State Health Commissioner Praises Summer Blood Donation Program

New Jersey Health Commissioner Mary E. O’Dowd praises a blood donation program that targeted blood drives in the work place and increased the number of drives in New Jersey by 450 this summer.

The following is a Letter to the Editor submitted by New Jersey Health and Senior Services Commissioner Mary E. O'Dowd: Dear Editor, Hospitals depend on a ready supply of blood every day to perform surgery and treat trauma victims. Thanks to the generous support of New Jersey businesses and their employees, we made great strides in increasing New Jersey’s blood supply this summer. Our 2012 Summer Workplace Blood Drive Campaign, called The Need for Blood Doesn’t Take a Vacation,was hosted by the NJ Workplace Blood Donor Coalition, which represents some of New Jersey’s biggest employers. Coalition members promoted the need for workplace blood drives to thousands of New Jersey business leaders and public officials. What’s unique about this …

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Letter to the Editor: Nutley School Board Race

Author makes a case for candidate Alan Thomas

Dear Editor: Though eclipsed by the Presidential race, another very important election is for the three seats on the Nutley Board of Education.  This is the first time that the Board of Education election is being held in November and the first in which the budget is not being voted on .   Nutley’s schools face special challenges over the next few years: continued caps on budget growth, the loss of tax revenue and economic changes that are forcing many tough decisions regarding programs.  These are decisions that will affect the future prospects of the next generation of Nutley children.   It is more critical than ever that we elect candidates who will focus on the issues that will determine how well our children are prepared to compete in…

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Letters to the Editor

Letter to the Editor: Gov. Christie Has Failed to Bring Jobs to N.J.

The bottom line is that Christie’s corporate welfare does nothing for small businesses like mine, but serves up a big helping of future debt to New Jersey taxpayers

There is a reason Governor Christie is not touting the "NJ Comeback" in his speech tonight.  Governor Christie's policies have failed to bring jobs back to NJ after the recession, and conditions for the middle class continue to worsen.  Under his leadership, New Jersey was one of only six states last year with an economy that did not grow.  Our unemployment rate is 9.8% - the fourth highest in the nation, and the highest rate for the state since 1977.   As a small business owner, I know it is impossible to grow and create new jobs when the middle class is hurting- the strength of small businesses like mine is tied to a strong middle class.  When the middle class suffers, small businesses suffer, too.  We thrive when our communities thrive…

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Moving Elections To November Has Politicized School Board Races

The goal was to get a greater voter turnout for school board elections, but the result has been more pressure on school board and municipal candidates, this author says.

This Election Day — for the first time since 1903 — voters in most New Jersey’s school districts will elect local Boards of Education members on the same Nov. 6th ballot as candidates for municipal, county, state and federal offices, including the President. Ninety-percent of all New Jersey school districts – or 468 districts – hastened to switch elections from April to November after the state approved enabling legislation this year. Districts believe the change will boost voter-participation in school races where the average turnout was a dismal 15 percent for over a decade. But, if the number of inquiries my political consulting practice is fielding from municipal and school board candidates are any indication; this change has created …

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On WPIX News: Bloomfield Show Supports Blind Teenager

WPIX news reported on Friday night's 5:00 news program the story of former Bloomfield High School student Jessica Pastore, who is having a musical performed in her honor at BHS this weekend.

  Sixteen-year-old Jessica Pastore tap dances, swims, goes to the theater, sings in her church choir and “always has a smile on her face,” according to friends and family.  In fact, she is well-known in the Bloomfield community for her cheerful, bubby personality and game-for-anything attitude. What makes Jessica remarkable is that she is blind.  Diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor at the age of five, Jessica last year underwent surgery to relieve the pressure on her optic nerve.  Instead, when she awoke from the operation her vision was gone. Jessica’s parents, Tony and Myra Pastore, sat down with Patch this week to discuss their daughter and a theatrical show being performed in her honor.  Talent Time, a charitable theater company …

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Middle Schooler Question: To Cell or Not To Cell?

