Former Three-Term Mayor Steve Cappiello Dies

Steve Cappiello, who served three terms as Hoboken Mayor as well as two terms as Third Ward Councilman in the 1970s and 80s, has died. He was 89.

Cappiello was admitted to the hospital on Thursday and died shortly after.

City Clerk Jimmy Farina, who got his start in Hoboken politics after being hired by Cappiello when he was 16 years old, remembered the former mayor as a "people's person" who lived for local politics.

"I used to put up his political signs," said Farina, thinking back to the early seventies. In the late 60s, Cappiello ran for Third Ward Councilman and got elected.

Cappiello was elected mayor in 1973. Farina ran for school board shortly after, a post he held for the next 36 years, partially with the help of Cappiello.

When Cappiello was elected mayor, Farina continued, "the renaissance of Hoboken was just beginning."

"Steve was involved with that," Farina said, "he did a lot for people."

Those days were very different from what the Hoboken political landscape looks like now. In a pre-Internet age, Cappiello relied on his political allies to help him out and campaign for him.

Farina, who said he was very close to Cappiello, said he often went fishing with the former mayor.

"He enjoyed his family. Cigars and wine. He liked to play cards," Farina said. But, most of all, he continued, "his biggest passion was politics."

After Cappiello lost his bid for mayor in 1985, he returned to the city council as Third Ward councilman for one more term.

For most of his life, Cappiello remained involved in Hoboken politics and served as one of the main campaign advisers for former Mayor David Roberts, who was elected in 2001.

While Cappiello announced that he'd run for mayor again in 2009, he never officially filed petitions to do so.

"He was always in a good mood," Farina remembered on Friday. "He was a jokester."

As mayor, Cappiello often went down to the clerk's office to have lunch there. "A lot of business was conducted here over lunch," Farina said.

Cappiello is remembered by his wife Dottie, his two daughters, Janet and Linda, and his son Steven.

A funeral mass will be held in Cappiello's honor on Monday morning. There will be a viewing at Failla Memorial Home, but visiting hours were still being worked out as of Friday afternoon.