By Steven Morris

Matt Mowers is no ordinary college freshman.  While his counterparts at Rutgers University are busy living the animal house lifestyle, gaining their freshman 15, and trying to pick a major, Mowers is busy forging ahead at the Bergen County Republican Organization (BCRO) as its newly hired executive director.   He has a tough road ahead of him, attempting to rebuild a party that is $38,000 dollars in debt and routinely gets shellacked in county wide elections by a powerful county Democratic Party.  Mowers also has the added burden of having to respond to criticisms of his age, experience, judgment, and ability to balance his new fulltime job and fulltime course schedule at Rutgers. 

Mowers has big plans for turning things around in Bergen.  A key part of his strategy is to open up lines of communication between county committee members, local Republican chairs, and the BCRO staff.  He feels a steady flow of dialog between these parties is important for the GOP to have a successful year in 2008.  Mowers wants to reach out to every donor, both large and small, and hold more frequent and varied fundraisers to target donors in all income brackets.  He is also out to recruit new candidates for county offices, although he could not provide me with any names at this time.  "Pretty soon you're going to see a lot of republican victories!" stated Mowers. 

Mowers has been involved in the Republican Party at some level since he was 13 years old.  Although he is only 18 years old, he answers critics who dismiss him based on his age with, "I don't think its a Matter of age but of experience. I've been doing this since age 13, I bring insight, experience and a strong wok ethic to the table".  Mowers certainly does possess a strong work ethic, simultaneously pursuing a college degree full time, holding down a full time job 40 miles away as BCRO executive director, and on top of that, he serves as the current executive director of the NJ College Republicans.  He credits his "creative scheduling" abilities as the key to staying on top of all of all his obligations. Before taking on the responsibilities of BCRO executive director, Mowers ran the successful re-election campaign of Sen. Gerald Cardinale. 

Mowers has caused some concern amongst some party insiders with his unabashed support of mayor Rudolph Giuliani and with the controversial Arab-American mailer that went out during the Cardinale Campaign.  Insiders wonder if his, and Chairman Rob Ortiz's support of the former New York Mayor will end up hurting the party now that Giuliani has failed to capture the GOP nomination for president.  Other insiders cringe at the thought of more risqué mail pieces like the one accusing Democratic State Senate Candidate Joe Ariyan of having ties to the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee.  Mowers points out that although he had a hand in the mailer, it was a team effort by all members of the campaign, including the senator and that is was one piece of over 20 sent out by the Cardinale campaign. 

Only time will tell if Rob Ortiz made a solid move hiring Matt Mowers, boy wonder, as BCRO Executive Director.  Is he really Doogie Howser, or is he a naive motivated, hard working kid being taken advantage of?  "I've worked in Bergen, understand Bergen, where Bergen is at politically, and where it can go" says Mowers, and in the coming months we will see just how much truth is in that statement.