Paterson official considering Freeholder bid

Paterson Deputy Mayor Derya Taskin will make her pitch as a candidate for Passaic County Freeholder at a meeting of the county Democratic executive committee on Saturday.

Incumbent freeholders Sandi Lazzara, Assad Akhter and John Bartlett are all expected to seek re-election this year.

Sources say that Taskin’s potential candidacy is aimed at unseating Bartlett, a two-term freeholder from Wayne who briefly sought the Democratic nomination for Congress in New Jersey’s 11th district.  He dropped out of the race and his county chairman, Democratic State Chairman John Currie, endorsed Mikie Sherrill.

Bartlett sometimes struggles in his relationship with his freeholder colleagues, a source says, and that his quick entry into the race without party backing bothered some insiders.

Taskin, a Turkish-American businesswoman, became deputy mayor of Paterson, NJ in  2016. She is the president of Paterson Turkish American Association and a commissioner of the Paterson Library and Museum Board.  As deputy mayor, she serves as  a liaison between local government and the growing Turkish community in Paterson.