By Douglas E. Hall

When you think about it, serving the public in an elected office really is a tough job.  I’d say it’s more so when one considers this work on a municipal level.

Douglas E. Hall

Starting at the top, being president of the United States may be the toughest job around, but the president has lots of help and you’re really, for the most part, protected from direct contact with all the folks who voted for you, or voted against you.

That is true to a lesser degree as one considers holding public office on a Congressional level, a state level, county level and finally on a municipal level.  There on the municipal level, a Mayor, such as Nancy Merse of Edgewater, until her death on Thursday, March 10, gave her attention to supporters and detractors each and every time she conducted a meeting of the Borough Council.

Mayor Merse did it with skill, class and style and an amazing amount of patience with the most trivial or wrong-headed complainer.

Consider this, on top of the many pressures of this job; Mayor did it all while waging a lengthy battle with cancer that included major surgery.

Yet she was there to do, as best she could, her sworn duty to carry out the oath of her office and lead the affairs of the Borough of Edgewater through what ever challenges came up.

The high points of her administration were the resumption of regular ferry service across the Hudson River to Manhattan and the construction of a new borough Hall.

I’m not the first one to say it’s a pity the mayor did not get to participate in the opening of the new Borough Hall, which should be completed in a matter of weeks.  But it truly is a pity.

Nancy Merse

Now in the case of the ferry, this is a good illustration that the Mayor put the wishes of the people before her own thoughts on a matter.

For some may well remember that Mayor Merse, as a Borough Council member, did not initially support the acquisition of the Edgewater Marina, nor did she support the resumption of ferry service after an absence of 50 years.

But after the voters supported ferry service in a non-binding referendum, she wholeheartedly worked to make new ferry service to New York a reality.

The borough-owned marina has become an asset to the town, and the morning and evening ferry service has been a winner with commuters.  Not only did Mayor Merse provide shuttle bus service from the ferry to most of the Edgewater commuters to avoid the question of parking at the marina and increased traffic congestion, but she worked out arrangements with Fort Lee and Cliffside Park to have commuters from those towns brought to and from the ferries each day.  Cliffside Park Mayor Gerald Calabrese was among those who were there at her well-attended funeral at the Church of the Rosary on Monday, March 14.

There was a good turnout among the residents as well as current and former borough officials.  I feel it was a mistaken slight that there were no officials from the county, state or federal level at her funeral.

But Mayor Merse probably would not have minded.  Though she served the public and her town for 38 years, Mayor Merse was a humble, down-to-earth woman who sought not personal aggrandizement.

Anyone who even knew her slightly wound up calling her, Nancy, not Mayor or Mrs. Merse.

She was one-of-a-kind, and her steady hand on the tiller of the borough through rough seas or calm will be missed.  She was the first woman to serve as mayor of Edgewater with her exemplary service, which began on the Board of Education in 1973 and took her to the Borough Council in 1979 and the office of mayor in 2002. She should not be the last woman to serve as mayor of Edgewater.

Mayor Merse loved Edgewater and Edgewater loved her.  We miss her and will in the days ahead.

By Douglas E. Hall

For the ten years I’ve been writing this column, I’ve taken the opportunity to write tributes upon their death to some of the 300 show business personalities I interviewed back in the 1980s when I was producing radio programming and interviewing the stars who in one way of another made music in the preceding decades, particularly in the 1940s through the ‘60s.

Douglas E. Hall

Among the Hollywood stars I spoke with then was Jane Russell (May 10, 1988), who I am sorry to say died last month on Feb. 28 at her home in Santa Maria, Calif.  She was 89, which means she was coming into her 60’s when we spoke.

She looked good and had class and style and comported herself as the movie star she was. She was tall (5 foot seven, but statuesque compared to most of her contemporary actresses), which made her imposing, but she was a bit reserved and had to be drawn out a bit to keep the rolling recording tape filled with facts and tidbits of her glamorous career in Hollywood.

She also showed that she was a serious business woman, who was interested in talking about her then new line of lingerie especially designed for full-busted women.

Since the show I was producing was a musical magazine format that surveyed the musical hits of the past 40 years, I wanted to talk about her musical-comedy films with Bob Hope and Marilyn Monroe.  Of course we talked about both and her whole career, including the film that launched her at the age of 19 into the public’s consciousness and made her a star.  That was Howard Hughes’ controversial “The Outlaw.”  And yes, according to Ms. Russell, the multi-talented airplane pilot, tycoon and in this case film producer-director Howard Hughes did design a special bra she was to wear in that film, to show off her prominent bosom.  But it was for pure publicity as Ms. Russell said she never did wear that bra.

