Cunningham And Former City Mayors File Redistricting SuitUrban Times News
March 7 - March 13, 2003
by Ricardo Kaulessar
Jersey City Mayor Glenn D.
Cunningham, at a City Hall press confer-
ence on Thursday, February 27, 2003,
announced the filing of a lawsuit to have
Jersey City's state legislative districts
redrawn from three districts to two because
of the adverse effect the current structure
has had upon the city's political and eco-
nomic representation in the state legislature.
"The division of Jersey City
among three senatorial districts was accom-
plished more than twenty years ago with the
express purpose of minimizing or limiting
Jersey City's position and influence within
the state legislature," Mayor Cunningham
said. "As a result of these actions, for the
past twenty years, Jersey City has been held
political hostage by its smaller neighbors to
the north. This form of gerrymandering has
had negative repercussions on the city's
ability to properly and adequately represent its citizens at the state legislative level."
Flanked by former Jersey City
mayors Gerald McCann, Anthony Cucci,
Joseph Rakowski and Bret Schundler, who
joined him in bipartisan support of the law-
suit which would enforce the NJ State
Constitution law regarding redistricting,
Cunningham pointed out that Jersey City
has only one state senator and one member
of the Assembly who reside in the city, who
represent a majority of Jersey City districts,
as opposed to Newark which has legislative
representation from two resident state sena-
tors and four resident State Assembly mem-
bers.
"If Jersey City were equally divid-
ed between two legislative districts, even
members representing Jersey City who live
in neighboring municipalities would have to
pay considerably greater attention to the
needs of Jersey City."
The former Jersey City mayors also weighed in on the lawsuit, with Gerald
McCann delivering the strongest words
with his criticism of the lack of support of
the state Democratic party, and especially
the role of US Congressman Robert
Menendez on this issue.
"Jersey City has always been a town that has delivered the Democratic vote
in every election that we've ever been called
upon. But now the Democratic Party in
New Jersey is not there for the people of
Jersey City," McCann said. "The mayors
from North Hudson are not acting in our
interest, in particular, Congressman
Menendez is not acting in the interest of the
people of Jersey City. He's acting in his own
political interest, and not representing the
people of our community."
When the mayors were asked by the Urban
Times News about what was the difference
between the current legal battle and past
struggles by the city in regard to unconstitu-
tional districting and disproportionate repre-
sentation, former mayor Schundler offered
that "in this year that they (NJ State
Legislature) have slashed dramatically
Jersey City's funding and right in the
Governor's budget, I don't think the
Governor would be doing that, if we had
legislators who were fighting for us like
they should."
And while there be other New
Jersey mayors who are probably in the same
distressed economic situation as Jersey City,
whose allotment from the state went from
10.4 million dollars to 2 million in one year,
Mayor Cunningham referred to a conversa-
tion he had with State Senator Bernard
Kenny, who represents District 33 which
runs through Jersey City but primarily com-
posed of Union City and Hoboken, about
Union City's status as a state-labeled
"Distressed City".
"He said that last year he made an
agreement that they would lose only
approximately one million dollars. So when
they had about five million last year, they
getting three and a half million this year",
Mayor Cunningham said. "If Jersey City
gets an eighty percent cut then cut every-
body the same. If everybody else gets cut
twenty percent, cut Jersey City twenty per-
cent. We can live that. We're looking for
basic fairness."
Jersey City, which is Districts 31,
32 and 33 on the NJ State Legislature Map,
is represented by nine politicians in the State
Assembly, with only two, State Senator
Joseph Charles and Elba Perez-Cinciarelli
actually residing within the city limits.
According to Mayor Cunningham, the NJ
State Constitution states that "any city with
more than 200,000 people cannot be divid-
ed by more than two parts", although that
information is not stated exactly in the NJ
State Constitution. But what is implied is a
case of two's company and three's a crowd!
