all right that's I little space heater in his room now he hasn't complained we were home all day yesterday I me he's a 49 really kind of felt bad for the Lions a little bit and I'm a Bears fan yeah some of it was in effect on kind of bad the a little bit and I'm AAR so hard oh you saw [Laughter] there you go oh you saw it good evening everyone and forgive me for running a few minutes behind tonight this is the Village Council special public budget meeting the date is January 29th 2024 the time is 5:07 p.m. adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by a posting on the bulletin board in Village Hall by mail to the Ridgewood news the record and by submission to all persons entitled to same as provided by law of a schedule including the date and time of this meeting roll call Deputy Mayor parin here council member Reynolds here council member whites here council member wad mayor vaganos here will you all please join us in a salut tour flag I pledge alance to the flag the good evening everyone and forgive me for running a few minutes behind tonight this is the Village Council special public budget meeting the date is January 29th 2024 time is 5:07 p.m. adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by a posting on the bulletin board by mail to the rwood news the record and by submiss you know what he's going to say we want more money for Tech now that's what he's Say by law we're going to pause for a moment because we have technical difficulties how' you get you get you I think it's good we're good are we good sounds good before we go to public comment um Keith kasmar um would like to address an issue that's come up of late uh mayor thank you good evening everyone um before we open the meeting to the public I just want to address uh some some email circulation that occurred over the weekend with regard to the shade tree commission and also with green Ridgewood uh there were some numbers that were circulated um amongst those committees that were very very prelim preliminary numbers uh in preparing the 2024 budget that date back to last fall uh they were numbers that were exchanged between the director of Parks and Recreation and the Chief Financial Officer um I just want to stress for anyone who is inclined to make a public statement tonight uh that those numbers are outdated and tonight we will be walking through the actual numbers uh that are being that will be presented and considered by The Village Council uh for shade tree funding both on the capital side and on the operating budget for 2024 thank you mayor good thank you Keith and let's go to public comment and we have a microphone I believe over over there are we're still using that sorry Jim this way I'm new here yep all right please state your name and address address 3 minutes total per person thank you heather good evening I'm Jim Morgan I live at 140 Bel Air in Ridgewood my family and I have lived in Ridgewood for over 30 years before that I grew up in wof and Midland Park and Glenrock all around here I uh since January this year I have been a member of the Parks and Recreation board although I just joined the PRC this year I've served on the board of educations liaison of parks and wck for over eight years years over that time I've seen the expertise and professionalism of the parks department personnel in multiple situations the as a village has uh faced Financial pressures that sharply limited the resources available to the department our staff has adapted and continued to provide the residents with an excellent breath of services they are a gem in the village government and have earned their our support my family and I have always been impressed with the variety of activities offered by the parks department from our youth dances the summer camps the senior citizen programs all levels of residents can find valuable activities in programs rich with numerous Parks themselves offer multiple opportunities for outdoor activities Beyond just programs in addition to the programs the department also is responsible for many other things that significantly enhance the village Gren pool the downtown landscape are important areas for the parks citizen Le initiatives like the green te team shade commission Open Spaces committee all coordinate with with and are supported by the parks department budget in short many of the things that make Richwood special are touched upon either directly or indirectly by the responsibilities of the parks department you're now considering how to allocate The Village's limited resources for the next fiscal year having done so in the past at the board of e i don't relish your uh opportunities you're G to have fun your difficult choices will be made and many critical services like Police Department fire department require funding my ple to you tonight is that you regard the parks department as an and its various associate activities as also critical services and fund them accordingly this is an important department that touches on Ridgewood citizens every day in multiple ways please give the resources it requires on a personal note I'll add one other thing I'm uh I recently had heart surgery and I was in the hospital for my cardio rehab today I took the opportunity to stop off and see Rich Brooks who many of you know has been the long time chairman of the uh of the commission I can report that he's cheerful he's got an extremely strong handshake he's uh very optimistic about the future he uh seconded my comments and said he really hopes that the Village Council can find ways to support the wonderful work that parks and Rex does and he said that excuse me he's hopeful to get out of the hospital soon and be back in full action so with that I'll thank you and sit down thank you Jim thank you for your your service and thank you for stopping in to see Rich hello my name is Julia Bender I live at 239 Claremont Road I have two School AG children here in Ridgewood a 7eventh grader at GW and a third grader at Ridge I'm here to request that the Village Council earmark money to in order to fund Clinton Avenue to have a safe walking route to Ridge School Clinton Avenue is the only designated direct route to the school that does not have a sidewalk the situation has gotten increasingly unsafe with vehicular traffic ignoring soft closure signs and barriers after a thorough analysis the Ridgewood Police Department with the support of the Ridgewood engineering department recommended sidewalks as the safest option for our children it has recently come to light that the soft closure is in fact unenforcable per the Ridgewood Police Department the New Jersey attorney general considers a street closure that only allows certain individuals for example residents can can just be a little Qui I want to we're having trouble hearing the speaker thank you appreciate that um the children are now walking on a road that it has no enforceable closure I am asking that ele we are asking elementary school children to be in charge of their own safety when it is the job of the village government and the village residents please prioritize our children and focus funds on safety this is not an issue that can wait for the next budget cycle thank you thank you Julia and I will say that uh I was out there today with the village manager um someone from our engineering department and several people from our Police Department surveying the issue and we look forward to our next meeting on February 8th Wonder thank you so much if the speakers could just speak into the microphone it's hard to hear you good evening can you hear me uh Cynthia halby one Franklin Avenue I'm very much echoing what Jim Morgan said um it's tremendous pleasure that I have to speak in favor of parks and recck Department under the leadership of Nancy beos I've been very fortunate that I have worked with this group for at least 12 years um both in my capacity with the con conservancy and with women gardeners and I know firsthand how hardworking and dedicated they are in the big picture we all are very much aware of their work the big Sports Fields the open Park areas the trees the leaves and so on but what I would like to focus on is the added quality of life that they bring to our community so many programs run out of the stable and the community center programs for all ages from children to seniors some programs vary um some are passive some are active and many are educational they run programs for our young students and Scouts for families and many for seniors who continue to seek education and companionship the quality of life in Ridgewood is much enhanced by the parks and rack Department how sad it would be not to have a clean safe Graden pool our children in summer camp and not to be able to sit in an attractive setting to enjoy the outdoors or even to enjoy sitting under the stars at cashow Shell how lucky we are to be able to enjoy other events that they bring us for example the magical Fire and Ice event at Gren s'mores during the tree lighting ceremonies and of course my favorite the daffodil festival and Earth Day Affair just to mention a few so I urge you to provide parks and recre with sufficient funds so they can continue making Ridgewood the beautiful place it is and while I am here I would like to add a few words about the tree well in the CBD it's great that they've been filled with young trees but now we have the responsibility to maintain them clearly watering and pruning are a big component but we need to maintain their base they need to be mulched and weeded there is an ordinance for the landlords to maintain them but this is Impractical and not working last year councilwoman winegrad did a valiant job of recruiting volunteers for this and I commend her but I feel is the responsibility of The Village at the same time the village needs to maintain many small areas around the CBD by removing weeds which grow through the cracks in the sidewalks and along the sides of the buildings collectively we need to work hard to make sure our town is as attractive and inviting as can be thank you thank you Cynthia Carolyn jacobe 160 gu owin Avenue thank you Cynthia for the shout out for the CBD tree Wells um before I do my spiel about trees um I have to acknowledge the um Yan's work that our Municipal staff does and uh Matt andula is here Dean Madden our arborist and of course Nancy be GH to oversee the guys to ensure that we are able to maintain what must be done to develop and grow a vibrant tree canopy and to miss winegrad for her passion about the trees and support as liaison but last but not least we are so blessed to have this gentleman here Keith kasmar has been um a very uh thoughtful calming and very wise leader and thank you for your support now for trees though I wrote something so I feel I have to I have to read it the Myriad benefits of trees are again worth noting they exchange oxygen absorb enormous amounts of carbon dioxide a major driver of which is a major driver of of climate chain trees reduce pollutants dust smoke and pollen trees provide shade and cool the air as moisture escapes through their leaves they increase property values and their beauty is renowned at this immediate time however their greatest benefit to our village is the ability of trees to absorb great volumes of water through their Roots leaves and bark and reduce storm water runoff by decreasing Peak water flows during severe rainstorms this month alone we have experienced three major rain events and the continuous flooding of mun Municipal areas and Residences trees of every size and type have the ability to lessen damaging effects of flooding and a remarkable fact is a single mature oak tree can consume 40,000 gallons of water in a year and release much of it into the atmosphere as oxygen and water vapor growing trees is one significant and readily available way to help mitigate flooding and other adverse environmental concerns and I know as the council confronts all of the priorities that everyone is putting forth um needless to say trees are um a major part of our infrastructure and um the budget that's being presented will help go forward in managing this great asset thank you all thank you Carolyn hello my name is Scott Mueller I live at 118 John Street and I'm a 20-year resident of this beautiful Village I'm also the president of the Ridgewood baseball and softball Association a leading group of leading a group of 28 active adult volunteer board members we represent 1,350 boys and girls in ridgewood's largest youth program it encompass is fouryear olds up until High School kickball t-ball baseball softball and especially our Allstar program for developmental physical and mental needs children I'm here today to pledge my organization's full support behind the two projects that will promote our children's physical growth and also benefit our adults they are upgrading the lighting at Veterans Field and to replace the barn at Hackle with a multi-use open cover with restrooms the lighting at vests have been a long has long I'm not a real good public speaker but anyway uh has been a long Mish MOS of antiquated light poles that were too short for sporting events and leave dark spots in the middle of the field this inadequate lighting necessitates scottt excuse me guys your voice carries in this room so if while someone is speaking thank you very much appreciate it I I know you didn't realize go ahead Scott the inadequate lighting necessitates the usage of six to8 gas-powered portable lighting trailers that even have shorter poles with lights on them our citizens can't use the track around the field after dark our cashar shell events are virtually in the dark and require flashlights to leave the venue have you ever attended the July 4th fireworks and tried to collect your children blankets chairs and trash in the darkness wouldn't it be safer for the police to flip a switch and light the whole field for exiting it's time to upgrade our very tired Flagship facility the other project will upgrade and allow more citizens to use Hackle it replacing the vacant and decaying barn with a cover picnic area with working restrooms this would not only attract all ages to a very beautiful facility but it would also provide a safety shelter for our children during a lightning or other inclement weather storms on a lighter note who would miss those portons up there anyway our parks and wreck staff headed by Nancy Bigos is dedicated to maintaining our facilities for the safety of our children I applaud them for their tireless efforts to support the physical well-being of our town we have a we have to we all have acknow knowledge of the benefits of physical daily activity and the detriments of extended smartphone usage in our children ever developing Minds these projects will promote an active lifestyle for our kids I'm willing to team up with the other sports organizations to make a gift to help offset some of the developmental cost that development cost this will ensure our skin in the game approach we cannot allow a few self-interest people to creep into these projects we can work together to upgrade our beautiful parks that will benefit both the active and passive interest of our village Ridgewood residents deserve top-notch facilities thank you thank you scottt good evening everyone I'm happy to be here and I'm so happy to have had the privilege of being a lifelong resident of Bridgewood I love living here I love the trees and if there's one thing your name and address is for everyone your name and address it's the trees name name and address Nancy H you need to give your name and address to begin sorry right um Nancy Brennan Hill 136 darus Avenue Ridgewood New Jersey so you all know I love the trees and I think people before me have spoken more adequately about the benefit that the trees provide for all of us um I know for Generations they were ignored that was a big comparison to the way they were taken care of when I were little if a tree went down you know people would run out they'd plant another one on my own yard we lost a maple tree in Norway maple they came out planting planted a lyen tree and I was too young to understand you know I should have been out there watering it lyen tree died before I knew it they came out and planted a tree whose name I can never forget that is not recommended because it poisons the soil or something but it's beautiful looking it's still there and it's thriving so I'd like to thank um the current Council and the few previous councils that did put large chunks of money into the budget to support trees and if ever there was a time to put even more money in it's really now and I just I just urge you to do that thank you thank you so much Nancy good evening everybody uh my name is Victoria van djk 614 Robert Street um good evening Council thank you so much for the opportunity to speak tonight uh briefly I hope everyone is well considering the overarching topic uh of the budget tonight I wanted to bring everyone's attention to the wonderful strides that shade tree committee has uh kind of accomplished regarding new trees planting and watering within the town in the last few years that being said I believe we also should be additionally focusing on other programs that need help such as the utilization of our parks and from my own experience of director of Ridgewood summer day camp the needs of the camp program as well as director of the summer camp and member of the PRC board I have had the wonderful opportunity to work with our Parks director Nancy beos who has listened to my feedback regarding the needs of my campers and staff with empathy and care as we listen to budget proposals and presentations tonight I ask that we consider parks and their additional programs and thank all staff and Village Council for their continued support thank you thank you Vicki hello um my name is Liz clo I live at 383 Vesta cour um I've been a member of the PRC for the last two years but and I previously served from 2008 to 2020 I've raised my four kids in Ridgewood and I've been very active in many organizations in the village including College Club social service Mount Carmel various hsas Youth Sports Bridgewood basketball lacrosse my I'm most proud of serving on the PRC and the Gren swim team the work of the PRC touches every village resident all ages diverse interest and has a wonderful ability to bring people together to create positive impacts and produce successful outcomes I'm sure you're all familiar with the specifically designed senior programs thank you Deanna offered throughout the year strength training Zumba bridge majan and the amazing movies and talks hosted by our hobbyists um there are a Full Slate of Youth and middle school programs as well interesting Innovative educational stuff web design table tennis and recently a program on the dangers of vaping um this is only during the cold months all year long the PRC provides both recreational and educational instruction to our residents which enriches their lives gets them involved and gives folks a sense of belonging and Community I'm here today to first thank you all for your support and the trust that you put on us as PRC members um I next want to ask that you endorse ny's budget to help us continue to move forward enhancing and enriching our programs upgrading our facilities and give us the opportunity to do much more as we all try to tackle the many many challenges brought on with flooding field overuse increasing demand and limited resources let us focus and build on what we do have we know we have people who like to be together they like to be be outside and they like to feel safe and they like clean green surroundings so vets needs better lighting heracle needs shade and restrooms and the plantings need upkeep I understand there's limitations that is why I and and other members of the community center Advisory Board are embarking on a very aggressive fundraising drive to help provide additional resources and to also let residents know that their support is needed many times especially in a place like Ridgewood all you have to do is ask so tonight I'm asking all of you thank you thanks Liz Andrew Lowry at 441 hawthor in place uh I'm going to be brief I'm not here to talk about the benefits of trees Carolyn is covered covered that pretty well cooling air quality storm water Etc and beauty Beauty matters too um what I'm here to do is make a case for existing trees trees that we have invested in uh trees that are 50 years old sometimes a 100 years old that need to be taken care of um I use the analogy of you buy a car you you you polish it for a couple years and then you leave you leave it alone and what happens um we have a wonderful crew headed by Nancy Matt Dean Dena uh who can take care of our trees but we have to invest in pruning uh pruning uh treating when necessary um and and and watching over them uh the analogy of a new tree planted versus a 50-year-old tree is a about 20 to1 in terms of air quality and all the other benefits so I'm making the case it's important to plant new trees but it's important to keep the ones we have healthy thank you thank you Andrew anyone else in the room no we have some people on hybrid access uh the first person up is Annie Annie you're up can you hear me yes we can if you'd state your name and address please my name is an loving and I live at 342 South Irving Street thank you for the opportunity to speak and I would like to thank all of you for the hard work that you're going to be putting in in developing this budget I completely agree with everyone who has spoken in favor of trees because I think quality of life in our town is very important and maintaining and increasing our number of trees is just critical I also hope the public safety will be at the Forefront in terms of sidewalks kingis Bridge Lane bridge and so on I sincerely hope that we do not in any of these meetings hear the FW that is the Furlow word which we heard last year please do not even consider furing I also hope that the enormous tax increase that we had last year won't be repeated this year and finally in terms of trees which I agree with all the previous speakers but one of the first things is please do not cut down all those trees at shedler and cover it with a rubber rug thank you again thank you an next person up is Susan Susan you're up um hello um Susan Ruan 705 Kingsbridge Lane um I apologize I didn't prepare anything specifically to speak about I do want to thank you guys