all right good evening everyone at this time we'll call our meeting to order Jamie can you please read the sunshine statement call the role be advised that proper notice has been given by the township Council in accordance with the Sunshine Law in the following manner notice advertising the Bron County Times and Camden carrier post on January 4th 2024 and posted on the bulletin board on the same date Mrs aadu here Mr Smith here Mr Jenny here Mr lion here Mr bar here thank you Jamie appreciate that first up on our work session agenda is the Green Team Community energy master plan Joe you got that for us I sure do uh we received a $10,000 Grant more than 18 months ago and uh the attendance achieve the goals set forth in New Jersey energy ma master plan Pathway to 2050 what we like to do is uh prepare community community energy master plan uh with the Green Team and and other interested parties and uh with that I'm going to introduce Deb hment here to uh go through some of the details we've discussed previously with the mayor uh good evening mayor council and Delan residents I am Deborah Hammond chair of the Delran green team as Mr bolina indicated we had a $10,000 Grant from the BPU to develop a clean energy plan which focuses on all parts of areas Energy Efficiency new energy sources and all sectors commercial residential even Municipal the plan covers a variety of initiatives reducing energy consumption and emissions from our transportation sector accelerating the de development of renewable energy maximizing Energy Efficiency and conservation reducing energy consumption from new construction um and should be inclusive and will be encouraging par participation by low moderate households income households so we've talked to the mayor about putting together a team to review the initiatives and decide the ones we want to pursue and who should take the lead for the record we've already completed some of the initiatives like the EV charging equipment ordinance Community solar program the solar equipment ordinance uh one area which is residential Energy Efficiency campaign um I think we're going to pursue a another small Grant um that will provide technical assistance to encourage Energy Efficiency at the residential level and if it works then we'll see about the municipal level because Joe wants to do that one um uh to create the plan we're going to use the grant to hire a consultant to lead the project we'll be putting together a team representing all the sectors and departments anyone interested participating should send an email to Kim bogie and the administrator's office um the team will review and recommend the initiatives to include in our clean energy plan once the team drafts the plan we'll have a stakeholder meeting to um to review the uh initiatives and tweak the plan and prioritize implementation at the end of the process we be back in front of council for you to adopt the uh plan by resolution um as you know Delan Township has been certified with by sustainable Jersey at the bronze level since 2015 we're excited because implementation of these these actions May hopefully get us to Silver thank you great thank you so Joe there's no action for us right no I think you know what our goal was just to really introduce you to the the whole concept uh and how hopefully we can make pretty good inro Road during 2024 that' be great okay okay sounds good next I'd asked to prepare a presentation on pretty much a final uh plan on what the sketch and what the bike trail might be if you recall received well over a million dollars in Grants to uh construct this this Trail so with that and I'm going to ask you to talk about I'm going to send around I think S one to to b a copy of uh of the trail that CME has put forth and they've had we've had a few preliminary meetings with d and I'm sure there's going to be more so Ed please thank you Joe um so just as everybody have the plan in front of them yet I'll you guys yeah we have one but it's yeah yep small so I apologize for not uh putting putting it up on the screen um but just as a reminder as as Joe alluded to uh the municipality received um actually three separate grants um from dot one fiscal year 2022 for a total of 1.2 million um one in fiscal year 23 for a total of 700,000 and one in fiscal year 2024 for 447,000 now for the purposes of this plan in front of you the fiscal year 23 is not necessarily applicable um due to the the phase that's uh included in here that's the I'm sorry that's the 700 700 yeah so so in total you have I have to speak to the state about it but theoretically you'll have 1.6 uh 1.1 1,647 th000 for this this phase um our our preliminary estimate um was just under 1.4 million of this current configuration you see um so this path was chosen ultimately to minimize the disturbance of the freshwater wetlands and wetlands transition area after our pre-application meeting with njd so in comparison to what you may have originally seen um in a previous concept version this has been deemed by the state um to be the you know best possible path to ultimately connect Notre Dame Park uh to Del Community Park um now ultimately once once we get into the uh beginnings of design and concept but finalizing our ultimate plan we're going to actually walk the site and make sure that the path that we have shown here is is ultim feasible