New leadership needed to take back Democratic Party

With this year's political primary election approaching, I can't help thinking back to last year when the Ocean County Democratic leadership was asked, as they are on an almost perennial basis, "With all the people moving to Ocean County from North Jersey and New York, why isn't the Democratic Party in Ocean County more successful than it is?" The party leadership then goes on to make some innocuous statement that makes absolutely no sense to anyone.

Let me make a guess as to why. In 2006 an individual runs in the Democratic primary for county committee in the town of Manchester and he is the only one who filed to run for committeeman in that district. The present municipal chair is retiring from being the chair and tells the individual that the chair has enough votes to make the individual the next municipal chair. The individual obviously wins but is never notified about the municipal reorganization as required by law. The reorganization is held without him and another person is selected as municipal chair who is lacking in leadership ability. That person is also the municipal club president.

In 2006 an individual runs in the Democratic primary for county committee in the town of Beachwood and she is the only one who filed to run for committeewoman in that district. The executive director of the Ocean County Democratic Party, Al Santoro, tells the individual that he has enough votes to make her the next municipal chair. The woman obviously wins but is never notified about the municipal reorganization as required by law. The reorganization is held without her and another person is selected as municipal chair who is lacking in leadership ability. That person is also the municipal club president.

Both of the individuals who were not notified about their respective municipal reorganizations write e-mails and make phone calls to the Ocean County Democratic Party chair, Wyatt Earp, for help in resolving the situation. No one has seen Wyatt Earp for months. After numerous messages, Wyatt says that he will get to it but is busy at present.

Because the Manchester Democratic Club president is lacking skills, there is a great deal of friction within the club. There is so much commotion that the executive director of the Ocean County Democratic Party, Al Santoro, and the Democratic state committeeman of Ocean County and Barnegat Democratic municipal chair, Bill Coulter, tell the Manchester Democratic Club president to dissolve the club. The Democratic Club in Manchester is dissolved.

As of this date, Wyatt Earp has never addressed the municipal reorganization fiasco of Manchester or Beachwood with either individual.

In 2005 the Corzine staff in Ocean County told the volunteers that all the information obtained through door-to-door canvassing, phone calling, etc., would be forwarded to the Ocean County Democratic Party chair, Wyatt Earp, and would be a tremendous asset for future campaigns on both a municipal and county level. The Corzine campaign spent a great deal on money in Ocean County developing this information.

For the 2006 campaigns on a municipal or county level, this information was unavailable. For 2007 this information remains unavailable on any level.

For the reorganization of the Ocean County Democratic Party in 2006, as soon as the nomination of Wyatt Earp was mentioned, within a split second the nominations were closed to prevent anyone else from being nominated.

For the 2007 Ocean County Democratic Party nominations for the New Jersey Senate and Assembly and Ocean County freeholder, each municipal chair and each municipal club president had one vote. The individual county committee members didn't have a vote. In the case of Manchester and Beachwood, the chairs each had two votes due to having the dual positions of chair and club president for their towns.

This is just information I know about. I'm not an insider. It's one thing to win in a democratic process, it's quite another to subvert the democratic process, pack the vote and break laws.

Then there's the question of bylaws for the Ocean County Democratic Party. The Ocean County Democratic Party bylaws are tougher to get than the Holy Grail. The difference between the two is that many people think the bylaws never existed. No one has ever seen them.

It's no wonder that all too often the Ocean County Democratic Party nominations on anything above the municipal level all too often resemble the "usual suspects."

For 2008, I hope that more Democrats in Ocean County take the steps to become county committee members to take back their party.

Joseph Lamb

Brick