The movie exposed too much cleavage and too much skin according to censors of the 1940s.  The ruckus delayed the film’s release for two years and then resulted in a nine-week run in San Francisco in 1943, but postponed openings in New York until 1947 and a nationwide release that was further delayed until 1950.  Critics turned up their noses at this Western where Jane played a tough cookie to a sheriff and Billy the Kid.  But, as was so often the case in those days, the sexuality-related controversy guaranteed good box office.

Jane Russell found her stride in the better movies that showcased her talent when she teamed with Bob Hope in 1948 in a Western musical comedy, “The Paleface.”  She played Calamity Jane and Hope was the inept and cowardly dentist in the old West.  The movie included one of the biggest song hits of the year, “Buttons and Bows,” which featured Bob Hope singing to Russell.  Unfortunately the opportunity for a Hope-Russell duet was missed.

“They didn’t know I could sing then,” Ms. Russell told me 40 years later. Not only that, but Hope was a long established star of the first magnitude while Russell was getting her first real break in a first-class movie. The song won an Academy Award as best song of the year, and it was a big hit for Dinah Shore

Jane did sing in the sequel, “Son of Paleface” in 1952, but the songs were mediocre, and none became hits.  The movie was a hit with Bob and Jane paired again plus the addition of King of the Cowboys Roy Rogers in a supporting role.

The following year Jane did duets with Marilyn Monroe in the musical film adapted from the Broadway Carol Channing show “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes”

Jane and Marilyn were those “Two Little Girls From Little Rock,” trying to gold dig their way to Paris singing an appealing show-stopper of the film, only exceeded by Marilyn’s iconic rendition of “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend.”

This greater exposure of Ms. Russell’s singing ability led to her landing a recording contract that produced an album of 78 rpm records, which today are quite collectable.  There is a CD currently available of Ms. Russell’s vocals from over the years.  With 21 selections, many of the tunes are forgettable, but there are some gems: “As Long as I Love,” “Body and Soul,” “Love for Sale,” “Until the Real Thing Comes Along,” A Hundred Years From Today,” “I Can’t Get Started,” “It Never Entered My Mind,” “You’re Mine You.”

In all, I found Ms. Russell a charming, down-to-earth person to interview, who I would say deserved a bigger career in both films and musical recordings.

Time marches on and 22 years have gone by since I did the last of these interviews when I was working in radio programming.  The stars and other performers I interviewed are aging and leaving us at a faster rate.  I missed commenting on Mitch Miller, when he died in July of last year at the age of 99, songwriter George David Weiss, who once lived in Fort Lee, who died in August of last year and Eddie Fisher, who died in September of last year.

Mitch was an oboe player who became a supervisor/creator of hit recordings, who became a leader of a chorus.  Who can forget “Sing Along With Mitch Miller?

Who can forget the hit songs of Mr. Weiss – “What a Wonderful Word,” “Wheel of Fortune,” “Lullaby of Birdland,” “That Sunday, That Summer” “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.”?

Who can forget the hits of Eddie Fisher – “Oh My, Papa.” “Wish You Were Here,” “I Need You Now,” “I’m Yours,” “Anytime” “Dungaree Doll,” “Count Your Blessings.”

Someday, no one will remember.

By Douglas E. Hall

The fertile farm fields in the Willamette Valley of Oregon may not seem a legal battlefield over genetically modified produce, but it is.

Douglas E. Hall

The Willamette Valley is the heart of Oregon’s agriculture country. During spring and summer growing seasons, roadside stands dot the country lanes, and farmers’ markets appear in the valley’s historic towns.

The valley’s flat terrain and temperate climate make it a favorite for hikers and cyclists, who also enjoy the paved paths in the college towns of Eugene and Corvallis. Nestled among its rolling hills are over 200 wineries producing a medley of vintages—Pinot noir, Pinot gris and Riesling to mention a few. The valley, dubbed Oregon’s Wine Country, is one of Oregon’s major wine-growing regions.

But among the biggest cash crops are sugar beets.

If you’re not acquainted with sugar beets, you are very familiar with what the beets produce, the pure white sweet granules in your sugar bowl and so many of the foods you eat.  Sugar beets provide the nation with half of the sugar it consumes.  The other half is from sugar cane, produced mainly in the continental U.S. in Louisiana, but in Hawaii and Puerto Rico as well.

