Newark’s Central Ward will be without representation on the city council for more than a year after Superior Court Judge Robert Gardner refused to allow a special election to fill now-Rep. LaMonica McIver’s seat to be held on the same day as a citywide school board election on April 15.
McIver resigned in September after winning a special election for Congress. Gardner’s ruling will keep the seat vacant until the winner of a November contest is certified.
Gardner said the statute doesn’t permit piggybacking non-partisan municipal elections with non-partisan school board elections.
“We live with the statute the way the statute was written by the legislature. They knew what they were saying when they did it,” he said. “Obviously, we have to assume that they did.”
The decision appears to ignore a mandate to liberally interpret election laws to give voters as many choices as possible.
Deputy State Attorney General Craig Kaiser opposed the city’s bid to hold an election, citing potential voter confusion with sixteen and seventeen-year-old Newark residents being allowed to vote in only school board elections for the first time.
The Central Ward council seat was held by now-U.S. Senator Cory Booker from 1998 to 2002.