Two seats up for grabs on Hazlet committee BY JAMIE ROMM Staff Writer Scott Aagre HAZLET - Two familiar names on the ballot will be opposing two relative newcomers to the township political scene on Nov. 6. Scott Aagre and Republican running mate David Tinker are facing Democrats Joseph Marques and Gerard Jaume for two three-year terms on the Township Committee. Aagre is a former committeeman who did not run for re-election in 2006, while Tinker ran an unsuccessful bid for a seat that year. According to the candidates, the major issues in this election are taxes, how tax dollars are spent and how open the government actually is. With Republicans Michael Sachs and Bridget Antonucci deciding not to run for re-election, the party's presence on the committee is in jeopardy. The committee is currently split 3-2 in favor of the Democrats, and Tinker and Aagre are looking to ensure that Republicans still have a say. Aagre, 48, joined the committee in 2004 and served as deputy mayor in 2006. He currently is the chairman of the Hazlet Republicans. He has been a chairman on the Hazlet Planning Board and the Hazlet Rent Control Board. David Tinker He said he decided to run again because he felt that he still could make a change in Hazlet. "I enjoyed working with the residents of Hazlet during my time on the Township Committee," Aagre said. "I still have goals that I want to reach and I want to stop the out-of-control spending that is currently going on." The architect and New Jersey building code analyst for Milrose Consultants Inc., Jersey City, said he wants to make the government more open and work to ensure information is passed more clearly. "Take for example the issue of spending money on the parks," Aagre said. "We were told that the public was not going to spend a dime. The parks are now being paid by the taxpayers in lieu of the grants we accepted to pay for these things." He also had a problem with the government spending its budget on attorney fees. "We spent a surplus of money that was allotted on these fees," Aagre said. "So now we have nothing coming for next year because we spent it all." Tinker, 48, is making a second bid for the Hazlet Township Committee following last year's loss by a slim margin and the defection of his running mate to the Democratic Party. He works for the Musculoskeletal Transplant Foundation in Edison and has been a member of the Hazlet Planning Board for the past three years. While on the board he has served on the Stormwater Management Subcommittee and the subcommittee reviewing the township's master plan. He said that he is running again because he still thinks he can make a difference in Hazlet "I want to stop the empty promises and lies of the current administration," Tinker said. "I'm tired of the out-of- control spending. The purpose of the committee is to better the community, not spend money." He said that he didn't like how the committee allows each public speaker at committee meetings an allotted amount of time of three minutes. Tinker's said his goal is to make the government as transparent as possible "to stop the backroom deals." "I have been going to a lot of meetings lately and some of the things they say are just misrepresenting the facts," Tinker said. "I was told at a township meeting that the town has $100,000 of unspent monies and is in fact under-budget when in fact they are over a million dollars over budget." The Hazlet Democrats declined to be interviewed about their backgrounds and platforms for this story. Jaume, 44, has served on the Hazlet Planning Board as well as being a volunteer for the Hazlet Youth Athletic League. He currently works as the director of global electronic trading technology at the Royal Bank of Canada, New York City. Marques, 52, has served on the Hazlet Zoning Board and has been the coorganizer for Residents Against Giant Electric. He works as a sales consultant for the Verizon Corporation.