Plainfield cop fired for sex on duty; Perth Amboy cop had assignations on duty, got promotion. What's up?

Video shows Perth Amboy cop getting out of unmarked pickup
for assignation in neighboring town while on duty.

 

A Plainfield cop was fired after admitting he had sex multiple times while on duty and in his prowl car. He was fired, as was reported by the Courier (here) and the Ledger (here).

The Ledger published a story Tuesday on a Perth Amboy cop who took his unmarked vehicle on many occasion during work hours to visit his "romantic partner" in neighboring Woodbridge (see story here). You can view the video of two of his visits on YouTube here.

The Perth Amboy story does not make clear the gender of the "romantic partner" and what the two did while the cop spent hours there is not known.

Later the same day as that story appeared, the Perth Amboy officer in question was promoted to lieutenant (see story here).

What I find curious is why such two similar sounding cases should have such different outcomes -- firing in one, promotion in the other.

Former police officer Fernando Sanchez is appealing Plainfield's decision to fire him after he admitted the facts of the case.

Expect to hear more about the Plainfield case.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Board of Ed Reorg Report Card: D- for Deportment

Emily Morgan signs her oath of office at Tuesday's
Board of Ed reorganization meeting.

I would give Plainfield's Board of Ed a D- for Deportment for the conduct of its 2016 reorganization meeting.

Here are the reasons why:

RUDENESS TO MRS. MORGAN

The Board (or its Secretary) were inexcusably rude in not explaining to newly-elected member Emily Morgan how exactly the evening would unfold, and why she was to be excluded from the Executive Session before the reorganization meeting.

LACK OF AGENDAS

As attendees began to arrive shortly before 7:00 PM, there were no agendas on the foyer table as is usual. There was some flurry finally, after the new members had been sworn in, and the agendas were produced from a box on the stage and distributed to members of the audience by Business Administrator Gary Ottman.

ILLEGAL EXECUTIVE SESSION

An example of a properly noticed
Board of Ed Executive Session.

The Executive Session before the meeting appears to have been illegally conducted. Nowhere on the District's website can there be found any requisite notice of a public meeting then closed for executive session. Nor is there any indication on the Reorganization agenda (see here). So, evidently the executive session was conducted in violation of the Open Public Meetings Act (Sunshine Law).

Secondly, Mr. Campbell and Mr. Wyatt were included in the session, while Mrs. Morgan was excluded. When challenged on the discrepancy, the board attorney explained it was because Mrs. Morgan was not yet sworn in.

While the previous Board may meet in "lame duck" sessions until the new board is organized (including executive sessions), she did not address the illegality of the meeting.

Another way of handling it could have been to swear in all three members and then have an executive session (if legally noticed!).

Far from looking like an innocent oversight, the whole thing reeks of a snub -- an illegal one, at that.

THE "RE-ELECTED" FICTION

Then there is the fiction that Messrs Campbell and Wyatt were "re-elected".

This is absolutely not the case. Each was appointed to fill a vacancy on the Board. Their election in November was the first time they were ever elected by the voters.

Wouldn't you expect the School Board -- responsible for teaching our youngsters such distinctions! -- to correctly use the term?

But I fell for it, too, using the term when I addressed the Board.

It should be noted Mrs. Campbell's election to yet another year as Board of Ed president was not unanimous.

Mrs. Morgan firmly voted "No" when her name was called. When Mrs. Clarke protested that the Board Secretary had failed to call her name in the roll call vote, she then entered her abstention on the record.

There were about thirty in the audience, almost all showing support for Mrs Morgan, with the exception of the Campbells' sons, who presented flowers to their mother (the board president) in celebration of her birthday.

The Board of Ed appears to have gotten sloppy in the conduct of its meetings, with so little attendance and attention paid by the public. Such sloppiness will no longer pass muster.

What grade will the next report card bring?

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Siddeeq El-Amin vindicated ... mostly

Councilor Rivers is now the only person
involved who has not apologized to El-Amin.

