I write to urge my fellow Basking Ridge residents to vote for two outstanding candidates for Township Committee, Lily Wong and Ana Duarte McCarthy. 

Lily Wong is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Business School. She has worked as an auditor with PricewaterhouseCoopers and as an executive in corporate finance, strategic planning, and business development at Pfizer. She is also owner and co-founder of a STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, and math) summer camp for kids. She has been active in civic affairs locally through her service with the Municipal Alliance. 

Ana McCarthy has lived in Bernards Township for 27 years. She has an undergraduate degree in biology from Lafayette College and a graduate degree from Columbia University in Education and Organizational Psychology. She was a Managing Director at Citigroup for over twenty years responsible for developing global policy and practices within human resources. Subsequently, she joined the Forte Foundation as Director of Corporate Partners, where she was responsible for new business development. She is currently the principal of a business consulting firm based here in Bernards Township.  She has served on the Board of Directors of the Greater Somerset County YMCA for the past 9 years, has served on the Township Golf Advisory Committee, was a member of the Township Diversity & Inclusion Committee, and was involved in numerous parent organizations during the years her daughter was attending the Bernards Township public schools. Ana was also appointed to, and chairs, the NJ Advisory Commission on the Status of Women. 

Ana and Lily will bring the analytical and critical thinking skills they honed in the business world to the deliberations of the Township Committee. They have both been “at the table” where decisions were made at major corporations. They know that good decisions are made by discussing a broad range of options and by vigorous debate of dissenting viewpoints. Like the leaders of successful corporations, they understand the dangers of “groupthink.”

For too long, our Township Committee has been dominated by one party. Too often, ideas are not subjected to the kind of critical analysis that leads to the best decisions. With Ana and Lily on the Township Committee, we can be assured that decisions will be made only after the merits are carefully considered. Bernards Township taxpayers deserve no less.

Finally, Ana and Lily are both entrepreneurs who have established their own businesses. They know what it is to establish a budget and stick to it. They know, as only successful business owners can, what it means to plan for contingencies. 

As a resident of Bernards Township for the past 26 years, I firmly believe that Ana and Lily can provide the kind of leadership Bernards Township needs. Vote for McCarthy and Wong on November 7th. 

– Jeffrey Kluger