Four seeking two seats in District 1
McClellan, Simonsen face challenge from Rush, Sabo
TRENTON — It’s a four-way race for two seats in Legislative District 1 Assembly, with Republican incumbents Antwan McClellan and Erik Simonsen facing a challenge from Democrats Carolyn Rush and Carol Sabo on Nov. 4.
The district includes the municipalities in Cape May, Cumberland and Atlantic counties.
McClellan, personnel director, confidential assistant and public information officer for the Cape May County Sheriff’s Office.
He was first elected in 2019, serving as Republican whip from 2022 to 2023 and now deputy Republican leader since January 2024. He was re-elected in 2021 and 2023.
A lifelong resident of Ocean City, he served as councilman from 2012 to 2019, and as a member of the Ocean City Board of Education from 2010 to 2012.
Simonsen, director of athletics and activities for the Lower Cape May Regional School District, is a lifelong resident of Lower Township. He previously served as councilman from 2013 to 2016 and mayor from 2017 to 2018.
He was first elected in 2019, then re-elected in 2021 and 2023.
Rush mounted primary campaigns for Congress in 2022 and 2024 and joined Sen. Andy Kim as a plaintiff in a lawsuit that appears to have ended the county organization line.
A native of Medford who now lives full time in Sea Isle City, her work experience includes time as an engineer with Lockheed Martin. She has been affiliated with the League of Women Voters, American Promise, South Jersey Democratic Women’s Forum, ALS Association, and with the Association of Scientists and Professional Engineering Personnel.
Sabo has been mayor of West Cape May since 2018. Prior to that, she served on the boroough’s Board of Commissioners.
Sabo has served as a social worker and educator. Before entering education, she worked in Child Protective Services, advocating for families and children throughout Cape May County.
Democrat Carolyn Rush
Rush, 63, a mother of five, spent most of her life in Medford. She graduated from Montclair State University with a degree in computer science, and spent 35 years working as an engineer.
In the earlier part of my career, the company that I worked for was responsible for the initial design, implementation, installation and integration of E-ZPass.
I took a job with Lockheed Martin, in the defense industry. I had moral qualms about working there, but I took a job in an area that worked on the Aegis program, a defensive system that went on all of the naval ships. It was a system that was put in place not to attack others, but rather to defend our young men and women who serve our country.
I spent about 20 years there and retired early because I felt a calling to do something different. I got into community activism, and that turned into a desire to see if I can make change from within, instead of just trying to affect change from outside, as a private citizen. So that’s when I decided to run for office. And as a representative, I will be holding town halls.
What are your priorities if elected?: Fighting for the rights of the citizens of New Jersey, given what’s happening at the federal level. Prior to President Donald Trump starting his second term, my answer would have been very different.
I’m very interested in making sure that we protect women’s rights, the rights of the LGBTQ community, all the marginalized communities. I’m very interested in making sure that we protect our planet, because I feel that we have ignored climate change for so long that we’re suffering the consequences of that right now.
I believe that New Jersey has some of the best gun safety legislation in the country, and therefore some of the lowest gun violence occurrence. I support that, and I would oppose anything that tries to undo any of the good laws that we have in place.
Affordability has to be at the top, given the fact that people are struggling so much. It’s happening already, but it’s going to just continue to get worse in the next three years.
What are the biggest issues affecting southern New Jersey?: Affordability, definitely. We’ve got a growing homeless population, we’ve got people who can’t afford to keep their insurance, people that need to choose between purchasing medication or purchasing food. People that can’t pay their utility costs. There’s a lot of problems with affordability that definitely need to be addressed.
What can be done to address the high cost of living?: I believe our taxes are too high. I would love to see them lowered, but I think the only way to do that is to make some significant changes at the state level, and some of those changes would be consolidating school districts and municipalities and stuff, because right now, we are spending so much money educating our children, and we’re still failing them in so many ways.
I believe part of the problem is too many school districts that have so much overhead. If we were able to consolidate, which would take compromise, that can bring those costs down.
If you were to combine municipalities — making sure people are part of the decision-making process — you could find savings in police forces and municipal jobs like trash collection. This plan could help the government to use the limited resources better and possibly stop increasing taxes all the time.
I cringe every time I hear somebody say that they’re going to bring down taxes. There’s a balancing act that needs to happen.
Cape May County suffers from seasonal unemployment, poor transportation infrastructure and a lack of industry. What can be done to improve the economic situation, which depends solely on tourism? How can transit improve the local economy?: If people down here could commute to a job, or if people from out of the area could come here to work via mass transit, then people might be more inclined to start businesses here beyond the seasonal stuff.
