North Ward candidates talk about running for council
TRENTON » Marge Caldwell-Wilson is likely favored to win the race as a sitting two-term councilwoman of the North Ward. She faces a well-known challenger in Algernon Ward Jr., who previously ran for her seat. Political newbie Eboni Love brings an ounce of new blood to a race dominated by the usual names.
Caldwell-Wilson
As the incumbent, Marge Caldwell-Wilson says she’s running “on her record” and won’t talk about opponents in the North Ward race.
“If you’re going to run, run for yourself and criticize me on my record,” she said. Seeking her third term, Caldwell-Wilson, a former state social worker originally from Scotland who lives in the Mill Hill section, feels she’s still as invigorated about being in the community as the day she took office. Yet, she has been criticized by residents for not having her ward’s pulse.
A highly publicized cleanup effort of a burntout stretch of Monmouth Street Caldwell-Wilson admitted was a “thorn” in her side turned into a political grenade when some residents turned to another council member to address their issues feeling like Caldwell-Wilson was missing in action. Caldwell-Wilson defended herself against the backlash saying she visited the neighborhood multiple times and contacted city officials to get attention for the neglected block.
“When someone says I’m afraid to go there, that’s not true. I go into some of the worse areas. I can go everywhere in my ward.” Caldwell-Wilson said.
Taking up the mantle when Verlina ReynoldsJackson became assemblywoman, Caldwell-Wilson served as council liaison to the planning board and hopes to continue in that capacity if re-elected. An animal lover, she sponsored an anti-tethering ordinance that restricted the amount of time owners could keep pets tethered. Another of Caldwell-Wilson’s pet projects has been beautifying and maintaining Trenton Battle Monument and was disheartened when someone bowled through the iconic Trenton shrine earlier this year. She believes dumping, blight and crime are “huge” issues that discourage people from settling down in the capital city.
Caldwell-Wilson also feels council has been perceived as a disjointed body because of personal spats that has left unfinished business. “I really do want another four years because I’m just not finished,” she said.
Algernon Ward Jr.
Community activist and former school board member Algernon Ward Jr. wants to be the guiding light that changes the narrative of Trenton.
But “you have to change the substance in order to change the narrative. You have to create the positive facts, not just make them up,” he said.
The capital city’s story has been bad: rising property taxes, squatters overrunning foreclosed and abandoned homes, rampant crime including the execution-style murder of a man kidnapped from Trenton while trying to buy a Playstation 4 for his brother. Even Ward, the 64-year-old retired research scientist who still lives on Martin Luther King Boulevard, can’t ignore the gritty realism in his neighborhood where he was hit by a stray bullet in March 2016. People told him to get out, but he says he’s not going anywhere.
“That was God tapping me on the shoulder to get my attention,” Ward said about the bullet to his shoulder. “He got it. People get the impression we’re living in hell in Trenton. I don’t feel this is the case. This is my home, and we’re gonna fix it.”
Ward has run for a seat on the legislative body so many times friends call him the “best councilman who has never been elected.” Despite the losses, Ward described himself as a forward-thinker who has managed to “move the needle” in the community. He says he’s introduced ideas years before Trenton adopted them. He hopes to bring a civilian complaint review board to Trenton similar to Newark’s which had subpoena and investigatory powers. And he wants to make beat-walking cops a reality rather than “lip service” to residents from previous leaders. Ward’s mother’s straight-talk has influenced his stance on issues. “She used to say, ‘You light a candle instead of curse the dark.’”
Eboni Love
Eboni Love left to attend college in 2008 in North Carolina where she got a degree in history. She took a job as a corrections officer to pay the bills, but it wasn’t her passion. Homesick, she returned to the capital city in 2015 to help take care of her father, who has had health issues, and later landed a gig as an associate at Trenton Public Library where she has helped develop programming to increase youth literacy.
Love also works as a caretaker for mentally disabled adults. The 30-yearold, who lives at Donnelly Homes, is a political newcomer who hopes if elected to reopen some of the shuttered library branches closed years ago because of massive cuts. She believes the North Ward has had a “very small voice” and wants to “be the person” who changes the look of the ward.
“Someone needs to fight for us,” she said. Love has employed a grassroots campaign effort, going door to door and talking with residents about the issues that impact them.
Love, the eldest of two sisters, remembers being her siblings’ “protector on the playground.” But crime has stripped Trenton of the quaint “village” feel she grew up knowing. The violence that plagued the city over the years has made it “frightening to go out and play outside and go to the corner store and get a bag of chips,” Love said. She said restoring the calm starts with holding leaders accountable for the erosion of the community. Policing, abandoned homes and bad roads are other common gripes she hears from Trentonians.
Love admits she has only been an occasional attendant of City Council meetings, but she said she plans to ratchet up her civic engagement regardless of whether she wins the North Ward seat.