After two terms and six years on the council, what has Mario Karcic done for North Arlington?
It’s a central question given the fact he was defeated for reelection in 2016 due to a risky reassessment scheme most homeowners rejected which caused him to lose the confidence of North Arlington voters.
Now he proudly poses as a “Pronti political puppet,” no matter the issue, resolution or ordinance.
How can you serve for six years and fail to find any issue in which he doesn’t disagree with this political boss?
For he answers to Pronti, not North Arlington!
Quite frankly he lacks the character or courage to stand up to Dan Pronti.
He even supports the insane notion of constructing an elaborate office suite for Pronti that will cost in the “tens of thousands” of dollars outside of Borough Hall!
He’s petrified of the guy and if he stood up to him, he would be replaced on the ticket and that’s just the truth!
One even disagrees with their spouse once in awhile, but when it comes to Mayor Pronti, Karcic agrees with him 101% of the time!
He places “politics and partisanship” before responsible public policy and the most obvious example of that is his “cheer leading” of urbanization, gentrification and the proliferation of apartments along Ridge Road and his support of eliminating height restrictions from three stories to six, an obvious forerunner to low income housing in a vibrant suburban community no taxpayer or voter supports.
North Arlington is the first community of Bergen County, not the last town in Hudson!
Small, safe and suburban is what North Arlington is all about!
On Karcic’s watch, he even supports more apartments at the Italian Villa site as well as Boston Market, at the north end of Ridge Road.
His online followers and supporters are even calling for “skyscrapers” on Ridge Road!
Do you side with this kind of reckless gentrification?
With Karcic in charge developers have been given a “virtual blank check” and Ridge Road is becoming a tale of two communities, a stretch of road that is now becoming an extension of Hudson County and Harrison, for what was once an easy access thoroughfare for residents now more resembles Bergenline Ave in Union City and West New York, New Jersey.
No one in North Arlington wants hundreds or thousands of apartments constructed that are gutting our community’s values and character except maybe Mario Karcic, Dan Pronti and Donna Bocchino, his hapless running-mate and full-time political patronage employee.
While Karcic is engineering massive spending and borrowing schemes that are depleting our surplus, a steep spike in property taxes is just around the corner.
And when it comes to massive borrowing and debt, just how is North Arlington going to pay for this lie of a proposal to construct senior housing on River Road?
There is no senior proposal; just another broken promise weeks before an election that has no funding formula or cost to share with voters.
It’s a lie and Mario knows it.
Everyone knows that to construct 55 senior units in today’s dollars would cost at least $25,000,000 and Karcic nor this Mayor have an answer to this fundamental question which they avoid at every turn!
Senior housing is a political mirage, a phony, fake and fraud!
This is a campaign ploy and nothing more!
So when we talk about the Karcic record, here’s what we do know.
He voted to give himself a 19% raise as well as his political boss Dan Pronti and his running-mate Donna Bocchino.
Who would give themselves a pay hike in the middle of a pandemic?
But not only did he vote himself and his running-mate a raise, he voted to create a political job for his nephew, a position that was never needed in the first place!
That’s political patronage and outright nepotism!
But he went further, he voted to give his other political boss Jimmy Bocchino, a retired political hack and the chairman of his campaign and father of his running-mate a 23% pay hike after being in office less than a year!
This is the record of Mario Karcic, politics first and responsible public policy last.
Like his running-mate, he won’t debate and he won’t respond to this transformation of Ridge Road which leaves our suburban community in a dangerous predicament!
Mario Karcic has no roots in the community and is a political puppet and his record reflects that reality.
North Arlington needs responsible two-party government and his reelection would be a mistake for the future of this community and the direction he is trying to take us!
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