide research and information from conventions that could help guide the township’s own initiatives; and board members would vet and prioritize the senior concerns so that the council will not have to look into each one.
Yet before any senior board is formed, Perkowski said the council should initiate a survey so that seniors can share what exactly they need and what existing services are working.
Be sure to vote for three of the six candidates for Township Council on Tuesday, Nov. 8.
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Who is going to reduce my property taxes, which is ridiculously high and increases every year. I don’t receive pay increase every year compare to my tax increase. Who is going to get West orange property taxes down?