Still Merla after all these years After more than two decades, Keyport mayor set to exit public life BY KAREN E. BOWES Staff Writer SCOTT PILLING staff Keyport Mayor John Merla mixes a drink at the Bulkhead Bar and Grille on Friday. Merla's term will end on New Year's Day, when Councilman Robert Bergen will be sworn in. People either love him or love to hate him. But either way, Keyport Mayor John Merla has made an impression around here, one that's sure to last far beyond the latest pesky indictment. For both Merla lovers and haters alike, the end of his era is near. After 21 years, the often controversial, always colorful 44-year-old Merla will end his more than two-decade career in Keyport politics. Come Jan. 1, the 6-foot-1, straight-shooting, pants-splitting, cop-heckling, federal indictment-fighting mayor will retire from the public eye, handing the reins over to Councilman Robert Bergen. Last Thursday, the Independent sat down with the Bayshore's most dynamic mayor at the Bulkhead Bar & Grille. The mayor has worked at his family's pub since losing his longtime job at the New Jersey Turnpike Authority following his 2005 arrest. Charged by the FBI with everything from accepting $23,000 in cash bribes to providing free commercial garbage pickups to friends and family, Merla was one of 11 elected officials originally swept up in Operation Bid Rig, the scandal that broke the morning of Feb. 22, 2005. FILE PHOTO John Merla's first campaign for mayor in 1990 saw the 28-year-old become the borough's youngest elected mayor. Pending the result of his trial, does he have plans to run for office ever again? "Not right now," Merla said. "You know what? It's time for someone else to be kicked in the seat a little bit," he added, invoking a famed Richard Nixon speech. From gadflies to barflies, Merla appears perfectly at ease in both worlds, just as comfortable sitting sideways on a barstool in blue jeans and work boots as he does atop the dais in a suit and tie. "Let me tell you something," he begins. "I've seen the good points in politics and the bad. You know what, I lived both. ... I'll do what I have to do to help the community. And I always did and I always will. I did what I thought was right. It may not have always been right with everybody else, but I always believed strongly in my heart that if I thought it was good for the community, that's what I did." SCOTT PILLING staff Keyport Mayor John Merla works in the kitchen of the Bulkhead Bar and Grille, an establishment owned by his family. Always the optimist, the mayor said he hopes to get his old job back at the Turnpike Authority after the trial. He also wants to spend more time with his children and get more involved with the local Pop Warner program. Both feared and beloved, at times it would seem there are two John Merlas. A friendly neighbor whom almost everyone calls Johnny (even during council meetings), he is also quite generous, the first to empty his wallet to help children and their various causes, like the $750 he handed over to a group of young cheerleaders earlier this month. This is the John Merla who delivers Meals on Wheels to shut-ins and acts as a football, baseball and softball coach. And he's also pretty funny. FILE PHOTO John Merla in a 1985 campaign photo, the year he first won a seat on the Borough Council. "What's up, wild man?" Merla said Thursday afternoon last week, his greeting for a bar patron. "Praise the Lord. Pass the ammo!" A different creature entirely is the political John Merla, a caustic-tongued, over-the-top political caricature of himself. Often ridiculed by the public for his FBI arrest and straight-shooting mannerisms, this is the John Merla who will not hesitate to lash out at his critics during a public meeting. Perhaps the most poignant example of this dual personality at play was Merla's behavior at an April liquor license hearing for one of his family's bars, the Uptown Bar and Grille on Broad Street. Not allowed to sit on the dais because of his involvement with the bar, Merla sat in the back of the room, often speaking out and heckling those who testified. Still angry at Mitchell for providing information to the feds, Merla heckled him the most after he testified that illegal activity at the bar has prompted several still-open investigations. "You ain't got s***," "Just you wait," and, inexplicably, "Cinco de Mayo," were just a few of the phrases Merla spewed repeatedly in Mitchell's direction. Two weeks later, Merla claimed to have split his pants during the exchange, his rationale for having used a four-letter word while heckling Mitchell. He also said Mitchell was laughing at the mention of his recently deceased mother, causing him to become angry. "No one insults my mother," Merla told the room. "No one." A loyal following First elected to the Borough Council in 1985, Merla began holding public office at just 23 years old. Five years later, he became the borough's youngest elected mayor. He has served on the Board of Education, Planning Board, Library Board, Smart Growth Committee and Monmouth County Mosquito Commission, and is a former chairman of the Bayshore Conference of Mayors. In 1992 he faced corruption charges from the state, a situation he says he doesn't like to think about today. On Christmas Eve of 1993, he was acquitted of all charges. Yet despite all the controversy, Merla has become the proverbial last man standing, the only Bid Rig politician still serving in public office and, arguably, the most steadfast in proclaiming his total innocence on all eight charges. While he waits and waits and waits some more for the trial to start (it's been postponed five times), his confidence of a full acquittal has not wavered. His supporters are numerous, often showing up at council meetings to defend the besieged mayor at times of crisis. "When people know you for a long time, they believe in you," he said of that loyalty. "I mean, I believe in people. I have no ill feelings toward anyone over this whole thing. I mean, I'm upset with what I was charged with because I don't think it's right. But on the other scale, many a night I could have packed those council chambers with people. I backed people off. I still get a lot of support letters, and a lot of people on the street pull me aside and wish me well. I had people call me the day before the trial when it was scheduled for Dec. 12 to wish me the best of