The Jersey City Independent "

- At-Large council candidate Joseph Cassidy, who is running on Lou Manzo’s ticket, has filed an objection to Mayor Healy’s candidacy because of Healy’s 2007 conviction for disorderly conduct down at Bradley Beach. The Insider says that City Clerk Robert Byrne turned the request over to the Law Department, which doesn’t seem to think much of the objection. “It is totally without merit,” corporation counsel Bill Matsikoudis says. Cassidy’s argument echoes Manzo’s court fight to remove Healy from office, which was eventually rebuffed. The At-Large candidate says that the obstruction of justice offense counts as one of “moral turpitude” under the Faulkner Act, which governs how municipal governments are run in NJ.

- The state Supreme Court heard arguments yesterday about the validity of municipalities’ residency restriction laws for sex offenders. Jersey City is one of nearly 120 NJ cities and towns that has such an ordinance. A decision is reportedly at least a month away.

- It’s Cover the Uninsured Week, and Jersey City’s hospitals are hosting information sessions to help introduce people to various low-cost insurance options. Jersey City Medical Center will have tables set up in its lobby until Friday, from 9 am-4 pm; while Christ Hospital will have a table outside its entrance on Friday from 9 am-3 pm. Twenty-five percent of Hudson County residents do not have health insurance.

- Newport real estate brokerage Metropolitan & Waterfront raised the ire of Hoboken mayor David Roberts by buying a billboard ad near the Mile Square City’s PATH station that reads “Cut Your Hoboken Property Taxes 47% … We’ll Help You Leave.” Hoboken, struggling to balance its budget, is facing a nearly 50 percent hike in property taxes. After placing calls to Mayor Healy, HudCo Executive Tom DeGise, Sen. Bob Menendez and Jamie LeFrak, Roberts apparently got what he wanted: the ad is no longer standing. The Journal editorializes that the two cities should “practice some detente.”

- The vacant buildings next to the Journal Square PATH station are finally being demolished to make way for a high-rise project. Construction is slated to begin at the end of the year.

- Staffers from U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg’s office will make a stop in the city next Tuesday, March 31, to help residents with federal issues and concerns. They will set up a mobile office at the new County Plaza Building (257 Cornelison Ave.) from 10 am-2 pm.

- The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, a live-action film inspired by Fantasia that stars Nicolas Cage, had a day of shooting near Exchange Place yesterday. They were reportedly shooting inside the WFMU building on Montgomery Street. The JJ has pics.

-Dr. Timothy C. Brennan, Jr. has been sworn in as the newest member of Hudson County Community College’s Board of Trustees.

In statewide news:

- With the state’s unemployment insurance fund having run out of money, Gov. Corzine says the state will have to borrow money from the federal government to continue to provide unemployment payments. NJ is one of 14 states having to make such a move.

- A new poll shows that 62 percent of NJ residents polled oppose offering illegal immigrants any type of limited driver’s license and only 20 percent favor extending in-state college tuition rates to undocumented immigrants living in the state.

- Gov. Corzine’s budget proposes collecting $1.4 million from 9,000 AIDS/HIV patients who have previously obtained free medicine from the state because they do not qualify for other assistance programs, and also seeks to raise $4.6 million through $2 Medicaid prescription drug co-payments, capped at $10 monthly. Both came under fire at budget hearings yesterday, and Corzine later indicated he is willing to back off on at least the Medicaid co-payments.

- NJ is poised to receive at least $190 million in federal stimulus dollars to train a green workforce to weatherize the state’s 3 million buildings, install wind farms off the Jersey Shore and cover roofs with solar panels, officials said at a green jobs symposium at Rutgers on Tuesday.

- The head of NJ’s Black Ministers Council says public school reform begins with revising tenure, arguing that no other profession gives lifetime job security after three years and that the system gives tenured teachers no incentive to do their best.

- Agriculture officials are hopeful that the state’s honeybees are recovering from a die-off that has plagued colonies throughout the nation.

- A NJ company thinks it has the answer for the woes of the print newspaper business: flavored ink strips in advertisements!

- New York-based grocery mini-chain Fairway is opening its first NJ store in Paramus.

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