If they knew that people had a way to get to where the jobs are. I really do believe that having transportation in this area will improve the ability to get to work. Like if they wanted to work in Philadelphia, to be able to go to Philadelphia on a bus.
Atlantic City Electric has implemented several rate hikes this year. What plans do you have to assist the consumers? Is the answer more power plants? If not wind, what type of new energy-generating plant do you propose?: I think we need to produce more energy, and I do not want to see it come from fossil fuels. I would like to see an expansion of our solar program.
Because of the density of our population, wind would have to be offshore. We don’t own real estate for land-based wind systems. I know there are objections to wind farms here, so if we’re not going to increase our energy capacity via wind, I think we have to pursue nuclear as well.
We need to move forward producing more of our own energy and keep it clean. The limited energy that we have is being gobbled up by these companies that are providing AI services, the supply and demand becomes a problem.
We need the people who are using the energy to run their AI initiatives to pay a higher rate than the residential folks. So increase energy supply, and price it properly depending on who the user is.
What do you think of the NJ REAL regulations?: At the most basic level, I think this should have been handled as legislation instead of an executive order. I would have preferred it to go through the legislative body and had more discussion.
I know that something has to be done; we have ignored the effects of climate change for over 50 years, and we’re now seeing the consequences. But I don’t think planning for the worst-case scenario is the best course of action. It has to be phased in.
I would love to see more plans to curb climate change, by decreasing our use of fossil fuels, maybe we wouldn’t need to plan for the worst case. But as it stands now, NJ REAL is a bit too much.
Do the changes recently proposed by the DEP change that opinion at all?: It is now slightly less onerous than before, so that’s a good thing, but my first two thoughts still apply. It should have gone through the legislative process, and it should be phased in. We shouldn’t deal in 2025 with what might happen in 2100.
Homelessness, drug abuse and mental health problems are prevalent in your district. What initiatives do you plan to address those issues?: You have to look from two different angles, the long-term solutions as well as the short-term.
In the long term, we need more affordable housing available so people aren’t in homes that they can’t afford. In the short term, we need more funding to help these folks.
In Cape May County, there is no homeless shelter. The only way that these folks can get any assistance is through nonprofit organizations. Now the commissioners are talking about having the county provide funding to some of these nonprofits so that they can better serve the homeless community. That’s a start.
I would like to see money set aside at the state level to help them, then we need to get places for these people to live. I actually started a nonprofit with the intent to build small houses.
We need to purchase or lease abandoned office space or retail space. The state should take over those properties and build affordable apartments in them, then provide people with wrap-around services.
What you need to do is put a roof over their heads, help them get some food and then help them get over whatever was the cause of their becoming homeless, whether it be mental health, substance abuse or anything.
We can provide job training, that would mean making more grant money available. I also think mass transit is key.
Republican Erik Simonsen
Simonsen, 56, was born and raised in Cape May and now lives in Lower Township with his wife, Anna, two daughters and mother-in-law.
I just retired from 32 years in education. I was teaching, I was vice principal, an athletic director and a supervisor back in the day, but for 18 years, I was at Cape May County Special Services School, working with special needs. I coached wrestling for a very long time and I am an ordained deacon at Macedonia Baptist Church in Cape May. I’m also a professional musician.
What are your priorities if elected?: With 32 years in education, it’s always education. With the funding issue, I’m hoping the speaker puts me on the task force to work on that. Obviously tourism, that’s what makes things run around here. Our fisheries, both our fishing industry and trying to help the oyster industry’ Of course, veterans. I’m very proud of the bills that I’ve sponsored. And of course, helping our families and small businesses, because down here in our district, the majority of the businesses are the small businesses.
What are the biggest issues affecting southern New Jersey?: The cost of living is ridiculous. There aren’t as many families as there used to be in Cape May, because it’s just too expensive to live there; same with Lower Township. Places that were once affordable are now tough to buy a home there, and we see there’s been a decline in enrollment in the schools. It’s tough for young families to afford to live here and raise kids.
What can be done to address the high cost of living?: Let’s face it, taxes are ridiculous. If you look at the budget this year with some of the ridiculous things that the governor, and all the people involved in the process are doing … they’re taxing everything now, anything they can squeeze, from bowling to gas tax. It’s gotten out of hand.
I think that’s one of the main issues, and I think we need to generate more money. By trying to give more opportunities to generate revenue and increase, especially, like I said, hospitality, whether it’s hotels, restaurants, small businesses.
