$160M Vocational-Technical High School Grand Opening in Secaucus

West New York (NJ) Bans Airbnb

West New York adopts ordinance banning short-term rentals, despite concerns from local Airbnb hosts

Hudson Report, 20-Jan-18

Short term vacation rentals, of 30 days or less, will be banned in West New York, after the town's Board of Commissioners adopted an ordinance at their Jan. 18 meeting. The measure is largely a response to numerous complaints officials received regarding people using Airbnb, the popular short-term rental listing service, in town.

It also is an effort to preserve the town's limited housing stock, given that it is only 1.3 square miles and has an estimated 54,000 residents.

But the agreement didn't come before at least five local Airbnb hosts urged the board to better regulate the rentals, as opposed to banning them outright.

Mayor Felix Roque and the commissioners signaled they would be open to such regulation down the line, but needed to respond to resident complaints now.

"Thank you for educating me a lot about Airbnb," Roque told the hosts, after they spoke. "And there might be a way, down the road, that we could sit down and try to make this a reality for West New York. I saw the bad part of Airbnb. Now, we're seeing the other side. I would love to revisit this, as soon as I get more information."

West New York native Christopher Appelgren struggled to pay property taxes on his family house in town, which he purchased many years ago. Therefore, he began hosting Airbnb users to compensate. "I have to say, it's been an incredible help for my family," Appelgren told the commissioners, during the ordinance's public hearing section. "I think that instead of banning Airbnb, maybe we can look at a solution that can help the town."

He floated the idea of adding an additional tax on those renting their properties to Airbnb users: "It would alleviate the property taxes for the rest of the town, which cost a lot."

Hudson County average home sale prices

Avora condos in Weehawken selling long before they're built

Source: Data from NJ Division of Taxation

Weehawken Police Director Jeff Welz Makes $84,966/Year

Who is Hudson County's highest paid police chief? The answer may surprise you

The Jersey Journal, 13-Dec-14

By Terrence T. McDonald

Can you guess which Hudson County town pays its top cop the most?

Is it Jersey City, which FBI statistics show has the highest violent crime rate by far, at 7.3 violent crimes per 1,000 residents in 2012? Nope. That city's chief, Philip Zacche, ranks No. 5 on the list with his $194,069 salary even though he oversees the largest police force in the county, at about 840 officers.

Is it West New York, which has the next highest violent crime rate, 3.8 violent crimes per 1,000 residents? No again. The town has no chief, and Robert Antolos, its police director, makes $70,000, putting him next to last on the list.

No, the chief with the highest pay is Bayonne, the county's southernmost municipality and a city with a population of 65,028. Its new chief, Drew Niekrasz, makes $238,394 a year overseeing Bayonne's roughly 155-officer force.

That's a full $33,394 more than the salary of the county's second highest-paid chief, Union City's Richard Molinari, who makes $205,000. And it's $63,394 more than Gov. Chris Christie is paid.

Niekrasz, who joined the force in 1988, isn't the only guy running Bayonne's police force, either. Robert Kubert, the public safety director, makes $70,000 (Kubert also helps to run the fire department and EMS).

And this for a city with the county's fifth lowest crime rate, 2.1 per 1,000 residents.

Across the Hudson River, New York City Police Commissioner Bill Bratton, who oversees over 34,000 police officers, has a base salary of $205,180.

Niekrasz became chief in July, succeeding Ralph Scianni, who made $234,000 a year when he retired.

Bayonne Mayor James Davis, a cop himself, said he didn't know his city was home to the county's highest paid police chief. Davis said even though the chief isn't part of a contract, contractual obligations to the city's two police unions help to keep the chief's salary high.

The city's contract with its police superiors guarantees a 15 percent pay differential between ranks. Davis said he hopes to negotiate a better deal for taxpayers for the next contract, and he wants to have a contract for the chief and his deputy so pay details are "all spelled out," he said.

"At some point, it's getting to be too much to hand people percentage raises," Davis said.

Of course, Davis may not be mayor when this contract expires – in December 2018, seven months after the next Bayonne mayor's race.

