Councilwoman and Deputy Mayor Kate Triggiano at Thursday’s meeting. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Two key drivers of the overhaul of Red Bank’s government that began this week will get to serve on the borough council for four years, following a lottery held Thursday night.
Councilmembers Kate Triggiano and Nancy Facey-Blackwood drew terms twice as long as their four council colleagues.
Attorney Greg Cannon at Red Bank borough hall in 2017. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
One year after he was unceremoniously dumped as Red Bank’s borough attorney, Greg Cannon appears set to regain the influential post Thursday night.
That’s when the newly reconstituted government led by Mayor Billy Portman is scheduled to get down to business at a special meeting to kick off the “council-manager” era.
Attorney Greg Cannon at borough hall last November. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
It was another night of political fireworks, this time punctuated by Cannon fire, as the Red Bank council terminated borough attorney Greg Cannon without explanation Wednesday night.
The abrupt action created a vacancy Mayor Pasquale Menna angrily refused to fill when Councilman Ed Zipprich nominated a lawyer who recently “exonerated” him of impropriety.
Judge William Himelman swearing in a defendant last year. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank municipal court Judge William Himelman died Thursday, according to Mayor Pasquale Menna. He was 85 years old.
The circumstances and place of his death were not immediately available.
Believed to have been New Jersey’s longest-serving local court jurist in modern times, if not state history, Himelman presided on the borough bench for 38 years. Long past the age at which others in his position retired, he doled out justice to everyone from cellphone-gabbing motorists and drunk drivers to a pair of men who squared off while naked.
Erik Yngstrom embraces his mother, Yvonne Yngstrom, after giving his oath as councilman. Below, Kathy Horgan began her fourth term on the council and was elected its president. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Red Bank’s first Republican majority in a generation ended after just a year Sunday, when Democrats regained control of the borough council.
With the addition of political newcomer Erik Yngstrom to the governing body, the Democrats now share 3-3 parity with the GOP on the council. But with the support of three-term Mayor Pasquale Menna as the tiebreaker to any potential deadlock, the Democrats wasted no time in doling out key jobs to partisans.
Mike Whelan, 24, at his swearing in as Red Bank councilman. Below, Whelan running mate Mark Taylor. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
The first Republican majority in a generation showed up at Red Bank borough hall Saturday with a broom.
Ousted were:
• Borough engineer Christine Ballard, of T&M Associates of Middletown, replaced by Bill White of borough-based Maser Consulting.
• Borough Attorney Dan O’Hern, the son of a former mayor, who was replaced by Jean Cipriani, a lawyer with a Toms River firm headed by the chairman of the Ocean County GOP.
Below, property owner Lee Jasper Rogers talks with Fire Marshal Stanley Sickels. (Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
Fire tore through a Red Bank home and filled a street-level office with smoke Sunday afternoon.
Attorney Lee Jasper Rogers tells redbankgreen he was working in his office at 298 Shrewsbury Avenue when “I heard a popping sound, and when I went into the next room, all I could see was black smoke.”
