|
Candidates For Appointed Mayor Submitted; Newman, Casten, Kelly On List
By Catherine Snipe
Who will be the next mayor of Brick?
The candidates – the next mayor selected among them by the township council – are former Mayor Daniel F. Newman Sr., former Councilwoman Kimberly Casten, and Planning Board Chairman Dan Kelly.
The appointee will replace Joseph C. Scarpelli, who served as mayor since 1994. He resigned earlier this month, citing personal reasons.
“We are submitting three outstanding individuals to the township council,” said Democratic Municipal Committee Chairman Michael Blandina in a written release. “Each brings a unique background, each is rooted in our community, and the committee is confident that each of them would serve our community well as mayor.”
Whoever the council selects from among the three candidates will serve until November 2007, during which a general election will be held to elect Brick Township’s next mayor.
All three candidates are Democrats. According to state law, the council must appoint a Democrat, the same party as Scarpelli.
Each of the candidates has experience in municipal government.
Casten is currently a municipal prosecutor for the township. She was a Brick councilwoman from 2000 to 2003, serving as council president in the last year of her term. In 2001, she ran for a state assembly seat but lost. She was also an assistant prosecutor for the county.
Kelly, who is currently the township planning board chairman, was once nominated by his party to fill a vacant seat in 2003. Then, Kelly was a possible replacement for filling Councilman Steven N. Cucci’s unexpired vacant seat. The seat ultimately went to former Councilman Leon Mowadia.
The third candidate, Newman, previously served as mayor, along with a number of other public positions. In addition to serving as mayor, Newman was a state assemblyman during the 1970s, serving as one-third of the 10th district team of Sen. John F. Russo and Assemblyman John Paul Doyle.
Newman also served four terms on the Brick Township Board of Education and was, up until the end of 2004, also chairman of the Brick Township Municipal Utilities Authority. “I and the members of the committee are confi- dent that Brick Township would be well served by these three people we have recommended to the township council,” Blandina said.
Councilwoman Kathy Russell was also approached as a candidate but said she declined in order to work on her master’s degree from Georgian Court University.
Council Vice President Stephen Acropolis said the names should be “representative of the type of people that should be leading Brick.”
He added that he’s thankful the appointment will serve with a council that has experience, instead of having a new mayor and a new council.
Council President Anthony Matthews said the council will give its support and work with the appointed mayor in order to continue as it has cooperated with the administration in the past.
| 
