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<font face=arial size=2>: Red herring letter </font> <font face=arial size=2>: 03/08/02</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Peter Weiss</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Jersey Journal</font> <font face=arial size=2>: The other day, Jersey City Mayor Glenn D. Cunningham was saying that picking a fight with him was no way for U.S. Rep. Robert Menendez, D-Union City, to advance in Congress. Menendez is vice chairman of the Democratic caucus, his party's fourth-ranking position in the House, and he has announced his intentions to seek a higher spot next year.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Perhaps coincidental with Cunningham's remarks is a letter addressed to Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri, the House minority leader, criticizing Menendez for not recognizing Cunningham as the Hudson County Democratic leader.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: The letter, copies of which have been circulating locally, asks Gephardt to intercede to prevent "a senseless battle" being created by Menendez.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: It's signed by one Jose Alvarez, a name that may have been chosen to convey the impression that it's from Menendez's former aide, Jose Manuel Alvarez. Menendez's office said they couldn't find any Jose Alvarez at the letter's return address, but they stopped short of labeling it part of an organized anti-Menendez effort.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Jose Manuel Alvarez left Menendez's office two years ago, largely because he didn't agree with Democratic national policies toward Cuba. He briefly became director of the Hudson County Republican organization. A condition he insisted upon in switching parties was that he wouldn't be called upon to criticize Menendez, who he still considers a friend.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: "I would never attack Bob Menendez," Alvarez said this week.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: </font> <font face=arial size=2>: With the filing deadline coming up for the Union City municipal election, expect at least one of the current commissioners to be off Mayor Brian Stack's ticket.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Stack said he plans to put someone of Dominican descent on his five-member slate for the May election. Among those being mentioned are Tilo Rivas, a school board member, and businessman Kennedy Ng.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: The most likely to go off the ticket is Commissioner Ray Lopez, who never was allied with Stack.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: </font> <font face=arial size=2>: Housing market, Part I: The sale of former Hudson County Executive Robert Janiszewski's waterfront condo in Jersey City has been officially recorded.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Janiszewski and his wife, Beth, sold their Port Liberte condo for $470,000.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Janiszewski was most recently living in upstate New York and working in a ski equipment store. He resigned as county executive in September when it was about to become public that he had been cooperating with federal authorities in their investigation of government corruption and had secretly been tape-recording his associates.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: So far, nothing further has come of the tapes or the disclosure that Janiszewski, himself, had earlier been caught in an FBI bribery sting.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Housing market, Part II: Former Jersey City Mayor Bret Schundler isn't leaving town.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: Rumors began circulating last week that a "For Sale" sign was up on his Downtown brownstone. It turns out the sign is on the adjoining home.</font> <font face=arial size=2>: But for Schundler, who wasn't born in Jersey City and cou</font>

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