Bernards Township’s 2025 Political Earthquake – First in Almost a Century

Bernards Township Political Map Goes Blue,
Changing the Political Landscape for the First Time in almost 100 years.

First of all, this is not a political post, and it is not meant to take sides on candidates or positions. The Mr. Local History Project prefers to tell “history with a social twist,” and when we realized that it had been almost a hundred years since Democrats last held a township majority in Bernards Township, we decided to examine the context. This meant not only reviewing the vote numbers but also tracing how the voting districts and the local landscape had changed as the community grew.

A few facts set the scene. The last time Bernards Township elected a Democratic majority, Franklin Delano Roosevelt had just taken office as President of the United States. The country was still struggling to recover from the Great Depression. Families were struggling, local farms and businesses were under pressure, and national programs were being introduced to provide people with a basic safety net at a time when everyday life was filled with uncertainty. What stood out as we compared the two periods when Democrats took control in Bernards Township is that the themes were surprisingly consistent. Voters talked about fiscal responsibility, development pressures, and community safety. While the township of today looks very different from the township of 1933, the core concerns of residents reveal that some things remain unchanged. Let us take a look.

2025

In 2025, President Trump and the public were grappling with multiple major challenges. The administration rolled out a sweeping and urgent agenda, issuing hundreds of executive orders, reorganizing federal agencies, imposing new tariffs, and expanding federal power in areas such as immigration and domestic security. Meanwhile, ordinary Americans were contending with sharp spikes in the cost of living, political polarization, questions about democratic institutions, mass protests in many cities, and economic anxiety as jobs and housing costs remained unstable.

In 2025, in Bernards Township, the local election for Township Committee centered on a few clear themes that consistently appeared in candidate questionnaires and meeting debates. The biggest flashpoint was the fourth round of affordable housing plans and specific proposed projects for families, seniors, and adults with disabilities, with arguments over state mandates, density, traffic, school impact, and the extent of the township’s control over its planning choices.

Budget and taxes were another core issue, since the committee had recently adopted a budget that raised the municipal tax rate by a little over three percent due largely to higher insurance costs, inflation, and the loss of pandemic relief money, while both sides tried to claim fiscal responsibility and to protect the town’s debt-free status. Public safety also featured prominently, with candidates emphasizing strong support for the police, citing Bernards’ ranking among the safest communities in New Jersey, and highlighting new tools such as license plate readers and drones.

Finally, voters kept hearing about overdevelopment and warehouse projects, preservation of open space, better walkways and bike paths, services for seniors and youth, and the broader question of whether township government was listening to all residents and treating people with respect at meetings, which together framed the local stakes of the 2025 race.

We reached out to the Bernards Township Democratic Committee for comment and have yet to get a response.

Scott Mitzner, Bernards Township Republican Municipal Committee Chair, noted: “We are all friends and neighbors here in Bernards Township, and we wholeheartedly congratulate Brett Hodges and John Tompkins. We look forward to the new Township Committee keeping Bernards the incredible community we all love and have chosen to call our home.”

Feel free to addd your comment at the end of the post.

Bernards Township Democrat Candidate Historic Wins (1973-2025)

Election Year	Candidate	Registered Voters	Votes	% of All Ballots	Ballots Cast	Election Turnout	Notes
2026	Democratic Majority						3-2 means the Democrats appoint the first Democrat Mayor in Bernards Township’s history.
2025	Stephen Hodges (D)	22,807	5,790	36.33%	15,939	69.89%	Won three-year term – margin of victory 2.43 %
2025	David Tancredi (R)	22,807	5,515	34.60%	15,939	69.89%	Incumbent lost by 275 votes
2025	John Tompkins (D)	22,807	5,877	36.87%	15,939	69.89%	Won one-year unexpired term – margin of victory 3.18%
2025	Bill McMahon (R)	22,807	5,425	34.04%	15,939	69.89%	Incumbent lost by 452 votes
2023	Ana McCarthy (D)	22,065	4,034	25.20%	16,009	72.55%	Won one of two open seats
2018	Joan Bannon (D)	20,918	6,063	46.55%	13,025	62.27%	Broke the 80-year GOP hold on the committee
1998	Bill Allen (D)	9,300	3,450	54.87%	6,288	67.61%	Three-year term. over Scott Guilbord 2838
1973	Bill Allen (D)	6922	2,782	≈ 65 %	4145	59.88%	Served 1975–1979

Last Democrat Majority – 1937

During the final years of the 1920s and the early 1930s, the nation faced a crisis that affected every town and neighborhood. Herbert Hoover entered the White House as the country rode high on years of growth, but the stock market crash of 1929 quickly eroded that confidence. Banks folded, factories closed, and families struggled to hold on to their homes and savings. The effects reached deep into local communities, where main streets thinned out, farms failed, and ordinary people searched for any small sign of recovery. Hoover believed the economy would right itself and held back from large-scale federal intervention, a position that shaped how many Americans viewed his presidency as the situation worsened.