luck. I have people that want to come to the trial for support, moral support. "I think the reason why is because they know me. Of course, the people who don't know me are going to judge me based on what the media says. And then there's people who are going to judge me because they never voted for me. ... So if you look, if I'm still maintaining good support throughout this whole ordeal, I find that pretty acceptable." Regrets:, I've had a few His biggest regrets, aside from what he is not allowed to discuss, involve the police. Back in the 1990s, some residents accused Merla of being a racist for his stance against promoting a black police officer to chief. Merla's often strained relationship with the local police department has been a point of contention throughout his political career. "If I had to do things all over again, looking back, myself and Raymond Lee, who were friends at one time, became, I'm not going to say enemies, but we became ... we had hard feelings against one another because of his promotion," Merla said, struggling to find the right words to describe the touchy subject. "And if I had to do something all over again, I'd have to give it a second thought, because Raymond wound up suing the town. He wound up going out on disability. ... And that was bad for the town. I was involved with that. People that knew me, some Lee supporters accused me of being a racist and they know there's not a racist bone in my body. And I proved it many times." His opinion this summer about not promoting another police officer was also the source of later regret, Merla said. It was also the source of much controversy, the catalyst for a mini police revolt. The officer in question happened to be Detective Capt. Thomas Mitchell, a man credited with bringing some of Merla's alleged crimes to the attention of the FBI. Later, Mitchell was invited to attend the FBI Academy, an invitation-only, six-week training course, considered to be an honor. In June, with the issue of Mitchell's promotion hanging in the balance, Merla wrote a letter to the Independent stating the town would do better with a non-police officer as head of the police department. Without ever mentioning Mitchell's name, Merla criticized the officer as "fake muscle." This led police to crowd the next several council meetings to demand Mitchell's promotion. Even Merla's old pal/enemy Raymond Lee showed up, shouting at the mayor, "You the problem. You the problem with Mitchell!" All in all, it was a messy scene. "The incident with the cops ... I wrote a letter. Maybe I should have read it actually before I published it," he said. "You know, stuff like that gets you into a little bit of trouble. But you know what? It prompts good discussion and debate." So what's the deal with Merla's recent praise of Mitchell? "I give credit where credit's due," Merla replied. "I'm not gong to say Tommy's my friend - put it this way, he wouldn't be on the list to be invited to my wedding. But I will tell you this: I respect the job that he does. I think he's a good cop. I think there are some things that I can't say because of pending litigation against me, but I will say this: he does a good job. When he does it well, I stand in line to congratulate him. I wasn't in favor of Tommy being promoted to captain only because I thought everybody was rushing it. ... But overall, I think that's what the council wants and that's what Keyport wants." Fond memories, thoughts on the future One of his proudest accomplishments, Merla said, was the part he played in cleaning up and reinvigorating downtown Keyport. In the 1980s, the site of Merla's Bulkhead restaurant was a pornographic movie theater. The neighborhood preservation movement eventually saw the mayor's family turn the theater into a restaurant and kept an adult book store from opening shop on West Front Street. "That was so important to me, to revamp that section of Keyport which was the downtown business district," Merla said. "And today, you're seeing buildings that in the '80s may have been worth $150,000, $200,000, whereas [they're] $800,000 to a million dollars today. Merla credits "Robby's dad," aka former Mayor Richard Bergen, for obtaining key Neighborhood Preservation Grant funding from the state for Keyport. Richard Bergen was in office when Merla was first elected mayor in 1990. Next week, his son, Councilman Robert Bergen, will take over where Merla leaves off. "I don't think Robby's going to have an easy task, because I see the way votes are going, the way he's questioned," Merla said. "Personally, I think Rob is a hard worker, harder than a lot of people realize. The main thing people have said to me is they just don't like his attitude. And personally, I'm used to it. When I battle with Robby, I can battle with him at the council meeting and the next day have a drink together, so that's nice. "My only advice to Rob, knowing what he's got on council with him, I would know my votes before I put anything on the agenda, 'cause otherwise, Rob could be in a lot of trouble. And my other advice to him is to try to be a little more people-friendly. Not that I was the most perfect gentleman in the world, but I took a lot of s*** ... and never gave half as much back. But I always accepted the public opinion, whether I liked it or not, I accepted it, and I think that's fair." On a handful of occasions over the past few years, Bergen has stormed out of public meetings when things were not going his way, an issue Merla could see being a problem. "I've seen it all," Merla said. "It's a problem. He's done it before. In 21 years, I missed five meetings and one was for a honeymoon." Before he goes, there are some loose ends he'd like to clear up, like the property on the corner of West Front and Beers streets. "I think the council should step up to the plate. Sell that borough piece of property. Why are we messing around?" he said. "It's a 30-by-50 lot that's worthless to us. ... I can't see why the council isn't taking action to sell that piece of property. ... It could be a beautiful development there with plenty of open space and no harm to the environment. I don't know. It's like no one's got no guts, it seems like to me." His first unofficial act as Citizen Merla? He has plans to finally say exactly what's on his mind to the gadflies that irk him the most. "Now I can rebut them," Merla said, "and it's not going to be nice."