JACKSON – A political battle erupted during a recent council meeting with two zoning board members and one planning board member revealing they were asked to resign their positions after they attended a public meeting of an anti-development group in August.
Dr. Sheldon Hofstein, who served on the Zoning Board of Adjustment for 11 years and resigned on Aug. 26, spoke first declaring his departure was demanded by Councilman Ken Bressi who serves as the council liaison to the planning board. He called his and the other resignations unfair adding, “the council had acted hastily in requesting resignations without fully discussing the situation.
“They bypassed the concept of fundamental fairness,” Hofstein added. He criticized Bressi for an interview he did with the group Lakewood Neighbors, a group that Hofstein said “plans to influence the future development of Jackson, Brick, Toms River, and Howell.”
“Lakewood Neighbors is overwhelmingly Lakewood-centric. It consists of leaders of the BMG Yeshiva, the VAAD, members of the Lakewood planning and zoning board, Lakewood civic leaders, Lakewood business leaders, Lakewood builders and other big shots,” he said.
Bressi told The Jackson Times recently that Mayor Michael Reina is a charter member of that group and his name appears on a list at Lakewoodneighbors.org.
Hofstein said these Lakewood leaders have “destroyed their town (referring to Lakewood)” noting overcrowding, traffic and diminished open space “and they failed public schools that their leadership brings.”
In addition to Hofstein, fellow zoning board member Joseph Sullivan and planning board member Richard Egan called for Bressi to resign from the council. Hofstein, Sullivan, and Egan had attended the Aug. 15 meeting of the group called Citizens United to Protect our Neighborhoods Jackson and Manchester (CUPON).
Egan and Sullivan resigned from their respective boards on Aug. 23. They resigned from two other volunteer citizen boards they belonged to as well.
Sullivan said that the CUPON meeting was publicly advertised. He was also the first of the three to voice an accusation that their resignation letters were leaked to The Lakewood Scoop, a media outlet which in its posts included sound clips secretly recorded during that meeting. These very brief, edited clips had potential legal ramifications. A zoning board attorney had said their presence at an anti-development meeting could call into question their impartiality to hear future applications.
“We have a mess here,” Egan said. “How did things get so far? This started with one man’s vendetta. The only way Councilman Bressi knew who was at this meeting was that he got a report by someone because he demanded that we all resign. We did nothing wrong.”
Egan and Sullivan questioned the timing of the posts by The Lakewood Scoop in their accusation that Bressi sent the copies of their resignations that were presented to Township Clerk Janice Kisty and placed in the council mailboxes in town hall.
Egan said The Lakewood Scoop posted his resignation letter Monday morning after it was submitted to the township on Friday while Hofstein’s resignation was posted an hour later. He maintains that a “mole” exists feeding documents to the media and public shortly after they were submitted.
Bressi stated to The Jackson Times that at no time did he contact The Lakewood Scoop. “I’ve never talked to the Lakewood Scoop. I never leaked anything.”
Kisty stated during the meeting that the information was distributed to the media in the usual manner. She also confirmed that an Open Public Records Act had been requested to her office by a member of the public.
Sullivan said “this was used to put pressure on us to resign.” Sullivan said after the meeting that he regretted resigning from his positions.
Much of those in the audience during the council meeting were in support of Egan, Hofstein and Sullivan all of whom have strong political ties to Mayor Reina.
Egan concluded his remarks saying that he had said enough and “my attorney will be doing my talking from now on.”
Council President Robert Nixon worked to maintain order during the meeting which often included loud applause during criticism of Bressi. “I will not allow anyone’s patriotism to come into question,” Nixon said. While respecting Egan’s opinion he did not agree with his conclusions regarding a mole in Town Hall.
Nixon said, “they are public documents, there is no rule that you have to have an OPRA request.”
Sullivan, who also serves on the township’s Republican Club executive board, said “in volunteering my service to Jackson, I did not give up my right to due process.” He called for his reinstatement and that of Hofstein and Egan. He also asked if it was normal procedure for an OPRA request to be responded to in 90 minutes.
“If it does not require research and I have the information, I would respond right away,” Kisty said.
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Resident Elenor Hannum said “I organized the CUPON meeting.” She said that the meeting was held at a Jackson firehouse on Miller Avenue. She added that the local group is the 13th chapter of a group that began in Rockland, New York which experienced similar issues of development.
Hannum provided information about CUPON which states that its mission includes “to ensure the laws as set forth by local, county, state and federal governments are followed; and to oppose land use variances and approvals that adversely affect our very diverse community.”
“We want to maintain our community the way it was. We are facing propaganda tactics. Mr. Bressi you sir have no honor, no integrity. I am asking you to resign,” Hannum said.
CUPON held its second meeting on Sept. 12 at the Jackson branch of the Ocean County Library.
After the council meeting, Bressi said he was “standing by the facts. I’m doing my job.” He would not comment further regarding the accusations made by Hofstein, Sullivan and Egan.
Before the council meeting started, comments could be heard by audience members regarding a lack of trust in the governing body. There were also conversations about the content of a deposition by former Republican Councilwoman Anne Updegrave.
Updegrave was quoted in court testimony describing Reina, Nixon and Calogero as “Anti-Semitic.” She was asked the same question of Bressi and she replied “no.”
The deposition is part of litigation against Jackson Township surrounding the denial of an Orthodox Jewish School for girls in 2014 which sparked an ongoing lawsuit in 2017. Updegrave left office at the end of 2018.
