O’Dea internal poll shows 3-way tie for Jersey City mayor

1. Ok An internal poll for Bill O’Dea’s mayoral campaign shows a statistical dead heat in the race for Mayor of Jersey City, with James J. McGreevey leading with 23%, followed by O’Dea and James Solomon each at 20%.

Mussab Ali is at 12% and Joyce Watterman is at 3%, with 21% of voters remaining undecided.

The poll was conducted by Hart Research, a top U.S. pollster.

Unless one of the mayoral candidates hits the 50% mark, Jersey City will hold a runoff on December 2 to pick a new mayor, and possibly some city council members.

The O’Dea poll shows McGreevey’s positives at 47% and negatives at 29%, while O’Dea is at 46%-12% and Solomon at 41%-16%.

O’Dea is a longtime Hudson County Commissioner and former city councilman; McGreevey is a former governor of New Jersey, and Solomon is a two-term city councilman representing the city’s downtown ward.  Ali is a former school board president, and Watterman is the current city council president.

The three-term incumbent, Steve Fulop, is not seeking re-election.  He sought the Democratic nomination for governor in the June primary and will move to New York next year to become president and CEO of the Partnership for New York City.