NJ News & Views

[Editor's Note: At 8:52 p.m. on December 13, at 8:15 a.m. on December 14 and at 3:16 a.m. on December 15, 2011, this story was edited for style, content and accuracy.]

Two weeks after the busiest shopping day of the year, some retailers listed on entrance marquees in front of Jackson's Brewers Bridge Plaza on County Line Road are no longer there to profit from it.

Others are making out like bandits.

They have government officials to thank.

Located on an 8.59-acre tract near the Jackson border with Lakewood, the unimproved shopping center site was assessed in 1988 at $540,000.

In 1991, a Burger King was built on the site, followed in 1999 by a supermarket. A free-standing Hollywood Video store opened on the site in 2000. In 2001, developers completed a strip mall attached to the supermarket.

According to Jackson Tax Assessor Toni Nagle-Rowe, the shopping center's improvements had an assessed value of $2,852,100 upon completion, but shopping center land on which the improvements were built had reduced assessment of $515,000 - a loss in value to taxpayers of $25,000.

In 2002, the total shopping center assessment was $3,367,500.

Local government may have further reduced any benefit the shopping center brought to Jackson taxpayers or Jackson shoppers that year.

Prior to 2002, the year Lakewood's largest residential development began buildout at the border with Jackson, most area commuters parked their cars at the Howell Park and Ride on Route 9 north, where they took a bus to work in New York City.

According to a May 9, 2002 article by Tri-Town News staff writer Kathy Baratta, an unidentified source contacted the newspaper after reportedly finding fliers on cars parked at the Wyckoff Road and Route 9 Park and Ride in Howell that were allegedly left by the National Alliance, an American neo-Nazi group.

Howell Police Detective Tom Connors reportedly informed Baratta that no one had contacted police to report finding the fliers on any commuter cars parked in the township Park and Ride.

A spokesman for the National Alliance reportedly informed Baratta he was not aware the fliers had been distributed anywhere in Monmouth County.

Baratta contacted local officials for comment on the unconfirmed report, including Howell Mayor Timothy J. Konopka.

"Hopefully this was an isolated incident, but we will keep a close eye on it," Konopka reportedly told Baratta. "We’ll monitor the situation and make sure they, whoever they are, don’t work to incite any violence."

Noting Howell’s ethnic diversity and the ethnic diversity in neighboring Lakewood, Baratta wrote, Konopka also reportedly told her, "There is no place anywhere around here for these types of remarks or beliefs."

Jackson officials agreed.

After the newspaper published an unsubstantiated, inflammatory report of anti-Semitic and racist literature being distributed at the Howell Park and Ride, Tri-Town News correspondent Dick Metzgar reported on June 6, 2002 that Jackson Committeeman Michael Kafton had announced the township was opening its own park and ride.

Jackson was represented by a 5-member township committee until July 1, 2006, when a mayor-council form of government replaced it.

Kafton, a former Jackson committeeman, is currently a member of the Jackson council.

According to Metzgar, Kafton described commuting to New York City as "a real hassle" for Jackson commuters employed there.

"They have to go to a park-and-ride lot on Route 9 at Aldrich Road in Howell," Metzgar quoted Kafton. "That can take 15 to 20 minutes and the Route 9 buses are local, making many stops before reaching New York City. In addition to that the traffic on Route 9 is horrendous, making the trip even slower. The only other option is to hop in your car."

Kafton said committeemen had a plan for two park and ride sites where commuters could board Academy buses for New York — one in the east end of Jackson and the other at the west end.

According to Kafton, the buses serving Jackson would depart from the two park and ride sites and travel via I-195 to the Garden State Parkway, then take the New Jersey Turnpike to the Lincoln Tunnel entrance to mid-town Manhattan. He said similar nonstop service to Wall Street, New York’s downtown financial district, was expected to commence later that year.

Instead of outlining a comprehensive plan for a needed service that promoted local jobs and commerce, as well as generating public revenue to provide taxpayer relief, Kafton and Jackson Committeeman Sean Giblin promoted their political careers by telling Metzgar the service would be free to residents.

"When we were elected, Mike Kafton and I promised to work hard to get better commuter service for Jackson," Giblin reportedly told Metzgar. "We are glad that Academy came forward to provide this service."

Giblin said the new bus service would not be subsidized by the township.

