Five Hoboken Residents Challenge Housing Authority Exec's Assembly Run

Five Hoboken residents have filed a lawsuit with the goal of removing Carmelo Garcia's name from the June primary ballot. 

Garcia, the executive director of the Hoboken Housing Authority, is running for state Assembly and has said he will keep his current job on the HHA, should he win. 

The five residents, none of which are Hoboken Housing Authority residents, claim that Garcia is not eligible to run for office.

Hobokenites Jerome Abernathy, James Castiglione, Avi Ohring, Sheilah Scully and Vasudev Trivedi released a statement on Thursday laying out their objections.

"A regulatory prohibition under state law addressing people who work on federally-funded bodies like the HHA clearly bars Mr. Garcia’s candidacy," according to the statement.

"Separately, a conflict of interest prohibition under HUD regulations also bars Mr. Garcia’s holding a legislative office while he is HHA Executive Director," according to the group's statement.

According to Flavio Komuves, the laywer representing the five Hobokenites, the goal of the suit is to remove Garcia's name from the ballot because he won't be able to devote all his time to both jobs. 

Garcia could not immediately be reached on Thursday afternoon.

It'll be "difficult if not impossible to do both," Komuves said.

Komuves claimed that Garcia is in violation of the Hatch Act as well as a state regulation that prevents those whose salaries are paid by federal funds to run for public office.

Garcia has said he will keep his job as executive director of the Hoboken Housing Authority, citing a 2012 amendment to title 5 of the Hatch Act, which allows those whose salaries are not completely funded by federal funds to run for public, partisan office.

Komuves said that he had been in contact with Superior Court Judge Peter Bariso to schedule an appearance in court, but it's still unclear when the matter will be discussed in court.