Regarding education, the state should spend more to cover the cost of special education, for example. And we should establish a state tax credit to support families who use high-impact tutoring, as well as supporting veterans and businesses as tenants.
Cape May County suffers from seasonal unemployment, poor transportation infrastructure and a lack of industry. What can be done to improve the economic situation, which depends solely on tourism?: The people in Cumberland County, they’ve been able to do more of a year-round market, more of a year-round business for visitors, and that’s been great for the economy, but there’s so much more we can do.
The rail system, people don’t understand that’s privately owned down our way. So I’d love to do something with that. But unfortunately, it’s privately owned. There’s been talk about starting it up farther north, at least running like from Middle Township on up, so that’s a possibility.
That brings job opportunities. It gets people that might not drive or own a vehicle, especially younger people. I think it helps a lot. When you create more jobs, and you create more revenue, you’re going to take in more money for the local municipalities, which obviously helps with the local budgets.
How else can transit improve the local economy?: We need South Jersey Transit and forget New Jersey Transit, because we don’t get enough services down here. When you get into Cumberland County, it’s even worse because it’s so rural there in a lot of areas that it’s difficult for a lot of those people to get back and forth from work. There are more people coming here, and there’s more people living here now than back in the old days. So we really need to up that game, and that’s what we’re working on with New Jersey Transit.
Atlantic City Electric has implemented several rate hikes this year. What plans do you have to assist the consumers? Is the answer more power plants? If not wind, what type of new energy-generating plant do you propose?: We need more forms of energy. I was mayor of Lower Township when we fought those windmills; I did a lot of research for that.
The bottom line is, wind energy is a minimal amount of energy. I am about green energy, and that’s not green when you’re crapping up our ocean with tons of cement and steel. And the turbines themselves aren’t really recyclable. I mean, you can break them down if you have the means to do it, which is impossible, so they end up in landfills.
People don’t realize the impact it has on our environment, our fishing industry, our sea life. You have to use these cement carpets that hold the cables down. It’s not like someone’s going to go out and take them down once they’re useless.
We need the nuclear generators. They have the smaller nuclear generators now that are very safe. It’s not the 1970s anymore. We really need to invest in hydrogen power, water-powered vehicles. But I think we really need to invest in other forms of energy that are more productive, such as natural gas power plants and nuclear.
What do you think of the NJ REAL regulations?: I know recently they did back off a lot of it. It’s too much too soon. Rome wasn’t built in a day. They wanted to do all this in one fell swoop, and I think anything’s impossible to do like that.
When you start looking into all the finer details, like when new construction and elevators and houses that are below sea level. There’s so much in there that is financially impossible to do for people. It’s literally to drive up the cost of building, whether it’s houses or businesses, buildings, whatever, for both those constructing it and then those buying it.
Do the changes recently proposed by the DEP change that opinion at all?: I’m not against it 100 percent. I always say don’t be reactionary, and I think that’s what happened here. Our district would be hit harder than all the other ones, just because we have more mileage on the coastline.
This plan is for the 75-year or 100-year storm. We need to plan for the 25-year storm. We need to do it in smaller increments, instead of these big jumps. I wouldn’t throw NJ REAL out, but I think there could have been more discussion or conversation about it. We’re never going to agree on everything in politics, but I think we could have a more realistic approach.
They threw something out there that looks good on paper, but in the real world it would be impossible to do on the timeline they put forward.
Homelessness, drug abuse and mental health problems are prevalent in your district. What initiatives do you plan to address those issues?: We can’t just rely on ourselves; we need to reach out and see what other models are working in other counties, municipalities and districts, so that’s what we’re doing.
The Cumberland County homeless shelter, they do a great job over there. And right across the street is the food distribution center, where they organize the food to go out to all the shelters.
We’re trying new programs all the time. I don’t think people realize, they go down to the Cape May Mall, or the Wildwood Boardwalk, and they don’t see the people behind the Walmart, or over in the pits behind Erma or Rio Grande. It’s an eye-opening experience. We are working with Cumberland County to try to get those models here.
There needs to be a means beyond just having the Branches. We need to open these programs up to the schools; that’s a good way to get help to the families that need it. One advantage the schools have is that they know who the families that need help are. Not just at Thanksgiving or Christmas, it needs to be a regular occurrence.
Building a structure for that is difficult, but it needs to be done. With the help of Cumberland County, we’re going to get that done. It’s always been an issue that people want more shelters but don’t want them in their towns. These problems get dumped on the same lower-income areas, and there needs to be a paradigm shift to end that.