The 14 police chiefs and police directors in Hudson County (only Bayonne and Jersey City have men in both positions) make an average salary of $147,186. That includes the county's top cop, Sheriff Frank X. Schillari.

Three of the men – there are no women in either position throughout the county – make more than $200,000 and five make less than $100,000. Of those five, one, Weehawken Police Director Jeff Welz, has a second public job, co-director of North Hudson Regional Fire & Rescue, that gives him an additional $84,462.

The county's median household income is $58,722.

There is no correlation between the size of a police force and the pay of its chief. Zacche, who runs the Jersey City police department along with Public Safety Director James Shea, who makes $185,000, heads a department 13 times the size of Secaucus' force and yet makes a smidgen less than its last chief, Dennis Corcoran.

Weehawken Mayor Richard Turner said chiefs in smaller towns don't necessarily have fewer duties.

"The bigger the structure, the more backup there is," Turner said. "You may have one chief and five deputies. In a small town, you may have one chief and no deputies."

He added: "It all kind of washes out."

Census figures show salaries for New Jersey public employees are some of the highest in the nation, especially for police personnel. Police officers here in the Garden State earn about 40 percent higher than they do in the rest of the nation, figures show.

Full list of Hudson County police chief/director salaries

Bayonne Chief Drew Niekrasz: $283,394

Union City Chief Richard Molinari: $205,000

North Bergen Chief Robert Dowd: $203,168

Secaucus Chief Dennis Corcoran (retired): $194,137

Jersey City Chief Philip Zacche: $194,069

Kearny Chief John P. Dowie: $190,446

Jersey City Public Safety Director James Shea: $185,000

Hoboken Chief Kenneth Ferrante: $162,000

Harrison Chief Derek Kearns: $161,817

Hudson County Sheriff Frank Schillari: $117,938

East Newark Chief Anthony Monteiro: $94,527.26

Weehawken Police Director Jeff Welz: $84,966

Bayonne Police Director Robert Kubert: $70,000

West New York Police Director Robert Antolos: $70,000

Guttenberg Police Director Michael Caliguiro: $36,334 (also the town's administrator for an additional $36,334)

Salaries include longevity pay where applicable

County high school may move from North Bergen to Secaucus

County high school may move from North Bergen to Secaucus

Weehawken Reporter,

by Al Sullivan

With additional money being generated through the state, a plan to move the North Bergen campus of the Hudson County Schools of Technology to Secaucus seems to be on the agenda again after being set aside in 2011.

The move would not affect the Montgomery Avenue campus in Jersey City, one of the concerns that were raised when the project was proposed.

The new facility will move to a site currently occupied by a dinosaur park, which recently received a two year extension on its contract.

“I’m guessing they will start construction after the contract with the dinosaur park expires,” said Secaucus Mayor Michael Gonnelli.

Freeholder Bill O’Dea said that by having the Jersey City campus remain where it is, he has no objection to the Secaucus location.

The Hudson County Board of Freeholders is expected to revive the plans over the next few months for a possible approval in early 2015.

“The Jersey City campus will remain as is – they’re adding classrooms and a new gym -- which was my biggest concern of losing County Prep from Jersey City,” O’Dea said. “Since the Jersey City campus remains intact, the concerns I had about the remote location have been ameliorated.”

The county applied to the New Jersey Schools Development Authority in 2011 for funding that would revive a project first suggested in 2001, in order to secure the millions of dollars needed to construct a new campus on property already owned by the county in Secaucus.

The Schools of Technology are countywide public high schools to which the area’s students must apply for admission. The schools affected by the move would likely be High Tech High School, at 2000 85th St. and Tonnelle Avenue in North Bergen, and County Prep, at 525 Montgomery St. in Jersey City.

But the project was stalled partly by the downturn in the economy.

The original plans called for building a new Schools of Technology campus in Secaucus’ Laurel Hill park, a county-owned park that could accommodate 480 students from North Bergen and additional students from the campus in Jersey City. Both properties would then be sold to help cover the costs of the new building.

The new plan would leave the Jersey City campus alone. It was always a school structure and recently renovated. The students would move from the North Bergen building, a converted 100-year-old factory.

