In an editorial, Jersey City Ward E Councilman James Solomon explains how he will make the city more affordable if he is elected to be the next mayor.
I love Jersey City. It’s where my wife and I planted roots, raising our three daughters and sending them to our city’s public schools.
It’s where I taught environmental science and urban policy as a college professor — and where I got my second chance at life after surviving cancer at 30.
In short, this city built me. This city had my back during one of my toughest moments. So I ran for City Council in 2017 to have this city’s back. To give back to the people that make this city ours.
My campaign for Mayor today focuses on the same goal: Jersey City deserves a government as good as its people. And right now, that’s just not happening.
Too many families are wondering if they can afford to stay in the place they call home, because Jersey City is in the grips of an affordability crisis—one created by decades of machine corruption and giveaways to developers.
For years, well-connected insiders in local politics have handed out tax abatements and sweetheart deals to luxury developers, without requiring those developers to build either affordable homes or essential infrastructure.
The result? Rents and property taxes skyrock, while longtime residents are being priced out of their neighborhoods.
This is unacceptable. I refuse to let the city I love be sold off for parts while its beating heart, its people, are priced out of their homes. As Mayor, I’ll make Jersey City affordable. And here’s how I plan to do it.
First, we need to build real, affordable housing.
As mayor, I will require all new large-scale developments to include units renting at under $1,500 a month and under $1,000 a month—units that working families, seniors, and young people just starting out can actually afford.
We’ll also create dedicated workforce housing for the frontline workers who keep this city running: our teachers, firefighters, police officers, and healthcare workers. They deserve the chance to live in the city they serve.
Furthermore, I have a plan to cap runaway rent hikes. As mayor, I will enforce and expand rent control protections and pass a citywide ordinance defining ‘unconscionable’ rent hikes as more than 7%.
I will also crack down on corporate investors who buy up housing just to jack up prices. I’ve taken on powerful interests before—like when I partnered with 32BJ to ban AI software from price-gouging units across the city.
And as Mayor, I’ll keep holding developers and landlords accountable to our city.
We also need to stabilize property taxes by rooting out corruption and waste at City Hall.
I have voted no on eight budgets since first getting elected to the City Council, because our budgets keep getting balanced on the backs of working people while corporations and developers don’t even pay what they owe.
I’ve launched citywide tax audits of corporations and contractors on the City Council, clawing back millions of dollars in unpaid taxes from our corporations to fund our public schools.
I plan to do the same as Mayor, so we can cut costs, end the culture of corruption that led to this kind of waste, and finally deliver for our families.
Finally, we must invest in our young people. I’m so proud to have a plan to create 1,000 more youth summer jobs.
Through the Department of Recreation, we’ll connect 1,000 Jersey City Public Schools students with paid internships, apprenticeships, and summer jobs.
These opportunities will build skills, create pathways to good careers, and help our young people see a future for themselves right here in Jersey City.
Our city’s affordability crisis didn’t happen by accident. Decades of corruption and mismanagement brought us here. That was their policy choice. But my policy choice will be different.
As Mayor, I will do everything in my power to make Jersey City affordable again — for the people who live here, not the developers who see our skyline as their personal ATM.
The same developers that have bought our City government for over a decade are trying to do it again, making huge campaign contributions to my opponents in this race. This is exactly why I have vowed to take no campaign contributions from Jersey City developers.
The issue is not new development per se, but the fact that the development that has occurred in the past two decades has not happened in an inclusive manner that maximizes public benefits for city residents given market conditions.
Developers received tax abatements that they did not need to make a project financially viable, resulting in a windfall to them at the expense of our taxpayers.
We cannot sit by and continue to watch the City missed numerous opportunities to demand stronger community givebacks as part of new development, including affordable housing, community infrastructure including safe streets infrastructure, schools, and parks and recreational facilities.
As Mayor, my priority will not be to discourage development, but to make sure that the City is getting every possible benefit out of the development occurring.
Here is some self reporting data of cars consistenly blocking bike lanes and every time I ask the cops at grove street why they dont ticket they say because they give a courtesy. Problem is I have to ask them to first before they ask the vehicle to move.
https://reportjerseycity.com/en
No data behind any of these proposals. Developers will continue to clean our clock 2 ways. 1) over-stressing our infrastructure requiring repairs and upgrades. 2) being abated out of having to pay for any of those repairs and upgrades.