Sugar beets are grown across many northern states in the Continental United States and they are also a major crop in Nebraska, but what has put the Willamette Valley on the map is the fact that all of the sugar beet farmers in the valley have all decided to use genetically modified seeds from Monsanto to grow their crops this spring despite a ruling from a federal district court that revoked a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) approval of the seed use.

Despite the ruling of Federal Judge Jeffrey S. White in San Francisco that USDA had to first prepare an environmental impact study (EIS), the Department said on Friday, Feb. 4, that the farmers could proceed with the genetically modified seeds.  The department decided it could not produce an EIS until May 2012 and if planting of the seeds was delayed, that would produce a sugar shortage.

These seeds have been modified by Monsanto to carry a gene that makes them resistant to Monsanto’s powerful and toxic weed killer, Roundup. The concern, particularly in Willamette Valley, is that there is insufficient room to isolate the bio-tech sugar-beet plants from cross-pollination with other sugar beets or even table beets and Swiss chard, which are from the same plant family as sugar beets.

There is concern that through wind-blown seeds, there will be cross-pollination with weeds as well, which will eventually make Roundup useless against weeds that have joined with the bio-tech sugar beet seeds.

Even scarier is the belief among some scientists and nutritionalists that ingestion of sugar produced from bio-tech sugar beets will cause increased and new diseases among human consumers.  These food watchers have also complained about corn grown with genetically modified seeds containing genes from insects that attack corn.

But Monsanto and its new German partner KWS Lochow seem unconcerned with those who are troubled by genetic modification of seeds.  In fact, KWS is taking a growing position in the United States in this area.

Last month it announced, KWS has acquired the wheat germplasm assets of two American companies, Great Lakes Cereal Grains, Loveland, Colo., and Sunbeam Extract Co., Wooster, Ohio. These acquisitions provide KWS increased access to the US wheat seed market and increased opportunities to partner with organizations providing the latest technologies for cereal breeding (application of the science of genetics to commercial agriculture).

The move will, in the long term, also strengthen the company’s existing activities in Germany, United Kingdom, France, Poland and Russia. KWS’ wheat breeding and commercial activities in the United States will be consolidated in the newly founded company, KWS Cereals USA, LLC, located at the KWS Seeds headquarters in Shakopee, Minn.

And so the brave new world continues its meddling in the things we eat.

By Douglas E. Hall

The 11^th-hour plans of a lame-duck; Democrat-controlled Board of Freeholders to rescue the financially-ailing BergenPAC will probably come to naught, even if a suit filed by Republican County Executive-elect Kathleen Donovan against the Democrats plan is found to be without merit.

That’s because the ordinances passed by the lame-duck Freeholders to purchase the BergenPAC theater for $2.6 million and float bonds totaling $2.4 million for that purpose can be rescinded by the new Freeholder board in a matter of days by the new 5-2 Republican majority.

In fact, Ms. Donovan has promised to rescind the BergenPAC deal.  She has said, “BergenPAC has a substantial line of credit, which they can draw from to make payments on their current mortgage until the organization can develop a permanent resolution.” This presumably would be through fund raising and perhaps selling bonds on their own.

Douglas E. Hall

The suit, which may serve as simply a shot across the Democrats bow, takes issue with the fact that the Democrat-controlled Freeholders voted for the acquisition and bonding during an executive work session, which preceded a “public” freeholders meeting.

Freeholder David L. Ganz, a Democrat, who has been serving as chairman pro tem, said that both the work session and public meetings were open to the public and the public could comment at both meetings.

He also said the Freeholders were “talking to their lawyer (Edward J. Florio) on how to proceed.”

Freeholder Chairman James M. Carroll, who is also mayor of Demarest, declined to comment explaining that he never comments on pending litigation.

By Douglas E. Hall

Death panels? Oh my.  President Obama said last summer that he’d never want to pull the plug on Grandma, but some people paying attention to rule- making coming out of the White House think that’s just what the Obama administration has in mind.

The New York Times broke this story as its page 1 lead on Sunday, Dec. 26, the day after Christmas, a day when readership might be lower than normal.  Was the timing a gift to the Obama Administration?  Perhaps, but unappreciated if it was.

“The Times story is wrong. This benefit was signed into law under President Bush. The only thing new here is a regulation allowing the discussions –authorized in 2003 by the prescription drug benefit — to happen in the context of the new annual wellness visit created by the Affordable Care Act,” said White House spokesman Reid Cherlin, as reported by Fox News.