for all the work that you put in because I know I never say enough thank yous to you guys um the next is I hope that the Kingsbridge Lane Footbridge or eastle river foot bridge is on the budget because it is desperately needed um also I I will Advocate also for the Glenn sidewalks CU I do Drive uh my son into town in the morning and I'm horrified on how busy that street is and can't imagine children walking up and down that street um and I would also ask I know that in light of all the storms that we've Rec recently had in all the talk about the flooding is to put something in maintenance for the rivers or the Riverway um all the different waterways I'm not just speaking for Saddle River I know that there are other waterways throughout Ridgewood that people have come up to me and told me that they're also um impacted by the um the waters flooding around their house so that is something that I will ask that which I know the budget's only so much but to start looking at how to maintain these different waterways especially since Ridgewood has so many um I I don't think blue Acres will buy everyone out in this area um that's impacted by flooding so I think we have to figure out other means of also maintaining and I do want to agree with everyone that has spoken tonight about the trees um it is very important to maintain and also in light of all the flooding um to change the topography up at shedler by removing the old trees that do take up absorb so many gallons of water I fear what will happen um again to Saddle River and to the residents there um but thank you again um good luck with the budget thank you Susan next person is Denise good evening Denise you're up super Denise Lima 319 East Glenn a been a resident for 20 years I just want to thank everybody for inviting the public to this I know it's complex I know it's really challenging Ing and it's uh it's certainly not easy lot of long hours so thank you to all the department leads for um helping to prepare and for giving insights to the residents um we had a pretty high increase last year of almost 6% um the discussion about the furlows and so I think um I'd like each department if they can to really let us know what you're doing different how you're Reinventing how you're transforming are you're being creative in your ways of working so that we prevent this and go back to the 0% tax increases there's several towns around us in buron county that did not get the CO credit and still was able to keep the taxes at zero so these are going to be really um a challenge everybody you like we all have to Residents departments you know dig down on what we would do different so the discussions about sharing services with other towns to reduce our costs or get more revenues what what is each department doing or thinking about that um maybe we change our collection of garbage and that everybody needs to bring it to the curb um you know maybe we change our trucks that are getting the garbage to be more automated like pamas maybe we don't collect leaves anymore so Fon sadle River some of the other towns they don't do curb collection they kept their taxes low by making the residents um you know mulch bag get their landscapers to do it um maybe we don't have paid firemen maybe it's volunteering I know these are not good topics with people they're not um they're not topics that people often want to talk about I myself don't want to take my garbage H to the curb it's 400 ft but you know we all have to think about taxes and and how to do things differently I think we need some more money spent in the building department where we have more code enforcers um that can enforce the planning board the board of adjustments things that are happening permits and really watch what people are doing in town and the developers I think we need a real honest conversation about all of our Fleet all of our trucks across the board and I think I saw in the 2023 the flood appropriation dollars was zero so I I definitely think we need a a hard conversation about that as well this year um so thanks for allowing me to give my uh my feedback thank you Denise and that's all we have and so I'm going to close public comment but I want to take a moment to thank everyone first of all for being here um the the annual budget is where it all starts for the rest of the year and and getting your input is critical because we hear what you have to say and of course there are competing demands and we will we will try to address everyone's needs and everyone's desires and we will try to keep our tax rate at a reasonable rate and we will try for lots of things and we appreciate everyone being here but I especially have to thank those people who serve on our boards our committees coach our teams run our Sports organizations those people who work to make our village the great place that it really is so I want to thank you all and with that we will now begin our budget process for 2024 thank you mayor um first I want to thank um our professional staff here in the village uh for beginning this budget process back in September of last year um as of today um we have had at least three meetings which with each of our Department directors and many of our supervisors uh to assess their needs coming out of a very difficult 2023 budget preparation year as we head into calendar year 24 um Bob started to meet with each of the department directors back in the fall uh for a first glance and to get a better understanding of what each department director's needs are within their uh respective jurisdictions um and over the last two weeks we've had follow-up meetings uh to refine those requests uh with myself included uh in order to present the very preliminary budget that the council received on Friday uh to kickoff budget meetings for tonight um what I can report to you is that we do not have all of our year-end numbers in yet um we expect those to be finalized by the end of this week um and then it'll probably take an additional week to 10 days for us to do all of the calculations um and apply last year's Revenue Surplus numbers um all the different factors that go into calculating what the potential tax impact would be um on the municipal budget uh so we will not have that number probably until mid-February um so as we wrap up our budget hearings um which these truly at least from my perspective are hearings uh for the Departments to come in and make their case to the council as to what their set of priorities are for 2024 and then as we head through the end of that process uh we'll be able to come back to you with a more refined understanding of what the Appropriations will look like what the revenues will look like what the projected revenues will look like and ultimately what the financial impact on the taxpayer would be so with that I'm going to turn it over to Bob Rooney for some preliminary comments so Village Council I just want to let you know that I received we received the complete cooperation of all the department heads and their staff they were fantastic in responding to our requests they met everything timely uh they were well informed and when we sat down with our meetings they did their homework so I thank you all for that and I think you should just be honored that we have that type of personnel in our our organization uh tonight the Departments are going to be presenting to you their operating requests as well as capital that we discussed at our Thursday meeting uh we finalized and and we're all in agreement as to where we want to go with uh again preliminary just for your information obviously ly you'll have the opportunity to ask them questions uh and we'll move forward the only comment I will ask our our departments is that you try to adhere to the timetable that we established uh so that we can um move this thing forward and try to get wrap all the assigned uh departments in tonight thank you so mayor we're going to begin tonight with um Parks and Recreation um for those of you who have reviewed your your binder um it is in the order um as it will be presented um and actually the the department head's name is actually assigned on a yellow tab um and then the individual sections of their budget will follow that yellow tab so first up tonight is our director of Parks and Recreation Nancy beos Nancy if you would introduce your staff that's here with you for the public catification and then we'll jump right in to your 2024 budget presentation my pleasure manager thank you um next to me I have my parks and sha Tre supervisor Matt andula um next to him is my Recreation supervisor Katie fry and our program coordinator for our community center Dean shab good evening once again I sit beside you and I say thank you thank you my Village manager for the support the guidance the understanding resource ources and staff to bring a wide variety of quality programs and facilities and service to our Ridgewood residents I am incredibly proud of my team for their steadfast dedication loyalty and as you know this starts at the top both my Recreation supervisor and my Park shade tree supervisor their support staff and the men in the field each of us keeps in mind mind that as a society we are recreating more every day one way or another and then each and every day throughout the year it's those services that we bring to the community I also value the relationship that exists with the various advisory boards under our jurisdiction PRC board the open space committee the fields committee the community center Advisory Board the shade tree commission project pride and the casell shell committee that's a lot of meetings it's a lot of voices that we represent within our community each board is engaged in hearing the voice of our residents the public through assessing their needs and finding Solutions through monthly meetings conferences programs beautification mornings together Park walks and visits um are the important ways that our community comes together to provide this um trees this uh Municipal service so so very much is happening throughout our village community my sincerest appreciation to my friends within the Conservancy for Ridgewood public lands and the women Gardeners of Ridgewood who unselfishly tend our Municipal public garden s through their own volunteer efforts what am I about to share with you this evening are quite frankly the needs and desires of our residents and how they have communicated through Myriad ways whether it's directly with us as professional staff if it's through Miley aison if it's coming to a PRC board or a meeting like tonight the voice of our residents comes to us and is is heard um whether they participate in active or passive Recreation our hopes are to upgrade our Park inventory and provide a finer quality of service to our residents my first request to you is Staffing departmentally we have reached the Tipping Point where change is most needed um um and support um I ask you for the growing demand of the service for our residents the sophistication of Le Leisure Time Services whether it's everyday programs after school activity special events throughout our community there is an increase for professional assistance and Daily Mountain maintenance each and every day the first request is for a recreation program specialist this certified Parks and Recreation professional would have a solid understanding and knowledge and education to upgrade our professional operations this would occur uh beyond the 4:30 day that most of us end from 4 uh from 8:30 to 4:30 each day and also be able to work with our staff on the weekends we are often asked to provide programs and customer service beyond the regular workday this professional would also handle the in the intricacies of the master Library New facility and building online scheduling platform for the thousands of residents that request use of our Municipal facilities a solid understanding of scheduling liability program details event needs and maintenance is a must for this professional an additional Parks employee would take a great deal of pressure off our already overburdened staff to maintain our properties each and every day through this greater Park use has become burdensome ball fields open space Meadows Lawns Parks vets field vanet Square bra and pool and the host of special events that are held at least weekly if not more at each of these sites needs someone to maintain these properties as you drive through our community please take note of the many ways that we recreate and that our great and the greater use of our Municipal parks open space and Meadows so that's it for Staffing next I want to move on to you and very quickly just address my goals my goals are reflected through the capital and budg and um operating budget requests to you very simply they are the enhancement of the electronic technology and the deliveries whether it's group spot our new Village website Master Library we need to engage in this and bring this information to our residents upgrades and enhancement to the community center have been discussed on several different meetings that's important to us and we'll address that later the infrastructure within our Municipal Parks facilities there's they're worn it's time so I'm going to bring to you the retrofit of the and possible LED lighting at Veterans Field h shelter restroom at Herber nickel and the shade tree planting and watering for us to be able to continue to grow an urban Forest um so first if we can just to reiterate a little bit more on each of these I'd like like to talk to you about my number one project that is a a retro fit for new LED lighting at Veterans Field I can share with you that the initial lighting that you see there today was installed in 1980 the last retrofit happened in 2001 it's time for Led this facility is used from sun up to sun down every single day many of you know that you walk around that Park at 5:30 6:00 7:00 in the morning um that facility is used by sports groups it's used by the Cashel shell it's used for the 4th of July it's used for the Memorial Day run um and it's used for that type of passive Recreation that's really important for our everyday Health just the ability to take a walk for the little ones to ride their bike for two girlfriends to walk side by side pushing strollers that's the importance of what we do so lighting is important um at for this facility I have talked to my CFO and my Village manager about potential outside funding whether it's the Bergen County open sta open space trust fund whether it's our own Municipal open space whether it's the psse and G ratables that we'll look for and support from our youth sports groups second on my list of passionate requests is um so the price tag for um vetfield is 700,000 bear in mind that that full ticket price has to be placed within the budget as a price holder um the Bergen County open space uh is a 50/50 match the ratables will be applied hopefully some in-house open space um so we'll be able to configure that that number greatly and if I may on that so the highest award from the Bergen County open space trust fund in 2023 for any Municipal Open Space Project was $200,000 so I'm not saying that there's any guarantee that Bergen County would bestow that on on Ridgewood uh but that's sort of our Target number um and then obviously we would have the money in place through the full appropriation of the 700,000 to match that uh we are meeting in the next two weeks with PSC and to talk about their incentive program uh they have um provided uh various programs uh to municipalities who have chosen to relight any sports athletic fields um and they provide incentives um in that regard so we are going to sit down and drill down as to what those uh ratables might be from that perspective um and then Nan has talked about the possibility of of looking at our local open space trust fund or uh some aid from the sports teams Which Scott we appreciate uh that gesture tonight um so that $700,000 that'll be discussed later when we talk about the full capital budget um that's not an actual number that we would realize in debt service so I just want that to be clear as Nan makes her presentation so could I just this is so sterile and I just want to say a couple things first of all thank you to your whole entire for people watching at home we have the whole Parks and Recreation board here the shade tree commission Nancy I often joke as a w it was so exciting to see my committees go first but I do want to add to this that um the improved lighting it it all the things that nany's saying but we do have neighbors and it will improve the quality of life of people who live around the fields this is an issue that the Board of Ed has also had because they have lighting issues and spillage and because people are watching and I want this to be Community oriented if you go to Maple when the lights are on and you step out onto Meadow Brook it's like nothing there's no spillage and you actually get to see a technology that a prior capital investment has invested in and people on Meadow Brook are so happy about the lights because they're not shining in their room so um you know one I think this is very exciting and two I just want to make sure if anybody wants to see it in real live action we've already done the investment on Maple and everything that nany is's going to say our Parks need to be invested but the lighting does have a serious impact around people and we're three sides of neighbors around here and they get you know when we talk about benefits to parks and the impact on the neighbors we've many existing Parks who've shouldered a lot of the burden here so I did just want to challenge everybody when the lights are on to go to Maple see it and step out and be like oh that's what they're talking about because it's a major quality life Improvement for the Neighbors around existing parks and and through you mayor should this uh Capital request um be approved by Council one of the first things we plan to do is have a meeting with all of the neighbors who surround vets Park um to illustrate exactly what the councilwoman uh just spoke to so that they can see for themselves how this would actually improve their quality of life if the retrofitting was to go through and Keith would we have I know you said that 700,000 is a placeholder would we have a better idea or closer to when we vote on the budget what the actual number would be or we just have to assume it's 700 and whenever we get back is is great so so 700 would be the way we would fund it we would want the council to approve the full 700 and then whatever um incentives or whatever grant money that we would be able to achieve or realize um that would just be reduced so when when you appropriate these dollars we're not taking on any type of Debt Service until we're actually spending it um so we would appropriate the entire 700,000 whatever number comes off of that from other funding sources uh we would just not take that on on as Debt Service and then when the project is done Bob would cancel the balance so my my only concern there's no harm to the taxpayer that's great my only concern is and Scott thank you for stepping up and speaking on this is that if we are going to solicit private funds I think it's going to be hard if people already know that we've already paid for it and we're getting it you know because then it's just a basically a donation to offset our capital budget versus if people were donating money thinking if we don't donate money we may not get it so if we are looking at some private sources I I'd be interested to know a ballpark of what we think we could raise before we vote because again I think once we vote in favor of it it's going to be very hard to get folks to kind of open their wallets and the only portion of the money that I would feel comfortable doing that would be any private donations any public um any public money that we solicited from Bergen County or any other source I would want that fully appropriated and then we would just cancel the balance yeah no agreed on that I think the private funds only it's okay thank you I think I just I just have one question I don't know if anybody knows because it's a board of ed um field but Stevens they don't have the they don't have these they're not LED so I don't know if they're LED but the help me out here I always call it musco is the vendor who we met with and they're all the rage and so when we looked at them we have on PRC we have a bad liais on and I believe those lights not to get to into the bad are 15 feet higher and they have greater spillage than ours I can't say that they're not LED on Stevens but their spillage rate is significantly higher than maple so you know I think that's an opportunity for us to engage in our purchasing power because we can't dictate what type of investment that people do on the board of ed side but we do hear from the sports groups consistently about the improved lighting and how beneficial it is from a safety perspective and from a neighbor's perspective regarding spillage and you know a lot of people who come to us don't realize we're not supp Bo of that and that's not our field but I do believe and I don't want to overstep it's their decision we are just the council but I do believe there's lighting efficiencies that could could be sought on the board of ed side in reduction of height and Improvement of spillage okay I just I was just curious because I do know that the neighbors in that area are not happy yeah the technology now councilwoman is is beyond belief I mean it's it's really like the councilwoman said you could be on the field and it could be lit up like MetLife Stadium and you could walk out to the curb and you wouldn't know there was a ball game going on behind you the other thing I will say is that this plan with the $700,000 actually allows us to light the ball Fields um it does sort of amaze me that we don't have any well-lit diamonds um to be able to play night baseball or softball games here in the village this would um this would correct that moving forward and it would allow for for night games to be played um on V field and I'm sorry I I will let you go back but this is like important topic um do we have any costs that we would offset in the current lights I know we use the generators they're not nice my kid plays soccer out there it's not great but what do we CA I'd be interested to know what that cost cu presumably that would be a savings that