At Monday's City Council reorganization, retired Plainfield police captain Siddeeq El-Amin once again tried to get closure on the matter of an "investigation" of his character called for when the Council declined to accept his nomination to be Mayor Adrian Mapp's Public Safety Director when Mapp first took office.

Standing again at the mike during public comment, El-Amin reiterated that he would accept an apology from the remaining Council members who had been involved -- Councilors Storch, Taylor and Rivers -- then consider the matter closed.

Both Storch and Taylor apologized on the spot, joining Councilors Williams and Taylor who had apologized in December (see here).

Councilor Bridget Rivers -- who as Council President had originally said an RFP was issued to hire an attorney to pursue such an investigation -- remained silent and stone-faced throughout the exchange.

She remains the only Councilor involved and still on the Council not to have apologized.

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With Storch as Council president, new era a possibility

Mayor Adrian Mapp poses with newly installed Councilors Cory Storch (Ward 2)
and Barry Goode (Wards 1/4 at-large).
Storch was elected Council President for 2016.

Plainfield's 2016 City Council started off with a bang as Cory Storch was elected Council President in what appeared to be an upset.

Storch, who begins his thirteenth year (and fourth term) of service with this year's swearing in, has always been a moderating influence at contentious points in the Council's history ever since he has been a member.

Traditionally, the wrangling over who will be council president and chair of the committee-of-the-whole takes place out of public sight, with unanimous votes being recorded in the public ritual -- along with the obligatory smiles.

Not so this year.

When time for nominations came, Councilors Rivers and Storch were offered. Surprise registered on the faces of Rivers and Brown as Councilor Taylor joined Goode, Storch and Williams in voting "no" on Rivers nomination. That set the stage for Storch's election by the same 4-3 split.

Councilors Tracey Brown and Gloria Taylor were nominated for chair of the committee-of-the-whole. Brown was defeated by the same 3-4 split; with Taylor then getting a unanimous vote. Both Taylor's and Brown's terms will end December 31 of this year.

Mayor Adrian O. Mapp swore in both Storch and Goode (who replaces Vera Greaves as the Wards 1/4 at-large representative) to their Council seats. Judge Joan Robinson Gross administered the oaths for Council President Storch and chair of the committee-of-the-whole Taylor.

In his impromptu remarks as Council President, Councilor Storch stressed that he expects to improve communications between the Council and the Administration. Along this line, he suggested that he would have Department heads make frequent updates before the Council as part of revamping the shape of the Council meetings.

Storch also suggested that each ward host one Council session (not a Town Hall) during the year. This sounds good, but could be a logistical nightmare given the school district's current hostile attitude toward city government.

Storch also proposed a strategic planning retreat for the Council and the Administration, where the top goals for the year can be arrived at in a public discussion and a broad road map for 2016 set forth.

Hopefully, the overly dramatic and highly embarrassing comportment of Council meetings in recent years will come to an end with a firmer hand on the gavel and an eye to the Council's minding its own rules of conduct.

In a highly unusual move, two items of old business from 2015 were taken up: Budget transfers (a bookkeeping maneuver) and the cancellation of the 2015 health insurance line. Resolutions are generally viewed as governing actions taken during one year that govern that year's business, while ordinances bind the city going forward on a permanent basis. Every effort is usually expended to close the Council's "resolution" business by year's end. For some reason that did not happen in this instance. Councilor Goode, who did not hold office in 2015, abstained from voting, while the other six members sustained both resolutions.

The ritual business of designations and appointments then went forward smoothly with unanimous votes on all items.

Among elected officials recognized by Council President Storch were Union County Freeholders Linda Carter and Sergio Granados (Granados is the new Freeholder Vice Chair), and newly elected Plainfield Board of Ed member Emily Morgan as well as members Wilma and John Campbell and David Rutherford. Assemblyman Jerry Green, a longtime presence at Council reorganization meetings -- often swearing in various officials -- was absent.

Mayor Adrian Mapp made brief remarks, congratulating Storch and Goode on their elections as councilors and Storch as Council President. He said that the traditional "State of the City" address would be offered this year at a separate time and place, as is done in many of New Jersey's major cities.