make sure we minimize tree removal Etc um but generally speaking what we have in front of you is is what the intended path is going to be um so any anybody have any questions yeah and I I have it from from when it crosses the stream up and in between the uh Fields but I I can't really tell there's a lot of hash marks where it comes out yes gets to the parking lot okay so ultimately the the connection point to minimize the distur servants and not have to obtain additional permits from from the state um utilization of the existing HMA path within Del Community Park is is currently the intention um so where the connection point would be is it this way or is on L Cross or up and up you know so yeah it has to go through that thing through the center of the field through the center of the fields the way that we have it laid out now yes if we have to modify it we might run into some storm water management uh mitigation which would Ballo cost potentially so um and we're trying to limit the the mitigation that we have to do yeah and I get that okay maybe explain but I get why we had I know there was a plan that didn't have it going through the middle but it was $3.5 million or something crazy um I'm just I mean I don't I just worry that you know someone's strolling through you know it's not very clear where the path you just get dropped in the middle of four Fields you know we would add signage and stuff to way finding signage conversation we had that one meeting was that most of the people going from Notre Dame would be heading to the sports Fields anyway yeah and they wouldn't be heading elsewhere actually made more sense as well so ultimately to to answer your questions what the the final product of this you'll have way finding signage and and there'll most likely be like a kiosk of some sort to give everybody actual directions of how to navigate the the path um so it be just more than a point a to a point B one thing I do want to highlight and this is this is a little bit of a change from initial there's going to be Boardwalk that needs to be associated with this um in order to keep down the impacts as part our meeting with this with the state um so okay does that add CA what does that increase the cost everything the EP asks for increases the cost yeah they should pay for it but the estimate the estimate that we that we prepared included the cost okay yeah oh I see that here number 10 okay any thoughts comments questions Council question go ahead so um if you I don't know if we can get another copy that's colorcoded yeah can we just get it's hard to follow along yeah yeah I can show you I can we can uh distribute the the version that in a larger version so you can actually maybe color code the path something just it's EAS to see yeah thank you so just one last point on that Mr President the uh inside the consent agenda is a resolution to authorize CME to go ahead and um begin the phase of design and of course they include bidding and and what have you uh including additional meetings with theep folks okay and what's the other 7004 though so that is that's for phase two so if you recall the the initial concept um that was done I think it was probably three or four years ago now yeah um there was the potential connection to Hunter Drive and then also the high school now that that adds an added layer like I mentioned before then you're starting to get into larger disturbance than what we're allowed based off the permits um that we can go through for a GP and also then you're talking about mitigation um storm water which and just Wetlands disturbance it adds a few layers to I have one more question and where does this put where does the path end on the notame size so ultimately will end um where the parking lot is around where the old uh treatment plan is the back that's where that's where we Tim have that's great that's what I was hoping you would say okay sound good any any other questions I think we're good great with that okay so there that's just on the consent agenda right to uh yes it is see me okay sounds good all right next up is our D flood plane requirements Joe or Ed you I'm going to let Ed handle this perhaps the njd requirements became more La saided um so de like that one really enjoyed that one sorry so to to kind of just give a a brief overview so the state is going around and having all the municipalities that are impacted have blood Hazard areas um within their uh boundaries to update their blood plane ordinances so the the one item in particular that um I wanted to highlight to you one one we have the township has to adopt this this is just something we have an actual deadline of formal adoption by the 14th of May we don't have anything in our packet with this right no okay no so it's a it's a sample ordinance I can I can distribute um the sample ordinance um to everybody but ultimately there is a section in here for local design flood elevation so ultimately what that's that's uh speaking to is you can make your free board in town in the township more restricted so for example right now your free board is one foot above your base flood elevation so you have municipalities like Upper Township Manville that have made it a little bit more restrictive than what is just mandated by the state um one of the the bigger highlights that I wanted to to mention to to you all