we could log against the 700,000 if we were you know going to do this but again on the on the generators I do want to add that because the generators are noisy loud and kind of gross and again going to the quality of life and the Improvement to not just people participating on the field in a traditional Sportsman idea they're really they contribute to environmental and they're they're somewhat hazardous in situations and the safety aspect of the new lighting outside of Sports you've all been on a field when it went completely dark possibly with a grandparent and we have the Walkers out here it's it's overall the improved lighting hits on everything that all the first public comments there it's a quality of life issue um I'm not entirely sure Nan who pays for the full generators I know some of the sports groups can sports groups do so I don't believe it'll be a reduction to us but it will just be an well the offset is we don't generate the gas the noise no one runs into it and it's a safer it's a great idea it's just a matter of can we pay for it and that's always my question and that's what I was trying to get at but again an I know we've talked over you like quite a bit although I know Pam you're going to jump in but I felt bad because we broke your stride it's okay you know what as long as all of your questions are answered then I've done my job right so we're moving for you want to continue sure okay or I'll wait till my done at six o'clock uh oh I do have ah so the portable lights that we have what we do with them so Pam just so that you understand all of the portable lights within the village of Ridgewood that you see on our Municipal Sports fields are owned by each of the youth sports groups so Maroons junior football RSA that they own those gotcha so I I can also share with you just for you to rest a little bit at ease when we did the public hearing for the open space which we' have to do if we apply for the grant for the permanent lighting at vetfield I mean I mean um at Maple that was a $600,000 price tag that we went in um we were able to get um $200,000 from Bergen County $45 from the youth sports groups and 145 from our Municipal budget we also held a public hearing with no less than 15 residents on both sides right understanding trying to learn since that permanent lighting has been installed I have not had one complaint which is surprising because there was sincere understanding and um concern for the residents that were directly um accessible uh and contiguous to that property not a complaint so it it will make a difference it's a quality product and I really feel it's time so next on my list of capital budget requests is the possibility of a new shelter Pavilion and restrooms at Hackle Park um with your approval back in December we talked about the um demolition of that Barn um that sadly has been able to depreciate and um over the years our conceptual thoughts and I can share with you that this is conceptual are for a 24 by 76 structure on a cement pad that will allow children a place to gather When Storms occur um that is one of my major problems in this Northwest farthest corner of the village is that when the storms do come up through Hackle and whether it's a youth sports groups a program at Health Barn um a a program that Parks and Recreation is hosting or the Boy Scouts with the rocket launch when those storms come through these children and adults need someplace to go so we've been using that little tiny alcal that's probably the size of these two t for people to run under people diverse really quickly for their cars and then often times Stacy will open the garage at um the gate house for them just to seek shelter immediately until the storm passes so in Clement weather lightning is really a major concern for me as a mom and a Parks and Recreation professional and for us to be able to provide our residents a place to go the other the other benefit is that we will have a new place to host events so whether it's a picnic whether it's a church group whether it's a girl scout uh organization coming together to work on their badges um it gives us an outdoor Pavilion and an outdoor Gathering place for us to be able to assemble restrooms are definitely definitely part of this equation um you know you know how I feel about restrooms don't say it sioban um we've been able to move forward with the gift from Mr Bulger um and those restrooms at the stable coming together with my friends in engineering and retrofitting vaness I mean um vets with those restrooms outdoor restrooms are really important to all of our residents so um I I really want you to consider that for us um and that's it on on that questions anyone so going back to operating um high level how much percentage increase are you asking for and how much is offset by raising a fees okay you got this I can't honestly give you a a percent number um I don't know um what that final was I can tell you that our operating stayed pretty stagnant what was removed from our operating budget last year um we asked back for um we did have to cut certain things and we we did make do but things where um maybe we didn't send out two informational brochures for grade and pool we only sent out one we've asked for those funds back uh when it comes to what we're bringing in we have since talking to Mr Rooney over the summer um added an additional uh now 25% um fee that we take from our vendors when we work with them instead of a 20% um we are collecting out of town fees and we have gone back to look at our programs that we're offering to see what is competitive with other groups what supplies can be purchased with that if we have to pay for those and then what can keep us competitive with other people if we don't want to price ourselves out so I think we're right at that line we should be able to generate some more with these fees but still be reasonable that we're not losing patrons so the overall percentage of increase I'm trying to just figure out what the net extra you're asking for is respect the fact that you're not have a number yet how many digits are in the percent and what does it to start with I don't think that there are digits in the percent good answer I think's the we were giving the directive to keep our budgets flat great answer just so that you know that okay and how successful were you absolutely positively straight on okay CFO back me up here can I can I just make a can I just make a point just is probably something I should have said at the top of the meeting in your actual budget summary sheet which is in the front of each you know right behind each tab it's the front page for each um each area we're going to speak about tonight I did ask the finance department to add in the 2002 Appropriations in one of the columns the reason I asked for the 22 Appropriations to be added is because there were some significant cuts that were all familiar needed to be made in 2023 in order to get under the Appropriations and the tax levy cap some of what we're doing to tonight and as we go through these budget meetings is you're going to start to see some of those line items be restored um some of them were exceeded in 2023 because obviously we had to buy chemicals for the pool so it exceeded what was budgeted in 2023 and we made transfers before the end of the year to correct that um but I did want the council to be able to see the 22 numbers in comparison to what was budgeted for in 23 when the Cuts really needed to be made versus what we're going back um to try to restore 2024 so I just want to point that out and you'll see a consistent theme with that in certain line items that exceeded last year's um budget number as we go through each of these departments so that's helpful I guess my only con um and again it's always easy to have 2020 hindsight is that it looks like it's broken out by each individual Department as opposed to like everything that nany's in charge of so I see grade and I see wreck I don't see one to cover yeah and and that's just how that's just how the state budget format is is formatted uh councilman so that's that's how that's why it's broken up in into these different tax because I do want to give credit if if you know grden is spending more but wreck is spending less like I want to give you credit for that um and obviously income matters to me I know that's a separate conversation sure but also I do want to give credit if you all find ways to make more money for the village you all should be able to spend more money for the village so I those are going to be some of my questions I'm going to have as we get deeper into this but again I don't want to blow this up I want to hear everything um uh you know the fact that the number is flattish is is a really good answer so I will very much keep an open mind and at the February 21st meeting we will do a deep dive into the revenues because by that time everything will have been collected collected um and uh and inputed into the the 24 spending plan so I do I do want to Echo because Nancy doesn't do this all the time but they the parks department is continually asked to do more do more and do more um and when we took our seats last year in my opinion we haven't invested in parks and trees for with no judgment to Prior Council as much as I would have liked to seen the um we've spent money to buy master library and we've relied on interns and Katie working with those interns to bring this important piece of software that will help manage our existing inventory of space and our field utilization and we're relying on interns so I I do agree that prior investment in the department hasn't been as robust as I would like to see it that would Echo all the sentiments I mean we are really in the Parks Department relying on volunteers financially you know we ask our sports groups for a lot we ask the women's gardeners for a lot we ask our shade tree I mean don't get me started on how tough mulching is because I did it to save money this year so I do want to say that they've done a really good job and every single year we ask them to do one little bit more and I think it's to quote Nancy it's at a Tipping Point um but I just want to say thank you because I know we do ask a lot and Katie thank you for managing the intern with the software and if any any body wants to find out more about master Library Katy's running a training session tomorrow night and and mayor along those lines um I just want to Echo the councilwoman's comments here keep in mind what we're talking about tonight are asks right and depending on where we stand budgetarily and the impact on the taxpayer much of this can change between now and mid-march when this budget's proposed to be introduced but I do want to say that when it comes to the Staffing levels I think Nana has made her case um we cannot sustain operating Master Library without additional Personnel I've had extensive conversations with the new superintendent of schools uh they do have an employee that spends a good portion of her full-time job dealing with um the administration of Master library on the board of education side and for us to be able to match that on the village side which a commitment was made long before I arrived here that that was the direction the village and the Board of Education we're going to go collectively in Partnership um we we're going to need to to provide that additional Staffing to make Master Library work here um in addition to that um parks and um shade tree um are a Yan's task and being able to keep up with that especially in light of recent weather events that we've experienced um I think Matt and Nan's recommendation for uh additional personnel there is warranted um it's also a challenge to try to recruit people especially in the tree maintenance area um we've gone out to private entities that uh provide those services and Tred to recruit from the private sector to come over to the public sector uh but it is a challenge to to recruit folks in that space so I also have one two three four five six more Capital requests so um you didn't I don't think you spoke about number three you did the the LED lighting the shelter and three was trees trees well but you didn't really okay so the other thing yeah if if everybody wants to refer to this spreadsheet Um this can walk you through exactly what each of the department requests are thank you so the the next request is the $50,000 Turf replacement initiative that was started by councilman seed in six years ago um he requested that we set aside $50,000 each year in a syncing Fund in order for us to have the appropriate monies in 10 years to replace the field at Maple Park next is a request regarding my Parks division I'm looking for $100,000 for a new F350 pickup truck with a plow this um vehicle will replace a vehicle sadly that it's already been taken out of commission through Parks so your approval on that request is graciously appreciated um the next request is for um an Avante mini loader with a plow this piece of equipment can do it all um it can pick up logs it can move top soil transport clay plow sidewalks it's an uncovered um well mini loader like it says the beauty of it is is that it can help us plow sidewalks since that service has been brought inhouse in the the last two years so all of our operational staff are plowing streets and Municipal sidewalks within the Village um it's a very versatile piece of equipment which serves can serve us in a myriad of ways it can bring equipment to the pool it can help us um with trash removal at our major events um it it's it's really versatile and we're grateful where would you be storing that in the Parks yard is there room for it we'll make room yeah maybe you can stack them so so next I and I'm I'm sorry because I see that my friends in engineering are here um the next request is $300,000 for a fall residential tree planting just so that you understand the requirements with this we are um hoping to plant an additional 200 trees under this program and water for the the following year for these trees um also within the shade tree um area would be a $90,000 uh request and this would be to finalize the CBD um project completely we are looking for uh to be able ble to plant 12 additional trees to finalize the CBD and then be able to water not only the trees that we planted last year but also the trees that we will plant this year and then to be able to sustain them the following year we have realized that our trees are an investment in our infrastructure living breathing plant material that needs to be watered in order for it to continue to grow healthily so I think my friends in regards to capital budget um that is where we are and if if I may just with regard to uh shade tree um so I did reference at the top of the meeting that there were emails circulating over the weekend uh that reflected a very preliminary number for the shade tree commission Capital request for 2024 I believe it was submitted to Bob back in sep September um that number has evolved as we learned more about the mission and what the shade tree commission um and the parks department we're looking to accomplish when it ca comes to tree planting in the village and as Nan said um that $300,000 request for residential shade trees uh will amount to approximately 200 new trees to be planted in 2024 and subsequent watering in order to sustain their growth uh with regard to the 90 ,000 uh there are three uh parts to the CBD planting uh one is that all the trees that were planted in calendar year 22 would continue the watering efforts downtown uh all of the trees that were planted uh there will be there were 12 new trees planted in 2023 the watering would continue um for for that block of trees and then in 2024 uh we'd be looking at 37 mm I'm sorry 37 trees were planted in 23 12 new trees would be planted in 24 all of them would be collectively watered correct um so that is um the ask for capital for 2024 we also met prior to this meeting tonight uh with Nancy with Carolyn um the chair of the shade tree commission and the council liaison councilwoman winegrad uh there is a $60,000 available balance in Prior Capital um which they are going to take take back to their shade tree commission next Tuesday the 13th um and they're going to have a discussion about how best uh to appropriate that additional Capital which most likely will be for maintenance and pruning um but that is a discussion that the committee needs to have before we come to conclusion on that also how many how many trees did you say that $300,000 would plant $300,000 in the residential will be 200 uh there were 37 trees planted in 2023 downtown there would be 12 12 additional in 2024 thank you um and in addition to that I just want to mention under shade tree um we are also working uh with the committee on the new tree ordinance Matt Rogers is currently drafting uh that up for the committee's review um and one of the requests that they've had is tree enforcement um and we have budgeted a part-time position uh that person will likely uh be um compensated hourly uh to come in and provide that service uh to the Village as a whole so that is also included in the part-time operating requests under Staffing under Park so I just wanted to note that as well that was not a request of of the parks department it was a request of the manager after Consulting with the shade tree Commission on their needs with regard to the revised ordinance and I know there are a number of council members who have asked for an uptick and enforcement when it comes to tree maintenance as well okay I just have a couple question are you done Nancy yes thank you okay so um on the person you want to the rec program specialist will that be a full-time job part-time job we're hoping for a parttime position um we have been looking at a salary range between 44 and $55,000 for part time for part for fulltime oh full time full time yeah truthfully I'm looking for a Parks and Recreation professional someone um that is trained in the mechanics and the fil philosophy of what we believe and what we do you know we are incredibly anally detailed um when you think about each and every event you know so if you've ever planned a golf outing or an event for church or the temple or so you know what goes into each and every event um I can tell you honestly in the decades that I've been an employee that has become much more sophisticated in regards to liability in regards to um parental approval requests um for for the last 20 years we have relied on our volunteers to put together that field schedule um this came before me for the first time through councilman Ramon hashe you know he thought it was time for us to take this business into our own hands and manage our own parks and Facilities um so that's that's how it initially started councilwoman and we've gotten ourself to point and this person if I I understood you correctly they would be working kind of after hours and weekends so that's our desire and that's that sounds like it would be really hard to find somebody to do that sad but true right all of us in the recreation field understand understand that you don't we don't recreate between weekdays between 8:30 and 4:30 some people have that benefit some people have that privilege the most of us do not right so understanding in the field and the three of us at this table kind of knew that when we got into it you know um I can say that we're people people you know we understand people's needs we understand the quality of life we understand what keeps them healthy and we really think that um this person um will be able to be flexible um and be able to you know possibly give us a couple of nights at the stable you know some of our concerns are somebody wants to buy a badge but they can't do it you know they can purchase their badge online which I'm very proud of but they can't get their picture taken so it's frustrating for them right because they can't come during the day so maybe even just to be able to offer one or two nights a week and maybe that occasional Saturday morning would just give our residents a little bit more freedom and the opportunity to further what they love fair enough um then the next add on to that going back to what Evan had asked um it would also help us with Revenue because now we can offer a little bit more one of the Hang-Ups that we're starting to see with after school programming is the schools offer after school parents that don't get out of work till later if we're only offering programs till 4:30 or 5:00 we're very limited if we have somebody who has a different set of hours and can stay a little bit later we can now offer a five to6 program a six to7 and even more adult programs for the working parent um and then we'd be able to generate a little bit more revenue on that side that sounds good um and then getting back to the Pavilion on the capital it shows that shelter Pavilion structure 340,000 and then on the next line it says installation concrete slab footing structure electric so that's supposed to be parentheses and know that it's all included oh okay it's all so it's 340,000 total total pack it's not 340 plus 350 with the bathrooms yes well surprising okay 340 total Okay um and with that structure how I mean I know you know and I don't want to get into a big conversation but would Health Barn be allowed to use the tables and everything for their programs or would it be more for the residents to if they want to on a whim hey let's meet a tabernacle have a picnic you know you wouldn't want people to go there and the tables are taken up with a so the way that both Green Acres and the village approaches this is that parks are parks right they are available to the public um any Resident regardless of where they live um since we accepted Green Acres money are welcome to our facilities but having said that I think that there will be controls put in place where possibly her programs can meet there on Tuesdays and Thursdays and the rest of the time be available to the res res um you know it's the way that we handle the playground now there are no specifics on that councilwoman you know those facilities are available to the taxpayers of the state of New Jersey okay and then just one last question just because to me the numbers don't make sense where it was 300,000 will plant 200 trees and watering for like a year and then we have 990,000 to plant 12 additional trees and water 37 plus 12 Trees like I don't know