"I hope residents use the service and make it profitable so that Academy will have the incentive to provide even more service in the future," Giblin reportedly said.

Kafton said he hoped residents of neighboring communities would use the new service to help make it profitable enough for Academy to continue providing it.

"We approached other bus companies for the service," Kafton said. "As a matter of fact, we first approached NJ Transit, but they said they could not provide the service. We are glad that Academy is willing to take a shot at providing this much needed service to Jackson."

A reporter for NJ News & Views recently made OPRA requests related to the 2002 park and ride service. According to Jackson Township Clerk Ann Marie Eden, no correspondence was available for inspection that corroborated Kafton's assertion he had contacted any bus company, including Academy, to service the proposed park and rides.

The absence of corroborating documentation wasn't the only omission made by members of the 2002 Jackson Township Committee that initially selected public property as the locations of the municipal park and rides.

At the June 10, 2002 meeting of the Jackson Township Committee, Tri-Town News staff writer Cindy Tietjen reported divided public support for the proposed park and rides at Johnson Park and a parking lot at East Commodore Boulevard at Route 526.

While many people in attendance at the June 10 meeting said they were overjoyed by the thought of bus service from Jackson to New York, Tietjen reported that others were unhappy with the location of the park and ride facility and with traffic issues it would create.

Kafton told Tietjen that the governing body had decided to look at another location for the park and ride in order to "do right by the people in Jackson."

"We want to keep the bus service a positive experience for the people in Jackson," Kafton reportedly told her. "If that means finding an alternate location for the park and ride, that is what we will do."

Less than a year after Jackson assessed Brewers Bridge Plaza for new construction that expanded several free-standing stores into a shopping center, Jackson committeemen adopted a July 22, 2002 resolution to turn private property owned by Richard Sambol and Jackson Properties LLC into a public park and ride serviced by Academy Bus.

According to the resolution, Sambol and Jackson Properties had offered the use of their properties at no charge to the township, subject to the execution of an acceptable use/license agreement with the township.

The resolution did not identify the owners' private properties by company name, address or by block and lot.

NJ News & Views made an OPRA request to inspect the township's agreement with the property owners.

Eden told NJ News & Views no agreement was on file with the township.

She provided a reporter with a July 18, 2006 letter the township and Academy Bus Lines received from attorney Jason Klein of Ansell Zaro Grimm & Aaron of Ocean Township, representing Whalepond Development, a limited partnership owned by real estate investors Meyer Gold and Bernard Schanzer.

According to online county land and tax records, Whalepond owned Brewers Bridge Plaza on the same date the 2002 Jackson Township Committee adopted a resolution to open a municipal Park and Ride on property owned by Sambol and Jackson Properties. No resolution was adopted by the governing body that identified Brewers Bridge Plaza or its owner as the location of a municipal Park and Ride.

The letter indicated that the resolution to dedicate private property for public use may not have been made at no cost to taxpayers either, despite Kafton and Giblin's statements to the contrary.

According to Klein's correspondence, the agreement was never legal.

"It is our understanding that at one time the above parties considered entering into a Use/License Agreement for the use of approximately seventy-five (75) spaces in the parking lot of the above location," Klein wrote in his letter, addressed To Whom It May Concern, instead of Mayor Mark Seda, who was sworn into office on July 1. "To the best of our recollection, said agreement was never signed. The unsigned agreement that our client has in its files was for a term commencing on August 1, 2002 and the same terminating on January 31, 2003."

Klein informed the township and Academy Bus that the park and ride was no longer welcome on his client's premises.

"Many of the people who use the Park and Ride park in spaces (for the entire day) which are more appropriate for use by the tenants and their customers," Klein wrote. "Our client has received complaints from tenants and their customers regarding the unavailability of parking spaces due to the use of same by the parties using the Park and Ride."

For the managing partners of Whalepond, L.P., the failure of local government to provide promised services in exchange for use of their property was reason enough to prohibit its continued use.

"Nobody has made any payments to our client over the last few years for the use of the property and nobody has contributed to the up-keep of the property and the parking lot," Klein wrote. "Accordingly, our client requires that you take immediate steps to discontinue the use of our client's property."

The same year Klein informed the township his clients had not received payment for the use of their property, Jackson Township Tax Collector records first reported that Whalepond paid adjusted property taxes of $0.00, which was also reported in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011.

