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The mayor of the first town in New Jersey to ban legal marijuana sales has also spent most of the past year on the payroll as a lobbyist for a prominent anti-marijuana group in the state. But he hasn’t always been upfront about that connection, raising questions about ethics and conflicts of interest.

Mayor Stephen Reid oversaw Point Pleasant Beach banning marijuana businesses in December 2017, and he has since become one of the leading voices in opposition of legal weed in the state. More than 60 towns in New Jersey have taken some step to ban marijuana businesses from their borders. Reid has traveled around the state, offering his hand to other towns considering a ban as the mayor of a town that’s already done it.

But Reid is representing more than just his or his town’s stance on marijuana. Since May 2018, Reid has been a paid lobbyist for New Jersey Responsible Approaches to Marijuana, and Reid’s potential conflict of interest is the subject of lawsuit filed Monday against Point Pleasant Beach. Reid was also named executive director of RAMP last May.

Patrick Duff, a blogger who filed suit against Point Pleasant Beach to get records of Reid’s emails, called the mayor’s work as a lobbyist “the ultimate misuse of office.”

“Reid has been instrumental in promoting NJ RAMP’s anti-marijuana agenda across New Jersey, but has not always disclosed the fact that he was really working on NJ RAMP’s behalf,” the complaint says.

Both Reid and Kevin Sabet, president of Smart Approaches to Marijuana, RAMP’s parent organization, said that Point Pleasant Beach passed its ordinance banning marijuana businesses well before Reid started working for RAMP. Reid said he has spoken to lawyers, who advised him that he wasn’t violating the law by lobbying for RAMP.

Point Pleasant Beach Mayor Stephen Reid talks about being opposed to the legalization of cannabis during a hearing in Trenton last year.NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

While Reid and RAMP have been clear that the mayor was the executive director of the organization, it’s not been evident that Reid was being paid as RAMP’s lobbyist. Though he admits he started lobbying in May of last year, Reid didn’t register as a lobbyist with the state until October, state lobbying documents show.

On Friday, Reid said that he informed the state of his lobbying activity before October, but didn’t properly register until then.

Daniel Horowitz, an official with the state Election Law Enforcement Commission, said all lobbyists in the state are required to register with the agency prior to starting their lobbying activities. The mayor informed the state late last month that he was halting his lobbying for RAMP, as he is planning a run for state Assembly.

Reid said Wednesday that any public appearance or op-ed after he started working for RAMP was on behalf of the organization, not in his capacity as mayor. Despite this, in a letter to the Asbury Park Press in May 2018, after he had started working for RAMP, Reid wrote in opposition of legal weed in his capacity as mayor and did not disclose he was being paid by RAMP. Reid rejected the notion that not disclosing that he’s being paid by RAMP when discussing marijuana represents a conflict of interest.

“I don’t see the conflict,” he wrote in an email on Wednesday. "(You’re) taking a frivolous lawsuit and giving it credibility.”

But the lawsuit filed this week is seeking email records for Reid from Point Pleasant Beach to see if he mixed his duties as mayor with his job as RAMP’s executive director and lobbyist. Duff, the plaintiff, filed the lawsuit against the borough because the records were redacted to hide other email addresses, potentially email addresses belonging to Reid. Those redactions made it impossible to tell whether Reid was using his borough email address to conduct RAMP business. Reid denies that he’s done anything improper.

Sabet, like Reid, challenged whether this represents a conflict of interest and said he thinks this scrutiny could be coming from the marijuana industry, since Reid is working against their interests.

“I would not be shocked if the pot industry is doing this,” Sabet said. “I don’t see it as a conflict; I see it as a complement.”

Reid said he gets paid $3,000 per month for his work with RAMP, substantially more than the $6,500 per year he makes as mayor of Point Pleasant Beach.

That Reid has another job is not controversial. Many New Jersey mayors work part-time in government and have other jobs. Some have multiple other sources of income. But for Reid to get paid to lobby for an anti-marijuana group while going around the state as the mayor of Point Pleasant Beach having conversations in opposition of cannabis has raised eyebrows.

The state Department of Community Affairs, which oversees local government official ethics, declined to comment on whether Reid was using his office improperly.

“We cannot opine on that,” said Tammori Petty, spokeswoman for the DCA. “The question of whether specific conduct violated the Local Government Ethics Law can only be determined after an investigation by Local Finance Board staff.”

Joseph Donohue, deputy director of the state Election Law Enforcement Commission, said that the agency doesn’t have any specific law that prevents local government officials from working as lobbyists.

Still, several attorneys said that Reid’s lobbying seems questionable, but wouldn’t speak publicly since they weren’t familiar with the case. Duff’s attorney in the suit said she thinks Reid shouldn’t have been able to lobby for RAMP while serving as mayor.

“It seems to a layperson like this would be a conflict of interest,” said CJ Griffin, the attorney representing Duff in his lawsuit against Point Pleasant Beach. “If it isn’t, I think the laws need to change.”

UPDATE: This story has been updated to add Reid saying that he attempted to inform the state of his lobbying activity before he officially registered.

NJ Advance Media staff writer Claude Brodesser-Akner contributed to this story.

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Payton Guion may be reached at PGuion@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter@PaytonGuion. Find NJ.com on Facebook.