JERSEY CITY, N.J. (PIX11) — Calls for a sitting council member in Jersey City to resign are growing.
They come a week after the elected official was involved in a disturbing hit-and-run incident where she struck a delivery person and proceeded to flee the scene.
It happened at about 8 a.m. on July 19. The cyclist was traveling along Martin Luther King Drive when he was suddenly struck by a fast-moving black Nissan Rogue at Forrest Street, police said.
As seen on CCTV footage released by officials, the driver keeps going and the cyclist who was identified by police as 29-year-old Andrew Black, topples on the pavement. He quickly gets up in a daze when witnesses rush to his aid.
It was later revealed that the driver was Councilperson-at-Large Amy DeGise, who was just elected to her seat in Jersey City last November. She is also the daughter of current Hudson County Executive Thomas DeGise and former chairwoman of the Hudson County Democratic Organization.
Black, who said he was making an Uber Eats delivery at the time of the incident, sat down exclusively with the local outlet HudPost where he showed the injuries he suffered, which included bruises and a laceration to his leg.
Black revealed to the publication that he now has back pain, anxiety and PTSD. He said he had no idea the council member was behind the wheel until HudPost reached out to him.
“Someone of prestige,” Black told HudPost in an interview published this week, “[who is] trying to clean our streets or whatever they want to call and they can’t even do it themselves.”
While the video clearly shows Black running a red light, the filed police report states that he told cops he had a green light.
After leaving the scene, DeGise reported the incident in person to police. She was issued two summonses for failure to report an accident and another for leaving the scene of an accident, according to the police report. It remains unclear how much time passed between the crash and when she went to police.
City Council member James Solomon, who represents Ward E, is among the first of DeGise’s colleagues to come out against her. He is demanding that she resign in wake of the surveillance footage, going as far as calling for a recall if she refuses to step down.
“I was horrified and I want to know why the council member did not stop,” Solomon told PIX11 in an interview Wednesday. “If we lose the trust of the public and the public doesn’t trust us to put the public first, and not ourselves, I don’t think you can remain in office.”
PIX11 News made several attempts to speak with DeGise, but her office did not respond to the requests for comment.
As of Wednesday afternoon, a Change.org petition calling for her dismissal was closing in on 500 signatures.
