Mila Jasey

Mila Jasey wouldn't say much in her first comments as an Assemblywoman-elect; she wouldn't even commit to backing Joe Roberts for Speaker next year.
Mila M. Jasey won a Special Election Convention to replace Mims Hackett in the State Assembly tonight, and promptly took the fifth.

"No comment," she said, when asked if Hackett, who was arrested earlier this month on bribery charges, should resign his post as Mayor of Orange.

What about Gov. Jon Corzine? Should he release his email correspondence with his former girlfriend, CWA President Carla Katz?

"No comment," Jasey said. "That wouldn’t be appropriate for me to comment on."

And would she support Joe Roberts for another term as Assembly Speaker? Again, Jasey had no comment.

Mark Meyerowitz now faces Mila Jasey in the 27th district Assembly raceFor about two days, 27th district Republican Assembly candidate Mark Meyerowitz thought that he might just be able to pull it off – that he could become the first Republican legislator elected out of West Orange since 1969.

The odds were stacked against Meyerowitz, a 52-year-old financial advisor with barely any political experience, from the beginning. He was running against two entrenched Democratic Assembly opponents – Mims Hackett, Jr. and John McKeon -- in a district represented in the Senate by Richard J. Codey, the most popular politician in the state.

The major players in Essex County have thrown their support behind Mila Jasey to take over Mims Hackett’s spot on the ballot.

Jasey, a South Orange-Maplewood Board of Education member, has won the support of Senate President Richard Codey, Assemblyman John McKeon, County Executive Joe DiVincenzo and Essex County Democratic Chairman Phil Thigpen.

That all but assures her the nod from the Essex County Democratic Committee, who will vote on a ballot replacement on Wednesday.

There was a time when South Orange was the center of the political universe in Essex County.  The small village of 16,000 people had more than its fair share of public and party offices: Peter Shapiro, who was elected to the State Assembly in 1975 (at age 23) and Essex County Executive in 1978; John Cryan, an Assemblyman from 1964 to 1968 and the Essex County Sheriff from 1968 to 1980; Harry Lerner, the longtime Essex County Democratic Chairman who was the party boss from the late 1960's until his retirement in 1979 (following Shapiro win over his candidate, Cryan, in the '78 Democratic County Executive primary); Martin Greenberg, who won State Senate races in 1973 and 1977; Larrie West Stalks, the Essex County Register from 1974 to 1989 and the sister of Newark powerhouse Calvin West; and Harry McEnroe, who served as an Essex County Freeholder and as an Assemblyman from 1980 to 1996.  Wilfredo Caraballo was a South Orange resident when he replaced McEnroe in the Assembly in the 1995 election, but moved to the North Ward of Newark in time for the 2001 legislative redistricting, when South Orange became part of Richard Codey's district instead. 

Emerging as a strong candidate for Mims Hackett's seat in the State Assembly is Mila Jasey, a member of the Maplewood-South Orange Board of Education and a longtime community activist in South Orange.  Essex Democrats have reportedly been searcing for an African American woman to fill the 27th district seat.