Hayes Just Looking to Serve Residents

Editor's Note: Each day this week, we will feature the biography of one of the candidates running in the elections this year. First will be the mayoral candidates, followed by the candidates for council.

He came to New Jersey for a professional opportunity—but he came to Bridgewater specifically 13 years ago for the quality of life.

“It was the quality of life, reputation for great schools and reputation of the town,” said Dan Hayes, who is running for mayor on the Republican ticket. “There was the opportunity for good recreation, great education, the services and we have a great location.”

Dan Hayes, current Republican councilman, is running for mayor against Democrat Jim Ventantonio and Independent George Jones.

Hayes, who was born in Brooklyn and moved to Clifton when his father decided he wanted to take his family out of the city, moved to Bridgewater about 13 years ago, and has never looked back.

After graduating with an undergraduate degree in chemical engineering from the University of Rhode Island in 1979, Hayes began working for Corning Inc. in the engineering department.

“I was supervisor for quality control, and then I was an on-site engineer in Raleigh, North Carolina,” he said. “I then left the company to go to full time business school, which took two years.”

In 1984, Hayes said, he graduated with his MBA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

“After that, I switched my interests from factory and production, and broadened to business development,” he said. “I was interested in the intersection of technology and business.”

“The idea of managing business growth is not foreign to me, that’s what I studied and what I believe in,” he added.

Hayes said he returned to Corning Inc. and worked as an engineering manager before being transferred to fiberoptics.

“In that field, I had different assignments, but my culminating one was to be a product manager, and that’s what I’m really interested in,” he said. “There was a product being phased out, but I did an investigation and sold the leadership on a reinvestment strategy, and moved from $19 million in sales to almost $60 million in sales.”

“I was able to do that through leadership that involves everyone in the decision-making,” he added. “I work on giving them skills to do what they want to do, and it’s very rewarding for all the members and everyone contributes.”

Hayes said that when he and his wife, Diana, decided to start a family, they opted to stay on the East Cost, living just outside of Boston before moving to Bridgewater.

And this year is Hayes’ second year on a new career path, as he is now a chemistry teacher at Piscataway High School.

“I have changed my career after meeting my obligations with my children,” he said. “I always wanted to move into the education field. I am a certified physical scientist.”

“I’m essentially an alternate route candidate, which is based on my experience and undergraduate qualifications,” he added.

Hayes said he believes he has a lot to offer to the students, between his scientific knowledge and his actual work experience.

“I believe children need to have more technical education,” he said. “it’s very rewarding. I strongly believe education needs to be goal-oriented, and that having teachers with work experience facilitates that.”

Aside from his work life, Hayes said he has always been very geared toward community service, serving first on the Property Tax Appeal Board while living in New York, then carrying that desire to serve to Bridgewater.

Hayes was the Knights of Columbus Grand Knight from 2006 to 2008—where he helped raise more than $40,000 for charity—and then got involved in township government.

“I got the opportunity to be on an ad hoc economic advisement board,” he said. “The mayor had tasked the group with mapping out strategy for the township as a commercial strategy. That’s right up my alley.”

“I did benchmarking with other nearby towns, and was able to exert a lot of influence in the writing of proposals,” he added. “What came out of that was a strategic plan to grow the commercial community.”

Hayes said the Economic Development Advisory Committee was then established, and he was part of that until 2007, while also serving on the planning board and helping to restart the library advisory board.

“I was chairman of that from 2007 to 2009 with the goal of managing the township interests in the library,” he said.

In 2009, Hayes was a part of the Open Space Advisory Committee, and then he was asked to run for council for a term beginning in 2010.

“I like to look at this as service with an impact,” he said. “In the roles I have had, I have been very lucky to be given the opportunity to make significant impacts, and I have been able to deliver.”

Among those impacts, Hayes said, are helping make Bridgewater one of the towns with the lowest municipal taxes in the county, adding recreation while limiting development, passing a master plan amendment to strengthen land use restrictions, increasing open space holdings and helping find savings in response to COAH.

As for his decision to run for mayor now, Hayes said, it is all about opportunity and competence.

“As mayor, one of the additional skills is that I have to provide leadership to the administration,” he said. “Through all my experiences, leadership has been a common thread. People will say I have the ability to get people excited about their jobs, and being the mayor allows you to exercise that skill for the residents.”

In addition, Hayes said, he looks at the council position as more of a reactive role, while being in the administration is more proactive.

“You can craft things and steer the ship, and that’s where my strength really lies,” he said.

Hayes said his family—including his wife and three grown daughters, Brenna, Cara and Dana—are all supportive of his decision.

“They are all with me and always have been, they understand the seriousness with which I make these commitments, and they appreciate that,” he said. “They are all for this, and they know the joy I get out of helping the community.”

Hayes said that one thing he believes in, and which he will carry with him if he is elected mayor, is what he has established as his rules for behavior in his leadership and other positions.

“I have made a pledge to every organization in terms of how I will act,” he said. “I have been able to keep that as councilman, and I would fully intend to keep it as mayor.”

That pledge, Hayes said, includes being transparent, being inclusive in decision making, being resourceful, having long range thinking and being accessible.

“Every since I started as a councilman, I have had evenings with Dan, with an open door policy,” he said. “There is no appointment needed, and I intend to do the same thing as mayor.”

If elected as mayor, Hayes said, he plans to continue fiscal managing, maintaining low municipal taxes, growing commercial bases, providing essential services like restoring the bulk trash program and maintaining vigilance around open space for recreation.

But most importantly, Hayes said, he is looking forward to serving the residents.

“It is such an honor to serve as councilman, and what I am asking for is the opportunity to continue that type of service,” he said. “But I would like to add the component of leading the administration and guiding one to where everyone in it recognizes what they are there to do and who they do it for.”