New Jersey
New Jersey pastor detained by ICE weeks before Easter
A pastor in New Jersey was taken into custody by immigration agents while working at his day job, according to church members.
Yeison Cortes Vasquez was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on March 20. He is a pastor at The Gathering Place Church in Elizabeth.
Officials from the National Latino Evangelical Coalition said on Wednesday that Vasquez has no criminal record. He has been ministering to other detainees while in custody at Delaney Hall Detention Facility in Newark, they said in a statement.
A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said the pastor illegally entered the country in January 2016 from Colombia. Vasquez allegedly overstayed a tourist visa that expired in July 2016.
“Against our nation’s laws, he knowingly overstayed his visa by nearly a decade and failed to depart. He will remain in ICE custody pending his removal procedures,” the statement read.
“Any allegation that Cortes Vasquez was denied a bible while in detention are FALSE. ICE facilities do not deny detainees accesses to holy coverings or texts. Detainees are given the opportunity to practice their religions. ICE provides all religious items permitted as soon as detainees make the request,” the spokesperson also said.
Church leaders are now trying to get him out of detention before Easter on Sunday.
“For us, this is devastating because this is our holy week. This is the week we are celebrating the death and resurrection of our Lord. The church is devastated,” said the Rev. Dan Mendez. “Instead of celebrating our spiritual holiday, we are crying and praying for the situation of our dear brother.”
The National Latino Evangelical Coalition said it plans on retaining an attorney for Vasquez.
New Jersey
Man arrested in New Jersey after missing woman’s body discovered in Georgia woods, GBI says
A suspect has been charged with the murder of a missing woman whose body was discovered weeks ago in a stretch of Georgia woods.
Authorities say 35-year-old Gainesville resident Loron Spaulding was taken into custody by the U.S. Marshals in New Jersey earlier this week.
According to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, officers had been searching for 30-year-old Diaja Benson since she was reported missing out of Dawson County on Feb. 20.
On the morning of March 13, agents with the GBI, the Cumming Police Department, the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office, the Dawson County Sheriff’s Office, and the Georgia Department of Natural Resources found a body of a woman near Lanier 400 Parkway in Cumming. The body was later identified as Benson.
Authorities have not shared any information about how they connected Spaulding with Benson’s death or if the two knew each other.
Spaulding remains in custody in New Jersey, facing a murder charge. He will eventually be extradited to Georgia, at which time he will be booked into the Fulton County Jail.
The investigation into the case remains ongoing. If you have any information that could help, call the GBI’s Regional Investigative Office in Cleveland at (706) 348-4866 or the agency’s tip line at 1-800-597-8477.
A popular Jersey City coffee shop is facing down a zoning complaint that could force them to temporarily shut their doors.
“I think our reaction when we heard of this most recent zoning complaint was just real frustration because we’ve done everything right,” said co-owner of the Hive, Kristin Karotkin.
Kristin and Catherine Willhoit run the Hive together.
They told News 12 they are permitted to sell coffee and baked goods under their current zoning designation, retail.
However, a nearby neighbor has filed a complaint seeking to have the business reclassified as a commercial restaurant, a move that could require The Hive to halt operations while the zoning issue is sorted out.
“The fact that one person is kind of challenging the way that zoning is interpreted really just feels like a kick in the gut for a business that’s not only beloved here in the neighborhood but has done everything we are supposed to,” Karotkin said.
City officials previously denied the neighbor’s initial complaint, but the issue is now back before the city following an appeal.
According to the appeal, the central issue comes down to one item: cinnamon rolls.
The complaint alleges The Hive is operating a commercial kitchen to bake them on-site.
The owners dispute that claim, though, and showed News 12 the shop’s oven, the only one on the premises.
“There’s nothing being made from scratch in the back room here,” Karotkin said. “It’s all made off-site and then baked here in our shops.”
Beyond their own business, the owners worry the outcome of the case could have broader implications for small businesses across Jersey City as well.
“A lot of small businesses, if this keeps happening in Jersey City, they’re going to stop trying — they’re going to stop coming here,” Karotkin said.
A zoning board meeting is scheduled for April 9, where officials are expected to make a determination on The Hive’s future.
A few weeks ago I wrote about staying in New Jersey feeling like a bad relationship. The love is real. The memories are real. But the bills keep coming and the promises from Trenton keep not arriving. And most people keep saying just one more year.
Here is the part of that story I did not get to. For a lot of New Jersey residents, the “just one more year” conversation does not end with a decision to leave. It ends with retirement — and the sudden realization that the math that was already hard just got impossible.
The friends who are no longer here
I think about this a lot because I see it in my own life. Friends and relatives I grew up with — people who are approaching retirement or are already there — are gone. Not gone as in passed away. Gone as in New Jersey made them leave. Financially bullied out of the state they built their lives in.
Off the top of my head I can place friends and family in western Pennsylvania, Illinois, Arizona, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Hawaii — and of course Florida, always Florida. A few landed in Delaware, close enough to drive back for a long weekend. Most are not that lucky. When you move to Scottsdale or Nashville or Maui, Sunday dinner with the grandkids is no longer twelve minutes down the road. It is a flight.
Thank goodness for social media. It is the only reason we stay connected.
These were not people who wanted to leave. They coached Little League. They served on school boards and rescue squads. They wore badges and volunteered at firehouses. Stand-up citizens who would have gone on contributing to their communities for another twenty years. New Jersey pushed them out anyway.
SEE ALSO: Staying in NJ is starting to feel like a bad relationship
Photo by Zac Gudakov on Unsplash
When paying off your house becomes a rude awakening
For many of them the realization came at the worst possible moment — the moment they should have been celebrating. Paying off your house is supposed to be the reward of a well-lived life. Decades of mortgage payments finally done. You own it. Free and clear.
Except in New Jersey, that moment of triumph comes with a brutal clarity. The property tax bill that was quietly folded into your monthly mortgage payment is now sitting on your kitchen table all by itself. No mortgage to soften the blow. Just a number. A big one.
The average New Jersey property tax bill tops $9,800 a year statewide. In Bergen, Morris and Essex counties it pushes well past $12,000. That is the bill you get for owning something you already paid for. Pay it or face consequences. It is not quite Tony Soprano showing up at your door — but the message is not entirely different. Pay up, or we make things very difficult for you.
Social Security was not designed to absorb that number. Most pension checks were not either. (For those who worked hard and were fortunate to receive them.) For many residents who paid into their 401k…it sadly just does not cut it here.
The Stay NJ promise that isn’t
What makes it sting even more is that relief was supposed to be coming. Governor Sherrill’s proposed budget cuts the Stay NJ property tax relief program — $500 million gone. That program was supposed to cut property tax bills nearly in half for eligible homeowners over 65. People built their retirement plans around it. Stayed in their houses because of it.
Now it may not happen. And for retirees sitting on a house worth four times what they paid for it, the calculation is shifting fast. Cash out. Head south. Let someone else argue with the tax assessor.
What Trenton owes this generation
The people facing this decision did not fail New Jersey. They showed up for decades. They raised families here, served their communities, paid their taxes, and stayed through every rate hike, toll increase and broken promise of reform.
They deserve better than a retirement that forces them to choose between financial survival and the only home they have ever known.
New Jersey is still worth loving. The Shore, the food, the neighborhoods, the culture — none of that has changed. What has changed is the price the state charges for the privilege of staying.
For a generation that gave everything they had, that price has finally gotten too high.
LOOK: Here’s where people in every state are moving to most
Gallery Credit: Amanda Silvestri
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