Should you have to live in the town where you work? At least three Hudson County towns are considering stepping up enforcement of old municipal ordinances requiring City Hall employees to live there – and in light of the cities’ budget problems, some towns are considering terminating those who don’t.

In desirable cities along the Hudson River, it’s becoming harder to maintain a residence on a City Hall salary, but some officials believe city government would run better if workers had more of a stake in the town they serve, and were easier to reach in an emergency.

At least five Hudson County municipalities have laws on the books saying their employees have to reside in town – but often, the laws are enforced only when brought to light in tough economic times or during a political campaign.

Some believe the ordinances are antiquated in an era of cell phones and superhighways, and make it harder for towns to find the most qualified people.

In light of upcoming changes in policy in towns like West New York and Bayonne, officials are asking two questions: Do residency requirements pose a recognizable advantage to the public? And if an ordinance is on the books, why shouldn’t it either be enforced fairly, or discarded?

Jersey City, Hoboken WNY, and Bayonne


At a Hoboken City Council meeting last month, Councilman Michael Russo, a rumored mayoral candidate this coming May, told the crowd that because the mile-square city is suffering a huge tax increase this year, the approximately 30 city employees who live out of town should be told to either move to town or face termination. Laying them off would cut the town’s ballooning budget.

In Bayonne, Peter Cresci, the town business administrator, warned in an inter-office memo to 741 non-uniformed city employees last April that those who don’t live in Bayonne have to move back “or face termination, removal, or discharge.”

In West New York, Mayor Silverio “Sal” Vega plans to change the town’s residency requirement at the beginning of 2009, so all new Town Hall hires must move into town, if they don’t already live there.

In Jersey City, the requirement exists but is rarely enforced, officials said. That means that employees who want to skirt the law can do so without consequences – that is, unless someone makes a point of bringing it up.

Different for police and fire


According to Jersey City Municipal Clerk Robert Byrne, the residency requirement for Jersey City workers has been on the books for about 30 years, but has not been well enforced. Of the 2,940 full-time employees for Jersey City (including police and firemen), a total of 1,703 live in the city while 1,237 live out-of-town.

However, the rule in all towns is different for police and fire personnel than it is for City Hall employees. A 1972 New Jersey statute stipulates that when it comes to emergency workers, “No municipality shall pass any ordinance, resolution, rule, regulation, order or directive, making residency therein a condition of employment for the purpose of original appointment, continued employment, promotion, or for any other purpose…” That means police and fire personnel are theoretically exempt from any residency requirement ordinance.

However, in several Hudson County towns, there is a one-year residency requirement for new police officers and firefighters. They can move after the first year. This apparent contradiction is allowed because two state statutes permit each town to give a preference to their residents when they hire police and firefighters. Since so few are hired each time, this ends up being a de facto residency requirement. Police and fire applicants must first take a written exam and graduate from the police academy before they are formally hired, a process that can takes a year or more.

Hoboken’s Public Safety Director Bill Bergin said regarding living in town, “It is just policy for first-year officers, part of a probationary period, and after that first year, people can move out.” He said the one-year time period is “more of an unwritten rule than anything else.”

Officials said they like the rule because first responders don’t have to travel far in case of an emergency.

Who upholds the requirements?




Regarding Town Hall employees, cities can be stricter than with law enforcement. At least five Hudson County towns have residency requirements for non-uniformed employees: Jersey City, Hoboken, North Bergen, West New York, and Bayonne. Three towns that do not have a requirement are Union City, Weehawken, and Secaucus.

All of the towns with requirements generally have a stipulation that certain high-ranking professionals (such as the chief financial officer) don’t have to live in town to be hired, if they have a “special skill” that can’t be filled by a resident. In that case, there is a preference for those from nearby counties, and then those in New Jersey, and then other qualified applicants.

When employees are found to have moved out of town, some towns simply send them a letter to remind them to comply. But other towns are starting to do more.

Some cities were sued




Paul Swibinski, a spokesperson for North Bergen Mayor Nicholas Sacco, said the reason Sacco adopted an official residency requirement ordinance in 2004 was to make sure the administration could immediately serve the community.

“The feeling is we are more connected to the community, as this administration prides itself on excellent government,” Swibinski said. “We attain those higher levels of service, we believe, because about 90 to 95 percent of the employees live in town.”