Notable among the public comments at the meeting's end were Siddeeq El-Amin, which I will take up separately, and Mary Burgwinkle, who noted the passing of Democratic activist Dottie Gutenkauf and how much she would have enjoyed seeing this evening.

With that the Council adjourned, in what is probably record time for a reorganization meeting.

Now the work begins. Council's agenda-setting session will be next Monday, January 11, at 7:30 PM in the Council Chambers / Courthouse at Watchung Avenue and East 4th Street.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Magic 8-Ball tells all for 2016

All will be revealed in due time.

2016 will prove to be an interesting year in Plainfield politics. Let's check in with the Magic 8-Ball.

SCHOOL BOARD ELECTION

The Board of Education has stirred up a hornet's nest with a secretive vote to move the school board elections from November back to April.

The move appears to have been taken at a work/study session immediately after the November 3 general election. It was not listed on any agenda, so a resolution is presumed to have been a walk-on matter. There was no public notice or discussion of the measure or its expected $115,000 annual cost (which will be stolen from the kids).

That has left plenty of taxpayers and parents hopping mad.

It seems hardly likely Mayor Mapp will let this one go without a challenge.

CITY COUNCIL ELECTION

The 2016 rota for City Council elections is comprised of the Citywide at-large seat and the Ward 3 seat.

Councilors Tracey Brown (at-large) and Gloria Taylor (Ward 3) will complete their current terms on December 31.

Will Plainfield Democratic chairperson Adrian Mapp seek more active involvement from committee members in the council candidate selection process? That certainly is a possibility, given his opposition to the high-handed methods of former chairperson Green.

If that is the case and prospective candidates must face a vetting process, there is a local version of "the Donald Trump question" to be layed out: If you do not get the nomination, will you support the party's candidate?

BEYOND PLAINFIELD

There is plenty of speculation about Assemblyman Jerry Green's health and ability to perform his duties -- as Assemblyman and as Union County chair.

There is already scuffling behind the curtains over what happens if Jerry must step down as county chair.

Will 2016 hold any surprises in politics beyond Plainfield?

Magic 8-Ball says: Stay tuned.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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City Council reorganizes Monday evening

Will the Council be 'just and capable' in 2016?

Plainfield City Council will reorganize for 2016 on Monday (January 4) at 7:00 PM in the Council Chambers/Courthouse. Note the time -- an hour earlier than usual.

Councilor Cory Storch, re-elected to a fourth term for Ward 2, and Barry Goode, elected to Wards 1/4 at-large, will be sworn in by Mayor Adrian O. Mapp.

While most of the business transacted at the reorganization is boiler-plate stuff (setting the year's calendar, designating official newspapers, banks, etc), there are several appointments that call attention.

For the first year in a long time Joan Robinson Gross' name does not appear as the chief municipal court judge (the nominee is Carl L. Marshall, Esq.). Robinson Gross, who also serves as a Superior Court judge is assignment judge for the Union County courts. (CORRECTION: I stand corrected; Karen M. Cassidy is the current assignment judge. Judge Robinson Gross has served in this capacity in the past. Thanks to reader DB for catching this one.)

Newly elected Board of Ed members Emily Morgan is also up for appointment to the Human Relations Commission.

But the biggest items of interest are always the election by the Council of its president and chairperson of the committee-of-the-whole for the year.

There is speculation that Councilor Bridget Rivers long run as Council President may be at an end.

Council Chambers and the Municipal Courthouse are at Watchung Avenue and East 4th Street. Parking on the street or in the lot across from the police station.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Every best wish for the New Year

Image from.happynewyear.net

HAPPY NEW YEAR!
¡FELIZ AÑO NUEVO!

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Campbell capers, Mapp coup top 2015 stories

Winners Cory Storch, Emily Morgan and Barry Goode
celebrate with Mayor Adrian Mapp on election night.

Mapp's City Committee slate swept the decks
in the June election.

