A former Jersey City chief attorney is running against the city’s incumbent Mayor Steve Fulop this November.
Fulop is seeking a second term as mayor. His challenger is Bill Matsikoudis, the city’s former chief attorney under the previous Mayor Jerramiah Healy.
Fulop says that he has put Jersey City on the right track since he took office.
“When we came in there was growth in one part of Jersey City – downtown,” Fulop says. “Every other ward was neglected, and we’ve started to change that.”
Fulop points to new, upscale housing in the Journal Square section of the city. He says that Journal Square will become the city’s cultural center in the next few years, if he is re-elected.
But Matsikoudis says that the city has become too expensive.
“We'll require developers to create more affordable housing for the working class and low income,” he says. “And we're going to extend rent stabilization to thousands of people who don't have any at all now."
Matsikoudis also accuses Fulop of not being the good government reformer that he campaigned as four years ago.
“Steve Fulop talked about transparency, but he operates in the shadows,” Matsikoudis says.
Matsikoudis points to an event held Friday by some members of the local NAACP and a police union, many of whom support Matsikoudis, who called on Fulop to be more transparent and to renegotiate a police contract.
"We've run an ethical government, a straightforward government, a government that moves Jersey City forward and I'm proud of our result,” Fulop says.
Election Day in New Jersey is Tuesday, Nov. 7.