the 990,000 just seems much higher so n can I say a couple things because shade trees is here so I just want to make sure we have multiple buckets regarding shade tree we have residential trees we have CBD we thankfully are done with Emerald ashb so we do them in different buckets because how that that's how they're allocated last year um the shade Tre commissioned petition for watering in the central business district because those trees live the toughest life they're the least likely to survive they live in harsh environment they don't have access to water and so when we did the CBD which last year was 37 plus the ones that are already in there we water them twice a week and then you know we we it moves based upon rain last year F everybody laughed now remember how dry it was in the beginning of the year we were really worried during the Spring that it was never going to rain it was a serious concern concern and the year the street trees I think there were 108 or something that were at risk of dying so shade tree made the recommendation that the capital for planting be used to offset firste trees in residential for the first time ever so everyone with me so last year we took a a a replanting chunk and service the trees to ensure their survival so this year what they're doing is saying we're going to plant the residential trees we're going to plant these 12 remaining trees thank you to Andrew Lowry and Pam that's an expanded scope they're at the the mouth of the driveways so it's adding more Greenery in town those trees the 37 the existing plant of the tough trees like the hard survival trees get watered and then last year the first trees that we put in residential will also get watered but I believe it's once a week so net net you have all this added up so you have in shade tree this recommendation you have 212 total new trees you have an expansion of the watering system to ensure livelihood not only in the CBD but on the residential section and then you should smile about the enforcement thing both of you and the whole committee and um that's sort of where we end up one thing I do want to highlight is that this doesn't include the potential of 50 additional trees or if Nancy Brenan Hill has her way of a 100 additional trees and the rille District where some of you live with adopta sapling so net net it's 212 the expansion of watering to ensure the survival of those baby trees which I'm told not to call them baby trees but I like the expression and expanded enforcement with the expanded enforcement that money that's earmarked in enforcement as a change that Carolyn and Andrew recommended with shade tree last year will come right back rather than to the general fund into the tree fund so um I want to say this because we do fight in shade tree quite a bit and we do like and love each other quite a bit as well this is a very good plan it ensures that there's not in the year before too much and not too little and that the trees that we put in the ground cuz the number one cause of death to a tree is lack of watering that they have the best shot at surviving and it doesn't include adopting adopt a sapling which now the challenge is on Nancy 100 trees that was it Nancy thank you very much I appreciate it and ladies and gentlemen the hour grows late um I'm sure we have many other questions but just so you know this is our first witness this evening and we have we will be here so with unless anyone has any serious objection Pam I have questions serious objection yeah here you go okay I want to understand the operating budget um under the first page uh detail 31 has to do with chemicals they're up significantly like by 400 plus per and if you can I I looked at the detail and I don't quite understand why it went from 600 6,500 to 38,500 so this is going to be a consistent theme even when we get to Wastewater Pollution Control there are significant increases in um in chemical costs and Nan can speak to that and I'm sure Chris Ken as well when he when he comes up next uh but the one thing I will point out to you there is that that line item did take a significant cut in 23 that's what I so if you if you go back to the 22 appropriation it was $32,000 we're restoring it up to 385 because of the inflationary costs when it comes to chemicals um but you'll see um you know you'll see that that's an adjustment that we're trying to make to get back on to the actual budget number we need okay I wanted confirmation on that and Chris can speak more to the chemical costs going up because we've spoken about it at Great length during his budget meetings and then um on Parks uh the it's detail number 13 temporary and seasonal employees that's gone up a lot and I didn't see on that detail um mention of the recreational professional that you're talking about now um so the the um the additional wreck person um or Rec program specialist is under the recreation budget um so if you go back to the rec tab um second page back lists all of the Staffing uh staff members including the potential for the new position so that falls under re marks yes okay that's XXX is a is an unnamed person to to be named if the uh if the budget passes with that appropriation all right and then in the Parks so so in Parks I do see detail 13 temporary and seasonal employees the salaries have gone up 100% is that because we had nobody and now we hired somebody so if you go to the third and fourth page behind there y you'll see one is for shade tree enforcement part-time that's the position I I referenced with regard to to tree enforcement and maintenance um the second is um seasonal employees n do you want to speak to the the the the Staffing um in that area so seasonal employees in the past um we have generally been able to hire young adults and um we're looking to be able to switch our our thought process on that and be able to hire adults and those who have retired we're finding that our young adults um and their work ethic um is somewhat challenging um and I truly believe that we will get a better product if we spend a little bit more and go for that maturity um the last two years I I can share with you and some of you in the audience know we have hired um a 63y old um and a 58 yearold um adult males who are retired just looking for something to do and their their work is impeccable so my thought process is that I would like to be able to um enhance what we're doing Lorraine with some outside mature staff um rather than hurting cats okay and then as to trees that must be removed for safety reasons um are we are we budgeting for that that's or do we yeah that's the remaining six $60,000 of carry over well we're we are committee Reliant and we are going to discuss this at our next meeting but the chair and I were hesitant to remove that given the liability so Carolyn and I just found out about the carryover today and I think Nancy on her recommendation we want to make sure we keep that $60,000 for maintenance and hazardous removal but we want to take it back to the committee through you mayor just to go back to the deputy mayor's question about the part-time Staffing Bob has a something'd like that so the request this year was exactly the same as they requested last year and were approved we they didn't hire enough people because of availability so we transferred money out of there so the request of the 30 is the same as they asked for last year gotcha okay and then I did want to thank uh the parks department under detailed 50 acquisition of equipment for for stroke engine back back backpack leaf blowers thank you much better for the environment so I'm I'm sorry I know we want to move on but I'm just struggling to understand one thing so as I SC as I go through the package speak to the microphone please as I go through the packet um I'm seeing percentage increases total budget of 6% 15% on each one of these Pages how are we flat I'm sorry last sure so how are we flat I mean or you I'm seeing all these proposed numbers are 6% 15% increases overlap last year's budget in front of us on for these you know these couple of tabs we're looking at am I reading this wrong am I missing something so in some cases you're comparing numbers that we reduced last year so on their request it may be the same as what they had last year we didn't allow for promotions we didn't allow for new people coming on board so they're asking to replenish those this year and bring it back um so as far as being flat we're not flat yet we're still having these conversations and we're moving forward but this is what they're asking for we trimmed down some of this already so now we're presenting it to you to for questions and and and much of it is contingent upon what we spent last year for example when we get to a fleet and you look at the number that's associated with tires your head's going to spin so um so you know we're what we're aiming to do here is to create a balance I mean there there are certain inflationary pressures that we can't control obviously but at the same time where we can control and where we're reducing staff where we're moving to for example privatizing the cleaning of this building and reassigning staff you'll start to see that as we go through each of the budget items so I'll look for the you know I I look for where this balances out but I got to tell you if we're at 6% 7% this will be a very quick conversation because I will never agree to raise taxes by that much again understood one more comment to your question earlier about revenues so I believe Nancy did a report I'm going to say back in November on Gren which showed it that it made money and I think anticipated the Staffing that she's requesting for this year along with whatever fee increases they were going to establish so positive note so great two things I want to add sorry I know everybody's waiting but this I never get to go first with my committees uh one we had the Lifeguard shortage and one of the reasons we all decided to increase some of the hourly rates was to ensure that Gren could be staffed and the increase in our lifeguard rate where we played equivalent of the Jersey Shore and tire that's one reason and two is are is everything with the minimum wage reflective here because the other thing is I think this is the last year for that Mandate of an increase across seasonal so um you know we will with respect to Gren pool there was a clamoring to have it staffed that resulted in an increase to ensure that we got the appropriate labor force and to do that we had to incentivize them with additional money and I think that was a good call I think everybody I hope this full Council was proud of our efforts to open Gren and to attract the labor force that's critical we needed to pay them more anyone else I am failured moving this along quickly um that being said I absolutely first I want first I want to Echo exactly what Evans said who as I always say goes right to the heart of the matter there are lots of things we want and need and uh but we can never ever go back to what happened last year first that being said Nancy I want to thank you for your passionate and well-reasoned and well supported uh request for uh for your budget I especially want to thank Matt and Katie and Deanna I do not know how the four of you run this expansive Department that takes up about a third of this budget book um and the programs that you run uh again I just want to thank you on behalf of of this Council thank you so much my pleasure and with that I just have one more announcement to share with you just want is it going to cost us any money no actually this is an honor um a um several weeks ago we submitted a nomination to the New Jersey Recreation and Parks Association for an award in excellence in programming Deanna you want to share our good news it's been 10 years coming and I bet you that council member Siobhan winegrad is going to be very excited we have won the Daniel M Gastel birdie excellence and Recreation programming award for the annual giving thanks Ridgewood Elder dinner so this Council prior Council and the village itself and all our partners and our volunteers this is something that I was so happy on Friday we had our staff meeting in the morning and we've been waiting to hear back and I got to my computer and I see something in red I'm like and it was red in a good way so KD I are high-fiving in the in the office Nancy has no idea what's going on but um it was really exciting to get that news on Friday so we will be uh accepting that award from ngpa at our conference at the end of February specifically the 27th of February at their uh 49th uh dinner so um we're just super excited and I am so excited I'm so proud of all of us um sioban can I call you sioban sioban has been a has been a Committee Member since the beginning since 2016 so I knew that you would be really excited to hear this this and Pam has been there as as a volunteer during covid and in in the uh snow waiting for people to come and pick up dinners Paul was just there uh this past year um so it was it was wonderful and I'm just really happy that we can share that news with you guys tonight so thank you for conratulations support outstanding [Applause] work shall we go to the second item on the agenda y I'd ask uh Chris rter Houser our village engineer and his um supervisors to come forward we are doing yes chis good evening Mr ruthazer good evening mayor and councel uh I have with me tonight Mike Juna supervisor of streets and Fleet and Rich tton supervisor of traffic and Signal uh Jim Fels could not make it because he is subscribing to one of our model which is Family First his son has a very important basketball game so he's there first things first and and welcome gentlemen where would you like to start waiting for Mr kasmar to return well he's walking across I want to publicly thank you for Paving roads they are markedly better than they have been in a very long time thank you very much tremendous amount of credit for that it's not entirely The Villages credit uh Bergen County did a lot of Paving als I'm giving you an easy one here Chris I can't lie because uh and by the way people involved coordinating with Bergen County coordinating with PS CNG and getting them all to come to the table because for a while while they were there roads they didn't get paved and they got paved this year and here let me tell you what the answer is now thank you so much we did a great job because you did thank you you all did team effort every one of you guys so mayor as you're aware uh there are a number of Divisions that fall under uh Chris's jurisdiction we're going to take take you through each of them tonight um and each are tabbed uh under uh engineering and uh Chris's lead so Chris you want to uh kick us off with uh Building Maintenance which I believe is the uh the first portion of your budget to be discussed uh yes Building Maintenance as uh Keith alluded to we are making a change in janitorial services for this building um we're using a vendor uh that vendor will also be doing cleaning effort at Lester stable uh Douglas spice and where else Rich oh at the Ambulance Corp that's dou this place how much do we think that saves us um we have to look up how much we save ballpark remember how much we save use the microphone Bob actually has a spreadsheet on this that will'll distribute to the council while Chris is talking I think for uh 24 we're estimating about $88,000 savings I'm not Mist working there's a sheet right in the back of all right which one behind 771 772 and it shows the uh movement of a Personnel over to another department and the contractual commitment on the uh Building Maintenance so the savings for this year is a little over $8,000 that's great ah there we go okay it's the it's the one uh portrait mode sheet in there and as Bob said it's behind 771 right before 772 but that's the breakdown of the Personnel changes versus the um the cleaning service and to the for the council's uh consideration while we save $8,300 with the change in custodial Services the individual that was doing those efforts is being transferred to Recycling and is going to focus a lot of his efforts on the clean community's work and Hudson garage because we have heard from the residents from the business Community they would like to see more services and better services for those locations and and just to be clear the employee who handles uh during part of their day the Hudson garage will then be able to expand his efforts in the CBD itself um the exterior sidewalk areas along the business district um we'll have somebody um focusing their efforts on the Hudson garage and it frees up uh this building to be um adequately addressed by the new vendor okay any questions on the building maintenance budget that we can answer all good okay next up is Board of adjustment I will mention that um we have had a request from the chair of the board of adjustment to take on additional meetings this year um in talking to Chris and Jane the secretary to the board um and Greg the chair um the directive that I gave to Chris and Greg was if the applicant comes in and requests a special meeting specifically to hear their application those professional costs for the village professionals for the board of professionals will be passed along to the applicant if the board chooses to have a special meeting especially in order to address any residential applications that are getting backed up because of the commercial applications that have taken u a number of hearings uh to get through the testimony uh the village will pick up the costs for those professionals on the village side um but we do want to try to adequately get to those residential um applications so we're not holding people up from construction projects and that type of thing Chris I don't know if you anything anything else you want to add uh yes uh zoning board is the busy of the two land boards land use boards excuse me um one of the things that the zoning board is facing right now is a time of decision rule under the municipal land use law where if an applicant isn't decided or acted upon by the board um the applicant may get a default approvement that's 120 days yeah and we've got a considerable backlog with the Zony board so we're trying to move on that it's difficult to schedule additional meetings because the board attorney Bruce Whitaker is very very busy uh he's also very good uh so Jane is trying to figure out what they we could possibly have an additional meeting currently they're running if we have a fifth Tuesday in the month they have a third meeting in the month uh for example the zoning board will be meeting tomorrow uh with the intent to catch up on some of the residential applications uh because as Keith mentioned construction season is just around the corner people like get their approvals in whatever shape or form so they can move forward with submitting plans for building permits so the point in me telling you that is uh items uh line items 21 and 28 under this uh under this category that's why you see an increase is to to handle that uh that backlog amongst the board of adjustment so it's 120 days and then goes to a default uh the applicant can demand an AA default approval um we haven't had any occur yet uh John Barry our planner myself we have maybe a fallback position where we'll do a rigorous review of the applicant and maybe find something that can kick it back but nonetheless that still extends the time frame for the applicant and since the zoning board nor normally deals with one and two family residences uh it affects mostly our residents directly right it could be very frustrating when you're trying to extend your porch and it's a minor variance and you can't get on the docket because there's a billboard application and a and a and an autoshop application and you're getting put back month after month because of these larger commercial applications so we're trying to accommodate those resident requests okay move on to engineering Chris or you want to do planning planning board or what order do you have uh well engineering then Fleet then planning board I'm just going to go by go by tab order okay sorry these nicely fonted tabs I must say the nice font tabs we were talking about the budget it looks so good Bob and Olivia too uh with engineering uh Staffing will stay the same um we might hire an intern if we get funded for him we haven't had one for years we did have a volunteer intern last summer uh he's a high school student lives around the corner he was actually very handy did a lot of computer work for us very good we may want to see if we can get him back this year questions why did Mark increase so much because of all the natural gas main work oops I'm sorry I didn't have the mic why did natur the question was why did Natural Gas why did markouts increase so much uh because all the gas main work from pscg all the tree work with tree plantings uh and another factor is going to be Richard Waters uh lead and galvanized lateral Replacements those are all things that need markouts require markouts other questions good thanks Chris move on well hold on are we going to go to Capital or is that going to be we're we're going to do Capital at the end yeah okay Nan kind of broke the rules but we let her that's why I was Nan and um the the full-time in increased a lot is that because you hired somebody new in engineering yep we hired a new engineer about 20 months ago Chris pierer he's also a licensed engineer so that makes two of us in the department he's been very handy because I am conflicted on some applications before the land use boards so he covers them like the uh electric billboard I'm conflicted on that he attends the meeting as The Village's licensed engineer that explains it thank you okay I also just want to mention too that um some of the salary and wages from the engineering department um are being charged to Capital which is a traditional expense so when they're working on road resurfacing when they're working on you know sidewalk projects when they're work working on anything um that is funded through Capital their salaries being offset by that which is the same concept as it would be if we had a Consulting engineer rather than an in-house engineering staff um so um Bob will make those those transfers as it's necessary anyone else Fleet where's Fleet Mike can talk about tires [Laughter] now uh Fleet we have uh no change in Personnel we continue to function with our