is the D made a change last July um to their blood Hazard area uh Control Act s uh 7 colon 13 which adds three feet to the uh firm Mass so for example if you have if you're in a no this is in a fial area this does not impact that the title areas like Riverside Park yet um so if you're have an elevation 10 somewhere your previous um freeboard elevation ultimately your your lowest uh inhabited unit would have to be at now that needs to be at 14 to just to make it to make it easy so instead of having one foot above that elevation now you have four feet because you have your one foot of freeboard plus your additional three feet um that they're having you take into account now as as it's presented there's nothing you need to necessarily do if you're going to just follow this the state's minimum however if you want to make it more restrictive now would be the time to add any additional requirements in terms of freeboard uh above that elevation that's set forth by um the maps this doesn't impact Riverside Park right it's only the no so Riverside Park is is titly influenced which from my understanding there'll be a separate ordinance um ordinance will probably be required for that so this is for new construction this is for basically subst well you're going all all construction so substantial improvements stuff of that nature now if Riverside Park for example if you have your and I would have to look into it a little bit more in two instead of one which is the standard any new construction within the township regardless of what's been hasn't been adopted by the state Etc would have to adhere to that because it's more restrictive so if you wanted the the new Bild to be two foot above your BF in town versus one foot that would be a BF B base flood elevation okay so I I think the best thing I mean I don't speak for all counil but I think we need to see the ordinance before we can figure out what what's up and down no I more than anything with our intent here tonight was to just put it on your radar yeah something something was coming okay andum so to to add to to Joe's point we actually have to submit a draft to the state because they need have to RW it um the they gave us the ordinance so all we were basically doing is just filling it in and sending it to them and then you ultimately have to go through the adoption process so yes so if you could just get us the appropriate time the draft and then we can consider if we want to do anything more than that well tell you what when we send the draft up to D we'll give A draft copy to you folks as well okay okay Tom I guess the only do we know what percentage of the town that would affect if we went higher than this one foot State I mean obviously the Tex it it affects everybody but the point being is how much what What proportion of the town is already 13 14t above base flood elevation as opposed to which areas or not understood yeah I don't know that off hand but that's something that we well because that would to me that would dictate um and I'll just make it up all right there's 20% of the town that would be affected if we go more than the state which means 80% of the town it's going to have no bearing okay to me that would be something I would want to know what's what would be the net impact if we went past the state and you know obviously the benefit and where it's at so all right thanks is there any way to get a map of what areas you're impacted by this you said yeah yeah yeah that'd be great okay any other questions Council comments so we're get some more information we'll be back on our desk and I know we've talked about this before in concept I we knew it was coming so keep moving on it all right right and then the next thing is the parking restrictions along Chester A yes Mr I'm going to ask we do have a we do have a a safety issue on Chester Avenue with part cars particularly during school hours GNA ask Chief Jim Mitchell to uh illustrate what the problem is and and what we think is needed to be done to amarate these conditions good evening I've uh noticed since Co that there's an increasing number of vehicles parking on Chester Avenue at morning drop off and afternoon pickup uh this is causing sight line issues with people trying to exit the high school or excuse me exit the Middle School um either in school buses or in vehicles additionally uh as you probably noticed there's a crossing guard Greenwood Avenue and there's another one in front of the high school or excuse me right at the front of the Middle School uh right at the driveway for this building the the sight lines are impaired for the crossing guards as well when they go to walk people out this is causing increasing problem I'm getting complaints from my guards um I would hate to have you know I don't want a tragedy to determine our actions what I tried to do was to work directly through the school and have them prohibit pick up and drop off at the curb they tried to do that but uh over two years we it's only gotten worse not better so in conversation with the safety director he basically told me that um parkings are a problem and uh it is so uh I've come to you with our problem and I'm asking for your guidance here I was it was my thought that we should perhaps uh limit parking 7:00 a.m. to 3M which would be school hours um Monday through Friday and this will affect three