Hamilton's Public Safety Advisory Commission - The Rest of the Story - Shocking!

Fred Yaede, or the suppression of any mention of Gangs in Hamilton, may be the most important public safety issues in Hamilton Township! Sounds, strange, but as you read on sadly you are sure to understand.

The Public Safety Advisory Commission was unanimously approved by Hamilton Council on May 6. 2008. Ms Yaede moved the motion for approval which was unanimously approved by Council, including Messrs Kenny and Pone. The record of this vote appears on page 40 of the Council minutes of that date. Thereafter, Ms, Yaede voted yes for the appointment of each and every member of the PSAC that was brought before her.

The Ordinance establishing the PSAC, Ord. No. 08-026, states its purpose is to “act in an advisory capacity to the Mayor and make recommendations for the development of policies and procedures in general to improve the state of public safety of the community.” Any statement or representation by Ms. Yaede, Chief Collins or any of their surrogates alleging this Commission’s purpose is “public oversight over the police department” is just an unequivocal, purposeful misrepresentation or as it is called on the street, a big LIE, or horse manure. 

The Public Safety Advisory Commission ordinance can be found at Sec 2-820.36 in Hamilton’s Code of Ordinances. The Commission per the ordinance “shall meet monthly at a time and place determined by the membership.” These meetings are not optional.  An approved ordinance is the law until modified or revoked and is not to be selectively enforced at the whim of any elected official. When information was previously requested regarding the Commission, incomplete records were provided by the Township with numerous meeting minutes missing. It begs the question, are they covering something up?  Have the records been removed or destroyed?

The PSAC met 10 times. It did serious work and made meaningful recommendations to Mayor Bencivengo.  Just a portion of the minutes show it addressed the police computer system; workload and manpower efficiency; the necessity to replace the radio system by 2013; problems with the TKR radio tower; and radio interoperability problems. It wasn’t until the Commission breached four hot button issues that it got serious push back and effectively shut down.

The critical issues that apparently offended our elected officials or at least one of them, Ms Yaede:  the repeated mention of gangs in Hamilton during meetings 4-6;  a series of problems within the Fire Districts and the mention of the “consolidation”; an admission by Business Administrator, John Ricci that there is no accounting of the Fire District tax monies collected  by the Township; and finally perhaps most important to our newly appointed Mayor, the possible mention of  Fred Yaede.

With the serious nature of all the issues mentioned in the prior paragraphs you likely think we jest when we mention Fred Yaede.  Sadly, we are not jesting. Just the poor, pitiful truth that a sitting member of Council would demand to know if the Township’s Public Safety Advisory Commission “discussed her father at October’s meeting”.  See email dated Wed. Nov 10, 2010 regarding PSAC October minutes addressed to PSAC members. Apparently, with all the issues mentioned by the PSAC, with all the crime in Hamilton, with a documented gang problem, the most important issue for our Mayor is nepotism and protecting her father’s position as a paid Fire Commissioner.

Pitiful, selfish, juvenile, immature, misguided, inappropriate, are just a few of the adjectives that come to mind when describing Ms. Yaede’s apparent motivations. Is Fred Yaede, the mention of gangs in Hamilton or breaching the possible consolidation of Fire Districts really more important then all of the PSAC's recommendations?  Is Kelly Yaede really qualified to be the Mayor and leader of New Jersey’s 8^th largest town?