four mechanics they're all very capable individuals uh I think the biggest budget increases are materials and supplies tires parts for the equipment we use and uh so forth 30% increase I think I so no 54% no I'm sorry 30% 54 would be realistic yeah parts are hard to get a get and the price has gone up uh we have had police cars how long's the police car been at the 23 Ford use the microphone now we're starting to run into everything seemed to get a lot better and now we're having delays again with trying to get parts uh just speak into the microphone please sorry unfortunately with police cars to keep the pursuit rate rated vehicle status that it has it has to be OEM parts and we've had some challenges with the uh with the tahos I mean this is a quarter of a million dollar increase I'm not saying we don't need it I'm just saying that again coming back to what we're saying before if we're going to look to keep a relatively flat budget across the board we're going to have to find some other places to save money to be able to spend a quarter million dollars more than we did last year on this um we believe in keeping the cars for the police department in particular Pursuit rated and the reason I say that um about 101 15 years ago we had police cars that were brought up to the academy and they flunked out of the academy the car not the driver not our police officer because they were in such poor state of repair I I don't argue with the need I'm just talking about the fiscal reality that we'll have to figure out a way to pay for it and that's a lot of money that's ear add up I I have had conversation with conversations with the police department I think they're looking at increasing some of our car use fees for outside jobs okay um that's good I don't want to take their Thunder but I think they'll present that to you and when they do their budget okay um if there's a way to offset it I'm all yours I hope that's what they're considering and Chris I see under line item 51 $170,000 for police vehicle maintenance um if I'm not mistaken wasn't this taken out of the police budget and put into Fleet I believe so and so that would be a significant part of that very significant increase so it's really I think and correct me if I'm wrong Keith and Bob is this basically a bookkeeping change that it went from one Department to another 51 you some of it I don't think it was entirely I think part of the 170 is new um it may have been ,000 that was in police before but as Chris said they're experiencing a lot more body work and maintenance work on these police vehicles that we have so that's the reason for that increase in that line item you have an idea of how much of that 170 um is a transfer from the police budget my guesstimate is roughly $50,000 okay thank you um I want to thank you for reducing overtime by a lot and uh also okay so we had to buy a lot of tires but we should be doing less recapping then right if the Caps don't blow okay I me I'll stay hopeful a cap is a lesser Quality Tire you can't put a cap tire on a front two wheels because of those your drive Wheels um you put them on the back if they pop they blow off got to get another one mhm all right questions planning board planning board had a stellar Stellar year last year very little very few meetings um very few applications uh so we didn't have meetings uh when we cancel a meeting we do not incur the charge for the planner or for the board attorney we think that'll be different this year um we have one minor subdivision that's been submitted uh another minor subdivision that's just basically a lot line rearrangement otherwise um we haven't gotten wind of any large planning projects uh that would come to the planning board uh we also do not know what Valley Hospital is going to do since they are leaving uh moving to pramis on I think middle of April 14th or 18th or something um I've seen some online Media news releases on what they plan on doing but they haven't approached us at the planning board and also keep in mind any zoning changes so if they're you know we're right now talking about inclusionary versus exclusionary zoning things of that nature those ordinances need to go to the planning board and usually they take a a stop off at the planner uh for any types of comments or recommendations so there is some money built into this budget to make sure that we can accommodate any planning costs relative to any zoning changes that the council might want to consider uh also in the planning board budget at the very bottom is historic preservation um they would like a individual to take notes um we have to see if that is approved by you folks historical preservation committee yeah yeah we agreed we're going to take turns strike that from the budget see I'm m in Valu you got it I'm glad you I'm glad you said that because we were days away from putting that out to existing staff yeah we should go back to the committee but we talked about it we agreed we'd all take turns and I think I just volunteered myself now for one those turns I guess but we're not spending $116,000 for somebody to take notes um I take a lot of notes and I would suggest you record the meetings at least on you know just orally because it's not an easy task um we we do have the recording devices too we at parks and R record them and I believe several of them it's like a center console um most of my meetings Parks some Rec uh does open space do it too no yeah so we you can talk to Nancy but we do have a backup recorder we we can talk later I mean I'm not a huge fan of recording meetings I think it cuts down on on people speaking candidly keep in mind HBC has no actual Authority we're advisory only but either way we'll work something out and we're not going to spend $116,000 for somebody to take notes okay thank you uh other than that the budget there is just a little Postage and stuff materials and supplies may I ask you Chris about detail 28 um it's it's other Professional Services there's one line item that says legal services for the board attorney $500 per meeting and I gather that's Steve Welling horse and then it says on another line legal services to board and that's $8,000 why are there two entries I don't understand uh one is probably the meeting attendance fee and the other one is for answering questions when they're posed to the attorney for legal advice oh gotcha and the other day we also have always bubbling a little bit in the background is the affordable housing situation uh so when questions come up on that we would like to get get the legal advice on that rather than myself or John isn't that under the next detail 29 affordable housing they sometimes sometimes get Blended in planner so that that's the separate planner but uh the board attorney might be utilized for any legal type of questions streets let's go so Chris going back to the question from the Gren pool budget uh can we can we just talk to the chemical piece um I know we talked a lot about it in your individual budget meeting with Bob and I uh but could you just expand on that a little bit for the council in the street division yeah um well generally speaking because it comes up here and then it comes up again in water pollution when when we bid out purchase of chemicals or some items we buy off a cooperatives uh you're correct we are seeing price increases uh significant price increases um for like sodium hypochloride which is our principal disinfection we have little we have little Alternatives and I see what you you actually saved money elsewhere you're coming in at like 0% on this which is great so you absorb that which is exactly the type of set we love to see and like I've said before remarkable job on the roads on top of it well we're trying very hard and we have a capital request that is very much geared to that one other thing I'd like Bob to just review um or any offsets because of the snow trust um this is money that we are able to carry over from year to year in case we have a heavy snow year but Bob you want to just speak to that and how it applies to this budget so in some of these departments where um we have storm related incidents for overtime or chem chemicals or anything that's associated with a storm we're allowed to use money that we've accumulated over time into our what is called a snow trust account uh so you'll see in some of these Pages here where I've reduced the request knowing that I have money in the snow trust to compensate for any of these potential storms we're fortunate last year to have minimal amount of of use so this year we've already had a few events that is starting to eat into that but for the most part we we're pretty solid in what we've we've put aside there and the last meeting that we're going to have together you'll see the balances that we have in these trust accounts that are going to be available yeah our principal chemical for the street division is rock salt for de iing um we purchased that off the Bergen County cooperative bid um they also Bergen County also gives us a quantity of tonnage for every storm for the Bergen County Roads that we are obligated to De I and plow and just to clarify it's not that we're using more chemicals it's just that the prices are going up prices are going up and well compared this year compared to last year we've already used a lot more we had a re we had a very difficult icing storm um we burn through most of our two Salt bins uh you know it comes down rain then freezes so we have to Salt then we plow then it freezes then we have to Salt uh it was a complicated storm it was very lengthy it was not a easy storm like a a simple 8 in of snow where we just have to plow and once the roads are plowed a little bit of so Sol to get them black and ready for the motorist to use thank you move to Signal are are we going to cross our fingers for a mild winter come on we we after that global warming is not a bad thing cuts down on salt use I think the the big issue in the operating expenses for the signal division is some well-deserved promotions for our staff uh they've gone above and beyond uh they've educated themselves they Advance their skill sets and the village is the significant beneficiary of that um traffic and Signal maintains are game well also known as a fiber optic Network um Rich can speak more to it since it's his Division and Rich before you go one thing I just want to point out to the council um one of the things we've talked a lot about is succession planning um especially in the divisions that report to Chris um so some of the Personnel moves that we're making here and potentially at the water pollution control facility um are meant to just put us on the right trajectory as far as leadership in these areas moving forward so rich I'll turn it over to you uh so we did a lot of changeovers um with the Department as we spoke about transferring a custodian um we also transferred another member of signal over to the street department for Mike we felt his um expertise be better used in the street division um one issue that we've had in the past 10 years was signal is we've had a lot of gentlemen retire and they've taken a lot of that that knowledge base with them so I have almost a whole department full of gentlemen who have been here for 7 eight years that are still laborers that's their title that's their salary although they are skilled technicians we fix HVAC we fixed Plumbing we're electricians um we're fiber optic technicians we are heavy equipment operators and these gentlemen are due proper promotions um to titled positions with civil service if anybody understands where that is that guarantees you a role for the future in your career we need to maintain these men it's hard to find people with multiple tasks we have same guys that can all do electric H AC Plumbing fiber and dig trenches and back fi trenches that usually takes four or five different guys when you do that we have four guys that can all do that themselves we need to retain these men and if they are not promoted um and given an honest day wage for an honest day's work we're going to lose them uh we were able to save thousands and thousands of dollars this year over not hiring contractors um we saved $188,000 in two days we did the heat unit on the roof of the EMS building ourselves in house the laborer cost was $188,000 we did it for about $2,800 we fixed the grade and pool well pump out here on the park um the wires that that power the pump that feed water across fets field to Gren pool those wires went bad last year right before rba's opening day um and they went to finance to get $112,000 for a contractor to came in to dig up the trench the weekend of RBA opening weekend we said hold it give us a minute we put a repair on it we got it to last through the summer and we waited for football to end and soccer to end and as soon as it was over we went in we dug the trench we replaced the wire we replaced it we saved $122,000 on that project so we do this multiple times every year and I'm sure that we're going to get the same opportunity this year and the year after to create these savings these are the same guys that do the hpac on the roof that dig trenches that fix fiber um we are building out the water skated Network for them as this beos plant comes out we had fiber optic Network to support their skater at a huge cost savings you don't have monthly cost of Verizon to control water pump stations in wof Inland Park and Glenrock we have our own fiber Network that connects to these and we do that all inhouse no monthly cost to Verizon to connect to these units over the internet to control your water system so these men save tons of money so I believe transferring the custodian and transferring one member to Street Division I believe it's almost an equal on the money but the guys get an honest day's pay for honest day's work they're getting paid as laborers and they skilled technicians me you're coming in on salaries are coming in kind of flat even with the extra money for these well that's what rich just said we Lo we transferred out two people from the signal Division and that's going to be offsetting the request for the welld deserved promotions okay and so where is the salar of those two folks now going to be reflected well one's going to recycling and Par uh recycling okay and the other one is in the street division all right so we'll see the salaries there but no but don't get me wrong I I completely agree with everything You' just said just again just a matter about finding the money to do the right thing well that's why Rich looked very carefully at the staff we also looked carefully because building maintenance the two custodians is part of signal so you know he took the initiative in Seeking a vendor that is actually on a Cooperative they do clean the uh Bergen County Sheriff's offices and they clean the county court system so they're vetted for our police department and our violations office so that shows an $8,300 savings not terribly large but it's still something yeah no agre I don't have any questions but because it's my first year I I did want to just say thank you because we don't sit on any committees especially to Chris for supporting shade tree with the markouts and always as new council members answering all the questions about institutional knowledge as a joke I often say well that was when Liam was little Chris would know and so I am very grateful to engineering for everything you've done and for me for answering all my questions and um to Rich I want to say thank you as well I know that a lot of the projects that I've spearheaded have been a little different for signal and I have so enjoyed working with you on making downtown more beautiful through um improving our garbage cans the kissing balls and possibly the biggest compliment to your division was that when we asked to support the access committee which is such a rare occurrence to get signals supporting access you sent somebody who sat out in the cold and waited for us to light the Christmas tree and that's not reflected here but I'm really thankful to both of you you and we never get a s chance to really say that so one year in I I've asked a lot of crazy questions and gone down a lot of different paths for both of you and I'm just very grateful and Rich and I a little spoiler alert have a new project that's going to be coming out that uh I think everybody's going to be excited because it's going to save us money and improve a community spirit so I'm going to leave you all in suspense oh goody and you're you're going to love it Chris you're going to love it so much [Laughter] much he was just as enthusiastic in the emails I know he secretly likes it I know it and Rich um on behalf of the rotary club we really appreciated the opportunity to paint the game well boxes that was really fun they'd like to do it again and um and the public should know that that you took your day off on a weekend to to help the the crew we really appreciated it thanks so much Rich all right utilities ah utilities I think uh the big a big cost increase is actually from rdwood water because their water rates have gone up considerably with all the posos uh sear charges that they're required to add for the work they're doing uh fuel has stayed actually kind of not so bad for us in the last year or so and Hope hope it'll stay that way is that is that petrol yes you're showing is that a 19% increase I reading it right well let's see we have a 43% increase isn't it think it's a 43% increase we're showing it a 9638 39 is the proposed 2024 budget and actual as of December 31st 2023 is 681 uh 18 but I'm not 100% certain if all the latest bills have been submitted they they have been we and if they I think December was estimated but we didn't average to figure it out okay well that's great that we're at 671 um gasoline as everybody knows has been under $3 a gallon for regular uh it is creeping back up a little bit um we have to see how it is with fuel uh both Diesel and gasoline I mean but you requested 800,000 last year it's great you're under budget not going to complain about that you're asking for another 150,000 on top of what you last for last year and we under budget for this year I wish I had a crystal ball on fuel prices um I'm trying to be conservative if that has to be reduced so be it we'll cross our fingers and hope fuel stays where it is right now okay the other thing is also like last year we didn't have any much snow plowing so that was a reduction in diesel fuel um we didn't have too many bad storms that required a lot of fuel for vehicles and so forth okay I hear you just it's a third more than when you've actually spent so far I realize that okay like I said if you got a crystal ball that tells us feel free to let us know okay everybody good on utilities Water Pollution Control Water Pollution Control has one Personnel request that Keith mentioned uh we would like to promote one of the senior members to chief operator which is a supervisory position uh currently when the supervisor is not present we usually pay a senior person an extra hour a day to act as the acting supervisor is the acting supervisor so that's the only Personnel request we have um good news on water pollution is last year our liquid waste acceptance program took in 148,149 um great nice sum of money but it goes to Mna I wish it didn't but that's the way the budget Works um another example of how efficient The Village's own treatment plant is we have about 56 connections that go to Northwest Bergen Utilities Authority and when you divide that into their annual charge it comes out to about $900 $8 $900 per connection our cost per resident is around 220 roughly because we have about 800 8,100 connections so the plant is much more cost effective in comparison to North Westburg and up in Waldwick um going forward uh chemicals maybe an additional cost um we have a lot of repairs to make uh the plant's last upgrade was in 2005 it was completed in 2005 started probably in 2002 so a lot of our equipment has been running 247 for close to 20 years questions yard waste yard waste has a number of interesting things for us going forward um we have a new permit that we have to comply with uh we have to test the storm water rain runoff on a quarterly basis we're going to start doing our first test tomorrow and then we'll have to see how those results fit in with our parameters and with what the DP will require us to do uh good news is the Scarab that the council had funded a couple years ago the new Scarab has started to prove its worth it's making much more efficient windr um we believe we have some capacity for additional leaves uh I mentioned this to Keith and he has also gotten inquiries we're going to start having some conversations with ad Jason communities to see if we can take their leaves we have we have two neighboring municipalities ities that saw a significant increase in disposal uh for leaves so I'm in discussions with both of the administrators from each of those towns about possibly you know using our facility um we try to be more competitive than what they're paying now but at the same time the village would see an increase in Revenue uh utilizing two other municipalities to to Great have access to our facility what what's important to keep in mind with Lake View is we do all our leaves inhouse in the village with those communities uh they really don't have a leaf composting facility um I know other towns are subject to trucking costs and once you start Trucking leaves to an offsite dump um you get very addicted to it until the price goes up which I think is what our neighbors are starting to experience shared services opportunity for sure yes absolutely and thank you very much I know this is something that you and I have spoken about Keith and I have spoken about out that we are in a sweet spot in terms of the services that we provide our community that we can offer to our neighboring communities that are often times smaller towns um in shared services Arrangements which would only benefit our taxpayers so thank you very much for Keith and I believe it will be a big benefit for us sounds thank you I have a quick question under uh 48 disposal fees disposal of grass clippings MH um it shows it says 82,2 but then if you go to 048 it says 100,000 but then I guess Bob is adjusting it to recycling Trust of 25,000 what is that your that's a trust account that we have that we've used in the past to offset some of