Although the North Bergen facility has been modified significantly, officials said the place still had problems. Also, Tonnelle Avenue is increasingly becoming a dense commercial area and, officials said, the school does not fit in with the type of development taking place around it.

O’Dea was among the outspoken critics of the original plan and demanded that Schools of Technology keep a small satellite campus open in Jersey City, probably somewhere in the Journal Square area.

O’Dea and other Jersey City freeholders in 2011 said they were concerned about how remote the Secaucus campus was, and the toll traveling to and from it would have on students that come from other parts of Hudson County such as Bayonne or Kearny. By keeping a full facility in Jersey City – which is mostly attended by kids from Jersey City, Bayonne, and some from North Hudson, kids would be less burdened.

Could be a good thing for Secaucus

The original estimated cost for the building was nearly $200 million although the latest plan appears to be about $150 million if approved. The state would pay about 59 percent of the total cost, while the county would have to pay the remaining $61.5 million.

The move comes at a time when Secaucus has authorized the expansion of its existing middle school, and raised questions about what the impact might be on the local school system.

Mayor Michael Gonnelli, who had expressed some concerns several years ago when the project was first proposed, said new proposal looks more viable.

“We didn’t have a lot of information back then and it was a much bigger project,” Gonnelli said. “It’s looks to me that the county has put a lot of money into its Jersey City school, and that part of the school isn’t coming over to Secaucus. This is a smaller project than first proposed. This reduces the scope and the number of buses that will be coming into Secaucus.”

Gonnelli said people in Secaucus had raised concerns about increased bus traffic, “But the county has come up with a plan that would have the buses coming off of [Turnpike exit] 15x and along County Road, not on County Avenue or other streets. There is a positive. This will be a beautiful facility and provide opportunities for Secaucus kids.”

There is a potential for expanding programs to local students through cooperative agreements made possible by the move, not possible previously because of how remote the current location is to Secaucus.

“The only downside may be where it is located near the wetlands,” Gonnelli said. “But I’m going to meet with Bill Sheehan [the Hackensack Riverkeeper] and our environmental committee to discuss it. The project is being proposed for uplands, and we might have an opportunity to provide some environmental education programs as a result of this.”
 

Hoboken, Jersey City and Weehawken plan regional bike-sharing program

Hoboken, Jersey City and Weehawken plan regional bike-sharing program

The Jersey Journal,  17-Dec-2013

A new regional bicycle-sharing program may link three Hudson County cities by this spring.

Hoboken, Jersey City and Weehawken are working together to launch a regional bike-sharing program, which would include at least 650 bicycles and solar-powered parking stations, officials said in a statement late Monday. The cities plan to select a single vendor for the program through a competitive contracting process, which has yet to be approved by the cities' councils.

The councils plan to vote on the solicitation process at their next meetings.

The proposed launch for the program is June 2014, according to Hoboken City Council documents. The cities hope to install — at a minimum —300 bikes in Jersey City, 250 in Hoboken and 100 in Weehawken, according to officials. The program could later be expanded to other municipalities.

The program is designed to allow participants to travel between and throughout the three cities via bicycle, officials said.

“We know that our transportation network is a regional one that connects our three waterfront communities, which is why it was important to partner on this initiative," Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop said in a statement.

The announcement comes roughly one month after Hoboken's trial bike-sharing program came to a close. At the time, Mayor Dawn Zimmer indicated that the city would be exploring its vendor and funding options before deciding how to move forward with the program. She also said that the city would be looking into the possibility of a regional program, connecting Hoboken, Jersey City and Weehawken.

Hudson County has also been mulling its own bicycle-sharing program. The county's planning division launched a feasibility study Oct. 18, through a $95,000 grant. The study is expected to be complete in July.

The proposed regional program seeks a vendor that would allow online registration, walk-up users and that would provide bikes with built-in GPS and use-tracking systems.Officials said the program could ease parking issues and encourage local shopping.

“Following Hoboken’s extremely successful bike share pilot this summer, we are ready to scale up to a full-scale, regional bike share program,” Zimmer said in a statement. “This program will improve our region’s transportation resiliency and provide another low-cost, healthy transportation and recreation option.”