Braun, Booker and bruins

I don't understand (0.00 / 0)

I don't understand the shadenfrueda moment you describe in this diary.  Yes I understand it can be fun watching someone who built a nice life on a system of oppressing others watch that sytem fall.  I was part of a desegregation case growing up and I saw the homeowners fight, kick & scream. It was kinda fun.
You seem to put the balme of the cities problems on suburbanites.  As if someone in Piscataway had something to do with Newark's problems.  Let's put Newarks' problem's on Newark.
Newark has elected it's third mayor in over two decades.  SHarp James has been there since 1986.  So, since 1986 the reason why Mayor James could not reduce crime, or stimulate economic growth in Newark over the past 20 years is some sububanites fault.  The reason why Mayor James couldn't get his schools out from under state control is a soccer mom in Middlesex County.
When Mayor James pays $30 Million Dollars for a 6,000 seat stadium, approx $140 Million on a hockey arena, and who knows how much on the NJPAC.  All for facilities that Newark residents unfortunatly cannot afford to buy addmission to.  How about take the money and buy housing, or community policing, or possibly buy school buildings.
When do we put some of the blame on the leaders of the cities who are not moving their cities forward, but allowing the same graft, favoritism, and games to be played year after year and then cry foul when exposed.
Mr. James has a secure pention thru the state sytem, how many of his constiuants do?
It's time for some of the leadership in the cities to actually lead and not use their city as an ATM.

New Jersey....not as bad a it sounds.

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by: njmitch @ Fri May 12, 2006 at 12:43:43 PM UTC

Let's not forget (0.00 / 0)

that when Corey Booker called Mayor James to take for his lack or leadership in 2002, the Mayor responded by taking the "moral high ground" and claiming that Corey Booker was Jewish.

New Jersey....not as bad a it sounds.

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by: njmitch @ Fri May 12, 2006 at 12:58:16 PM UTC

njmitch, it's a complicated issue (0.00 / 0)

Part of my diary was to lob a few firebombs and encourage discussion, but my point was that Newark's problems - or any NJ city's problems - go beyond one man or one town.  Newark still is facing major issues, and Cory Booker won't be able to work miracles overnight or even in a few years.  Municipal mismanagement is a major problem in all urban areas where the citizens don't care or are too busy or undereducated to care.  Bob Braun places some blame on the State Legislature.

And I know the phrase "don't punish success" is a GOP mantra when tax-cutting season comes around (just look at yet another yet another Congressional giveaway of public money to the wealthy), but I think that it has been used as an excuse for suburban communities to wipe their hands and say "Am I my brother's keeper?"

Thinking about reforming New Jersey's archaic system of property taxes will require us to think regionally rather than parochially, and that's why the success of cities and suburbs are tied to each other more than one may think (hence my reference to the deceased blac bear's trek through Essex County).

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by: thecontrarian @ Fri May 12, 2006 at 14:05:39 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

The scenerio (0.00 / 0)

That you spoke of on your origonal post put the issue in very simplistic terms.  You impending glee involving suburban moms puts the issue in an oversimplified black/white view.  I understand that the property tax issue must be dealt with in NJ, but I don't know if this is the way to fix it.
With me it's not a racial issue.  As said before I grew up in a desgregated district during the court battle.  So for me racial mixing as you were alluding to freaking out the suburban moms does not bother me.  It's the fact that I bought into a small town with a decent school district and if anyone in Middlesex County can attend a school in Middlesx County, then I wasted money.  If I wanted my kids to go somewhere else I would have moved somewhere else.
We all do what we can for our kids.  I came from a home with an income of $40K, we had a one bedroom apt., and I was bussed.  I went to college and became somewhat sucessful.  It can be done.  Sure I would have much rather gone to school in Scharsdale but that was not what was dealt to me.  Its where you end up not where you start that matters.
To make this a racial issue pitting suburbs vs cities, is absurd.  To try to fix racial segregation in the guise of a budget measure is ludacris.
I wish the Assembly Majority Leader luck, I just wish she had more details.
This issue can do the dems in in '07 & Corzine in '09.

New Jersey....not as bad a it sounds.