According to 2011 county tax records, which report the assessed value of the shopping center since 2007, the Brewers Bridge Plaza had a total assessment in 2007 and 2008 of $3,367,500, and a total assessment in 2009, 2010 and 2011 of $9,448,500.

Jackson Tax Collector Michael Campbell maintained that the adjusted property taxes reported by both the county tax board on its Web site and by his department on a computer printout he provided to NJ News & Views was the amount owed by Whalepond after payment in full of each quarterly tax bill.

Campbell told NJ News & Views that county tax records reporting no taxes were paid by Whalepond were incorrect. He also asserted the county did not report municipal tax payments.

Visitors to the county tax board Web site can inspect tax payment records for property owners by clicking on the active link for the property's lot number, which displays local zoning, assessment, annual tax payment and tax status. The information, which is also linked to county land records, includes a record of the property's sale history and improvements located on the property.

A reporter for NJ News & Views asked Campbell for permission to inspect a scanned copy of the front and back of all checks received from Whalepond since 2002 in payment of their property taxes.

Campbell said his department did not keep copies of tax payment checks it received or receipts for cash payments.

FoodTown supermarket, which occupied the retail space where the municipal Park and Ride was located on its parking lot, paid a higher price than Jackson taxpayers for public policy.

The same year Klein sent a cease and desist letter to Jackson Township and Academy Bus Lines, Lakewood grocer Zeev Rothschild began renovating the former FoodTown retail space in Brewers Bridge Plaza.

Free commuter parking came at a cost too high for the neighborhood supermarket to afford.

Five years later, the NPGS (Non-Profit Grocery Store), a supermarket owned by Rothschild, is prospering in its location, but other retailers that leased space in the shopping center are not.

One of them is Hollywood Video, whose free-standing store is closed and shuttered for want of customers.

So is a Curves fitness center, a Lifestyles Salon and Day Spa and the 63 PDS Food Express, as well as the proprietors of several other darkened storefronts that no longer have a sign over the door.

In place of an Open for Business sign, many of the darkened windows had a posted sign informing anyone interested in leasing the space to contact Paramount Realty.

Schanzer and Gold of Whalepond Development L.P. did not respond for comment.

Six months after the township and Academy Bus received a cease and desist letter by certified mail from counsel for Whalepond, The Jackson Times reported on January 12, 2007 that the park and ride had been relocated to the parking lot of the nearby Central Jersey Italian American Club. According to the newspaper, Councilman Angelo Stallone, a member of the club, had been instrumental in arranging the new location.

In exchange for free use of the club's parking lot, the township offered to maintain private property with free municipal services, such as snow plowing in the winter, the Jackson Times reported.

"They decided to do it as a community service," Stallone said in a quote. "There's approximately 50 to 60 cars that park there, and there are also people who walk from the apartment complexes in that area who it will help too."

Despite Stallone's assertion, Marvin Krakower, Deputy Mayor of Jackson in 2002, recently told NJ News & Views he and other committeemen had discussed locating the municipal Park and Ride on the club's parking lot before deciding on the supermarket parking lot in Brewers Bridge Plaza.

Krakower currently serves as a member of the Jackson Board of Education.

The 2007 agreement not only benefited area commuters, it also benefited owners of a Jackson tax shelter that stand to profit even more from public policy in the near future.

One year after relocating the township Park and Ride to the club's property, Jackson approved Ordinance 04-08, which reversed a 6-year-old initiative limiting residential housing construction to either one home per three acres or one home per five acres.

The newly-created MF-AH-6 zone permitted construction of multifamily dwellings at a gross density not to exceed six dwelling units per acre.

By rezoning a site adjacent to the club for dense development, local government enabled owners of club property to apply for township approval to redevelop it in conformity with the surrounding neighborhood created by Windsor Crescent, an affordable housing development that recently opened for occupancy by tenants.

Earlier this year, the club announced its property was for sale and that the club was no longer permitting the township to use it as a park and ride as of April 1.

The agreement with the club expired two years earlier and was not renewed, even though the township continued to use club property as a park and ride, according to former club President John Grillo, who spoke to NJ News & Views.

Grillo told a reporter the property had been sold.

The buyers of the property may be the same investors as the sellers.

