In a letter to the editor, Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla explains why voters should approve the two questions on the November 5th ballot to improve the local Open Space Trust Fund.
Dear Editor,
When heading to the polls on November 5, I’m asking Hoboken residents to please consider voting YES on municipal questions 1 and 2.
Voting YES to these two questions will substantially help our efforts to acquire additional land for open space, and develop parkland without burdening taxpayers.
Our Open Space Trust Fund, which was approved by a 10-1 margin back in 2007, creates a dedicated pool of funding that the City has used for the past 12 years to both acquire land, and build out our parks without impacting our tax rate.
Two prime examples of the way we have successfully utilized our Open Space Trust Fund was the acquisition and build out of our Southwest Resiliency Park, and the acquisition of our Northwest Resiliency Park (currently under construction).
Without the Open Space Trust Fund, it’s likely neither of these park projects would have been possible.
Planning for the future with our proposed acquisition of Union Dry Dock, it is critical that we have sufficient funding to connect our waterfront with public, open space.
Voting YES to municipal questions 1 and 2 will increase our Open Space Trust Fund by one cent per $100 of assessed value, so we can have the funding necessary to build a waterfront park our City can be proud of for generations to come, without having to raise taxes.
Additionally, voting YES to municipal questions 1 and 2 will allow a greater portion of the Open Space Trust Fund for actual park development, as opposed to land acquisition. Currently, the regulations for our Open Space Trust Fund mandates that 75% should be used for land acquisition.
Voting YES will allow for a greater share to be used for park development, which allows for more flexibility as we move forward with Union Dry Dock, the Northwest Resiliency Park, and planned Southwest Resiliency Park expansion.
And, voting YES allows the City additional flexibility to spend a portion of the funds for historic preservation purposes.
We can’t move forward with these critical projects, especially Union Dry Dock, without your help on November 5. I’m asking residents to please support open, public space in Hoboken and voting YES on municipal questions 1 and 2.
Thank you,
Mayor Ravi S. Bhalla
The entire City Council should go on record to support a YES vote these two Open Space funding ballot questions.
Duh! They put it on the ballot you idiot.
Another cash strapped Bhalla Team stunt.
More insults. The usual response.
VOTE NO!
VOTE NO!
Stop Ravi Bhalla treating Hoboken like his ATM.
No thanks, Ravi. I don’t have the money to pay more taxes and since we’ll have 2 more years of you throwing other people’s money around, I have to control what I can.
Obviously you did not read and comprehend what Mayor Bhalla has written, this is not a tax increase.
It is a allowing additional open space uses for taxes already accessed.
Why give Ravi Bhalla more taxpayer money? He’ll just use it for dirty politics.
Ravi doesn’t care about any of this. What’s good for NJ Transit is good for Unions, PACs and Law firms who donate to Ravinder Bhalla.
Ravi has no ability to raise money from local residents so he’ll go to the shady money PACs, The Unions who want to strip mine the city and his lawyers & vendors.
His ticket will lose and mayor Bhalla will escape to the Assembly or local Congressman.
I feel Sorry for Nora, Cristin, Ronald and Lisa. They actually think they could win.
I don’t feel bad for that secretary from city hall
You have your entire litany except the fliers. As usual no reference whatsoever to the subject at hand.
Have to wonder if that post is being generated from DeFusco, Fisher, Giattino and Ramos’s joint shady political media company? They are paying them many thousands a month to try to keep them in office.
I would think they could do a better job for the money as this sort of post makes them all look bad.
Don’t be fooled by this. Ravi is levying huge taxes against the citizens since he is using eminent domain against Academy Bus and intends to against NY Waterway’s property. These are two formidable fighters and the future lawsuits that these two companies will use in their fights against Ravi will suck so much money from the citizens and burden the taxpayers because taxes will go up. We do not need anymore park land. We already have a 100 million dollar price tag on the North Resiliency Park and that will cost more in the end and who knows what trying to take over NY Waterway’s property is going to cost us in the end. Academy is not going to give up their battle so each of these entities will cost of many millions. Then of course we have no money to make any park out of these sites so the land will sit empty for decades. NY Waterway’s land will never become park. It will sit abandoned behind a chainlink fence home to rats and weeds at least a decade or more. If NY Waterway could move into their property, they would pay for one third of their upland for a park for us at no charge to the taxpayer. But Ravi is all about power and image.
VOTE NO on these questions. Don’t let Ravi strain the city further. The city has no money for the Union Dry Dock property or Academy. Ravi know he is straining the tax dollars and he will need more money for the infrastructure and traffic problems and other issues that will affect Hoboken down the line. He is soaking the public all for his future career. He does not care about Hoboken, he lies, and he wants to move up in the political world. Don’t fall for this crap of these municipal questions.
NYW now plans to run dozens of busses from their Port Imperial dock to the American Dream World Mall.
If NYW succeeds in moving to the Union Dry Dock those busses would be on Hoboken streets.
That should never happen.