When Franklin Roosevelt took office in 1933, the country was at its lowest point. Roosevelt brought an entirely different approach that reached into towns, villages, and rural crossroads across America. Through his New Deal programs, people saw new job sites open, roads and bridges repaired, and a sense of hope return. His policies reshaped everyday life as government relief became a lifeline for workers and families. Later, as the world plunged into war, Roosevelt guided the nation through the immense demands of World War Two. For local people who lived through those years, the contrast between Hoover’s restrained response and Roosevelt’s sweeping action marked one of the most transformative chapters in American history.

By the time Bernards Township voters headed into the 1933 election, the community was being pulled in several directions at once. The Great Depression was squeezing families, farms, and local businesses, and Bernards carried one of the highest property tax rates in Somerset County. Every household felt it. Residents debated how to keep schools open, maintain roads, and provide relief without losing their homes to unpaid taxes. These day-to-day worries shaped nearly every local debate.

At the same time, the township was undergoing changes that no one could ignore. The federal government had just opened the enormous Lyons Veterans Hospital complex a few years earlier, bringing new workers, veterans, and traffic to what had long been quiet farmland. The new Somerset Hills Airport began operating on former farm property, introducing overhead engines, weekend flying clubs, and the first hints of future development pressure. For many longtime residents, the 1933 election was less about party labels and more about how a rural community could protect its character while facing both economic hardship and the arrival of two major institutions that signaled a new era for Bernards Township.

	Election Year	Candidate	Registered Voters	Votes	% of All Ballots	Ballots Cast	Election Turnout	Notes
	1933	Democrat Control						3-0 Democrats would hold a majority until 1940, then no Democrat would be elected until 1973.
	1933	Frank Beatty (D)	3,000 (est.)	513	n/a	1023	n/a	Defeated Charles Butler by 3 Votes. Mayor in 1933, 1934, 1939; Thu, Nov 09, 1933 – First year all Democratic Township Committee (3 Members)
	1932	Wallace A. Childs (D)		629	50.40%	1248		FDR Dem Wins Presidency – Defeated Bert Magee by 10 votes claiming Democratic Majority
	1931	J. Richard Flege (D)		561	56.50%	993		Defeated Fred Ramsdale got 432 and lost by 129 – Thu, Nov 05, 1931

Bernards Township Voting Districts and Interactive Map

In 2025, Bernards Township is divided into 24 voting districts, covering all of Basking Ridge, Liberty Corner, Lyons, and The Hills, as well as senior communities such as Ridge Oak and Fellowship Village. Each district is assigned to one of several neighborhood polling places. Districts 1 and 6 vote at the Bernards Township Library on South Maple Avenue. Districts 2 and 7 vote at the Basking Ridge Firehouse downtown. District 3 votes at Ridge Oak Senior Housing. Districts 4, 21, 22, 23, and 24 vote at the Hills Recreation Center off Hansom Road. Districts 5 and 8 vote at Somerset Hills Lutheran Church on Lake Road. Districts 9, 10, and 17 vote at the Bernards Township Community Center on South Maple. Districts 12, 13, 14, and 18 vote at the Liberty Corner Firehouse. Districts 16 and 20 vote at Fellowship Village. Districts 11, 15, and 19 vote at Millington Baptist Church on King George Road.

2025 Historic Vote Summary – Bernards Township

Bernards Township Committee History

Back in the early 1930s, surviving Bernards Township voter registers indicate that in 1905, the township had a single Election District, numbered 1. By 1930, a separate register was established for Election District 2. Additionally, registers for Election Districts 1, 2, and 3 were in place by 1947 and 1948. That pattern places 1933 in the middle period, when Bernards almost certainly had two local election districts, numbered 1 and 2, covering the entire township. One district would have centered on the Basking Ridge village area and nearby farms, while the other would have encompassed Liberty Corner, Lyons, and the southern part of the township; however, the exact line between them is not documented in any online source I have accessed. In 1933, Bernards voters still went to only a couple of election districts, simply called District 1 and District 2, rather than the 24 separate districts that exist in the township today.

The Bernards Township Committee would expand to five members in 1956. The committee, which switched from having a committee chairman to a mayor in July 1952, has annually chosen one of its own for the one-year mayoral term but has never selected a Democrat. Allen and Bannan were both passed over for more senior Republican committee members. That’s poised to change, and more history is certain to be made as a Democrat is poised to be the Mayor of Bernards Township for the first time in history.

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