 

 

As you might expect with a blog that focuses on Plainfield politics, political happenings drew the most interest in 2015. In particular, the Mapp coup in the primary and general elections and the Campbell clan's capers involving both the Council elections and the Board of Ed.

MAPP COUP

Going head-to-head with Assemblyman Jerry Green for control of the Plainfield Democratic City Committee in June and for the party slot for two Council seats, the Mapp teams swept the boards.

Cory Storch and Barry Goode won the primary election (story here, and a review by-the-numbers here).

Following the election, there were questions of whether current Council opposition would get the message (story here), the no-no of Green's office preparing the notices for City Committee reorganization on a state computer (see here).

The smooth transition to Mapp leadership of the City Committee (here) left the question of whether the 2015 election cycle was Jerry Green's 'last hurrah' (see here).

Storch, Goode and Board of Ed victor Emily Morgan took a victory lap in November, after the voters sealed the primary winners' victory (see here), despite Election Day wrangles.

CAMPBELL CLAN CAPERS

The Campbell clan ran on two tracks (City Council and Board of Ed) in this election cycle and their capers garnered a lot of reader interest.

BOE president Wilma Campbell's husband John was surreptitiously appointed to a vacant board seat during the year and stood for election to the balance of that term in the November election (see story on the candidate forum here).

Meanwhile, son John cleverly filed in June to run for the Ward 2 Council seat as an Independent candidate. His first public outing was at the candidate forum in October (see report here), but his splashiest campaign stunt was to plan a campaign event at Leland Avenue Park, which is a property of the Plainfield Public Schools.

When I blew the whistle on that caper (story here), things got really interesting. Turns out young Campbell had gotten the OK from the District (how hard was that?), but had failed to secure the necessary city permit. Mayor Adrian Mapp responded with a public statement and advised the city would not issue a permit for the event (story here). The flap led to cancellation of the planned rally and coincided with a hush-hush pre-election Board of Ed meeting that raised eyebrows and questions (see here).

Retribution for the embarrassment caused by the cancelled Leland Park rally was swift -- on the afternoon before the November 3 election, Mayor Mapp was advised that the school district was withdrawing from a citywide youth summit (slated for November 13), a Mapp initiative that the district was hosting at PHS (see report here). Of course there was no connection (wink, wink). The cancellation of the Youth Summit led to a brouhaha in which Councilor Brown posted a Facebook comment at variance with the facts reported by Mayor Mapp (see here).

The final caper was for the Board of Ed to take the first opportunity after the November election to move the school board election back to April -- at an annual cost to the taxpayers of at least $115,000 per year -- without public notice or discussion (see here).

So, the stage is set for 2016. It should be an interesting year.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Doctor's Day today, see you tomorrow

Doctor's Day today, see you tomorrow.

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Frontiers 2016 MLK Breakfast features journalist Earl Caldwell

Journalist, professor and witness to history Earl Caldwell
will speak at 2016 Frontiers MLK Breakfast.

Journalist Earl Caldwell, who has covered -- and been at the center of -- historic events over the last half century is the guest speaker at the 2016 Frontiers International MLK Breakfast slated for Monday, January 18, 2016.

Caldwell, known to many Plainfielders for his WBAI program "The Caldwell Chronicle," covered events from the 1960s urban riots (for the New York Times), the police riot in Chicago at the 1968 Democratic Convention, the trial of civil rights activist Angela Davis and the 1984 presidential campaign of Jesse Jackson.

He covered the Black Panther Party from the inside and made history when the Supreme Court took up a case in which the FBI tried to pressure him to become an informant on the Black Panthers.

Caldwell is currently the Scripps-Howard endowed professor journalism at Hampton University and directs the History Project at the Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education.

This year marks the 40th Anniversary of the Plainfield Chapter of Frontiers International's MLK Breakfast event. The program gets under way with breakfast in the Plainfield High School cafeteria at 8:30 AM.

Tickets are $15 per person, $10 for students/seniors, and are available from John Brinkly at (908) 868-8704. This event is always a sellout -- make your reservations now!

