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Harvey York
Developers'
Lawyer |
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Nels Luthman |
Luthman Says Anti-Change Flier
Circulated By GOP Boss Contains “Blatant Lies”
Development And Political Patronage
Interests Begin Campaign Against New Dover Township Government By
Misleading Lake Ridge Residents
GOP Party Boss Richard Clement,
JAMM Realty Lawyer Harvey York, Other Development Interests Are Behind
Opposition To Change Of Government Referendum Question
Dover Township:
Government change referendum spokesman Nels Luthman went to the Lake
Ridge community election forum Monday evening expecting to present his
case for voting “yes” on the proposal to change the current local
government to a form with a directly elected mayor.
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Richard Clement |
Instead, he was told he couldn’t speak
on the proposal, but he found members of the local Republican Club
handing out fliers containing what Luthman termed “a collection of
blatant lies”.
“You’ll Have To Talk To Harvey York
About That” Says Boss Clement
Luthman asked Republican Club
president Richard Clement why the anti-change flier didn’t adequately
identify the source of funding, and was flippantly told by Clement
“you’ll have to talk to Harvey York about that”.
Harvey York is the attorney who
represented the two huge affordable housing apartment projects on
Route 571, and is also the attorney for the JAMM Realty project in the
Barnegat Bay Estuary, and the Home Depot application to build a big
store on Fischer Boulevard near the JAMM property.
York is currently suing the township,
seeking approval on both the JAMM and Home Depot projects, and Clement
has promoted the overdevelopment of the township in a variety of ways
including the placement of development interests in a position to
influence decisions made by the Planning Board.
Flier Wrong In Several Respects,
New Government Spokesman Says
Luthman took issue with several claims
made by the flier:
“The flier circulated by the
development interests says a change to the new government will cost an
additional $1.5 million. Nothing could be further from the truth.
“There will be no price tag at all
because the public will have the chance to elect a new mayor and
council who will eliminate huge expenses for political rewards and
politically motivated decisions that have bloated the township budget.
The York-Clement ‘estimate’ is a
manufactured number.
“If the public pays attention and
elects accountable officials next year, costs will go down, not up”,
Luthman said.
“Furthermore, every voter will elect
five representatives, not ‘only one’, as suggested by the flier: the
new Mayor will be elected instead of appointed, three at-large council
members will be elected, in addition to a district council member.
That’s five, not one”, Luthman said.
Furthermore, the ridiculous assertion
that the “mayor will make $80,000 to $100,000 and will be elected for
an ‘additional three years’ is proof of the lengths to which these
people will go to promote their own selfish interests.
“Every elected mayor in Ocean
County gets a four year term,
and there isn’t a single one of them that makes anything close to the
wild claims in this flier”.
Mayor Jason Varano of Berkeley, for
instance, a community with a government similar to the proposed new
form, gets a salary of $8500, less than the salary of the current
bogus appointed ‘mayor’ of Dover Township”, Luthman noted.
He added that the flier “was obviously
intended to deceive everyone it was handed to”.
More soon on the government
change referendum and related issues on OCPolitics•Com
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