Robert Notte Archives - New Jersey Globe

How Peter Shapiro won

July 22, 2019 3:43 amJuly 22, 2019 3:41 am

Peter Shapiro was just 26 when he beat the powerful Essex County Democratic machine to win the primary in the first race for Essex County Executive. Shapiro defeated Sheriff John Cryan by just 2,497 votes in the 1978 Democratic primary,...

The 1978 race for Essex County Executive, Part 1

July 22, 2019 3:42 amJuly 24, 2019 8:30 pm

Essex County politics had an evolutionary transformation in the late 1970s, when voters approved a referendum that switched control of country government from the Board of Freeholders to a single County Executive. A process that took six years culminated in...