Mayor of Hoboken, New Jersey

Mayor of the City of Hoboken
since 2018
Term lengthFour years
Inaugural holderCornelius V. Clickener
Formation1855
Salary$116,000
WebsiteMayor Ravi Bhalla

The Mayor of the City of Hoboken is the head of the executive branch of government of Hoboken, New Jersey, United States. The mayor has the duty to enforce the municipal charter and ordinances; prepare the annual budget; appoint deputy mayors, department heads, and aides; and approve or veto ordinances passed by the City Council. The mayor is popularly elected in a nonpartisan general election. The office is held for a four-year term without term limits.

Thirty-eight individuals have held the office of mayor since the City of Hoboken was chartered on March 29, 1855. Cornelius V. Clickener was the inaugural mayor of the city, and served two consecutive terms. The current mayor is Ravinder Bhalla; he was first elected in November 2017. On July 20, 2010, the Hoboken Council voted to move the nonpartisan municipal elections to be held on the same day as the statewide general election in November.[1]

Duties and powers

The City of Hoboken is organized as a mayor-council form of government under the Optional Municipal Charter Law. This provides for a citywide elected mayor serving in an executive role, as well as a city council serving in a legislative role. All of these offices are selected in a nonpartisan municipal election and all terms are four years.[2] Under state law, the mayor has the duty to enforce the charter and ordinances of the city, and all applicable state laws; report annually to the council and the public on the state of the city; supervise and control all departments of the government; prepare and submit to the council annual operating and capital budgets; supervise all city property, institutions and agencies; sign all contracts and bonds requiring the approval of the city; negotiate all contracts; and serve as a member, either voting or ex officio, of all appointive bodies.[3]

The mayor has the power to appoint departments heads with the approval of the City Council; to remove department heads subject to a two-thirds disapproval by the City Council; approve or veto ordinances subject to an override vote of two-thirds of the council; and appoint deputy mayors. The mayor is permitted to attend and participate in meetings of the City Council, without a vote, except in the case of a tie on the question to fill a council vacancy.[3]

Succession

In the event of an absence, disability, or other cause preventing the mayor from performing his duties, the mayor may designate the business administrator or any other department head as acting mayor for up to 60 days.[3] In the event of a vacancy in the office, the President of the City Council becomes acting mayor, and the council has 30 days to name an interim mayor. If no interim mayor is named, the Council President continues as acting mayor until a successor is elected, or until the council reorganizes and selects a new President. Prior to 1971, there was no automatic succession law.[4]

Mayors

Rank Rank[note 1] Mayor Years in office Notes
1 1 Cornelius V. Clickener 1855–1857 Cornelius V. Clickener was the first mayor of Hoboken, New Jersey.
2 2, 4 Franklin B. Carpenter 1857–1858, 1859–1860 He was a lumber merchant who served in the New York State Assembly from Otsego County in 1845. He served two nonconsecutive terms as the second and fourth mayor from 1857 to 1858 and 1859 to 1860. He then served one term in the New Jersey General Assembly in 1861.[5][6][7][note 1]
3 3 George William Morton 1858–1859 Morton served as the first Treasurer of Hoboken being elected in the 1855 Charter election.[8] He was appointed as a Water Commissioner in 1857.[9] Morton was the Democratic nominee for mayor in 1858.[10] He served a single term and was defeated by his predecessor in the 1859 election. Morton was the Clerk of the Court for the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York

under Judge Samuel Betts.[11]

