The Jersey City Independent "

When Bank of America shuttered their MLK Hub branch 18-months ago, citing the hard bottom-line realities of operating a branch with a low amount of deposits, residents in the area were left in what has been described as a “banking desert.” The problem presented a significant hurdle for the community, one with a sizable senior [...]

With Police Director Sam Jefferson announcing he will be retiring as of February 1st, Ward E Councilman Steve Fulop has proposed the lines of communication between fire and police officials and the mayor’s office be streamlined into a newly-formed Department of Public Safety. According to Fulop, the head of this department would be responsible for [...]

President Barack Obama, calling a decision made by Congress to set a timetable for the Keystone XL pipeline construction “arbitrary,” rejected the bid’s proposal, citing the need to continue environmental studies. The pipeline, a $7 billion project undertaken by TransCanada to bring the tar sand oils of Canada to refineries along the Gulf of Mexico, [...]

When in late 2011 the word “occupy” doubled up as both verb and proper noun, becoming a catchall in mass media and the everyday lexicon for financial system protests, there was a very clear association with the word and the movement. Put “Occupy” next to a city name or notable location and not only would [...]

Following the state’s decision to appoint former Jersey City district associate superintendent Cathy Coyle as a monitor over local schools, the Statewide Education Organizing Committee (SEOC) of Jersey City held a protest outside of Jersey City’s Board of Education offices this morning to let the state know their involvement is not welcome. According to Susan [...]

Joseph Cardwell, the political consultant who acted as go-between for a Hudson County official and a man he thought to be a rich developer but who was in fact a cooperating witness for the FBI, Solomon Dwek, was sentenced to 6 months in prison and fined $3,000 on Friday, January 13th. Cardwell, 70, had earlier [...]

The Jersey City school district is approaching one of the most momentous changes in decades, as interim superintendent and longtime district administrator Franklin Walker temporarily takes the reins from departing superintendent Charles Epps. Local and state politicians have declared the chance to choose a leader for the city’s public schools, and their 29,000 students, an extraordinary opportunity for reform.

Jersey City’s Council found an unpleasant surprise at the start of Wednesday night’s meeting: a late addition to the agenda approving a change in the city’s dental coverage that the Council had not previously known about. All such contracts require Council authorization and, typically, Business Administrator Jack Kelly will address the details of a contract [...]

A new majority faction on the City Council emerged at Wednesday night’s meeting when an ordinance was introduced to cut short Council President Peter Brennan’s term as president at a vote of 5-3-1. The law would also change the length of future terms from four years to two years going forward, but the crux of the issue is the direction of current Council leadership, which Ward C Councilwoman Nidia Lopez, the bill’s sponsor, had described as “lacking vision.” Along with the votes came sharp rebuke of Corporation Counsel Bill Matsikoudis’s memo questioning the legality of the ordinance, a legal opinion most of the Council said failed to address the question put before him.

A legal memo written by Corporation Counsel Bill Matsikoudis to the City Council finds that Ward C Councilwoman Nidia Lopez’s proposed ordinance to end Council President Peter Brennan’s term as Council President in the middle of his term would “not likely pass judicial muster.” Although Matsikoudis acknowledges that there is no exact judicial precedent to [...]