residences that go along Chester Avenue I was going to propose both sides of the street because I assume people just move to the other side I know we'd have to have a Engineers look at it and termine sight lines and things of that nature but U I am very concerned that tragedy's right around the corner I feel like it's a pressing public safety issue this is you talking about the whole Chester or just portion front of school Chester Avenue I'm sorry from the uh along the extent of the middle school property up until Greenwood Avenue okay yes there is two homes right there's there's two homes on this side in your opinion um the residents of those if they park in front of their house is that do that create a sight line issue there as well it would but it doesn't seem to be something they do because it's such a busy road I I think uh the only time I've really noticed them utilizing that is on over the weekends if they have some sort of large gathering at their homes which would not be during school hours correct okay the only reason I bring it up I know that uh some of the towns um for residents they actually make a they give them permit parking like across from Cherry Hill West in in the Cherry Hill States because the students like to park in there so to circumvent that there's they do some parking permits we do that brown but I didn't know if it's an issue or whatever you shouldn't say that on the record uh um okay so yeah I yeah I think I was gonna that's the same thing so it doesn't seem to be that those three people use it that we would need it but if they did it makes sense we just keep them we could look into that option so I mean next steps you need to have the engineer look at you know the proposal right in terms of how we're going to do that I mean I think it's no it makes sense to me right it's Nob brainer to keep the students and everybody even even the people that are parking where they really shouldn't be they're putting themselves at risk and and their own children yeah so we we protecting them from theel from themselves but yeah I'm all for it you just once it's adopted you just enforce you have to go out there and enforce it for a while to well ordinarily what we do when we change something like this we have a warning period where we go out and speak to the people ask them to move not issue right away but there will there will come a period of time when warnings have been issued and issued again and people haven't taken the hint so there will be summons issued okay chief can I I just this question Tyler goad Chief are you saying they're parking right in front of the school really yes and we'll have signage for that first we would have to have that made you know provided that you guys think appr okay yeah it seems like a no-brainer so I think we should Joe and Chief and Ed whoever whatever motions we have to do to do that let's we have to amend the code so and maybe expand the hours or maybe an hour before and an hour after school too because people show up early or stay late yeah yeah yeah let's yeah that makes sense okay Jo that's it that was it okay thank you Chief appreciate that anything else are you good I'm good if you want address all right thank you all right that concludes our work session items next up is an ordinance on first reading ordinance second to introduce the ordinance motion I'll second Jamie please mrsu I Mr Smith I Mr Jenny hi Mr lion Mr burrow I I have it motion carries the ordinance is introduced next up is our consent agenda is there any objections councel none I'll entertain a motion to approve motion second mrso I Mr Smith I Mr Jenny i m Mr lion Mr Bell hi guys have it motion carries next up is our reports first up Township administrator Joseph bolina Joe uh thank you Mr President uh Ju Just for your info the uh Route 130 sanitary store bursting project pipe bursting project the bid for that was well over estimate and well over what was budgeted uh so far so we're going to go back out to bid and uh we going to go back to the marketplace and see if we can't do a little bit a lot better I should say than that uh the the other other thing I want to report on tonight is the Leon sewer line situation you remember we had that that collapse on that Sunday night uh maybe about a month ago now so our our troops have been out there even during the overnight hours cleaning the line and tving it just to engaged with the U the condition of the pipe and uh and then we'll probably have to put a bond ordinance together I've been in touch with with our bond council at some point soon so we can go out uh you know prepare a contract it looks like right now but it it could be it could change it looks like parts are going to have to be replaced other parts might be able to be reigned but we'll we'll know more when it's done in a few weeks so I just want to keep that one in your vision um so any questions on that but that's all I have toight Mr President thank you Joe next up is our clerk jamers I have no report thank you next mayor C bone mayor thank you council president so there just two quick things one is that we are uh in the process of a refresh once again of the website uh hopefully we will continue to make it more accessible and intuitive and give it a fresh new look uh the uh currently they are working on uh we've seen some preliminaries we're we're