4 5 John R. Johnston 1860–1863 "Hon. John R. Johnston. Mayor of Hoboken, died early on Saturday morning, after a protracted illness, in the 67th year of his age. Mayor Johnston was an upright man, and was highly esteemed by all who knew him. The funeral will take place this (Monday) afternoon, at 2 o'clock, from Trinity Church, and will be attended by the City authorities."[12][5][13]
5 6 Lorenzo Welton Elder 1863–1864 He was a brigade surgeon of the New Jersey Army National Guard. It was through his efforts that the Hudson County Board of Health was established. He was president of the Hudson County Pathology Society and was deputy adjutant-general on the staff of Governor Rodman McCamley Price. He was the local medical examiner of the Mutual Benefit Life Insurance Company of Newark, New Jersey, and of the New York Life Insurance Company. He was three times elected as the tax commissioner for Hoboken.[14]
6 7 Charles T. Perry 1864–1865 He was born on January 10, 1812, in Massachusetts to George Perry. On December 13, 1838, in Sandwich, Massachusetts he married Caroline Goodson. Perry was president of the Hudson County Gaslight Company and a director of the First National Bank of Hoboken.[15] Perry died of a self-inflicted gunshot to the head on January 9, 1872.[16]
7 8 Frederick Beasley Ogden 1865–1867
8 9 Frederick W. Bohnstedt 1867–1869
9 10 Hazen Kimball 1869–1871 He was born on February 19, 1835, in Barton, Vermont. He was vice president of the First National Bank of Hoboken and president of the Gansevoort Bank of New York. He died on June 22, 1890, of apoplexy in Hoboken, New Jersey.[17]
10 11 Frederick L. Schmersahl 1871–1873 He was a German-American merchant.
11 12 Peter McGavisk 1873–1875
12 13 Joseph Russel 1875–1878
13 14, 16 Elbridge Van Syckel Besson 1878–1880, 1881–1883 [note 1]
14 15 John A. O'Neill 1880–1881
15 17 Herman L. Timken 1883–1886
16 18 Edwin J. Kerr 1886–1888
17 19 August Grassman 1888–1891
18 20 Edward R. Stanton 1891–1892
19 21 William Ellis 1892–1893
20 22 Lawrence Fagan 1893–1901
21 23 Adolph Lankering 1901–1906
22 24 George Henry Steil 1906–1910
23 25 George Washington Gonzales 1910–1912
24 26 Martin Cooke 1912–1915
25 27 Patrick R. Griffin 1915–1926
26 28 Gustav Bach 1926–1929
27 29 Bernard N. McFeely 1930–1947
28 30 Fred M. De Sapio 1947–1953
29 31 John J. Grogan 1953–1965
30 32, 34 Louis De Pascale 1965, 1965–1973 [note 1]
31 33 Silvio Failla 1965
32 35 Steve Cappiello 1973–1985
33 36 Thomas Vezzetti 1985–1988 He served as mayor from 1985 until he died in office in 1988. He fought against the gentrification of the city.
34 37 Patrick Pasculli 1988–1993 He served as acting mayor at the death of Vezzetti. He ran for mayor in 1989 on the promise to open the Hoboken waterfront to development.[18] Pasculli's campaign led to the formation of the Coalition for a Better Waterfront which opposed his plan to lease city-owned land to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey for commercial development.[18]
35 38 Anthony Russo 1993–2001 He was charged with corruption in 2003 while a Hoboken city councilman.[19]
36 39 David Roberts 2001–2009 A former firefighter who served two consecutive terms.[20]
37 40 Peter Cammarano 2009 Arrested in Operation Bid Rig and resigned 30 days after being sworn into office.
38 41 Dawn Zimmer 2009–2017 Dawn Zimmer was the first female mayor of Hoboken, New Jersey. As president of the city council, became acting mayor after Cammarano's resignation. Won special election on November 6, 2009, for the remainder of Cammarano's term. Elected in her own right in 2013.
39 42 Ravi Bhalla 2017– Ravi Bhalla is the first Sikh Mayor of Hoboken, New Jersey. He was endorsed by predecessor Dawn Zimmer who announced in June 2017 that she would not be seeking re-election.

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d Because Franklin B. Carpenter, E.V.S. Besson and Louis de Pascale each served two nonconsecutive terms as mayor, the rank for all who followed each person became offset from the actual number of people who served (and as a result there have been 38 people who have served 41 mayoral terms). Because of this, rank can be determined either by the actual number of people who served (left column) or the mayoral terms served (right column).