Is there anything else Obama & Company can blame/credit “W” for?  Maybe President Obama should coax President Bush to take an advisory position in the White House to improve the clarity of just what President Obama inherited from his predecessor.

What this latest brouhaha is all about was succinctly related in the Times article lead paragraph:

“When a proposal to encourage end-of-life planning touched off a political storm over ‘death panels,’ Democrats dropped it from legislation to overhaul the (nation’s) health care system.  But the Obama Administration will achieve the same goal by regulation, starting Jan. 1.”

Douglas E. Hall

Sarah Palin was one of the first to use the term ‘death panel,” when she was the Republican candidate for vice president in 2008.

“Obama’s death panel” would decide who was worthy of health care.  Ohio Representative John A. Boehner, who is about to become the House Republican leader, said a provision in the new health care bill “may start us down a treacherous path toward euthanasia.”

Rep. Boehner has since said he will work toward dismantling and defunding the new law that’s come to be known as Obama Care.

Hey guys, if you want to do this right you ought to call in an expert, Dr. John Kevorkian, a physician who was ahead of his time in this field.  He so believed in euthanasia and assisted suicide that he went to jail in 1999, convicted of second degree murder and served eight years of a 10-25 year prison sentence.  The guy’s a pioneer, claiming that he assisted in the death of 130 patients.  “Dying is not a crime,” was his motto.

After all, he started out advertising in
Detroit newspapers in 1987 as a physician consultant for “death counseling.” Isn’t that what were talking about here?

The new Medicare regulation calls for doctors to be paid for advising patients on options for end of life care, which may include advance directives to forgo aggressive life sustaining treatment.

The Congressman who led the crafting of this language is Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.).  When he heard of the Obama Administration’s most recent Medicare rule, he urged supporters not to crow about it.  Fearing Republicans will roll out what he calls the “death panel myth,” Rep. Blumenauer said, “We won’t be shouting this from the rooftops because we’re not out of the woods yet.”  In other words, let’s not let the public know what we’re up to.

Conversely, that reminds me of an outspoken Congressman from Florida, Rep. Alan Grayson, a Democrat.  During his campaign for reelection last fall he said, “If you get sick, die quickly. That’s right. The Republicans want you to die quickly if you get sick. . .”  He lost by 17 percentage points to Republican Daniel Webster.

In the above, politicians have attempted, often clumsily, to come to grips with a very serious problem:  People are living longer and it is costing more and more to keep them alive.  What to do?  How will these bills be paid and who is to pay them?

No answers here, but I do wish all of you a healthy life in the New Year.

By Douglas E. Hall

Thursday, Dec. 16 was a historic day for our nation.  Two things took place signaling, a major shift in the way we, as a nation, govern ourselves.

Following the action of the Senate that took place on the day before, the House of Representatives approved a tax bill that extends the lowered income tax rates enacted under President George W. Bush for the next two years.

It was a bitter pill for most of the Democrats and President Obama, but the legislation was the result of negotiations of the White House and Republican leaders, some of whom will take over leadership positions in the House for the new Congress next year.

As if that was not enough, this significant development was topped by the withdrawal of a massive $1.3 trillion 1,900 page omnibus bill that included $8 billion in some 6,000 earmarks of pork and favorite Democrat favorite projects such as the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the U.S. Senate, which was to receive $8.5 million (Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.) originally wanted $30 million).  The plans for the $150 million institute have already been funded with $38 million tax dollars from you and me.

Nevada Senator Harry Reid, the Democrat senate majority leader, withdrew the bill after it became clear that there were not 60 votes among the Democrat majority.  Ironically, it was Illinois Republican Senator Mike Kirk who occupies President Obama’s old senate seat who cast the 41^st vote against the bill.

This all shows that elections have consequences, that the efforts of the Tea Party movement and the Republican victory in November have changed the game in Washington even before the lame duck session of Congress was ended.

Senator Reid doesn’t seem to get it yet.  There he was on television, exclaiming, “I don’t understand (he certainly doesn’t) It’s Congress’ job to spend funds.”

Yes, Senator, but with discretion with and temperance.  It has never been the job description of U. S. senators to spend money like the proverbial drunken sailors.

Doug Schoen, political analyst, a graduate of Harvard College (magna cum laude) and Harvard Law School, who worked on the campaigns of Ed Koch and Bill Clinton, put it clearly, “The Democrats’ biggest mistake has been to underestimate the importance of a movement that is of unprecedented and potentially of fundamental importance to the American political system. Of course, I’m talking about the Tea Party movement.”

