Dale Florio

**UPDATED

MINNEAPOLIS - Three more Republican county chairs today affirmed their support for Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany-Troy Hills), who announced this week that he intends to pursue another term next year as party leader.

Rick Wright, executive director of the Assembly Republicans, said the following chairs indicated they want the 72-year old DeCroce to remain as minority leader: Essex Chairman\Sen. Kevin O’Toole (R-Essex), Monmouth Chairman Joe Oxley, and Passaic Chairman\Assemblyman Scott Rumana (R-Wayne).

Somerset County Chairman Dale Florio told PolitickerNJ.com that he wants to talk to conference leader Assemblyman Pete Biondi (R-Somerville).

"Whatever Pete decides to do, I'm going to support him," says Florio.

After being defeated in his reelection bid for Bergen County Republican Chairman, sources say that Rob Ortiz is likely to be the Republican State Committee’s next finance chairman.

Ortiz, an attorney from Ridgewood, raised about $200,000 for the Bergen County Republican Party, helping it emerge from $40,000 in debt. But his support for the candidacy of his friend and client Andy Unanue, along with several other missteps, cost him that job.

Somerset County Democratic Chair Peg Schaffer, right, with Montgomery Mayor Cecilia Birge, one of her freeholder candidates. 

Charged up by the presidential race, Democrats believe they can storm GOP freeholder strongholds in at least three counties this year: Somerset, Burlington and Monmouth.

While the Democratic Party has chopped away in sections at county freeholder seats in Monmouth and now is one win away from obtaining a majority, Somerset and Burlington remain elusive Republican bulwarks for the Democrats, who see Monmouth as a model.

The election this week of a new Democratic Party chair in Somerset brought forth fighting words from those party members long schooled in living under Republican rule, and prompted the obligatory GOP reply that for all the updates on Democratic Party registration, the county remains red.

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Dick Zimmer as he appeared in ABC television debate on Sunday.SOMERVILLE - State Sen. Joseph Pennacchio (R-Morris) never convinced party leaders that he could be the darling of the GOP, most of whom instead backed former U.S. Rep. Dick Zimmer for U.S. Senate.

Now, with a full day remaining before Election Day, maverick conservative leader Steve Lonegan, a former mayor of Bogota and gubernatorial candidate, says he will vote for Pennacchio, while questioning Zimmer’s ability to generate energy among rank-and-file Republicans.

BRIDGEWATER - Citing his disagreement with the political process, Bridgewater Councilman Michael Hsing declined to participate in the Somerset County Republican Convention on Thursday night.

A candidate for Congress in the 7th District, Hsing wrote a letter to Somerset County GOP Chairman Dale Florio before the meeting and told him he would not be in attendance.

Senate candidate Murray Sabrin plans to attend the Somerset County Republican convention tonight, but he may not be allowed to participate.

Republican Chairman Dale Florio told Sabrin spokesman George Ajjan that Sabrin is welcome to take part, but only if he pledges not to run an alternate slate of freeholder candidates.

The convention will formally endorse a U.S. Senate candidate, along with a Congressional candidate in the seventh district -- which is expected to be the real contest of the evening.

“They could not commit to me that they would not run a slate of candidates, so I advised them that they would be unable to participate in our screening process,” said Florio.

Manville Mayor Angelo Corradino lost his bid for re-election to a fifth termA bowling alley named Tenpin Lanes stands in the center of Manville, between a pair of Superfund sites that are the remnants of the town’s bulldozed factory era.

The alley for years has been a source of entertainment and relaxation for the hard luck blue collar work force here, and for Angelo Corradino, the borough’s longest serving mayor who straddled the transition Manville made from factories to shopping malls, and who earlier this month lost by 78 votes in his bid for a fifth term in office.

An old high school linebacker and longsuffering Jets and Mets fan who spent 19 years as an elected official in Manville, the past 16 of those as mayor, Corradino says rumors that he wanted to go full time with an annual salary of $95,000 sank his chances of re-election.

Linda Stender thought she'd face Mike Ferguson in 2008; now she's seeking a rare open seatU.S. Rep. Mike Ferguson today became the second New Jersey Republican Congressman in as many weeks to announce he would not run for another term.

Amid the smoldering remains of the Bush era, Iraq, the aftershock of Ferguson's life and death struggle in the last election, and news this month that he missed a vote on flood relief, Democrats were convinced they could hear him crying uncle.

Not so, said the 37-year old Ferguson, whose statement today indicated that he wants to spend more time with his growing family.

"Do you have kids?" wondered Somerset County Republican Party Chairman Dale Florio, in deference to the congressman's public rationale for departure.

Warren Township Mayor Victor Sordillo is a possible candidate for Congress, says Somerset GOP Chairman Dale FlorioDale Florio, chairman of the Somerset County Republican Party, said he was still stunned by the news today that 7th district U.S. Rep. Mike Ferguson would not pursue re-relection in 2008.

Nonetheless, "I respect his decision to care for a growing family," said Florio, who credited Ferguson with being a good watchdog of taxpayers' dollars and a strong advocate for homeland security.

"He is a good friend and a good congressman," Florio added.

The Somerset County chairman said he's sure there will be some horseplay in the coming days as the party considers its stable of would-be successors.

Somerset County hasn’t elected a Democratic Freeholder since 1979, but Democrats think that this year they just might be able to capitalize on Republican misfortune and pull it off.

This year, two women from the small town of Green Brook are battling it out to see whether the county’s five-member freeholder board will remain all Republican, or whether it will be joined by a lone Democratic voice for the first time since 1982, after Christie Whitman took the seat from Michael Ceponis. The Democrats have fielded Green Brook Committeewoman Melonie Marano, while Republican’s have tapped the town’s mayor, Patricia Walsh.