References

General
  • "150 Years of Hoboken Anniversary Journal". The Hudson Reporter. March 28, 2005. p. 62.
Specific
  1. ^ Musat, Stephanie (July 21, 2011). "Hoboken council majority moves next election from May 2013 to November 2013". The Jersey Journal. Retrieved July 21, 2011.
  2. ^ "Faulkner Act (OMCL) Mayor-Council". Types And Forms Of New Jersey Municipal Government. New Jersey State League of Municipalities. Archived from the original on September 27, 2007. Retrieved November 15, 2009.
  3. ^ a b c "Optional Municipal Charter Law" (PDF). New Jersey Department of Community Affairs, Division of Local Government Services. State of New Jersey. 2003. Retrieved November 15, 2009.[permanent dead link‍]
  4. ^ "New Jersey Statutes Annotated, 40A:9-131". New Jersey State Legislature. Retrieved January 27, 2010.[permanent dead link‍]
  5. ^ a b Winfield, Charles (1874). History of the County of Hudson, New Jersey: from its earliest settlement to the present time. New York, NY: Kennard & Hay Stationery M'fg and Print. Co. p. 319.
  6. ^ Ward, George Kemp (1912). Genealogy of the Olmsted family in America: embracing the descendants of James and Richard Olmsted and covering a period of nearly three centuries, 1632-1912. A.T. De La Mare Print. and Pub. Co. p. 58. Franklin carpenter hoboken mayor.
  7. ^ Fitzgerald, Thomas F. (1892). Manual of the Legislature of New Jersey. p. 97.
  8. ^ "New Jersey; Hoboken Charter Election" (PDF). The New York Times. April 14, 1855. p. 1.
  9. ^ "New-Jersey.; Injunction Refused. Election of Officers. The Hoboken Water Question" (PDF). The New York Times. December 3, 1857. Retrieved December 9, 2010.
  10. ^ "New Jersey Items" (PDF). The New York Times. April 10, 1858.
  11. ^ "Death of George W. Morton". The New York Times. May 9, 1865. Retrieved December 9, 2010. Mr. Morton, for many years clerk of the District Court of the United States, presided over by Judge Betts, in this city, died on Sunday morning at his residence in Hoboken. ...
  12. ^ "Death of Mayor Johnston, of Hoboken". The New York Times. April 20, 1863.
  13. ^ "Military Affairs in New Jersey". New York Times. Retrieved 2015-02-13. Hon. John R. Johnston, Mayor of the city, presided. ...
  14. ^ Atkinson, William Biddle (1878). "Lorenzo W. Elder". The Physicians and Surgeons of the United States. C. Robson. p. 356. Lorenzo W. Elder, Hoboken, N. J., was born in Guilford, Chenango co., N. Y., April 15th, 1820. He was educated at the Guilford district school, and studied medicine at the coll. of phys. and surg. of New York city, graduating in 1847. ...
  15. ^ Costa, Isaac (1867). Gopsill's Jersey City and Hoboken directory for the year ending 30th April, 1867. James Gopsill. p. 431.
  16. ^ "Suicide of the Ex-Mayor of Hoboken" (PDF). New York Times. January 10, 1872. Retrieved December 23, 2010.
  17. ^ "Hazen Kimball" (PDF). New York Times. June 23, 1890. Hazen Kimball dropped dead in Hoboken yesterday of apoplexy. He was one of the best known citizens of Hoboken, and in 1869 and 1870 was Mayor of that city. At the time of his death ...
  18. ^ a b Romano, Jay (March 29, 1992). "How a 'Bunch of Amateurs' Learned to Fight City Hall". The New York Times. Retrieved 2009-09-01. The grass-roots movement began in 1989 when Patrick Pasculli ran for Mayor on a platform that included a plan to lease city-owned waterfront land to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey for development. ...
  19. ^ "Former Mayor Of Hoboken Is Accused Of Corruption". New York Times. September 26, 2003. Retrieved 2015-02-13. Anthony J. Russo, the two-term former mayor of Hoboken, was indicted today on federal corruption and bribery charges a little more than a month after he ended a political comeback ...
  20. ^ Gettleman, Jeffrey (15 June 2005). "Mayor of Hoboken Wins 2nd Term in Bitter Runoff Election". New York Times. Retrieved 16 January 2011. Mayor David Roberts, a former firefighter and a favorite of the local Democratic Party, won a second term Tuesday night in a bitterly contested runoff election. ...