Report from the County Chair

Two Steps Forward; Two Steps Back

There is some good news. Leonard Flynn, who stepped forward to serve as our candidate for the one seat which will be up for election this year on the Monmouth County Board of Chosen Freeholders, succeeded in filing a sufficient number of signatures on Primary Day to gain a place on the November ballot. And Worth Winslow succeeded in his effort to get on as our Congressional candidate in the 12th Congressional District.

Unfortunately, neither Robert Hull in the 4th CD nor Steve Nagle in the 6th were successful. It's regrettable, but understandable. Gathering signatures (even the relatively easy 100 each needed) is time-consuming work, and not everyone cares to do it. This year's results demonstrated dramatically the need to have volunteers who are willing to take on this task.

Emerson Ellett's successful effort to get on as our US Senate candidate demonstrates this. Danny Maiullo of Tinton Falls did yeoman's work coordinating a statewide body of petitioners from 12 counties which allowed us to file over 1,300 signatures on 36 petitions. (He only needed 800.) I think the message is clear: next year we need more than willing candidates. We need volunteer petition coordinators, and we need to get them started as early as possible.

Actually we can take a decent share of the credit in the Senate campaign too. After all, we produced the candidate (Emerson is from Ocean Twp.), and the bulk of those signatures. If you have not already done so, I urge you to visit his website, www.Ellett2000.org

In any case, our busy season has definitely started. My thanks to all who helped at the Ocean Grove Community Flea Market June 3; now let's duplicate it at the County Fair. And we managed to catch the sneaky start of the county's "Guns for Cash" gun buy-back program on June 9. They can rest assured they'll be seeing us many time again in the months ahead.

Pat Bontempo,
County Chair