To the Editor:

I support the candidacies of Fausta Rodriguez Wertz for Princeton Council and Ron Cefalone for Mercer County Freeholder. Both candidates represent a refreshing change from the political regimes that have dominated Princeton and Mercer County politics for too many years.

Fausta Rodriguez Wertz offers inclusion to several alienated and frustrated groups which have been deliberately excluded from the decision-making processes that control our lives. In a public Princeton Council meeting recently, her opponent, Ms. Crumiller, directly told me that Council was entitled to spend much more than any other New Jersey municipality of Princeton’s size because of the voluntary payments of non-profit organizations, which don’t even total 10 percent of the Princeton budget. Rather than providing an excuse for continued, extravagant spending, including more than $10 million in annual debt service, which also far exceeds any town of Princeton’s size in New Jersey, these voluntary, non-profit payments should serve to relieve the enormous tax burden that is destroying what remains of Princeton’s middle class. Ms. Rodriguez Wertz clearly understands this fact, and she will also ably represent the concerns of Princeton’s taxpayers before the other two taxing jurisdictions that today threaten to drive some of us from our homes.

Ron Cefalone understands the wasteful spending and duplication that exist within Mercer County government. In the case of Princeton, he knows how unfair it is to increase taxes by nearly 10 percent while the level of county services is less than in most of Mercer County. He also realizes the fundamental flaw of the county “equalization” tax method which assumes that the value of all Princeton real property has increased at the same rate.

On November 5, please vote for Fausta Rodriguez Wertz and Ron Cefalone.

Frank Wiener

Loomis Court