Writing with Patrick Caddell, a Democratic pollster and analyst, whose work goes back to George McGovern and who has worked for a host of Democrats that include Jimmy Carter, Joe Biden and Jerry Brown, the two put together an opinion paper for Fox News, that states:

Douglas E. Hall

“President Obama’s deal with congressional Republicans on extending the Bush tax cuts that has now been passed by both the House and the Senate and will be signed by him this week suggests a fundamental misreading — by Democrats and Republicans alike — of the implications of November’s historic election. Not only that, but it suggests as well the failure of the president and both parties to deal in a rational way with the new balance of power in Washington.

“Coming on the heels of the Bipartisan Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform report, which underscored the need to significantly reduce and ultimately eliminate the national debt that is more than $13 trillion, not increase it even more, we are deeply alarmed by the willingness of President Obama and both parties to sacrifice the national interest for political gain — with a deal which at best can be viewed as the meeting in the middle of two failed policies.

“If the passage of the Senate’s Christmas-Eve health care reform bill last year — which aroused the country — is the Ghost of Christmas Past, the tax deal has all the potential of becoming the Ghost of Christmas Present.

“Regardless of whether you would support or oppose this particular compromise in the short-term, the long term deleterious consequences of the legislation for the country’s fiscal health are clear and obvious.

“It is as if there was no deficit commission report at all.

“Both parties have effectively agreed to add an additional $900 billion dollars to the deficit, further putting Social Security at risk – with a bill loaded with earmarks that does not include one penny in spending reductions, pays no attention to deficit reductions at all, and offers no clear direction for the United States’ long-term fiscal policies, and no discussion of any long term plan to grow the economy and restore America’s fiscal health.

“The political machinations over the last week have revealed that Washington is more polarized than ever: both the Republicans and the Democrats are demonstrating unprecedented levels of insularity and alienation, while political gamesmanship — fighting for the sake of fighting, battling for sake of battle, politics as a zero sum game – continues to be the way the process works.

“Meanwhile, President Obama, having completely lost touch with the people who elected him, reinforced his image as an inside technocratic deal-maker who will negotiate with anyone for his own political gain on Tuesday as he attacked the “sanctimonious” liberal Democrats, the Republican “hostage takers” and even his own deal for including “tax cuts for the wealthy.”

“Nothing better sums up the strange role the president has played than when he walked into the briefing room with President Clinton last Friday, asked the former president to speak about the deal, and then announced that he had more important business to attend to at a holiday party with his wife, Michelle.”

Attitudes in Washington better change all around and brace the nation for our next financial crisis.

If Meredith Whitney is to be believed in what she had to say on CBS’ “60 Minutes” Sunday night (Dec. 19), this was a scary scenario

“Fifty to 100 sizeable defaults” amounting to “hundreds of billions of dollars,” is her prediction. She believes that in the next twelve months, the U.S. government will face pressure to bail out struggling states, thereby saving the nation’s cities.

Ms. Whitney is a highly respected Wall Street analyst.  Her extremely bearish view on banks landed her on the cover of the August 18, 2008 issue of Fortune Magazine, even before the problems in the next month that befell Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers.  The year before she wrote a particularly pessimistic report on Citibank, which proved quite an accurate prediction.  She manages her own advisory firm and has been selected as second best stock picker in capital markets by Forbes.

The United States has not seen widespread municipal defaults and bankruptcies since the Great Depression of the 1930s.  Is that where we are headed?

Will Congress and the President fiddle as the United States ignites and burns?  2011 could be quite a year.  Fasten your seatbelts.  This could be very a bumpy ride.

By: Douglas E. Hall

These are tough times for many segments of our society. Theater is no exception and many centers of our culture and art are suffering.  BergenPAC in Englewood is no exception.

It’s a problem that plagues many institutions as well as individuals in a down economy:  Too much debt with too little income to put against the debt service.

So the lame duck Freeholders, dominated by the Democrats voted out of office in November, came to the rescue of BergenPAC on Dec. 8 by approving bonding of $2.4 million to acquire – the charming old theater BergenPAC calls home on North Van Brunt Street in Englewood for $2.6 million. Amidst grumbling from Republicans, three among them who are Freeholders-elect, ready to take office next month, the out going Democratic majority vote to sell bonds to acquire the theater and get BergenPAC out of a financial hole.

The members of the GOP reason the decision on purchase of the former John Harms Center for the Arts should have been left to the new reorganized Board of Freeholders when this changing of the guard takes place next month.