After calculating the numbers, Swibinski said that of the 400 non-uniformed employees, 321, or 80 percent, live in town.

But these ordinances don’t always last if they are challenged in court.

In 1989, the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) sued Bayonne, and in 1996, North Bergen. The NAACP argued that because of those towns’ resident-only policies, minorities were prevented from applying for town jobs. Since North Bergen was 98 percent white (including Latinos), they said that the policies effectively discriminated against blacks.

A ruling by the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia in 1997 found that North Bergen Township’s residency requirements were discriminatory.

Town Attorney Herb Klitzner said that at the time, they stood behind North Bergen’s requirement because neighboring towns also had residency requirements, which by definition would discriminate against hiring North Bergen residents in those towns.

But as a result of the lawsuit, the North Bergen Police Department hired at least a dozen minority officers who were on waiting lists of police departments in nearby towns such as Jersey City and East Orange.

Klitzner and North Bergen Police Chief William Galvin said last week that many of those officers eventually left the North Bergen Police Department when there was an opening in the police departments in their respective towns.

“We have tried to keep the officers here in North Bergen, but there are places like Jersey City that pay officers a lot more than we do,” Galvin said.

Also as a result of the lawsuit, North Bergen had to amend and then readopt in 2004 its residency ordinance, so residents of Jersey City along with North Bergen residents could be considered for non-uniformed government positions.

In 1991, Bayonne reached an agreement with the NAACP to relax its resident-only policy so the city could recruit African-American candidates as well (see sidebar).

Some are laissez-faire


Some top Hudson County officials say they believe it is best to have city workers living in town, but don’t take action to enforce the rule.

“My opinion is the more employees who do live in the city, the better it is for them, their families, and our city in general,” Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy said. “Our preference is to have as many city employees living in the city as possible.” But Healy would not comment about whether he plans to enforce the town’s existing residency requirement.

The ordinance actually says that while City Hall employees have to live in town, public safety directors and the municipal treasurer can live out of town.

In Hoboken, Mayor David Roberts’ answer was similar to Healy’s.

“We would all be better off if uniformed employees and teachers lived inside our community,” he said. “However, by law, they are permitted to reside outside of Hoboken. That being said, there is no question that having policemen [and] firefighters living and working in the community would be better.”

Some residents like Jersey City’s Yvonne Balcer, a longtime community activist, are a bit passionate about municipal employees living in town. Balcer has complained at council meetings that certain policies affected the taxpayers but not the out-of-town officials who proposed them.

Balcer said recently, “You want to take care of your own, but when your own is someplace else, then why would you care about it?”

Balcer added that if employees can’t afford to live in Jersey City, they should at least be required to live in Hudson County.

Union leader speaks


One city employee who has been thinking seriously about the issue is Chuck Carol, who has worked for Jersey City for 30 years and serves as the president of the Public Employees Local 246 Union, representing white-collar employees such as administrators. He is a lifelong city resident.

Carol, who works in the city’s Department of Health and Human Services, thinks there should be incentives for employees, especially uniformed personnel, to work and live in the same city.

“It would have always been a smarter idea to address it like they do with the promulgating of civil service lists, [with military] veterans’ preferences,” Carol said. “I think we can do a similar thing for people who live here – we give them an extra 10 points on the [civil service] test or we give them a preference of some sort for living here, because these officers and firemen are an asset to our community.”

In Jersey City and Hoboken, officials are working on plans for “workforce housing” through which town employees can apply for low-cost housing so they can stay in town.

One of the reasons cited by police and firefighters as well as regular municipal employees for living elsewhere is the rising cost of housing on the waterfront.

First-year police officers in Jersey City start at $42,000. According to a real estate survey of Jersey City done this fall by America OnLine, the average rent is $1,219. The average house costs $326,106.

That city already has one workforce housing project built – the eight-unit Harriet Tubman Homes on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive – and two more are scheduled to be built in the next year. But they are available to any resident in town who earns a certain income, not just city workers.

And the size of these projects is small. Hoboken recently began building a mere five units of workforce housing, with preference for families of four whose breadwinners earn $61,000 to $92,000.

