BY WALTER ELLIOTT
WEST ORANGE – The history-making peaceful transition of political power is being conducted and celebrated here and among 12 other elected municipal and board of education panels across 10 “Local Talk” towns Jan. 1-9.
Councilwoman Susan McCartney became this township’s first woman mayor after taking her oath of office here at the Grand Wilshire Hotel just past 3 p.m. Jan. 2. The outgoing council president succeeds three-term mayor Robert D. Parisi.
McCartney’s swearing in followed the inauguration of first-time council members Asmeret Ghebremicael and Susan Scarpa at the Municipal Building Council Chamber 11:30 a.m. Monday. Ghebremicael and Scarpa respectively succeeded McCartney and Councilwoman Cindy Matute-Brown.
McCartney and the fully seated five Township Council members then passed a series of housekeeping resolutions. These measures range from which members will be liaisons to other governmental agencies and passing a temporary budget to designating an official publication and setting a meeting calendar.
Some of the audience here will be gathering at the West Orange High School Auditorium Jan. 5 at 7:30 p.m. for the swearing-in of two members who were elected in the Nov. 8 General Election and the appointment or reappointment of a board president and vice president.
West Orange, Maplewood, Bloomfield and Glen Ridge happen to have both their municipal and school board officers sworn in this week. Their mayoral and/or council election cycles coincided with their annual board of election elections last year.
Essex County Clerk Christopher J. Durkin – who may or may not swear in officials or attend particular municipal inaugurations – usually tell the gatherings that they were witnessing “the peaceful transfer of political power here and in some 20,000 other governmental bodies across the country.”
That history-making tradition may have taken a broader view in light of recent events on the local and national levels.
Four of Trenton’s seven council members, for example, were sworn-in along with the mayor and selected a temporary board president 5:30 p.m. Jan. 3, The winners of the three Jan. 24 second runoff elections, barring further difficulties, will be inaugurated and seated afterward.
Three of the at-large council races encountered further voting machine and plurality problems after their Dec. 12 runoff.
Katie Hobbs was sworn in as Arizona’s Governor Jan. 2, six days after her opponent, Kari Lake, had filed an appeal for a new election in Maricopa County.
Lake is asserting that the printing of Vote By Mail Ballots in Arizona’s largest county was intentional. Lake’s first court appeals in December were either dismissed or ruled as lacking evidence.
Then there were the 69 dismissed voting irregularity cases filed by the President Donald J. Trump Administration and the attempt to install alternate electors in several states, leading up to the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
Back in WEST ORANGE, the council voted 4-1 to name Williams as this year’s council president. Colleagues Ghenremicael, Scarpa and Michelle Casalin supported her selection, Dr. H William “Bill” Rutherford was the sole dissenter.
Sitting WEST ORANGE BOARD OF EDUCATION President Jennifer Tunnicliffe and first-time board member Robert Ivker are to be sworn into their new terms past press time Jan. 5 at 5:30 p.m. Ivker is succeeding outgoing Board Vice President Gary Rothstein.
Tunnicliffe, Ivker and colleagues Melinda Huerta, Brian Rock and Eric Steveson will then decide who will be their board president and vice president.
EAST ORANGE is modifying its Jan. 1 annual reorganization meeting in the City Hall Council Chamber by moving it to 5:30 p.m. Jan. 9. City elders are otherwise holding their annual meeting regardless of its election cycle. (There were no mayor or council elections here last year.)
All 10 council members will decide whether to retain Second Ward Councilman Christopher Awe as its Council Chairman or rotate it to one of their other nine colleagues.
The ORANGE BOARD OF EDUCATION more than welcomed back Shawneque Johnson, Tyrone Jon Tarver and Sueanne Gravesande during its annual reorganization meeting here at the Orange Preparatory Academy Auditorium 6 p.m. Jan. 3.
A majority of participating city voters had returned Gravesande and Johnson and, after a two-year absence, Tarver. Tarver, who was a board president, succeeded Guadalupe Cabido.
Eight of the nine -member panel then voted to retain Johnson as board president and name Gravesande as vice president for Calendar Year 2023. Tarver abstained from both votes.
The four incumbent SOUTH ORANGE-MAPLEWOOD SCHOOL DISTRICT BOARD OF EDUCATION members are to welcome their three newcomers – Nubia Wilson, William R. Gifford III and Regina Eckert – after their scheduled Jan 5, 7 p.m. inauguration here at the district’s Administration Building Auditorium.