Plainfield High School is at 950 Park Avenue. The breakfast is in the cafeteria, which can be entered from the Kenyon Avenue parking lot. Parking is also available in the Stelle Avenue lot. PHS is an accessible facility.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Finding the mysterious Board of Ed election change action

Is this the 'purloined letter'?

 

Several folks have asked about finding the Plainfield Board of Ed's decision to change the school board elections from November back to April.

The complaint is that the action can't be found in the board's agendas as posted online (see here).

Is the answer, like Edgar Allen Poe's famous purloined letter, hiding in plain sight?

David Rutherford, in his December 2 post on moving the election (see here), says '[l]ast month, at our first occasion to do so' the Board took the action.

That suggests that the action was taken not at the November business meeting, but at the November 10 work-study meeting, which was the first Board meeting after the November 3 election which marked the fourth November school board election required by law before a change could be contemplated. You can view that meeting's announced agenda here.

Normally, the work-study agendas contain resolutions to be discussed for action at the next business meeting and note is made at the bottom of the proposed resolution when action is contemplated.

The agenda for November 10 contains no hint of a change of the election date, but it does contain the legally necessary warning: 'Action may be taken'.

These work-study meetings are seldom attended by the public unless a hot-button issue is known about beforehand. I am told there was only one member of the public present. And that the vote went down with only one board member voting 'no'.

Those seeking the resolution that moved the election date -- evidently 'walked on' -- would do well to look here.

Meanwhile, the Board of Ed has not bothered to explain why it took this action without advance public notice or an opportunity to discuss the diversion of an estimated $115,000 every year in perpetuity from its very tight budget for this charade.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Thinkin' about those GOP debates..

Matt Wuerker, Politico.

 

Check out Matt Wuerker, Politico editorial cartoonist and one of my faves (a slide show of his 2015 toons is here).

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Christmas Greetings from Balmy New Jersey

 

Christmas Eve temperatures in Plainfield reached the low 70s, as shoppers strolled the streets in tees and jacketless.

All this is thanks to an El Niño pattern -- which we are likely to experience throughout the winter.

But don't get too cosy. The weather service predicts snow and sleet overnight Monday as a cold front cuts across the Garden State.

Merry Christmas to all -- enjoy it while it lasts.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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The Twelve Days of Christmas

Charlie Brown and friends celebrate
the Twelve Days of Christmas.

 

A Scots native living in Plainfield related at a recent holiday party how amused he was that Americans played and sang the "Twelve Days of Christmas" song in the runup to Christmas and then dropped it once Christmas Day arrived.

In Scotland, he pointed out, the song is only played beginning on Christmas Day.

The Scots have it right (along with the other celebrants in Great Britan).

The Twelve Days is both a season and a song.

The Twelve Days mark off the time between Christmas and Epiphany (January 6), traditionally celebrated as the arrival of the Magi with their gifts for the infant Jesus (Matt. 2:1-12). They are either counted from Christmas Day and ending on the Eve of the Epiphany, or from the day after Christmas and ending on Epiphany itself.

Traditionally, these are the days of Christmas merrymaking and they end on the Twelfth Day. (In Plainfield, the Van Wyck Brooks Historic District has continued this tradition for many years with its 12th Night Progressive Dinner, which brings the holidays to an end.)

The song (which, blessedly, I can say I have not heard this year) is first recorded in the 18th century as a memories-and-forfeits children's game (see here). A leader led and the group repeated as the verses were piled up. When a participant made a mistake, they paid a forfeit of a sweet or a kiss.

A tradition has also arisen that the song was a catechetical device for young Roman Catholics, who were banned from publicly practicing their faith in England between 1558 and 1829. You can read about that interpretation here, though it is disputed and may be fanciful. (The only "gift" that would admit of a Roman Catholic interpretation only is the seventh, which this tradition suggests represents the seven sacraments recognized by Roman Catholicism; however, it could represent the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, a doctrine held by all Christians in common.)

Merchandisers could care less about the custom, and on the day after Christmas mobs will descend on the unsold holiday merchandise, after which the heart shapes of Valentine's Day will take their place.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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