Acting Housing and Economic Development Director pick has poor track record.

Carmen Natal Melendez was recently elevated from the position of aide to Mayor Tony Mack to acting Director of Housing and Economic Development.

What, you might wonder, are Ms. Melendez’s qualifications to hold such a pivotal position in the Mack administration?

• She was amongst a handful of Latinos who came out in support of Mayor Mack during the 2010 campaign. (Juan Martinez and his brother, Robert Menendez, were two others).
• Her husband, Cesar Melendez, made two contributions to the Mack campaign in May of 2010: $600 on May 7 and $2600 on May 12.  (That totals $3200 which is over the personal limit of $2600…but maybe it was intended to be split between Carmen and Cesar, thus not breaching the limit).

So Carmen has a personal relationship with the Mayor. What else has she got?

• Well, she does have a real estate license.  She apparently didn’t have one for awhile, but was re-licensed in September of 2010 and is listed as working for Paladino Realty and Auction of Lambertville, NJ.
• Her partnership with fellow realtor Albin Garcia is defunct. The firm’s real estate license was deemed inactive in April of 2004, more than a year before it expired. (For comparison, Garcia has maintained a broker of record license since 2006)
• Striking out on her own, Carmen created Melendez Realty Services LLC in March 2004. Her last annual report was filed in January 2005 and the state REVOKED its corporate standing in October of 2008 for failure to file annual reports for two consecutive years (2006 and 2007).
• In the meantime, she created Melendez Realty LLC. The original filing was done in November of 2007 but was REVOKED in June 2010 for not filing annual report for two consecutive years (2008 and 2009).
• She’s obviously had trouble keeping up with the requirements of operating a business.  But there is more.
• An online search reveals some $57,596.25 in outstanding liens and judgments against her. Some date back to 1996.

So we ask you, dear readers, is this woman qualified to lead the all important housing and economic development arm of city government?

We think not.

Now you see it

Vacant and abandoned properties have been a burden on the city of Trenton for decades.

This building, near the intersection of Market and Jackson Streets in Mill Hill has sat vacant for over twenty years. The owner wants to make it a multiple unit dwelling...which is against the current zoning for the area. Until he can get his way, he has vowed to let it sit.

Meanwhile, the same property owner maintains a business and rents apartments in the building to the left of it. And he completed renovation of a couple of other nearby properties with financial assistance from the State of New Jersey and the Trenton Downtown Association, even though he removed the original facade and left those buildings boarded and vacant for several years in the interim.

At no time has the City ever approached this property owner with demands to put this highly visible building back to productive use. And when the neighborhood association has raised the issue of this eyesore, it has been all but ignored.

A few years ago, the Palmer Administration announced it was compiling a list of all the underutilized buildings and lots in the city with an eye towards using the State of New Jersey's Abandoned Property Act to get them onto the tax roles and into productive use.

The act was signed into law in January 2004 and to date, the city hasn't published a list of properties.

An election cycle has come and gone and no list has been provided.

Various community groups and leaders have continued to ask for this list, only to be told that the Department of Housing and Economic Development is "working on it" and it should be ready "soon."

So we wait.

And buildings like these, abandoned so long that the boards are literally falling off the windows, deteriorate further with each passing month.

Well, we're waiting no more. Thanks to the efforts of the Trenton Council of Civic Association (TCCA) the community is taking an inventory of the vacant lots and abandoned properties around the city so that a list can be presented to the city.

While citizen action is to be encouraged and applauded, it is pretty telling that it is only through this type of citizen action that things might get done.

Why can't the city of Trenton come up with a list of these properties on its own?

Every workday, there are scores of Public Works, Water, Police, Fire, and Inspections employees traveling all around town. What would it take for them to take a minute and jot down an address of an abandoned property and turn it in to a central place?

That's the very method the TCCA is employing. Each neighborhood group has been asked to inventory their home turf and send the information (street address and basic description like "empty house" or "vacant lot") to TCCA President Patricia Stewart. (You can email your list to phstew517@gmail.com)

Mrs. Stewart and the TCCA are to be applauded.

Trenton's Administration is to be booed.

Once again, the taxpayers are voluntarily doing the work the public servants are paid to do.

Go figure.