Board of Health President Aims to Be GOP Write-In

John Hoover, president of the Madison Board of Health, announced Tuesday he is running a write-in campaign in the June GOP primary in hopes of being one of the party's two nominees in the general election come November.

Two Borough Council seats are up for grabs, but . Republicans had said they might field a write-in candidate to fill out the GOP ticket.

Astri Baillie and Ben Wolkowitz have filed to run on the Democratic ticket.

The announcement, which follows, touts Hoover's work on the Board of Health and community service.

Hoover to Enter Primary as Write-In Candidate

After 20 plus years of community service, John Hoover is running for a seat on the Council of the Borough of Madison as a write-in candidate.

A Republican, Hoover is currently the President of the Board of Health in Madison. In this role, Hoover has reshaped the Department of Health over the past two and a half years, including replacing the Health Officer and the Registrar in a 3-month period.

John is very active in the Madison Rotary Club, including being the Liaison to the Madison High School Interact Club. MHS Interact has 50 members that raise funds for international and community service needs.

Additionally, Hoover volunteers with Bridges Outreach, which packages and delivers food and clothes to homeless in Newark and New York City, and he is a volunteer with the Senior Cents program of Morris County Family Services Agency. He has also volunteered with Morris Habitat, and the Raptor Trust.

The candidate said he came to the decision to run after being asked to by friends and because he believes there is a need for Madison to move forward for the benefit of all citizens. His proven ability to identify, plan, and implement improvements in government and non-government organizations, large and small, international and domestic, establishes an excellent foundation to uncover issues, and design solutions.

“But the improvements must be those the citizens of Madison want,” he said.  “Their input is not only desirable, it is crucial. Collegiality and consensus are the oil that will make it happen.”

His commitment to public service dates back 25 years to his time living in San Francisco. There John served as volunteer President of the Family Service Agency of San Francisco. On the Board of the Convention and Visitors Bureau, the Board of the Bay Area Red Cross, and was Portfolio Chairman at United Way of the Bay Area.

“My sense of community is a deep seeded commitment to people ... to helping others become more self-sufficient. The same applies to Madison. The Borough needs to be an initiator, a source of revenue and service. Just as the Health Department is a supplier of services for a fee to five other municipalities, and growing, we need to change our paradigm. It is time to focus on revenue and provide a defined set of needed services at reasonable, minimal cost.”

Hoover moved to Madison over 12 years ago, primarily to be closer to his son, daughter-in-law, and three grandsons. He thought Madison was beautiful and had all needed services, education facilities, fine restaurants, churches, medical facilities, and fabulous commute into The City. It was not until he lived here that he truly learned of the value that is Madison. He became more and more involved in community services, and when he retired in early 2009, he dove in and immersed himself in participating as much as possible in supporting and doing.

“I consider one of my real strengths is doing and accomplishing. I don’t just sit on the sidelines and critique; I get in and fix things….do things. I walk the talk.”  

Hoover believes the issue most on everyone’s mind is preserving a core set of desired services, maintaining and where possible reducing costs, and ensuring collegial, meaningful debate.

“The services provided by the Health Department, police and fire departments add immeasurable value to the quality and preservation of life in Madison.” Hoover said. He also recognized the need to improve the infrastructure, eliminate unnecessary redundancies, and continue to support the many, many volunteer activities, and attract and retain businesses. Downtown Madison is beautiful and there have been many efforts to encourage people to buy, shop, eat, and enjoy music and other activities, such as the annual Farmers Market. These efforts need to be continued and expanded. 

Hoover’s three grandsons attend public schools and have participated at all levels in athletic activities, and Boy Scouts. His son and wife researched cities and towns in the tri-state area 20 years ago, and chose Madison because of the quality of education, the nearby medical facilities, the beauty of the borough and surrounding communities, the ease of commute into New York, and because of the quality of public services.

"With the Board of Health, Madison has a health department," he said. "Not all towns have them. One of the ways we pay for it, or it justifies its existence let's say, is there are overhead costs and what they do is they contract out their services to towns that don't have them for a fee. They (the other towns) get the service, they don't carry the overhead but they pay us a fee and the beauty of it is that service is right here. That's a shared service. That's a good way of reducing costs without really impacting the residents.

"I want to focus more on getting the revenue in as opposed to cutting expenses and the way you do it is keep it desirable, maintain the services, get rid of that vacant space. That's the focus right now. You have to manage your ongoing expenses. The model used by the Board of Health should be emulated in developing more shared services going forward” 

Hoover believes he has the talent, education, accomplishments and experience to keep Madison as the Madison we know and love.

"I look forward to partnering with Don Links as the campaign moves forward. He has the energy, integrity, commitment, passion and ideas to continue the work he has started for all the citizens of Madison," he said.

As for his opponents, Hoover said, "They're all good people. They have the best interests of the town at heart. Everybody wants to do what's right. It's just a different approach or philosophy. I'm not going to go at anybody. They have to walk out their front door win or lose, just like I do, and look their neighbor in the face. You have to have a conscience."