Pay-to-play reform set for Nov. ballot
BY ELAINE VAN DEVELDE
Staff Writer

EDISON — The signatures are in and some residents say they are closer to getting pay-to-play reform on the books.

Township citizens, guided by the Edison Community Association and the nonprofit Center for Civic Responsibility, turned in to the township clerk 2,088 signatures of citizens last week in support of putting a pay-to-play reform ordinance on the Nov. 8 election ballot.

The reform limits, and in some cases bans, professionals such as consultants, attorneys and engineers from being awarded no-bid professional service contracts in exchange for large campaign contributions.

Residents have been pushing the Township Council to act on some form of reform for a couple of years.

“We have been stonewalled on this issue for years by council, so we took the issue right to the people, where it belongs,” said William Stephens, Edison Community Association president and independent candidate for mayor. “If it succeeds this way, then there will be a guarantee that the ordinance, voted in on the ballot, cannot be altered or rescinded by the governing body for at least three years.”

The group needed the signatures of 1,467 registered voters in order to get the question approved at the county level for the November election. The signatures have to be verified as those of legitimate registered voters by the clerk.

Those spearheading the petition drive sought the help of the Center for Civic Responsibility, which has organized a statewide Citizens’ Campaign, a nonpartisan grassroots movement to get local pay-to-play reform on the books in as many municipalities as possible.

The campaign works hand-in-hand with Common Cause, the statewide group that crafted local pay-to-play reform ordinances.

The Citizens’ Campaign has a goal of getting 101 civic-based ordinances such as Edison’s on the books in 101 towns this year.

“The citizens of Edison have worked nights and weekends because they’re committed to improving the civic health of their town,” said Heather Taylor of the Center for Civic Responsibility.

Taylor has said that in some towns, such as Dover Township, where governing bodies adopted such ordinances before an election, they were rescinded or altered shortly thereafter.