Incumbent Board President Thair Joshua and board member Erin Siders passed on their re-election opportunities. Longtime member Johanna Wright withdrew her campaign in October.
Who will succeed Johnson as board president and/or respective First and Second vice presidents Susan Bergin and Kaitlin Wittleder, however, will not be known until later that Thursday.
MAPLEWOOD’s municipal leaders are a blend of the familiar and the new once they were sworn in here after 7:30 p.m. Jan. 1.
Dean Dafis’ outgoing peers, on Dec. 20, announced that they had decided to keep him as Mayor for the second straight year. Maplewood’s Township Committee, like Nutley’s Board of Commissioners, tend to select a mayor and deputy mayor from among themselves in advance of their scheduled reorganization.
The incoming Township Committeewoman, Deborah Engel, however, took the Deputy Mayor’s seat next to Dafis minutes after her inauguration.
Engel, who ran unopposed last year, knew she was going to succeed former mayor and outgoing committeeman Frank McGehee. What she learned on Dec. 20, however, was that the committee had named her deputy mayor.
Outgoing Deputy Mayor Victor DeLuca, who had also been a longtime mayor, returns to his committee seat. De Luca had asked his colleagues to table Committeewoman Nancy Adams’ proposal to extend future mayor and deputy mayor terms to two years. Maplewood’s elders are to talk with Township Attorney Roger Desiderio on the proposed amendment.
Changes in BLOOMFIELD’s local leadership were more likely found at its Board of Education Administration Building than its township hall.
Incumbent school board president Jill Fischman, Board Member Benjamin Morse and newcomer Phyllis Gerber were sworn in shortly after 6:30 p.m. Jan. 3. Gerber succeeds Daniel Anderson, who declined re-election.
Fischman was retained as president. Kasey Dudley succeeded Shane Berger as vice president.
Mayor Michael Venezia and his three incumbent at-large council running mates were set to be re-inaugurated Jan. 6 at 6:30 p.m.
Venezia himself will be sworn into his third term. Dr. Wartyna “Tina” Davis, Ted Gamble and Rich Rockwell’s re-inaugurations were to follow.
In GLEN RIDGE, former mayor Peter Hughes and Richard Law were sworn into their new BOROUGH COUNCIL terms at the Council Chamber 6:30 p.m. Jan. 3.
Law’s five peers then named him this year’s board president. He succeeds 2022 President Deborah Mans.
BOARD OF EDUCATION President Elisabeth Ginsburg, fellow incumbent member Dr. Heather Yaros-Ramos and newcomer Tricia Akinwande are to be sworn-in at the Glen Ridge High School Auditorium 7 p.m. Jan. 4.
Akinwande is to succeed outgoing member and First Vice President Michael de Leeuw. The board is to also thank and send off Erica Spayd, who was appointed in Yaros-Ramos’ three-month absence.
They will pick from among themselves a successor to De Leeuw as vice president and whether to keep or succeed Ginsburg as their president.
MONTCLAIR BOARD OF EDUCATION incumbent Mfreke “Monk” Inyang and newcomer Yvonne W. Bourknight are to be sworn in during an historic Jan. 5, 7:30 p.m. inauguration here.
Inyang and Bourknight are being sworn into their first full three-year terms in the second step of a three-year MBOE process of switching from a mayor-appointed to a voter-elected school board panel.
That same panel will then decide whether to retain Latifah Jannah and Priscilla Church and respective president and vice president – or select their successors.
BELLEVILLE BOARD OF EDUCATION TRUSTEES were to welcome first-timer Michael Louis Darro and incumbents Luis Antonio Muniz, Jr. and Gabrielle V. Bennett-Meany Jan. 3, 6 p.m. here at the Belleville High School Auditorium.
The reconstituted board then voted to retain Muniz and Bennett-Meany as respective president and vice president.
NUTLEY BOARD OF EDUCATION incumbents Charles W. Kucinski and Theresa “Terri” Quirk plus newcomer Tom D’Elia were sworn in Jan. 3, 6:30 p.m. at the Nutley High School Auditorium.
The new panel then voted Salvatore Ferraro to succeed Kucinski as their board president. Salvatore Balsamo was selected as vice president.
William Hathaway, Jr. contributed content and photos to this report.