Making the requirement stick




Peter Cresci, Bayonne’s business administrator, has a tall order to fill starting this month – making sure the city’s non-uniformed employees move into town. His interoffice memo, sent out in May, gave employees 180-day notice to move back in town. It applied to those hired after March 8, 1991 unless exempted by law (like police and firefighters).

There are 741 non-uniformed employees working for the city of Bayonne.

Cresci said while the majority of the employees have complied with the memo, there are some who are still not in compliance and will have to be “dealt with” by the administration.

Cresci spoke of the reason for enforcing the residency requirement for Bayonne.

“It is important that in a time of emergency, [like] snowstorms, ice, flooding, we have our workforce close and responsive to the situation,” he said. “The employees who live in town have a greater sense of familiarity with the town, the streets, the neighborhoods, the extended families.”

For those who have not complied, their fate remains to be seen.

Hiring locally




In a recent interview, West New York Mayor Sal Vega proudly noted that the town attorney, the public works director and the police director (until recently) have all been town residents.

Vega plans to change the town’s residency requirement at the beginning of the coming year so that all new hires will have to become West New York residents within a year after they are hired. They can get a six- month extension depending on factors such as the difficulty in purchasing a home in West New York.

There are currently 378 non-uniformed and uniformed employees working for West New York government.

“You have an employee who lives in the same town where they work, and there is a level of ownership for the community,” Vega said.

Vega said the town has retained a labor attorney to study the town’s current residency requirement ordinance. The town’s commissioners will get the chance to vote on the amended ordinance when it is brought before them.

Uneven enforcement: The consequences


One criticism of the uneven enforcement of residency ordinances is that it allows officials to look the other way most of the time, and then selectively enforce the laws when it benefits them.

The city of Trenton recently found out how much trouble the sudden enforcement of a lax employment policy can cause.

Former Police Director Joseph Santiago was ousted from his post in July after a state Superior Court judge ruled that by no longer living in the city, he couldn’t serve in his post any longer.

“Since Santiago has ceased to be a resident of Trenton, he has violated the residency requirements . . . and is, therefore, disqualified from serving in his position as director,” Superior Court Judge Linda R. Feinberg wrote in her decision in July.

Santiago’s residency was challenged first by Trenton residents and the Trenton City Council. They were successful, but then had to find a new police director.

Coincidentally, the Santiago case has a Hudson County connection, because the lawyers on opposing sides both have jobs with the city of Hoboken.

Hoboken City Councilman-at-Large Peter Cammarano works for the law firm Genova Burns, which represented Santiago and Trenton Mayor Douglas Palmer.

The Trenton City Council was represented by the deputy labor counsel for Hoboken, David Corrigan.

Cammarano, who is also a rumored Hoboken mayoral candidate this coming May, said last week that he doesn’t believe that Hoboken’s non-uniformed municipal employees should be required to live in town.

“I think we are punishing people by somehow requiring them to live in town when it is so expensive to live here,” Cammarano said. “There are people who are born and raised in Hoboken who want to stay here but are not making enough.”

In Jersey City, Sean Connors, a police officer who expects to run for a seat on the City Council in May, believes it’s a good idea for city employees to set down roots here, but they shouldn’t have to stay forever. He said he’d like to see city employees live here for five years. He first proposed the idea while running for the State Senate seat in New Jersey’s 33rd District last year (which he lost to incumbent state Sen. Nicholas Sacco).

“We have an opportunity for employees to set down roots,” Connor says, “and secondly, what it does is, it gets people to spend more money in Jersey City or in the municipality where they work.”

Connors said that regarding police, he doesn’t believe that the city is seriously impacted by police officers living out of town, since there are so many police personnel as well as relationships with other law enforcement agencies.

Hard to get there


Bayonne’s business administrator, Cresci, said he’d like to see more firefighters and police move to his city, even if the city can’t require it. In Bayonne, the waterfront is rapidly being built up, turning a former Army base into a six-section, mixed-use development called the Peninsula at Bayonne. The city expects to add up to 3,000 residents when the development is finished. Right now, the population stands at 58,844.

“We are a peninsula,” Cresci said, “which no other highly populated city is, and accessing the city in time of emergency is difficult on a normal high-traffic day. In an emergent situation, it might be impossible.”