Montgomery Twp Committee Candidate 2021
► Neena Singh (D)
► Neena Singh (D)
Neena Singh is the first Sikh to serve as a governing official of a municipality in New Jersey. She was appointed to the Montgomery Township Committee in 2021 to fill the unexpired term of Committeewoman Catherine Gural (D).
In her professional life, Singh works as a senior partner with Keller Williams Cornerstone Realty in Belle Mead. She holds a bachelor’s degree in political science and English literature from Kurukshetra University in India.
Singh has lived in Montgomery for 25 years. Her husband Paramjit Singh runs a life sciences consulting company. Their three children all graduated from Montgomery High School: Daughter Natasha (PharmD) is now a director of clinical safety for Genentech; Daughter Prianka (PharmD; MS in public health) is now a director of global health economics for Bristol Myers Squibb; and their son Sahib is a neuroscientist at Boston University School of Medicine.
Why are you running as a Democratic candidate?
I have worked for the last 28 years to make sure everybody has a seat at the table. I am the social equity ambassador at my workplace. I am also passionate about woman empowerment. That is one of my major priorities. I have lived my life making sure girls know they are equals.
What are the three top issues in Montgomery Township?
1. Communications
We need better communication between the people in our township. We have wonderful non-profits in town — Rotary, Scouts, The Elks Club... We have an entire community of organizations that we can go to and, if we have messaging, it gets out the right way. I’ve had a lot of people say to me over the years that they did not know about something that was happening in town. And they want to know how they can get involved. This is extremely important to me.
(The Montgomery News has volunteered to help with communications initiatives).
2. Health and wellbeing of community members.
I am passionate about mental health and I’m a mindfulness advocate. I also believe in building resiliency.
3. Emergency Communications
It needs to be fine-tuned. We need to be more involved with Nixle. A resident should not have to call the mayor to find out what is going on. Nixle should just send the emergency information. We need to make better use of it. Flash flooding alerts should have appeared on people’s phones so they know about an emergency situation right way and could get off the road.
Why are you running for township committee?
I am running to encourage, grow, and strengthen community engagement and participation. As a community activist I have been attuned to the need to bring awareness to mental health. I believe in creating a mentally, emotionally, socially, and physically safe environment for our kids with a focus on resilience building initiatives.
I serve on the advisory board of a mindfulness focused non-profit and they have collaborated on wellness events with the township with good results.
I also am running to ensure we make preserving our environment a priority, and encourage our residents to enjoy our beautiful green spaces and parks.
Many residents have not had a chance to visit our beautiful arboretum in Montgomery Park. I encourage them to make time to do that. Montgomery Township is one of only 14 towns in New Jersey to have earned Sustainable Jersey Certification. I am proud of that.
What do you love most about Montgomery?
I love the caring people in Montgomery. When I moved to Montgomery 25 years ago from Canada, people were so welcoming. Montgomery has a very good heart as a community. We are open to people. We have such a diverse population from so many different countries. I also love the green space. The environment is amazing. We are blessed that so much of the open space has been preserved. ■