Douglas E. Hall

Arguments can be made on either side of what lame duck government bodies ought to or should not do.  But the fact remains that Republican office holders and their party generally favor smaller government, and subsidizing the arts does not generally reflect the philosophy of smaller government advocates.

While Governor Christie legitimately can argue that his many cutbacks in state spending has had to be made because of the state’s dire straits financially, I for one, cannot imagine Governor Christie thinking it a good idea for the Freeholders to bail out BergenPAC.

The general assumption is that had the current Freeholders left a decision on BergenPAC to the new Freeholders next month with a 5-2 Republican control, a rescue plea for BergenPAC might well have gone unheeded.

So at a county level, we have a bit more of government involved our culture.

This is not the first time the Englewood venue has needed an infusion of cash to keep going.

Many will remember that the BergenPAC was once the Harms Center, which in 1998 underwent a $6.6 million renovation that included air conditioning for the first time in the building constructed in 1926.

That debt from that work brought the facility to serious financial difficulties in 2003 that led to the theater closing for a time.

Attorney Frank Huttle devised a plan to restructure the Harms debt, and then turned the Harms theater into the BergenPAC.  Mr. Huttle became the chief executive of the new organization, but stepped down when he was elected mayor last November.

The problem in 2003 was that the refurbished theater found that they could not pay for the renovation with the ticket proceeds from the artists booked into the theater.

It is troubling that Harms and now BergenPAC have had these financial problems.

One has to wonder if there is enough will on the part of the residents of Englewood and the surrounding area to support a cultural center in this generally upscale area of Bergen County.

Are the tickets, which range from $29-39 to $99 with recent tops of $175 for Dianna Ross, $149 for Meat Loaf and $125 for Paul Anka too costly, even for the well-to do of this area?  Does television, which threatened the movies in the ’50, now providing high definition with a wide variety of offerings on cable on giant-size screens, plus home-delivered film services such as Netflex, cut into attendance at live performances at BergenPAC?

Does the proximity of Broadway and Lincoln Center in Manhattan skim off the very patrons who would most likely fill theater seats at BergenPAC?

Over the last 60 years there has been a tremendous decline of live performances in our society.  The Rustic Cabin in Englewood Cliffs and Bill Miller’s Riviera in Fort Lee come to mind.  There was a live professional theater at Bergen Mall (now Bergen Town Center) in Paramus.  I well remember seeing Tom Poston in “The Fantasticks” the night before President Kennedy was shot in 1963. Movie theaters regularly had live entertainment, including the Englewood Plaza, the theater that now houses Bergen PAC.  Even Chinese restaurants had small music groups performing in the afternoon, at least in Manhattan.

So maybe today live entertainment can only survive with government subsidies.  But since so many patrons of BergenPAC tend to be upscale, is this something in which government should participate?

By Douglas E. Hall

It isn’t easy being a Republican governor with a Democratic administration in Washington – especially when the State of New Jersey is one Democrats used to count on being true blue, all the way through – and especially when the governor is an outspoken aggressive guy who has been around the country stumping for GOP candidates and who has been mentioned in polls as a serious contender for the presidency.

So it should come as no surprise that the feds want their $271 million back, which they invested in the ARC (Access to the Region’s Core) rail tunnel under the Hudson River from North Bergen to Manhattan.  This is the project that Governor Christie cancelled.

Douglas E. Hall

Not only do they want their money back, but they want it back in 30 days, on Christmas Eve no less.  Talk about the Grinch that stole Christmas.  This is it folks.  The federal government that invested a meager $271 million in what was the nation’s largest public work project, pegged at $8.7 billion and expected to climb to $10 billion or more before the work was completed.  This is the same federal government that spent $787 billion to stimulate our economy.

The problem began with the misguided planning of the Corzine Administration that was ready to have the nearly broke State of New Jersey assume an open-ended obligation of billions and billions of dollars in cost overruns.  It took courage to stop this madness, and that’s just what Governor Christie did.

And the reward from Washington is a dunning letter for $271 million with the interest clock ready to start toting up interest payments on this “debt” within 30 days. The demand is actually assessed against cash-strapped NJ Transit.  The feds also pile on with threats to notify all credit bureaus and bond rating agencies, to in effect. damage the state’s credit rating.

And finally, the feds are ready to loose Eric Holder’s Justice Department on the state as bill collector, ready to haul state officials to court.