According to the club's amended 2009 continuation of a 5-year-old UCC fixture filing with First Washington State Bank of Windsor, NJ, Diversified Capital of Lakewood may be the actual owner of property, not the Central Jersey Italian American Club.

Joseph Rosenbaum, President of Diversified Capital, is also President of Madison Title, LLC of Lakewood.

Diversified Capital officers reported on its Web site include Bruce Stern, a former member of the Lakewood Board of Education.

Madison Title's officers reported on its Web site include Elliot Zaks, a current member of the Lakewood Zoning Board of Adjustment.

According to the club's amended UCC filing, Diversified Capital used its property at 206 Madison Avenue, located on Block 72, Lot 7 in Lakewood, as collateral to secure continuation of the financing agreement.

For years, Diversified Capital benefited from ownership of property that club officers mortgaged over and over again to finance Diversified Capital's investment ventures, according to county land records.

The Central Jersey Italian American Club is a registered 501(c)(7) social club and is tax-exempt under the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) tax code, further benefiting Diversified Capital as a tax shelter.

Although county clerk records do not report that Diversified Capital paid all monies due and owing on the U.C.C. filing posted online since receiving a continuation of it in 2009, the investment company reportedly mortgaged the same property at 206 Madison Avenue with several others in Lakewood to secure $1,250,000 in financing from CP Capital, Inc. of Miami, Florida in a June 30, 2011 agreement, according to county documents posted online.

The Web site www.criminaldefenselawyer.com reports that under New Jersey State law, anyone found guilty of committing bank fraud is subject to a fine of up to $250,000.

Anyone convicted of bank fraud in New Jersey may also be sentenced to a term of imprisonment ranging from 1-10 years, with a 3-year probation upon release from prison.

Under New Jersey law, a judge may also order payment of restitution.

Following closure of the Jackson Park and Ride on County Line Road this year, government officials continue to promulgate public policy benefiting special interests instead of the public interest.

At the October 25 meeting of the Jackson Township Council, members approved a resolution in support of a plan proposed by the Ocean County Board of Freeholders to add two Academy bus stops on Hope Chapel Road (Route 639), eight stops on West County Line Road (Route 526) and three stops on North County Line Road (Route 526), according to media reports.

Council members reportedly rejected a September proposal by NJ Transit to also designate 42 additional bus stops throughout the 100-square-mile township. However, the 13 bus stops approved by local and county government and subsidized with a Federal Transit Administration (FTA) intercity bus program grant that Academy Bus will receive may cause more problems than they solve.

According to a spokeswoman for the Jackson School District, approximately 180 bus routes per day travel on Hope Chapel Road.

A reporter asked Lakewood School District Transportation Director Gus Kakavas in writing how many routes traveled Hope Chapel Road as well.

The reporter also sent an e-mail request to Lakewood Board of Education President Meir Grunhut, asking his permission for Kakavas to release the information to NJ News & Views for public dissemination.

Although all elected officials swear or affirm an Oath of Office to support the Constitutions of the United States and New Jersey, which both protect freedom of the press, Grunhut did not respond to a reporter's request by providing bus route information for Hope Chapel Road.

Neither did Kakavas.

Instead of designating 13 bus stops on heavily-traveled county roadways in Jackson that Academy Bus alone will service or promoting public trespass on private property, government officials could have condemned tax-exempt private property and rededicated it as a permanent Park and Ride at no loss and reduced risk to taxpayers.

Instead of operating two Park and Rides to provide commuter bus service in the 100-square-mile township, Jackson officials could have helped create new job opportunities for anyone seeking to own and operate a legal taxi service in Jackson or a taxi stand at the Progress Road Park and Ride by promoting and expediting the application procedure.

Instead of permitting free commuter parking for residents that use the Jackson Park and Ride, local officials could generate a stream of revenue by selling parking permits to anyone using it and parking tickets to anyone that does not pay for the privilege.

Instead of blockbusting merchants seeking to make a living in a neighborhood shopping center by turning its parking lot into a municipal Park and Ride, local officials could build a shelter at the Progress Road Park and Ride and lease it to retailers. The building would benefit Jackson commuters waiting for their bus, as well as local merchants servicing their shopping needs.

"We're open for business," Jackson Mayor Michael Reina said in an August 25 interview with the Asbury Park Press. "We have a lot to offer."