Campos v. Zimmer II

Hoboken residents in Ward 4 will go to the polls Tuesday to break a deadlock election result from last month when Councilman Christopher Campos failed to gain the requisite 50% + 1 against challenger Dawn Zimmer.

Campos received 746 votes to Zimmer's 609, as the two opponents soundly beat the other Ward 4 contenders, Freddie B. Frazier and Anthony Mussara.

Now it's just Campos and Zimmer.

A young first-term councilman affiliated with the Brian P. Stack wing of the council, Campos has faced a tough tenure, including a drunk driving arrest in New York. The Jersey Journal last month featured a tape of one of the arresting police officers calling Hoboken Police headquarters on the night of the arrest. When asked for his advice, the Hoboken desk sergeant told the New York officer, "I would expect you to do your duty." There's a pretrail hearing in the case scheduled for later this month.

Campos was raised in the fourth ward, or barrio 4 as it's known by some of the area's Latino population. A lawyer and vocal member of the council, he is notably allied with the other young, Stack-backed council people - namely Michael Russo, Peter Cammarano and Ruben Ramos.

Zimmer's detrators say she hasn't lived in Hoboken very long (just over five years) and doesn't understand the issues faced by those low and moderate income people who inhabit the ward, and who are struggling to make ends meet as gentrification takes hold of the square-mile city. A portrait photographer, mother and community activist upset by what she describes as the council's failure to secure more neighborhood amenities as it negotiates with developers, Zimmer says the irony is neighborhood hero Campos has taken campaign contributions from some of the very developers who would contribute to poor quality of life problems in the 4th Ward.

For his part part, Campos has his own complaints about Zimmer.

In the wake of last month's election, Campos sent a letter to U.S. Attorney Chris Christie and Attorney General Stuart Rabner, claiming some of Zimmer's volunteers - including Zimmer campaign manager Doug Snyder - strong-armed residents into signing their names on absentee ballots in support of Zimmer. Campos requested that the two law men keep their eyes on Tuesday's election.

Zimmer calls the charges untrue and described Campos' efforts as a Hudson County political tactic.