Neptune to choose new committeeman from these three, including one fired from school job
NEPTUNE - The Township Committee will choose between three candidates to fill the seat left vacant by Dr. Michael Brantley, one of whom was fired from the Roselle school district in 2018 following a state investigation.
Mayor Keith Cafferty, Deputy Mayor Tassie York and Committeemen Nicholas Williams and Robert Lane Jr. will make their decision at the Dec. 21 meeting.
The Township Committee voted to vacate a seat held by Brantley, who had been absent for several months, at the Nov. 27 meeting.
Because Brantley is a Democrat, representatives of the local Democratic Party selected three candidates to succeed him — former Assemblyman Eric Houghtaling, former Mayor Kevin McMillan, and former school board member Jason Jones.
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James Mowczan, municipal chair of the Neptune Township Democrats, told the Press there were initially six potential candidates.
"They all got up (before the district leaders) said their piece, there was a little bit of a question-and-answer period. Then we took a secret ballot and the three top names got forwarded to the township committee," Mowczan said.
Thirty-six of the 40 district leaders participated in the vote. Three were out of town and the remaining vote, Brantley, was also absent.
Jones was elected to the Neptune Township Board of Education in 2003 at the age of 21 and served for 14 years. He is a former aide to U.S. Reps. Frank Pallone Jr. and Donald Payne Jr., both D-N.J.
Jones was fired as the Roselle school business administrator in 2018, after someone used district funds to buy vehicles without the knowledge of the superintendent or the school board, prompting a state investigation into the district's business practices. Those vehicles had been paid for with a handwritten check, according to a letter from the board attorney to the state Department of Education.
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Prior to that, in 2015, an ethics complaint was filed against Jones alleging he was acting in his official capacity as Neptune Township Board of Education president to support certain candidates and special interest groups via emails, letters and robocalls.
In 2019, the state investigation found that Jones did not violate the School Ethics Act because the evidentiary burden was not met.
Jones was unavailable for comment.
Houghtaling served on the township committee from 2011 to 2015, serving as deputy mayor in 2012 and as mayor in 2013, before winning a State Assembly seat in 2015. In 2021, he lost re-election, and earlier this year he was unsuccessful in gaining the party's support for another Assembly run.
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McMillan spent 18 years on the township committee before losing party support for a seventh term. He was a Democratic Assembly candidate in 2013 and was endorsed by the New Jersey AFL-CIO, Coastal Monmouth Democrats and Planned Parenthood Action Fund of New Jersey.
Charles Daye is the metro reporter for Asbury Park and Neptune, with a focus on diversity, equity and inclusion. Contact him: CDaye@gannettnj.com @CharlesDayeAPP
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Neptune committeeman candidate was fired from Roselle Park school job
