The Record Prints Anti-Jewish Letter to the Editor: “You Should Visit Lakewood to See What You’re Fighting”

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The Record published a letter from a Lakewood resident this week, ostensibly to promote the cause of those protesting the Mahwah eruv, calling out out proponents of the eruv for using the anti Semitic “card.” However, the author then delves into what she perceives as the problems of her own hometown of Lakewood.

The writer and the publisher has been hit with backlash and were called out for being Anti Semitic. The letter can be read below:

“I read the article about the eruv being extended into Mahwah. I lived in Bergen County all of my life and moved to Lakewood about nine years ago.

There is no such thing as one solitary eruv. Lakewood is a town that once was historic and bucolic. Today, there are eruvs on trees, utility poles, telephone poles, etc. Lakewood is congested. Building is constant. And it seems that if there is even a square inch of property, a two-family home will be constructed on it. Trees are being removed at an alarming rate.

I believe it is fair to say Lakewood is probably 70 percent Orthodox. I believe most of the building is for the Orthodox.

It is very disheartening for me when the anti-Semitism card is played. There are over 30,000 private school students and 5,000 public school students. Taxpayers are paying for the tremendous amount it cost to bus all of these students. Our public students are not being given a fair education as our school board is mostly Orthodox.

Anti-Semitism is not the issue for people like myself who live in Lakewood. It is about the overcrowding, places of worship being allowed in neighborhoods, the cost of busing and mostly the congestion.

People of Mahwah, take a drive through my town and keep fighting for what you believe. It is the right thing to do.”

Karen Wehrle-Kruimer

{Matzav.com}


16 COMMENTS

  1. Try consulting the g’dolim on how to proceed. Are the activists keeping them informed? Are they mature socially and politically?
    The writer’s words don’t have that certain Ameliqi tenor. Maybe her eyes have the Stare – I do not know. What I do know is that if one is called anti-anything persistently enough, they’ll probably become just that.
    Trouble looms, and the safety and security of many can be affected if the situation is not handled fairly and sensitively.

  2. One wonders why Ms. Karen Wehrle-Kruimer moved to Lakewood 9 years ago when conditions as she describes
    them were already evolving. She raises the same tired arguments we’ve been hearing from other anti-
    Jewish groups. Why shouldn’t the 30,000 non-public school students receive MANDATED services? Does she
    think that we parents don’t pay real estate taxes at the same rate as she does? The cost of providing busing
    is a pittance compared to the cost of educating a child in the public school system. Would she rather that these
    30,000 private-school pupils enroll in the public school system? Does she think her taxes would then go down?
    Maybe she should re-enroll in school and learn arithmetic!

  3. Typical idiot anti semite
    If all 30,000 private school children in Lakewood would be sent to public school it would cost hundreds of millions of dollars more than is paid for bussing which would still have to paid to bus them to the public school

    • You want free education send your kids to public school. Last i checked public schools accept all children. Why should private school get public funds. Itdoesnt matter if your kids benefit. Do people who never get married benefit from public schools? Do elderly? Do you complain about the roads you don’t drive on but taxes pay for? Why should you pay for roads you never use? The government should only pay for the roads you go to? Your logic is faulty.

  4. nonsense lakewood is not what it is because of an eruv numerous towns in nj have an eruv and have trees and quick moving traffic that’s the mistake the eruv will not change the neighborhood the pioneers moving out want the same things the existing neighbors want

  5. If she doesn’t like Lakewood she is free to move out like everyone else did. They sold their house for a fortune more than they ever dreamed of and they moved. It’s a free country. Just like the Jews can move in the non Jews/anti semites can move out.

  6. I don’t agree with some of her assertions. But some our people who are in the halls of power should read these letters and see where we can make improvements so that when jews move into a new neighborhood there shouldn’t be the feeling of there goes the neighborhood.

  7. I am not saying that Lakewood is gan eden hatachton but it was never “historic and bucolic” Maybe a few streets but the rest of Lakewood was overgrown forests , drab industrial zones , drug infested blocks and crime ridden areas until they were built up .

  8. not allowing orthodox jews to pray in walking distance of their homes is basically taking away the right of a religion to pray and practice their religion,

  9. This could have been written by an early Monseyer or Lakewooder as they watch the Brooklynites move into there once uncongested neighborhoods. When they stop spouting vitriol at their fellow Jew, perhaps the gentiles will too.

  10. I lived in Lakewood for over Forty years. “Historic and bucolic” is nonsense. She didn’t even live here! It was a drug infested, crime riddled town, especially west of Route 9. We were afraid to walk alone, even by day. I got chased by street gangsters more than once near Lexington Ave, got a club thrown at the back of my car near the old Shul (4th and park). It was a total mess, although aside from the crime, it was pretty an extremely poor, sleepy town with near zero commerce. Denizens would sit out on their stoops bored out of their minds, looking for trouble. Stores were shuttered, industrial park was empty and the crime rate was extremely high.

    And then came the Jews! Today it is busy, traffic is horrific and there is little to no farm land left. Lakewood was and is totally under prepared for the influx. On the other hand, it is a thriving metropolis with upscale homes and every amenity possible.

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