these costs okay all right and then just a quick question does the village when we mow our own property do we leave the grass clippings or do yes we do yeah I mean they might bring a little bit where they had to clean up that but like on the larger Fields there's no bagging attachments no no capture attachment okay anyone else mayor if I may I just want to collectively thank this group of gentlemen across the table here um you know in the last seven months we've experienced it all at least that's how it feels between uh flooding and snowstorms um these three gentlemen are always always a phone call away always um ready to respond to any situation um I know Mike has been kind enough to extend his contact information uh to the school personnel as they're making decisions about snow days and um trying to keep folks safe uh whether they should open school or have a delayed opening or what have you um you know Rich's crew was here uh through the night with with us um you know for the various flooding events um and Chris has led that effort so I just want to collectively take the opportunity to thank them and their teams for all they've done you're welcome and I want to I want to Echo that I know all three of you guys since long before I was on the council and I know you are always around to fix things to help to get streets in the condition we need them to get lights on um I personally can't thank you enough uh really you guys are terrific and before they excuse themselves we do have to visit a capital budget as well ohal got holding off on that thank you I'm going to just just a minute yep all right uh for engineering we have the capital request for Kingsbridge lane bridge uh Rehabilitation um Keith had asked me to get a an updated price from our Consulting engineer and I regret the report I haven't gotten that email back we did have a price last year I think it was like 394,000 so hopefully if things don't go up more than like 10 15% will be good with the requested appropriation uh we also have the usual Street resurfacing reconstruction amount uh that bid docu document has been advertised or will be advertised excuse me in this Friday's Richwood News newspaper and the other project that we want to go forward with is the West GL sidewalk um our ask for 1.2 uh may be reduced because we did meet with the residents last September I believe um a lot of them were very open to discussing smaller and reduced size and scope and scale retaining walls uh I am getting a number of emails from one resident where the color will have to match her house and that'll be another challenge so do we think the 950 for Glenn and the 5 15 for Kingsbridge those are close to I know obviously they're going to change but these are close to real numbers yes yes I agree with Chris that they're close but I I want to just sort of Bob and I have looked at it as these are placeholders right now right as we get towards the finalization of the budget process you know Chris hopefully will have Chris make clear he doesn't have a crystal ball I get it just want to make sure that we're in the ball but I anticipate we'll have a more firm number from the bridge Consulting engineer on King Bridge um West Glenn we still have a little fine tuning but you know these are the numbers that we are comfortable using just to be able to figure out what the other allocations would be for Capital which are listed below and just say the obvious I know I think I think for all of us these two projects are priorities so absolutely I want to make sure we don't lose side on it AB that's been instilled in me very well so if you have a crystal ball will I have a sidewalk on Glenn next year H gosh darn I hope so all right good so some some good news on the capital side and just to move the conversation along with regard to flea in the fuel tanks I want Chris to speak to that project uh we have about $750,000 um that is in Prior Capital this 250 I believe gets us to the point where we can actually Undertake and complete the project correct Chris uh that's correct uh we The Village hired a specialized engineer to develop the plans and specs for replacing our gasoline and diesel fuel tanks uh we currently have 12,000 gallons of each product uh we're going to go forward with the same amount and the reason is we found that was extremely extremely beneficial to the Village during Hurricane Sandy because that was a wind event and a lot of people in the community were out of power for weeks um we did lend some diesel fuel to Valley Hospital for their generator because they ran out um but we were very very pleased that we had all the fuel necessary to provide the services to the community that we needed to and also like fuel to fire barment Vehicles police cars nobody ran out of fuel uh so going forward we want to replace the current tanks the reason we're replacing the tanks is they are past their life expectancy their life expectancy is approximately 30 years uh they are now about 33 34 years old um they were the tanks we currently use were put in after the tanks that were there were found to be leaking tremendously uh for those of you that have been around the village a long time may remember that that leak caused the village to have to buy an adjacent property because the plume destroyed the property um we do not want to do that again so could I two three questions um with the kingsb l once that's approved because assuming that is one piece of capital we're all in agreement we don't have to go out to bid we just go back to the engineering It's Quickly like it'll be done this summer uh no we do have to bid it out it's not on a operative or state purchase uh the engineer did produce plans and specifications very much ready to be bid all I have to do is add the front end to it so can I ask a dangerous question is it dangerous to put it out for bid now and even though the full Capital hasn't been approved so we can e into the timeline well we can't award it because Bob can't certify funds are available and it's kind of deceitful to any bidder who wants to put their time and effort into devel veloping a cost for a project that not I was just wondering and then the sort of ditto the same question with West Glenn assuming it moves forward because that's there's General I don't want to speak for all five of us but I think we we're laboring that there's General consensus on those two capital projects that goes out to bid and that will be done over the summer before school starts um I hope to get it done before school starts but I'm not 100% certain uh we have to see a how much you folks allocate in the capital budget and then depending who the paving contractor is for our Paving project we may talk to them and see if they're interested in an additional award to do that work a lot of the sidewalk that we have done on West Glen was just add-ons to existing Paving Contractors okay and then the last question is with the $2 million in Paving which I love do how much do we have in carryover from Paving because there's remaining streets from last year uh the tree streets in the CB D those were funded with old capital that was already awarded to the contractor um we asked him to do it he demurred because it was getting very late in last year as soon as the weather breaks and gets better probably in April we get to nudge him that's already awarded so that doesn't come out of that two million request great thank you and I'm going to circle back on what sioban just suggested about bidding this out now if there I believe there is unanimous consensus on this Council on these projects that they are priorities in the capital budget and with that being said of course until it's finalized it's not a done deal yet but in order to save time because that's what we're all about is getting these things done as soon as possible could we go out to bid on them with that consensus you have to appropriate the money first we could introduce an ordinance in February and adopt it in March for those two projects but you would have to agree to what you're going to fund You' have to give a definite amount what you're going to fund right so and then so then we could award in April so we could do what we did with the the garbage truck and the paving and then our capital's just reduced off the top yeah I I I strongly support that I know both projects there's a real need to get them done before school starts right and I completely agree with Paul and again it's so rare all five of us are like violently an agreement on this so anything we can do to get this done sooner I think you'll find so large support amongst us if if the council wants to take a consensus tonight to direct Bob to prepare to prepare the bond ordinances for West Glend and uh and Kingsbridge we can do that I saw five heads nodding on this one so I think I saw six I see Robin in the audience you have your I think you have your direction on it so we we do West Glenn and Kingsbridge one ordinance funding both projects Chris can sharpen his pencil and we can go from there let's go y okay all right I have something else to bring up of course um we heard from a resident tonight I know I haven't presented it at Council yet because it was just it was a meeting last Tuesday we haven't had a council meeting yet but it's on the safety of Clinton Avenue and both the police department and the engineering department have recommended that sidewalks be put in I mean I don't know what's going to happen but I'd like it to be on our radar it's it's not certainly we're not talking money like Kingsbridge or west Glenn but sign it appears that there have been significant changes in the last couple of years and specifically one that it has been determined unconstitutional to close that street to traffic and allow like residents to go in and out of their driveway so it was a case in Leonia and it was declared unconstitutional because you cannot treat one group of people different than another so you can't say to local residents okay you you can use this street but nobody else can so it's a real problem because people have been ignoring the signs and they there's really no enforcement there's no legal enforcement so I believe this time it's a little different there seems to be a lot more um residents the parents of kids that are using that street that are very concerned about the safety issue so I don't know what's going to happen we're having another meeting on February 8th but I do somehow want to if this if it happens that it is decided we need sidewalks I don't want to have to wait it it would be you know another half a school year and another full school year with a situation that is really not good um I don't I don't know Keith what do you recommend is there so I mean again this this capital budget is fluid um you know right now we're hovering with estimates so I don't want anybody to hold me to this number indefinitely but to somewhere around you know 7.8 million um you know if the council wanted to go a little higher they can as we go through each of these Capital requests that the Departments have made and we've sort of prioritized amongst the the leadership here in the village you know we can we can modify some of these line items if that's the discretion of the council um so excuse me in that regard Lorraine um as you know um there were a lot of residents who were unavailable for that meeting um you are the only council person who was able to stay for the entire meeting um I think it's premature since we are going to be again I was out there today with with police and um and the manager and Engineering um to talk about when we're going to do this project when we don't know the scope of it we don't know um if we're going to do it because we haven't discussed it as a council I think it's just premature so and it's not that it's not going to be a worthy um project whether it's this year next year I mean certainly safety is a huge priority but since no one has discussed this I think it's premature to talk about moving it along quickly until we've had a chance to take a look at I'm not saying that I'm just saying let's have it in our mind and you know we have another meeting in a couple of weeks we have several more budget meetings I want to leave it open for discussion that we can come back to this I don't want you know me to bring it up in three weeks and people say well you never mentioned anything this is the first we've ever heard so well for want to put it out there unfortunately for several members of the council this is the first that that that they've ever heard understand so so now they've heard about it we don't we don't know what we're doing I know that we've talked to everybody I think that we'll we'll have a Fuller discussion later after our February 8th meeting okay okay good could I just say a couple things not to go could we get a copy of the case law I I do want to say that what happened last year with Glenn wasn't good and um I think Evan and I both felt during the budget process that we weren't aware of the advocacy of their project and it was invisible to us and that no blame but that was how we both felt and now we don't want to be in that position again however the Clinton na thing is a big surprise because there has been no advocacy and now we're again at the tip of this we don't have a full value we haven't had a discussion um the residents that reached out to me were dismayed that the meeting wasn't moved and the full Council doesn't even have a full understanding of the scope of the project so I think over the next month I'm open-minded we did receive a very thoughtful letter from both sides and I do like the approach because we've just spent $1.7 million of capital with the decision we just made that we might want to talk about the sidewalks in future planning let it but there were some ideas of painting the street and putting some parking enforcement in there and there are some short-term things that we didn't have with Glen that I think we have with Clinton but I don't fully know because no one's really filled this in on Clinton totally and I'm going to jump in here right now because this is not this is a premature discussion to debate the sides of this so um with everyone's permission and agreement I'm going to move this along because we just don't know enough about it yet and mayor just for clarification I I whispered to Bob because I don't didn't know the answer to this question but traditionally the night of budget adoption which is tentatively scheduled for April 10th that would be the night that the comprehensive Bond ordinance would be introduced so again just from a timing standpoint and it's up to the majority of the council how they want to proceed on Capital um but you know there's there's plenty of time to get to you know what the balance of the capital budget will look like for 24 right thank in the past the uh Bond ordinance has been introduced with the budget oh introduced in March and then adopted in April with the budget e either way there's time whether you introd the only issue that happen create is created is how much we appropriate in the capital Improvement fund because you need the 5% on budget right good okay uh additional Capital requests we have the street division 390,000 to replace a hooklift and I'll let Mike speak to our need on hook the mic so this will be replacing number three of four um for lack of better term these trucks that we currently have are kind of ticking time bombs uh right now I have four salt trucks to handle the entire town uh unfortunately both times we were out this year one truck did go down which left us only three trucks um to do the whole town um so again this will be replacing uh 198 that is already gone um motor blw in it we did not put any more money into it um so this will help us to get back up to where we need to be questions the uh only request re EST for Capital that was approved to present to the council was for Signal division was various Communications fiber upgrades for police fire and EMS radios uh there is a push by the emergency services to upgrade their radios uh this is the background or support uh Rich could speak better to it he's much more familiar with it so there is a there is a division between what um the emery management um group is asking for than what we're asking for um we do the infrastructure of the radio system that's the antennas that are on roofs um and the big base station radios that blast the conversations of police officers firefighters EMTs across um across the village to each other what OEM is asking for is separate from what we are asking for they are asking for Portables that um emergency Personnel wear on their close so the um radio system that we maintain for the police officers and the firefighters was installed in 1994 when central dispatch was created it is now 30 years old we now have um technology upgrades in all of that time um that we need to upgrade so the last couple years we put 60,000 a year into the system to prepare for this major upgrade um this year we have 100,000 set we are trying to create islands for our Police Department our fire department the other firehouse on on West Glen and the EMS so that they can um kind of control themselves if we get a storm or an outage and where we're going with this for this year is the 100 Grand next year we will be asking for a large sum of money to up do the to upgrade the whole system at once because of Technology computers and firmware you cannot we have I think nine receiver sites and one transmit site you cannot upgrade one of these sites at a time we would love to you can't go of firmware and Technology we have to do the whole thing at once so next year we'll be asking for a large sum of money to come in and replace the whole radio system that's 30 years old that will support all of the communications of central dispatch police department fire department and the ambulance courp it is very important I look at the communication system this infrastructure as your fourth emergency responder you have police officers firefighters EMTs in your Communication System every time somebody pushes a button to talk they use this system to communicate with each other or in between agencies it's 30 years old it has done a fabulous job for us we did the right we did it the right way in 1994 that was my second year here in Richwood we did it the right way it's been 30 years years it's used a little bit of Maintenance over the years now it's time to redo it so this year we need that money to get ready for next year so next year we can ask for more um to redo the whole system and keep these guys functioning as the way they do and thank you Rich and just to piggy back off that um just to back up what Rich has said there I think next year as we approach the capital budget you are going to see a lot more focus on Emergency Services Communications uh when I was here maybe two months in uh the Emergency Services groups came in and did a presentation for Bob and I on what their long-term planning would looked like and what their needs would be um and while we had some major infrastructure projects like West Glenn sidewalks like Kingsbridge in this year's capital budget next year we are going to have to Pivot and start to focus on that as a as an important subject area so just to pinpoint that going forward well as as long as we are planning this far in advance then we can we can make decisions accordingly that we have to keep that much Capital available for that project and that's why on the when you do have some time and you look at the capital spreadsheet I'm sure most people were focused on what the requests were for 2024 but we've asked all of the Departments to insert what their Capital requests are projected to be from 25 all the way to 29 so as you look through that you'll start to see a PL taking shape as to what we want these Capital requests we don't want to be deciding here tonight what the capital requests are going to be we want to have sort of had a foundation laid for what each of the next five years is going to look like as we move forward in our planning I really appreciate that that gives us perspective I love it I think it's such great long-term planning good all right one last Capital request is for water pollution um our fire alarm system was granted a notice of violation from the Glenrock fire inspector cuz it doesn't work so we have to correct it and provide a functioning system so the fire alarm system we already have Capital open for um and then this year we're going to add to the sludge pumps correct for the 65,000 yeah well you can explain you can explain sludge pumps better than I can three of our three of our big sludge pumps uh need to be replaced they're worn out uh quote from a vendor is 273,000 um I went through the old capital accounts I can find enough money for an initial ward of about 100,000 I've written that up and submitted it to Keith for his review and presentation to you folks the council we also have other pumps that as I mentioned at my start of this evening everything's 20 plus years old and it's starting to show its age so we're trying to hold the plant together thank you anybody questions all good thank you gentlemen gentlemen thank you so much really appreciate your time your expertise and the work that you put into all of this thanks guys good and with that we're going to take a 15minute recess and pick up there sorry you guys is the ca still yeah the AIO yeah it's just [Music] oh so e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e to [Music] you got let me start the video Amsterdam cop and Stockholm northern Europe you have cameras on June 18th I get back on July good okay okay there's not heat wave yes wow yeah and the outling areas are beautiful we're good good I want to call this meeting back to order I want to thank everyone for their Indulgence as we took a short but needed break roll call Deputy Mayor parin here council member Reynolds here council member whites here council member windrad she stepped out of the room okay and mayor vaganos here okay let's go mayor at this time I'd like to call forward our director of Mis Dylan Hansen to make his budget presentation tonight hello hello Dylan how is everybody welcome so there's a little bit of an increase in my budget uh due to contractual obligations for like uh antivirus which is we renew every 3 years um so that came out to be a $188,000 uh hit this year um well it's a lot