Want To Vote On Hoboken Rent Referendum Or School Board? Registration Deadline Looms

HOBOKEN, NJ — If you live in Hoboken but you're still registered in Ridgewood (New Jersey, Queens, doesn't matter) — and you want to actually vote in Hoboken's school board election or on the rent control public question — Tuesday is the deadline to register in town.

You can use this link to register to vote in Hoboken.

• See the New Jersey voter information portal and election timelines here.
• See the timeline for the general election here.

Besides voting on the presidential election on Nov. 5, you'll get to choose from four Hoboken school board candidates for three seats. (More about that here.)

You can also vote on the Public Question on rent control.

Hoboken's local Rent Control Ordinance, which went into effect in 1973, limits landlords to increasing the rents to certain percentage each year, allowing them to also pass along various cost increases. They can also get a 25 percent decontrol every three years.

But a property owners' group has said the law needs to be revamped.

They amassed enough petitions on a ballot earlier this year to challenge the law, asking Hoboken residents to vote on a public question this November that would allow landlords to get a one-time decontrol when a current tenant leaves an apartment, if the landlord contributes to an affordable housing fund. Critics say this will just lead to more landlords pushing tenants out, because they can get a larger rent increase when a long-term tenant leaves. And it could be years before new housing is built.

(See a full story with an explanation here or here).

Any voter living in Hoboken can weigh in on the public question through Election Day, Nov. 5 — but if they're registered to vote out of town, they only have until Oct. 15 to change their registration to the current address.

What's The Public Question?

Recently, Hoboken's City Council voted to revise the wording of the question on the ballot, saying it was misleading. The city released a new "interpretive statement" that guide voters on what a "Yes" or "No" vote means. Read the language of the statement at the very end of this story.

Read a story about tenants in modern Hoboken here.

See the New Jersey voter information portal and election timelines here.

See the timeline for the general election here.