Coda
Sometimes, good people come up with a bad idea
Greg Bean

If you look out your window right now, chances are you'll see pigs flying. I figure that in a week when I end up agreeing with embattled Keyport Mayor John Merla, anything is possible.

Last week, I wrote about a bad idea - an ordinance proposed by Keyport Coun-cilman Joseph Wedick that would have required people who rent apartments to make sure their tenants are not in the country illegally. Failure to do that - by requiring prospective renters to provide the same type of residency documentation they demand at the Motor Vehicle Commission - would have meant fines of at least $1,000 for violators.

The proposed ordinance was flawed for a variety of reasons. It would have put the onus for enforcement not on municipal code officials where it belongs but on individual property owners. I also argued that it would have been discriminatory in its execution, and would have wound up segregating specific groups of people. In this case, those people would have been illegal Hispanic aliens.

There was a standing-room-only crowd when the measure came up for discussion last week, mostly people who wanted to see the measure tossed in the trash can. And the council was happy to oblige. After several people, including Merla, spoke against the proposal, the council simply removed it from the agenda. It didn't even survive to see a vote.

While that was a good thing, it's unfortunate that Wedick's reputation was damaged as the debate played out.

I spoke to him at some length last week after the council meeting, and he was hurt that certain members of the community, and some people from outside, had accused him of racism in proposing the ordinance. Nothing, he said, could be further from the truth.

He proposed the ordinance, he said, not to discriminate against illegal aliens, but to protect them from overcrowded, unsafe conditions and from predatory landlords. He said he came to the decision that something needed to be done after visiting rental properties in the community where illegal aliens were packed into tight quarters, sleeping on bare mattresses without proper heat or sanitary facilities.

I've never met Councilman Wedick, but every report I've heard about him has been positive. I'm told that whether you agree with him or not on specific issues, he has the best interests of the community and his constituency at heart, and there is nothing in his political history to suggest bias or racism.

Therefore, I say we take him at his word. We can argue against his ideas on the merits, or lack of same, but to ascribe a racial motivation to his proposal regarding rental property is unfair and unfounded.

He had a bad idea. It got shot down. Now, it's time to move on.

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They say you can't believe everything you read, and that's especially true when it comes to political advertising during the campaign season.

Although there are fewer races to contend with this year than in other years, there are bitter battles going on in some of the communities we cover. In some of those communities, the political advertising has been overwhelmingly negative, and in some cases, blatantly untruthful.

As usual, the race for Millstone Township Committee has been vitriolic and disgusting. Especially outrageous was the deceptive advertising by candidates John Pfefferkorn and William M. Nurko in which they floated the thinly veiled accusation that Elias Abilheira and Nancy Ann Grbelja were somehow responsible for break-ins and vandalism at the Little League facility.

Abilheira and Grbelja were outraged at the ad, and well they should have been. It was contemptible.

In Red Bank, meanwhile, a campaign flier prepared by the Oster Group for Councilman Pasquale "Pat" Menna - a Democrat running against Republican Councilman John Curley - turned out to contain statements that were out and out fabrications.

At one point in the flier, a statement highly critical of Curley's job as finance chairman was attributed to one of Greater Media's newspapers, The Hub.

Another statement claiming that Curley's mismanagement had created a $400,000 hole in the community's budget was attributed to the Asbury Park Press.

Trouble was, the statement attributed to The Hub never appeared in that publication. Later in the week, a spokesman for the Asbury Park Press said the flier inaccurately reflected their coverage as well.

When contacted, a spokesman for the Oster Group went into bunker mode, claiming that although they made a mistake when they cited The Hub, the Asbury Park Press material was properly sourced, the data was in the paper and the whole thing was a "difference of opinion."

Hogwash! The information in the flier was deceptive, and everyone knows it, including the Oster Group, a national firm that's been around long enough to know exactly what it's doing.

Frankly, we expected better from Menna, who was contrite but basically blamed the problem on the Oster Group.

No matter how he tries to explain it away and blame the embarrassment on his hired guns, Menna is responsible for the content of the attack advertising sent out in support of his campaign. And by allowing fabrications like this to be sent to prospective voters (as we noted in an editorial in The Hub) he attached his name "to a dishonest, unethical mailing that misrepresented the position of this newspaper and possibly others."

If (as he claims) allowing the deceptive flier to be mailed was just an unfortunate oversight, we hope he'll pay more attention to detail if he wins the Red Bank mayor's seat Nov. 7.

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In its story about the flier, the Asbury Park Press noted that The Hub had been improperly cited in the flier, but said "representatives from the weekly newspaper couldn't be reached for comment Wednesday."

I just hope my boss didn't read that statement. He thinks I was in the office all day.

And in fact, that's exactly where I was. Reminds me of a line from a Jimmy Buffett song, "If the phone doesn't ring, it's me."

Gregory Bean is executive editor of Greater Media Newspapers. He can be reached at gbean@gmnews.com.