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by: njmitch @ Fri May 12, 2006 at 18:13:15 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Real estate market has caused defacto segregation (0.00 / 0)

mitch, the explosive real estate market since 1999 has left the state's best school districts out of the reach of anyone making under $125,000/year.  Starter homes in any of the school districts listed in that Newsweek 'top schools' list start at a half-mil and rapidly escalate from there.

That wasn't the case 20 years ago.  There may not be conscious, race-based segregation, but New Jersey seems to be more of a state of haves and have-nots based on geography now than any time in its recent history.

Regionalizing our bloated educational bureaucracy may save tax dollars while giving kids zoned out of a decent education a chance at a better life.  Was I also taking a jab at the limousine liberal mentality/stereotype?  Yeah, maybe a little.

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by: thecontrarian @ Sun May 14, 2006 at 00:17:39 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

The real estate market (0.00 / 0)

Always segregated people in to poor and rich.  You might have ad ethnic segreagation as in, an "italian " neighboorhood, or a "Jewish" neighborhood, but Elizabeth were the poor Jews and Fairlawn had the rich ones.  Hoboken the ppos Italians and Saddle Brook the rich ones.  Yes today we don't seem to be as ethnically segregated but still you might not afford to live where you want to.
With out going to a socialist system there will always bee rich and there will always be poor.  And newflash the poor can't aford to live in rich neighborhoods.  And the rich don't want to live in the poor areas. 
There is no fixing it.  Public education is the great equalizer.  What we need to do is help the failing systems, not spread the failure county wide.
I came from an intergrated system.  Forced intergration does not work.  Before the case the district was 60% White and 40% Black & Latino.  Today the system is 13% white.  Where is the intergration.  The idea of intergration killed the town but it was the implimentation of the Education Improvement Plan thak did it in.  I suggest you really think about what a county wide system would look like. 
Build  up the failing districts don't kill the working ones.
-njmitch

New Jersey....not as bad a it sounds.

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by: njmitch @ Mon May 15, 2006 at 18:32:54 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Watching the horror on the faces of Suburbanites (0.00 / 0)

I hope you'll find it refreshing that as a white, male, Southern, Republican I agree with the point. In fact, I've written extensively on it, "Reviving the Party of Lincoln".

Southern cities integrated at the county level and as a result, maintained their capital base because "white flight" didn't happen in big numbers unlike Trenton which became a ghost town.

I find the arguement that integration is unfair ironic.
NJ is the 4th most segregated state in the country.  If you lived through desegregation in the 60s and 70s then you'll remember the same arguements about home values being destroyed that were made in this forum. 

School integration would go a long ways towards solving multiple ills in this state including: racism, sprawl, school funding, poor urban education and crime. 

It's about time NJ Blue State liberals get their heads out of the sand and lead this charge.  I'm certainly pushing for the moderate GOP to beat you to it.

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by: dandodson @ Fri May 12, 2006 at 20:06:28 PM UTC

I grew up in the middle of a desegregation fight (0.00 / 0)

And it killed my town.  The district before desegregation was 60% white 40% black & latino. Today the district is 13% white.  It didn't work.  The idea of desegregation did not kill the town but the implementation of the Education Improvment Plan did.  I agree segregation is wrong, but forced statewide, countywide of city wide desegregation does not get you the results you want.  Yes property values in my hometown are nuts (real estate boom) but I would never move there and subject my kids to the school system I went to.  There is a reason I kick my own but to study get in to college and take out a boat load of loans and try to move up a rung.  Andso far thank G-d I did it, but it was not to have my kids end up in the same boat I started in.  I might have well have cut class and had fun.
When will people realize that forced desegreation is a great idea, a laudable one, but in real life it doesn't work.  Ask Nick Warcscko, or John Spenser (GOP for Senate), or Phil Aiacaovne, or Joe Farmer how well it has worked for their town.  Or ask the NCCAP Yonkers Branch who is still fighting 26 years after the origonal suit was filed, or people who feel left behind after the aftermath of the case.  Myself included.

New Jersey....not as bad a it sounds.

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by: njmitch @ Mon May 15, 2006 at 18:40:33 PM UTC

[ Parent ]