more than that I mean I'm looking at I mean we're talking about line 29 right yeah I'm going through those right now I just went through one of them okay oh okay keep going then sorry um the other thing that we do is we have a uh sdl we extended last year it normally cost us 30,000 a year it's up to 50 last year uh the Grant from the health department covered a chunk of it so this year I don't know if that's still in existence it's not as I get a nod from the audience um so we're going to have to carry that this year uh we are using those licenses and the health department um engineering building department and other departments we're actually trying to spread that product around to be utilized in more and more departments Dylan would it be helpful if we asked the council just to refer to the memorandum behind sheet 208 behind sheet 28 and then you can walk everybody through uh these various various increases it's on the new letter head so so and towards the the end of that memo that I wrote there's highlights covering everything um page 29 no you're talking about this looks like this yeah yeah after 28 take your time well after 28 but this explains where stuff I'm I reallocated stuff around on my budget so um we had server warranties on uh tab 26 that we didn't utilize yes last year we used that towards um other things I ended up replacing those servers um the mitel charge we signed a three-year contract that's additional 19 uh 19 19,600 a year um we have our digital subscriptions to the news that we share with other departments it's on Tab 2033 uh tab 40 uh we did not utilize any of the training money last last year because we had a tight tight budget but I did ask for the money this year to utilize for myself and staff uh tab 41 um I would like to bring at least one of my staff members this year down to the njlm so they can get the experience of the classes and everything else I think it would be good for them so I have money in there for that um trying to think what else we have here oh we uh contractual Services migrated many it expenses to this tab so that was sdl which I already told you about the website hosting was an additional $10,000 that's to continue with the Civic plus um didn't have that charge last year uh Adobe CC licenses which is the Creative Cloud uh we utilize that for web design videos a bunch of things we've had this now for three years our backup software we uh renew every year for the latest and greatest updates a new hit this year is the Cisco moroi that covers firewalls and access points when we buy the equipment it comes with 3 years this is only some of the equipment that's do do this year it expires in September uh our antivirus is every 3 years uh it's 18,000 every 3 years so $6,000 a year for all the computers and servers and laptops it covers um murf is our AI for our recording for the uh phone system uh the one thing that's nice about it could get a virus cuz it's computer software but it never gets a bronchitis or sound it always sounds the same so it saved us a lot of money um the myel vpe we changed our phone uh supplier so this is a three-year contract that's 19,000 our ssls we still need for our email and our websites that we host EET and stuff uh that's our it's a site security certificate many everybody knows it has https when you go onto a website uh doc sign we want to introduce this year to digitally signed documents uh from vendors and everything help save on the snail mail waiting times uh and then the one thing that we would we should have done last year uh really want to do this year is the penetration testing this is an additional 21,000 this year this test our Wi-Fi our internal Network our external network and our employees on any vulnerabilities that I might not be aware of uh we use our auditor to recommend companies uh we never use the same company twice and we would like to do this every other year but this would not be a threeyear since we did it last time and that's everything questions yeah so I mean Dylan your work is fantastic I I your people are great I'm huge fan the new website's fantastic everything here looks fairly good except for the contractual Services piece and you are way Smarter on this than I am and so I'm not going to get in the Weeds on it because you're going to embarrass me if I do but we allocated 53,000 last year you spent 88,000 now you're asking for over 200,000 it's like a fourfold increase more than a almost four to fivefold increase I got to ask you to go back and sharpen the pen on that there's no way that I can that I I I can get comfortable with that type of increase or something like this there's got to be a way to come in closer to and I'm not saying it's not going to be more but closer to where we budgeted last year for this if you do look I uh some of the other line items went to the NV CU I reallocated from other tabs MH so and technically there's an increase of I think of 110 right for everything and then if you take the 21 for the penetration testing the 18 for the um antivirus the additional 20 on the sdl package the 11,000 for the moroi for our firewalls and Wi-Fi you get up there pretty quick I get it but even even taking into account the reallocation you're still 31% over last year has got to be a way to do this and again I and I appreciate In fairness to you salary and wages you kept flat very much appreciate that and again I don't doubt that a lot of the stuff is needed but there's got to be some priorities and see what we can put over to maybe next year uh come up with some workarounds but you know a four to fivefold increase in that one category just I I can't I'm having a lot of trouble seeing that through through you mayor Dylan abs the website which ones are new as opposed to existing in 23 so the moroi is new the antivirus we've renewed before three years ago and then we have the addition because you lost the sdl grant so that's an increase yes yes and the sdl because we don't won't get Grant to cover that portion this year so could I ask questions about that yeah so one because I just want I don't think we as a council or in Communications have fully explored how awesome sdl can be um and its impact it can have on the general user including the building department I just want everyone to know that but what happened to the Grant and is it definitely lights out we're not getting it so one of the one of the Health Grants expires in June the other in December uh so we'll drill down a little bit more on that when uh when Dawn comes forward okay um but it we we don't have the capacity because of salaries and wages to cover some of the operating expenses uh through the so I mean sdl is a very viable program that again hopefully you'll Echo this that we haven't done as much as we should have with the public with it but it's pretty cool and it has a lot of capabilities it would be uh wonderful when we have the new help in terms of communications but that's unfortunate I'm sorry you didn't get the grant so de the effects on many of these things the more we invest in the use of Technology the more it costs to protect ourselves is that on yes it is so with that being said a lot of these things that are in his perview are Rec just coming up now website again not big bucks but it starts to add up this penetration testing we're behind it's a security meth method that we use to make sure that there's no infiltration into the system that we're protected that we have the best firewalls because you don't want to be on the front page of the newspaper for something like that so in his defense yes it's a large number and he's tried to reallocate it from what's been out there before and consolidate into one line item and yes it grows but there's a price of having technology within your organization it just it it's a cost can't beat it I I do think that to the councilman's point and balancing it with Bob's point that he just made made I I do think we just need to go through this one more time um and really you know see if we can fine-tune this it's it's a lot in one year and I'm all about technology we have a a we're very Advanced here in Ridgewood when it comes to technology and we're we're blessed in that respect um but at the same time we just we just have to strike the right balance between the operating budget and the advancements that we need to make and that Mis has been been doing successfully all along questions anyone else Lind I do have one Capital request for 12,000 so actually I think um I think we're going to be able to pull that from existing Capital right is that where we left it there was no Capital yeah so you that's going to come from out of open Capital okay I'm good then looks like you're very good don't don't don't bring it up that's my advice good thank you Dylan thank Dylan thank you Dylan for everything so my email still going to work tonight or it depends no oh Dylan I wanted to say your staff is wonderful thank you they really help us with you know the committee meetings and they're a pleasure to work with I locked out yeah okay I'd like to uh ask Don to come forward to make the uh Health Department an animal control presentation so as Dawn starts to explain this budget I just want to call to the council's attention the fact that um as we mentioned earlier there are two grants uh that Dawn was able to uh receive and they've offset a number of operating expenses and salaries and wages when it comes to uh to her Department um so you you're going to see some fluid numbers here uh because we did make every effort to extend both grants to cover our salaries and wages for those specific employees who are are funded through the grant through June June 30th but also to extend it through the second Grant till December 31st so don if you want to uh just sort of take us through that um and all the uh all the requests you're making this year okay good evening everyone good evening D so unfortunately since 2020 we were able to obtain grants um this past year their fiscal year the grants that we have and the first grant was the olph grant which was mostly for salaries that and the requirement was to hire two people where I hired serby and Danielle which I think all of you have seen them out in the community they're doing great work um unfortunately at this time all we know is that we have $50,000 starting July 1st for the op Grant there might be more money they just haven't given us any answers yet with the second Grant we had $139,000 and that's where we were we donated money to buy sdl for other departments as well as our department um we're donating money to the police department to buy a sign for pedestrian safety what happened with that Grant is it was supposed to end June 30th 2024 and they told us hey whatever money you have you have another year to spend it so now we're kind of which is a great thing but at the same time a lot of the things where I was trying to spend it giving it wherever now we're kind of backtracking and saying we really want to keep our staff on so we've done some adjustments and as of right now through the grants it we can cover their salaries through the end of the year through the end of 2024 so um and again it might be more money we just we don't have any answers and we probably won't have the answers until you know a month before the grants so do you have questions regarding the grants well let me just start by saying you've done an outstanding job in obtaining grants um again so much so that you were giving money to other departments and um on behalf of the council and the village we really we really really appreciate that because you're you're always out in the weeds trying to trying to find more money to do good things so thank you very much thank you we were fortunate to have these grants through covid you know we needed the Staffing and that was how we were able to get the vaccine clinics going and and all the Outreach that we were doing and you know I'm I'm grateful that they've lasted this long and I'm still in denal that they're really kind of weaning out but we'll see what happens we'll see what happens questions I just want to Echo yours is always the easiest budget because the grants are so great and not only is it great financially but the services and I know it's a year past since Co but you really put Ridgewood on the map and made everybody feel so lucky to have a health department and um I just love working with you and I love the staff that you've hired so it's great thank you and and I know that now we're going to be um farming you out for more shared services yes which is of also of great benefit to the to to the Village again we're in that sweet spot where we have a lot of services that a lot of towns don't have and this is how we will work to keep taxes from going up too quickly and uh and you're a big part of that so thanks yes I'm excited February 1 good good questions anyone okay if we could move to uh any other questions on health Animal Control um and I want to just commend Dawn uh she has an initiative with regard to a dog census this year so don you want to speak a little bit to the Animal Control budget uh and why there is a slight increase sure so in the past it was a requirement to do an animal uh census or canvas I don't know if anybody ever remembers when we had the crossing guards going to everyone's house I do yes I was I was managing that it was Insanity there were I think I had 19 crossing guards that I was sending all around and the stories I could tell you were were very interesting but we we um obtained about 700 licenses from those canvases and it that was a requirement back then for us to do a half a year canvas for each you know a half each Town um half of the Town each year so we would every year we would get uh a half of the town and then the next would be the next half then we'd go to the other half again um we haven't done it in a few years obviously with Co we've been really busy and it's not a requirement anymore so it was just not something that was a priority however the past year or two we've noticed an increase in animal bites whether it's bite you know dogs to other dogs or dogs to people and in the past we've done some programs with we had Kathy Santos come she's a dog trainer and and talk about dog behavior and so we thought this year we're going to focus on rabies and we also are doing this through the grant so we're focusing on rabies and um pet behavior and trying to avoid the animal bites because most of the bites that come in the dogs are not licensed so we're trying to increase that so Tao can do the canvas they charge a dollar per house so rather than hiring somebody to do it they would they would take care of it for us so that's why there's an increase in the budget sounds like it's a good long-term investment definitely and Don just to be clear that'll just be for 2024 and 2025 that'll fall off until a subsequent year when you decide to do it a second time yes or we could do we could do half a year and then do a half a year I half the town and I keep saying half a year half the town this year half the town next year and then just keep alternating so it would be half the price um you know either way it would be fine if we did I the reason why I was thinking about doing it this year also is because of Valley Hospital moving you know know we're going to lose some Revenue with birth certificates so I thought it would be smart to kind of bring in some more Revenue with the animal licenses good idea thanks for thinking like that is is the pet inventory 100% physical are you going to use the license as the driver like how's it going to work I'm sorry if you're if you're looking for the dogs and the licenses and enforcement you know that you register your dog right and then are people going to are you going to go to every house how you so they go to every house so the way we did when I did it um I'm not sure exactly how they do it but the way I did it I had a door hanger made up I still have them and if there's evidence of a dog so if there's a leash if there's a sign if they hear a dog barking if they see a cat in the window they just tag the door and it just says you know with a attached application and it just says you know we think that you have a dog at this light at this address because we heard barking you check off barking and then call us if you don't and then sometimes people will call and say oh no you know I just have a beware of dog sign but there's not really a dog in there and we usually Let It Go but yeah but it's it's a it's a wonderfully simplistic system you use the technology of the doorbell yeah right and then the dog barks yes yeah so that's basically how it works y I was I was just wondering I mean I will say that Sheamus is licensed in Ridgewood and he's at the beach and when our Beach town was doing the inventory they knew we had him cuz he barked at them but then we Dawn gave me the license copy and we submitted it and he didn't count at the beach it's interesting so there's dog reciprocity is what wow good to know yeah as long as he doesn't live there more than six months in one day good is there that could be imposed on anyone that doesn't register their talk yes do you know what that res how much it's $30 so this year here we wrote maybe 50 tickets so it's $30 that comes in for that and that's a state like it's a state law to license your dog and Ridgewood we have the local law to license cats as well and the reason why cats are so important is because most cats are free roaming and they have more likely they're more likely to come in contact with a rabbit raccoon or rabbit animal and contact rabies anything else for Dawn all good than you thank you D thank you hope you're not here too late thanks like to bring up our tax assessor Bill Palumbo I don't like following her who would she gets grants I mean come on it's not fair how are you Bill good how are you all this evening so um in the grand scheme we're not actually increasing our budget um it is a request for certain items that we had requested last year that were taking out because of the budget situation so it's really just putting those items back in requesting them this year it's really um the fact that we need defense when it comes to appeals if we have a large appeal that takes place if the state rules on their side uh there's times we need the money in order to pay cash out it's not always a credit situation we like to do that but sometimes they request cash and there's nothing we can do about it so to have the reserve of the $75,000 actually protects us last year we did um take a pretty good hit on one of the appeals that was an appeal from 2016 so they had years and years and years of buildup of appeals and the same company had an appeal that went their way from another town their attorney said worked so then they threw it at us and the state said work there it's going to work here so that's the problem with having appeals last as long as they do sometimes you work it out just keep going every year to year sometimes you get a tax Court change and now that appeal is thrown in your face and there's nothing you can do about it because the state says it not because we're fighting not because the Count's green it's the state so I'm a little confused and so we we last year we portioned 158,000 you only spent 154,000 this year so and and and I'm listen I'm asking questions I don't know the answer to like I'm I'm not trying to be aggressive um but if we got caught having to pay all the stuff out then why did we actually come in under budget this year last year so so Bill if I if I through you mayor so last year um the the the operating budget for tax testors essentially the same as it was last year right what we're adding back in is the 78200 as a reserve for tax appeals this is a revenue source that you try to contribute to each year without question it's part of best practices in operating municipal government that you continue to have a fund that if you do have a major tax appeal you can not only pay for your Professional Services out of there but you can settle any type of you can come top some sort of settlement um you have some funding available to do that uh this was taken out of last year's budget in light of some difficult budget decisions that needed to be made in 2023 we're looking to at least on first glance of the budget try to restore that fund and we would try to maintain that in years to come um it's basically an insurance policy that we have money available in case we have any severe liability when it comes to a tax appeal I hear you but for the last three years we've been largely flat you got an $8,000 variance in the last three years so is it just because we're afraid that we're going to have like a one in five one in 10 year problem where we're going to get socked with something because 163,000 155,000 158,000 for the last three years we've been largely consistent and now you want to go up to 250,000 I'll I'll let Bob speak to the the um apportionment for the past few years and then Bill I'd like you to just comment I don't want to get into the specifics of any pending appeals but if you could just sort of sumarize where we are today that might be helpful in the council's decision- making process so the concept is is we had a tax appeal last year that was settled we had no appropriation no reserve for it so it hit the bottom line went directly against operations so as Keith said best practices is to try and put some money aside every year I've been trying to do this for at least four years now every year I put $75,000 in and because budget cuts we we take it out so you don't really see it in here at all until never made the cut because it never made the cut so I suggested to Bill that we do this again again to sort of cushion any tax appeals that may come against us so we sort of have money in the bank to pay for that just like any of these other reserves I have for snow trust or things of that nature it's rainy day funds that may be needed so is not to affect operations that's why so that's though why don't you summarize where we are from the tax appeal we do have one I'm afraid of I'm not going to lie um it was a senior center I'm not going to say the town I'm not going to say what the results the state approved them the numbers I'm getting back are quite scary so the 75,000 probably wouldn't even be enough and there's nothing I can do about it it's a state approved appeal how old is the