This is the Justice Department of the Obama Administration, which looked the other way when the new Black Muslims intimidated white voters in Pennsylvania, the same Justice Department that sued the State of Arizona over its tough immigration law when the state tried to force the federal government to bring order to the murderous U.S.-Mexican border, and the same Justice Department that cannot make up its mind about where to prosecute admitted Sept. 11 terrorist Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

Meanwhile, no one in the Justice Department or any other branch of the Obama Administration is taking any notice of the money-saving smart proposal of New York Mayor Bloomberg to extend the No. 7 subway from the West Side of Manhattan, under the Hudson River and westward to Secaucus at half the price of the ARC tunnel.

Again, we must ask, where are Senators Lautenberg and Menendez?  Why are they silent on this worthy proposal?

The Port Authority is interested.  Governor Christie is interested and would probably be ready to take any federal money on hand from the ARC project and spend it in this new direction.  Why can’t we move forward?  Why do we have no leadership on this obvious step?

Instead of demanding repayment from New Jersey, everyone involved and those not involved should be demanding any and all funding should be directed into planning and building this extension of the New York subway system into New Jersey.

Even the limited construction for ARC, which included grading under Tonnelle Avenue (Routes 1 and 9) in North Bergen might be utilized in the Secaucus subway plan.

We need cooperative planning by NJ Transit, New York City, the Port Authority and the federal government to improve the now over-crowded transportation between our state and New York.  It is in the interest of both states and the nation that this be done.

Can’t we all get along and work together?  This should not be so difficult.

Wow! Who would have thought the cancellation of the ARC tunnel under the Hudson River, designed to double rail capacity between New Jersey and New York, would have spawned such a good idea.

But that’s just what has happened.  New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who kept out of any involvement between New Jersey and the federal government to build the Access to the Region’s Core tunnel from North Bergen to just feet away from Macy’s basement, has taken Governor Christie’s rejection of the State of New Jersey‘s financial burden of $5 billion or more to build that tunnel and come up with a plan that makes a lot more sense:

Extend the No. 7 New York subway line, which now runs from Flushing to Seventh Avenue in Manhattan, all the way west to the Frank Lautenberg Transfer in Secaucus, the mayor suggests.

Douglas E. Hall

In a sense this plan is already underway in Manhattan, where New York City is spending $2 billion to extend the No. 7 line from Times Square across to the West Side of Manhattan and down to the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.  That is already a step to aiding New Jersey commuters since the Javits center is practically right next to the NY Waterway ferry docks, which now carry commuters and other passengers from New Jersey to Manhattan every day.  NY Waterway ferry buses, which take NY Waterway ferry riders to a variety of locations in Manhattan, regularly drop ferry riders at the Javits’ entrance.

If the No. 7 line was tunneled under the Hudson River, it could easily provide connections to the Hoboken rail terminal as well as the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail.  Perhaps, even if it were only extended to Hoboken, it would in the short run provide some relief to some commuters and encourage others to ride the rails easing congestion on both highways and local streets.

Extension of the No. 7 into New Jersey makes plans to extend the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail, at long last, into Bergen County more imperative.  NJ Transit planners should not give up on light rail up the Northern Branch despite the short-sighted leadership of the Tenafly Borough Council which led its residents to reject light rail for Tenafly and, in effect, all rail mass transit to that misguided borough.

The Flushing line had its beginnings in 1885, but due to various financial and construction setbacks, the line did not reach Times Square until 1927.  The line became very popular when the New York World’s Fair opened in 1939 and years later, it was a favorite of Mets’ baseball fans to reach Shea Stadium and it still is to reach the Mets’ new home Citi Park.  Should the line be completed to either Secaucus or Hoboken,  Giants and Jets football fans in New York will find the line a convenient way to get to the new Giant Stadium in the Meadowlands in East Rutherford.

While the proposal to make the No. 7 train and interstate route is gaining in popularity – Governor Christie has expressed interest and, in fact, he chided U.S. Senator Frank  Lautenberg for now showing an interest in this new proposal.  Democrat Lautenberg, who severely criticized Republican Christie for cancelling the ARC tunnel, shot back that U.S. senators usually seek federal money to march local commitments for big infrastructure projects.  Pressing Governor Christie, he wrote a letter asking the governor to inform him, the amount and nature of New Jersey’s commitment to this project.

The Port Authority, which put up $3 billion to build the ARC tunnel, also has expressed an interest in the No. 7 train extension.

Now here’s the best part.  New York City planners estimate it will only cost an additional $5.3 billion to extend the subway line to New Jersey, which is about half the estimated costs of the ARC tunnel.