tweaking it uh I will make sure that everyone on Council has a has a link to the staging site so that you can see if you like or dislike anything and I'm sure we'll have a multiple opportunities to review before it switches live and they have assured me uh multiple times that nothing will be lost that all the historical data that's on there all the old reports and agendas and minutes will be carried over and the second thing is uh we had a great I'll let if anyone else is going to speak about this I just want to mention that we had a great uh town hall meeting with u the Ashley crossing crossing folks and uh it was a full house and they had a number of questions I've been running them down as best we could as quickly as we could uh we have uh I now have the email uh signin list and if I can read all the writing I will get uh kind of a maass email out to uh Council and to all the residents uh with the questions that they they asked us to follow up on and that's my report great thank you mayor next up is our solicitor Robert Wright I have nothing to report thank you next up our engineer from C Associates Ed marant thank thank you Mr President um just one thing real quick I want to touch touch upon in the consent agenda there was the award of the contractor Earl Asal for Stuart Avenue phase one the one highlight that I just want to mention is we still need concurrence from do so once the resolution here tonight is is completed we'll submit that to do and once concurrence is um is received I've already been in contact with the contractor um they will be ready to have a precon um as soon as possible to start working okay thank you next up are reports for members of council first up is councilman Nikki appu councilman I don't have any report great thank you next up one on the list is councilman Marlo Smith councilman yeah thank you very much uh just very quickly um wrapping up February and it'll be this will be one time I could say this for the next four years happy leap year there an extra day in this month and as we head into March uh March is women's history month and I just would encourage folks to uh take part in some wonderful events that are know being planned all around the area uh to learn about all the wonderful accomplishments and um all the great things that women have done and for uh forth not just here in U Del Ram not just here in New Jersey but uh Nationwide and worldwide so um let's take part in those events because it's important end of report great thank you next up is councilman Lyn Jen Council thanks council president the only thing I wanted to mention to council and the mayor I I think I mentioned to the mayor informally and to council president a couple residents had approach regarding Riverside St Park the uh uh super action that our EMTs our Fire Department Public Service the water company um and I'm probably forgetting a couple other people our Police Department uh took uh during those times and the recommendation was that we recognize them in some way so I just ask that uh the council and the mayor think about something we can do to recognize them and do it soon before it becomes history uh it's history now but history let's that way that's my report thanks yeah great thank you much greed next stop is our vice president of council Mr Tom L thank you council president I'd like to say thank you to the police department Public Works Ed um everybody involved with the town coming out looking at that issue over in the Summer Hill section uh much like the chief reported on earlier there's some issues with sight lines and traffic and whatnot and uh we need to get together with that map and all that data you were going to look up see what we can do I don't want to lose momentum on that and get that taken care of because that's a safety issue with the kids going to the bus stops the bus drivers and you know just the kids going to the tot lots and stuff like that so I do appreciate everybody coming out on a very windy cold day and uh sucking it up out in the weather but uh we took a nice walk but I do appreciate that thank you that's it awesome great for my report I have nothing for this evening so at that time I'll entertain a motion to open the floor to the public comment I make a motion second all in favor I is opposed motion carries our floor is open to public comment if you wish to speak please raise your hand you will be recognized you'll have five minutes time and all statements are part of the record and cannot be redacted or retracted any public comment see none I'll ask for a motion to close the floor M motion second all in favor I who's opposed motion carries or floor is closed public comment at this time I'll entertain adopting resolution 2024 55 authorizing executive session to discuss labor negotiations so moved I'll second just all in favor all in favor I I who's opposed motion carries we're now going to go into executive session if there's any action to be Tak it'll be back here in the public we'll be back shortly thank you you good all right we're going to um I'll entertain a motion to exit our close session and go back in the public so moved second all in favor I who opposed motion carries there's no action to be taken I'll entertain of a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn I'll second all in favor I I who opposed motion carries we