L. Harvey Smith

STATEMENT OF ASSEMBLY SPEAKER ROBERTS

(TRENTON) - Assembly Speaker Joseph J. Roberts Jr. today released the following statement:

"I wholeheartedly agree with the Governor's call for Assemblymen Smith and Van Pelt to do what is best for their constituents and the Assembly and resign from office.

"I commend the Governor's quick response, as the scope of the allegations made today are shocking and disgusting.

"I am immediately removing Assemblymen Smith and Van Pelt from their committee assignments."

Federal prosecutors have filed a criminal complaint against Assemblyman L. Harvey Smith (D-Jersey City), alleging extortion charges.

Smith is not seeking re-election to the Assembly, but instead ran unsuccessfully for Mayor of Jersey City in the May municipal election.

Also charged was his aide, Richard Greene.

Click here to read the criminal complaint against Assemblyman L. Harvey Smith

JOHNSON / SMITH BILL CODIFYING STATE POLICE RACIAL PROFILING REFORMS APPROVED BY ASSEMBLY

(TRENTON) – Legislation sponsored by Assemblymen Gordon Johnson and L. Harvey Smith to codify reforms implemented by the State Police to end racial profiling and ensure continued state oversight and monitoring was approved 77-2 today by the Assembly.

The bill (A-3935) would establish within the Attorney General’s Office an office to assume the oversight and monitoring that has been performed by an independent monitoring team created as part of a 1999 consent decree entered into with the U.S. Department of Justice.

“The citizens of New Jersey are entitled to be protected and served by law enforcement professionals who conduct themselves in accordance with the highest standards of integrity, proficiency and accountability,” said Johnson (D-Bergen). “We’ve made progress toward making racial profiling a thing of the past, but we must remain vigilant. This bill both acknowledges the progress, but also provides the oversight needed to instill confidence that that progress will not be reversed.”

JOHNSON / SMITH BILL CODIFYING STATE POLICE REFORMS ADVANCED BY ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE

(TRENTON) – Legislation sponsored by Assemblymen Gordon Johnson and L. Harvey Smith to codify reforms implemented by the State Police to end racial profiling and ensure continued state oversight and monitoring was advanced today by an Assembly committee.

The bill (A-3935) would establish within the Attorney General’s Office an office to assume the oversight and monitoring that has been performed by an independent monitoring team created as part of a 1999 consent decree entered into with the U.S. Department of Justice.

“The citizens of New Jersey are entitled to be protected and served by law enforcement professionals who conduct themselves in accordance with the highest standards of integrity, proficiency and accountability,” said Johnson (D-Bergen). “We’ve made progress toward making racial profiling a thing of the past, but we must remain vigilant. This bill both acknowledges the progress, but also provides the oversight needed to instill confidence that that progress will not be reversed.”

Burlington County Republicans are saying that they expect Gov. Jon Corzine to nominate State Sen. Philip Haines (R-Springfield) to the Superior Court this month, and that Haines has told party leaders he could be out of the Senate as early as June 25.  Republican sources say that Christopher Myers, a former Medford Mayor who won 48% in a bid for Congress last year, has emerged as the leading candidate to win a July special election convention to fill Haines' seat.

Haines would become the third Senator in recent years to resign from the upper house to become a Superior Court Judge: Garry Furnari (D-Nutley) did it in 2003, clearing the way for Paul Sarlo (D-Wood-Ridge) top move up to the Senate; and later that year, Joseph Charles (D-Jersey City) left the Senate after less than two years to become a Judge.  It was the Charles seat that led to a rancorous primary between then-Jersey City Mayor Glenn Cunningham and the candidate backed by the Hudson County Democratic Organization, then-Jersey City Council President L. Harvey Smith.

Click here to view the Winners & Losers Special Edition for the 2009 Jersey City mayoral race

If Jerramiah Healy tops the 50% mark today, he will become the first Mayor of Jersey City to win three elections without a runoff since the legendary Frank Hague.

Healy won a 2004 special election 28%-24% over Assemblyman Louis Manzo, with Acting Mayor L. Harvey Smith running a strong third with 22%.  When he ran for re-election in 2005, he won 75% of the vote against former City Councilwoman Melissa Holloway.

Runoffs have been common in Jersey City elections in recent years.  In 2001, former U.S. Marshal Glenn Cunningham led City Council President (now Hudson County Executive) Thomas DeGise 38%-24% in the May election, and won the runoff 53%-47%.  Bret Schundler elected in a nineteen-candidate 1992 special election, won re-election with 68% in 1993.  But in 1997, he fell two votes short of winning 50% and after a court battle, beat Healy 59%-41% in the runoff.

When Dr. Paul Jordan, a reformer who toppled the Jersey City Democratic machine when he won a 1971 special election for Mayor, ran for Governor six years later, City Clerk Thomas F.X. Smith beat Jordan's handpicked successor.  Smith won 50% against William Macchi, the Jersey City Director of Human Resources.  That effectively ended Jordan's gubernatorial campaign and caused the defeat of Jordan allies in the State Senate (Walter Sheil ousted two-term State Sen. James Dugan, the Democratic State Chairman) and Assembly in the primary election a few weeks later.  Smith served one-term and unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for Governor in 1981.

Sources say that tracking polls taken by Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy's campaign show the incumbent around 53%, and around 55% with leaners.  His closest rival, former Assemblyman Louis Manzo is holding at around 15%, and Assemblyman L. Harvey Smith is running third.  Healy needs to win 50% of the vote tonight to avoid a runoff.

Jersey City residents will go to the polls tomorrow to either elect their next mayor or set the stage for a runoff next month.

Four candidates are taking on Mayor Jerramiah Healy in this city of 240,000, and the most well-funded among them, former Assemblyman Louis Manzo, has only one-tenth of the funds Healy does.   Also running are Assemblyman L. Harvey Smith, good government activist Dan Levin and police detective Phil Webb.  

There are also 42 candidates for council on the ballot -- a relatively small number by historical Jersey City standards.   

Healy, who had raised $3.1 million as of the last report with the Election Law Enforcement Commission, has been considered the favorite throughout the race.  He's rolled our one big name state endorsement after another, and spent this morning campaigning at the Journal Square PATH station with Newark Mayor Cory Booker.  He's hitched his campaign to President Barack Obama, and by now most Jersey City residents with cable television have seen Obama's two-year-old remarks praising Healy, then an early endorser of his underdog candidacy.  

Conventional wisdom dictates that the best chance someone has to upset Healy is to force him into a runoff by keeping him from getting a majority of the vote.  But Manzo, making his fifth bid for mayor, sees an upset in the making, one so large that it will overshadow John Kenny's 1949 defeat of Frank Hague Eggers, which ended the influence of Jersey City's three-decade mayor and powerful political boss, Frank Hague.  

"Based on what we've seen in our polling in the last week, the undecideds stay high and the other guys in the race were not drawing a significant amount of votes," said Manzo,  who got the front-page endorsement of the Jersey Journal this weekend.   "If the undecideds break one way or the other, this could be a first ballot win for us."