The mother of a rising sixth grader, Jessica Henry, writes about the cell phone dilemma.

  The “back to school” catalogs have started rolling in, but I still haven’t quite figured out my rising sixth grader’s cell phone situation. I want him to have a cell phone so we can reach each other as needed, but I am concerned about too much texting, too much Internet access and too much distraction. To find out how others deal with this pressing issue, I turned to the experts: a group of middle school parents, taken solely from my email contacts, to ask about their cell phone decisions.  As a preliminary matter, I wanted to know whether these parents were planning to buy their child a cell phone. Although the overwhelming majority of parents said yes, a small minority indicated that they were holding off—at least for the time being. …

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To the Editor: Ban Public Funds to Boy Scouts

If the Boy Scouts can openly discriminate against gays, then it should not receive any of our tax dollars.

  Ladies and Gentlemen, In 2000, the United States Supreme Court affirmed the right of the Boy Scouts of America not to admit gay boys nor gay men to it organization. As a result I sent letters to many which, while affirming the right of the Boy Scouts, also advised that, as a private organization and one in which their right of discrimination was affirmed by the Court, should not receive any public funding. Public funding means your tax dollars and mine. Then in 2010, the United States Postal Service issued a stamp commemorating the Boy Scouts. Although the cost of stamps is not part of the US budget, the United States Postal Service is a self funding public governmental agency. I wrote again to many that the use of that stamp, which has …

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Loren Svetvilas

9:24 pm on Wednesday, July 25, 2012

I have for a long time spoke against the BSA for their policies against gays. Back in around 2000, I submitted a cartoon to the The New Yorker magazine. It depicted two scouts standing alongside each other, with one scout proudly showing his peer his sash. The proud scout stating, "And this one I got for gay bashing..." Needless to say, the magazine did not accept the cartoon. (About 6-months …   more ›

New Jersey's Voting Future?

The following opinion piece was written by Essex County Clerk Christopher J. Durkin.

  Imagine an Election Day with no polling sites, no poll workers and no voting machines. Imagine doing away with our traditional pilgrimage to that school or fire house or church to register our decision on a presidential election, mayoral election, or maybe even a ballot question; or an election where every vote is cast before Election Day by mail-in voting. It may be hard to picture in New Jersey but that is how elections are conducted in states around the country. The people of Oregon decided by ballot initiative in 1998 to make the change to all "Vote by Mail" elections while the Washington State Legislature passed a law instructing every county to conduct only "Vote by Mail" elections in 2011. In Oregon, the counties have designated …

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Affordable Housing Fight Goes Back to the Courts

Housing advocate and municipalities try to prevent the state from taking their funds.

The battle between the Christie administration and the Fair Share Housing Center continues. This time, the two sides are going to court Friday over as much as $200 million in local affordable housing trust funds. So far, the Appellate Division of Superior Court has been kind to the Cherry Hill-based housing advocates, but this case could be a different story. To help balance the budget, Gov. Chris Christie recommended the state use the trust fund money. The administration appears to be within its legal right to do so, as the law creating the funds—and the developer fees that municipalities levy to subsidize them—specified municipalities had to “commit to spend” the money within four years. The clock strikes midnight on July 17. But as …

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Column: Christie's Battle With Dems Quite a Show

After spending vetoes, governor calls for a special legislative session on tax cuts.

Gov. Chris Christie had the last word on state spending last Friday, vetoing most of the new expenditures the Democrats had sought within the budget and in separate bills. And then he went further, calling the Legislature back for a command performance, a special summer session on Monday to try to bully them into the tax cut he has been seeking all year. Rarely, when there is divided government, does the theater that is the process of enacting a state budget in New Jersey disappoint. And that’s what all of this is, political theater. Because the Democrats are not going to pass Christie’s 10 percent across-the-board tax cut proposal as it gives more money back to the wealthy than to the poor and middle class. And there’s no way Christie is …

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