It could just happen that Governor Christie could come out of this looking like a winner.

No wonder Senator Lautenberg has a grouch on.

By Douglas E. Hall

Adoption is a subject that, to most people, is a sensible win-win solution for children who have no parents (at least parents who are available) and traditionally married couples who have been unable to have children.

For those involved – adoptees and adopters it is not so simple.  I come to this subject as an adoptee.  As such, I generally feel most people have little understanding that adoption is not a win- win situation, but one where making the best of a difficult situation is fraught with pitfalls.

Even the most successful adoption opens the door to self doubt and encourages a lack of self esteem.  The most irritating comment I hear when I disclose having been adopted is the following, “You are very lucky because you were chosen.”  Yes, but I would have been much more fortunate had I been born into a well-adjusted family with strong bonds, not an unwed mother who for whatever good reason, felt it necessary to give me away.  It leaves one with the nagging feeling of what’s wrong with me?  Why was I given to strangers?

Douglas E. Hall

I write this at this time because across New Jersey the state Division of Youth and Family Services (DYFS) just promoted the celebration of National Adopting Month.  According to DYFS, county agencies in 17 of the state’s 21 counties celebrated the event from Nov. 15 through Nov. 20.  These included Passaic and Hudson counties, but not Bergen County. I don’t know why Bergen County did not join the celebration.  But ever since voters turned every county office-holding Democrat out of office in the election on Nov. 2, the county publicity machine has all but fallen silent, since Nov. 8 and the county appears to be on autopilot.

Just weeks before DYFS staged these celebrations; the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute cited a “critical need for post-adoption services.”

The report states “An extensive examination of adoptive families in the United States, concludes that too many are not receiving the essential services they need, and calls for a reshaping of national priorities and resources to develop and provide such services.”

In an effort to demonstrate the breadth of professional support for a “paradigm shift,” major child welfare and adoption organizations across the country joined in endorsing the 116-page report.

“The report stresses that the vast majority of adopted children function normally — and their (adopting) parents are highly satisfied with their families. But it also points out that just over the past 15 years, nearly a million boys and girls were adopted by Americans from foster care in our country and from orphanages abroad, and the majority of U.S. adoptions continue to be of those types (by far, mostly from state child welfare systems).

“What it means is that these children live with the emotional, psychological and developmental consequences of having been abused, neglected or institutionalized before they were adopted,” said Adoption Institute Executive Director Adam Pertman.

And while these celebrations took place in most of the state, local Assemblywoman Joan Voss (D-Dist. 38) of Fort Lee continues to press legislation she is co-sponsoring that would to some degree open adoption records to adoptees.  Such records were sealed in New Jersey in the 1940s (they are sealed in many states) to protect the privacy of unmarried women who give up their babies for adoption.  The state now has about 150,000 sealed adoption records

The trouble with this practice is that it makes the infants who are adopted, parties to a contract in which they had no say.

While some adoptees say they have no interest in finding their natural parents, there are many who would like to at least know all they can about their heritage.  Certainly today, there is good reason for adoptees to know the medical history of their natural birth parents.

Since the adoption records were sealed, birth certificates have been issued bearing the names of the adoptive parents as if they were the natural parents.  This to me a fraud and cruel hoax played on the adopted.  It permits some adoptive parents to never tell their children the facts of their birth.  In other words, the adoption can be forever hidden.

This is counter to the inquisitiveness of human nature.  Most people have some interest in their heritage.  We all study history in school.  Society is populated with historians and archeologists. Writers from reporters to novelists all dig into history in varying degrees as part of their work.

Genealogy/family tree sites are one of the most popular destinations on the Internet.

A bill similar to the Voss bill was passed by the Senate in June.  It was co-sponsored by state Senator Loretta Weinberg (D-Dist. 37) of Teaneck.  This bill removes the exemption for adoption records within the New Jersey Open Public Records, and a companion Senate bill would give adopted individuals and a few others access to their original birth certificate and would give access to “non-identifying family medical history information.”   This is much like the Assembly bill Assemblywoman Voss is co-sponsoring.

Ms. Voss told me on Sunday, Nov. 21, that Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver promised Ms. Voss that the bill would be put up for an Assembly vote during the current session.  After Assembly passage, the bill will be sent to Governor Christie for his signature.

It’s been too many years that this legislation has been stalled in Trenton.  If Assembly Speaker Oliver puts the bill up to a vote in the Assembly, we might finally have a bit of common sense written into our state’s adoption laws.