appeal it's started in 16 or 17 wow that's like I said that's the problem with letting them sit for multiple years it builds up because they're looking for a return for every year they've appealed they're not just looking for a flat amount they're looking for credit credit they're looking for money back they're looking for all these things because they've been appealing for seven years and and they're typically on larger Parcels so not going to mention any specific properties because I don't think I'm allowed to but you know that is something when we have contributing large Parcels of land and they go for a reassessment that's where we'll get kind of really hit yes right which is which is a concern because all of you can think about some of the contributing large Parcels of land and think about a challenge from one of them that's not good I think this is it I think it's good because if an appeal comes we have a reserve we know that the peels are happening more I we had one recently I'm not going to I don't know what I'm allowed to say so I'm not going to say too much but I think it's it's wise because in the event that one of the larger places does this we need to be prepared and and just bear in mind and maybe I should have started off with this from a procedural standpoint but if we didn't spend any of that if we budgeted that seven uh 7 the 8,000 and we didn't spend any of it it would get rolled over into a trust account it would be available in future years whereas all the rest of this unex these unexpended Surplus this would roll into a separate Standalone account similar to the snow trust fund and we would have it for ensuing years in case you ever took on the liability of a larger appeal or a settlement any questions anyone no guarantee it makes the Final Cut but it's in there to start let's put it that way I think it's a very smart move it's a very smart move that's gone 0 for four for the last four years so um further further further reason to take a close look at it this year anything else for Mr Palumbo good you he grew up at Woodland Park by the way a good man chief judge good evening everyone good good evening Chief how are you good how are you good okay um just before we start chief judge and with chief judge in his presentation um there was a colorcoded copy of the top sheet uh that was placed at your seats tonight pass it along so if you could no if you could if you could just put that on top of the black and white copy that you received in your binder uh the color codes reflect the merging um of EMS budget with the fire budget there will be a similar spreadsheet like this when Jeremy kimman comes in on the OEM side uh to see where some of those uh operational budgets were merged um but I just for clarity so that you know why this budget looks different than last year's budget when it comes to the fire department it's because a lot of those EMS functions have been taken over by the fire department and administratively we've combined the budgets so with that Chief if you want to start with your salaries and wages absolutely I was just if you don't mind take about 30 seconds go over a couple items for those watching at home those who aren't here I know you guys are well aware of what we do but just a couple highlights from last year if I can um some of the big couple things from last year uh we had a mandated 24-hour course that the state mandated for every firefighter um we found a little way to handle it without sending him to class and it was a $75,000 in savings to the village and overtime costs um last year we were successful with two grants we got the 32,000 American Rescue plan firefighter Grant and we got A $263 plus th000 afg grant for airpacks um in may we brought a after the fire program to Ridgewood High School at no cost um these were two members from the seat Hall fire in 2000 that got severely injured so they come and we got them to do a class for all the high school seniors and they do a fire safety education class which this year Jeff nias looks to be doing again for the next class before they send them off uh we brought on three new fire volunteers last year and a couple goals just for this year is as I'll go over is to bring on three new members uh I want to fully roll out the Operation Blue Angel program which we are just in the ends of working on uh we have talked to everyone about the autism awareness month coming up in April and autism Shield training we're doing for the department and the police department uh we're going to do additional CPR and first aid classes that we we've been planning with everyone and we're hopefully successfully Implement our new billing company as the RFP is due back in 10 days and that's where we're at with that a couple quick highlights from the year thank you John okay on to operating so I will try to go through this as easy as possible the unfortunate part is you're going to see incredibly incredibly High increases in a lot of these boxes not due to actual increases and due to the fact that last year these numbers just weren't in this budget because what we did was we took the em m s Special Operations TI's budget and cleanly divided it up meaning there was no additional money added to either section on either side just they were added into here so but your bottom line number is 7.54% proposed proposed what's there sure yes I'll go with that the number that's there if that's the calculated number is that a is that a real number 7.54 where here the total budget increase oh so as I said that's also a budget increase with the fact that it was taken away from another department as well right that's what I'm saying it was an ACC thing thing because EMT now but I guess Bob my question is so is the proposed budget here that John's speaking to S and a half percent higher than what it was last year yes but it also includes which to go over yes I think what what Evan's saying is when you when you put them all together is that 75% strictly as a result of that and that if you add them all together there is no increase I think it's more that way and I'll go over a couple of the changes right now sure okay let's just let Bob speak to it yeah so my understand is that they're combined and that 7 and a half% is collectively comparing the way it was to what it is now right so the line items for EMT for instance came over with what we spent last year correct so 7.5% is essentially what you're saying you want to ask for over what fire and EMT spent collectively last year versus what you want to do this year right um yes and no there are a couple line items here that show only an amount for 24 that doesn't reflect the prior information from other departments so I'm going to say what color so the blue line items in that sheet are brand new orang is combined so they would contribute to part of that increase gotcha so so blue was not on our budget last year at all all at zero so yes percent increase so blue really Nets out unless although you guys are doing so great with the fonts but this blue is definitely going to mess us up it's really hard to see the black right and I'll explain all that second as well no just one page so but the blue is all at 0% so those two it's not really because it's a new account right right so there's no so prior years history I'm with you I got it all right so total budget increase from 220 from 2023 was 482 7529 of that 248 41893 was all contractual that's out of my hands that leaves an OE increase of 233 85636 of that we brought over 130 4 542 for EMS 63,000 was added back in for the hydrant rental which is due to rwood water and 22,200 was added in away from me for the signal service contract that they're sheding upon the Departments for the radios that is part of that so the only increase that I've been control of is $1 4,114 36 so that's kind of where all that money came from that's where all the money came from just by John I I don't I'm not actually giving you grief I actually 7.5% was actually pretty I don't want to say happy because we going have to figure out how to pay for that but compared to some of the other numbers I've been seeing tonight they're in the double digits I was going to LOD you for actually coming in with I think something closer to where we're going to wind up as opposed to doing what sometimes we do which is ask for here hoping one up here you're actually I think starting somewhere more realistic so thank you for doing that absolutely it's been a lot of work between Keith Bob Olivia Steve Finance they've been fantastic helping do this whole process so thank you to them um I don't want to go through it now but if anybody wants it I can send you I went through each account every page of what actually dollar figure got brought over so I can send you that if you want just to not go through the literally every penny right now but I can send that if you'd like um do you want me to go over the hires yeah okay yes please so we're asking for three firefighter hires but that isn't three new hires just to be clear is there a page number is there like a separate page on this one uh it's the it's the it's the Personnel sheet uh the second page okay it's probably the tiniest font in the book oh it's right after the summary page so the three new firefighters it has a it has the whole roster of of all the current uh employees so wait John before we begin how many are we how many are we at now and are there any retirements like numers we have one retirement that has not been filled correct we have one person who has been deployed but a second person will be retiring somewhat dovetailing with his return from his deployment so we're looking to fill that position which will be the person deployed and then ultimately that person will succeed someone who's going to retire at the end of the year so it's 47 minus three so we'll be at 46 by the end of the year it's it's plus one is what I'm looking to do okay so you at the end of the year you want to be at 46 i' like be 46 and that deployment just stays as a an employee and then comes back he'll come back the other person on the on the staff existing staff will retire got it so that person will fill the deployment vacancy and then ultimately the retirees vacancy the pending retiree and we did that that date what's that date oober this literally the same time it comes back end of the year and end of the year so it all just one goes into the other so we're trying to get a jump on this too because like right now for other reasons we're down four people right I to out of medical as well for extended leave right now and the same phenomenon that we've talked about with regard to the police department where when you have a vacancy and then you're calling in you know have a calling in overtime shifts now you're paying more where you know when you have the employee to actually fill the shift and in this case the deployment and the retire the retirement sort of um meet each other that that that that was helpful and unfortunately even with the higher fire one Fire 2 EMT school it takes a significant amount of time to get them up and running as well well so and interestingly enough too without getting too into Personnel um some of the candidates who are eligible to be hired as new recruit firefighters are already Village employees so there's something um appealing about that as well in other departments so quick question I I know with police officers from the time they like hire them then it's six months in training and then another six months it's like a year before they're fully fledged is is it basically the same with fire within a couple months yes CU just the academy alone you're talking over 12 weeks over 3 months plus EMT school which takes I think fulltime now it's 220 hours so okay and then all the training and everything else so they won't be on shift if let's say they started February they wouldn't be on shift till probably even September okay October at this point and then counting you know we try and everyone gets things differently so they might count towards minimum Staffing by October 1 by November one just depending on okay you know but around that it's a it's a long stretch unfortunately and are there like so did they take a civil service test like police they did yes so we did the entry exam we got that we certified the list we got less names back we sent them for the Physical Agility Test which now is a new thing back since Co they stopped it but a physical exam pass fail they went and did that we lost another handful and we have a reduced list which we interviewed recently so do you have enough people on the list we do okay so yes and then how many volunteers right now six to seven I'll say because we had one put a leave in this year our captain took a leave for some reason and um so he went there and then we brought two more volunteers position this year and a third one right now which where we brought in which we're just doing the psychon as we speak actually tomorrow and this is a really granular question to for the the Parkwood upper Ridgewood house how many firefighters in one day in a 24hour need to be at that H at the secondary location there are three minimum three and I would love to if it was four even but it is three I'm sorry I didn't quite hear you you say you would like it to be four I would love there to be additional Staffing up there absolutely but there is three you know right now they say a basic fire you should have at least 16 people in your first alarm assignment we go with nine and that's if everyone's available at that moment to go to that fire but like everybody else I'd be asking for you know plenty more firefighters which I understand is not and The Nine's the combination six from the lower three from the higher say that again when you said oh yes that's three from the lower and six six from the lower and three from the higher correct okay and that covers two engine a rescue an ambulance a truck and the command car and I and I do want to say I was asked by number of council people when I first arrived here to sort of do an overarching analysis um into the the need for the second firehouse and really drilling down with those numbers over a two-hour meeting on spreadsheets um you know the operation of the the secondary Firehouse is less than $10,000 a year um and John was able to prove that out with Bob's assistance um you know it just it didn't seem to me to be something and I know that in the past there's been controversy over the debate of whether or not that Firehouse should be should stay open or should be closed um but for less than $10,000 a year and operational costs it just didn't seem like something to to tackle in this particular budget cycle so if that's out there for anybody's edification that's my current position on on that particular uh topic questions capital capital capital all right let's put this back we have four items on for Capital this year the first item is $80,000 for NFPA compliant air packs we are due to replace all of our air packs in about 15 years ago when they were due we got those all through Grant as well um air packs are almost $8,900 a piece times 45 uh but because we got that grand for 263 and we got 50,000 last year I'm just asking for 80,000 which would allow us to do everything this year at once because you can't do it in pieces because then some guys have new packs some people have old it just gets too confusing and it's a safety issue that's great great planning so that was that uh number two is the tools and equipment um asking for 15,000 in that account right now we currently need two thermal imaging cameras they're between 4 and 8,000 a piece we need 5 to 7,000 in tools and equipment I have a little bit of money in a prior account but I can't even spend that because our host testings every year and a couple years ago we spent $7,200 when host failed and recently we spent $5,000 when host failed just hose is expensive so I need to save a little money for testing so that's what that's that account is for that covers equipment meters um hose nozzles things of that nature uh number three was replacing 10-year-old firefighting gear we initially went into a plan of four years at 45,000 um because we got the NFPA Grant sorry the NFPA the um American Rescue plan Grant last year we're able to cut back on that and then we're requesting 20,000 this year because we do need five sets this year there's no question about that we can push a little bit off and I did apply for the grant again because it came out for 75,000 this time for the American Rescue plan grant for 2024 but I haven't heard heard back on that yet so hopefully that will completely wash away any need for any future as well uh and then the apparatus replacement this was a sinking fund start $250,000 unfortunately a engine we bought an engine in 2019 it was 478 I remember years ago it was 360 before covid was 720 people are paying 1 to 1.1 right now and I'm being told you should probably ask for at least 1.3 for an engine someone just paid 1. n95 for a ladder and a Seagrave ladder is like 23 to 25 it's just Insanity how high this is getting so the 250 is just a sinking it just to start S so the the philosophy here is to replicate what we do with maple field Turf which is to take the $50,000 and appropriate it in capital and just have it sitting there for the time in which it's you're going to now purchase a new fire engine and and it would be my it would be My Philosophy moving forward to at least have a minimum of 250 going into to that syncing fund each year depending on what our capacity is in future budget years uh when it comes to Capital maybe that number goes up a little bit um as especially as you get closer to the actual purchase um but fire apparatus is the most expensive thing that you're going to buy out of capital short of buying a piece of private property and you know we need to just prepare for it each year rather than have to take on that huge amount of Debt Service when you actually go to purchase a truck do we do we earn interest on that if it's just going to sit there I assume no unless you and I want to clear this up because you're the second person asked me that today um you take while money the money is just appropriated until you spend it you are not acre any type of Interest so we're not so we're not just taking 250 out of this year's budget and putting it somewhere where you're you're approp you're appropriating 250 for use at some point so if the truck's going to be a million and you're going to wait till year four to buy the truck you'll have 250 from each of your your calendar your capital requests and once you get to that million dollar Mark then you can purchase that truck for a million dollar so I'm not going to take a time up I I I'll talk to you later about that I want to understand that a little more but again I don't want to yeah until you actually spend the money you're not actually borrowing the money so you're not taking on we're not we're not bonding it you're appropriating in a until we actually buy the truck which means that's why we're not getting spaying paying any interest on it so you spend the money yeah you don't have to go out and borrow the money gotcha John um how many years away are we from needing an engine um about two years ago um it's a 2003 engine I asked for it last year but we didn't have the funding I understand it's a 2003 NFPA says 15 years front line 5 years second uh backup we're at 21 years they're about two plus years out once we purchase on a good side we're two years out and we just went through maybe four five six five months of two engines being out of service because they just couldn't get parts it was in pieces and one's still in pieces at the garage right now so when we recall we' have increased Mutual aid needs um and or we recalls here and there's just literally nothing for them to even ride unfortunately gotcha so it's tape and Band-Aids until we can exactly and the garage has been doing a fantastic job getting the part trying to find the parts and just there's just supply chain issues and it's just there's nothing more we can do than wait this is the first year for the fund right yes because I tried to start it last year and it got I'll be honest we hadn't even talked about that sinking fund until we had our capital budget meeting on Thursday morning and as I went back to my office afterwards and was playing in the Excel spreadsheet with these numbers it just became a priority because if you don't start putting this money away with the cost of these these fire trucks now you're just you're just never going to be comfortable you know ordering it until until it's almost too late and that's that's the position I don't want to see this Council or any future Village Council I don't want to see you in that position if it's 1.5 5 million today at 250 a year that's 6 years away and in six years it's not going to be 1.5 correct and that's and that's the Catch 22 that you're in but you have to start somewhere you have to start somewhere good I think we're and you'll see that there's a couple of philosophical things that we're talking about as we go through these budget hearings one with with uh Bill Palumbo is the is the reserve for tax appeals right and then you know as we get into talking about police vehicles there will come a day that I would love to see all police vehicles come out of operating and not come out of capital you know it's going to take us a little while to get there but this this capital budget that you're looking at now is a first step on some of these philosophical things that just put us in a year to on a year-to-year plan to get us to where we need to be when we have to make make these major uh these major Investments well just that that the the capital budget has goes through 2029 is exactly the kind of thing that we need to do so that we can instead of getting hammered one year with a $2 million truck even if we don't get there with our sinking fund um it still won't be $2 million so good I mean just just to give you the escalation of trucks and I use this this example all the time when I when I was elected in 2022 I'm sorry in 2002 they had just bought four fire trucks one of them was a ladder truck for $2 million four trucks one was a ladder $2 million now you're looking at a ladder truck costing $2 million so you're getting one truck for what it cost you in 2000 to to to have four I mean that's that's talk about inflation and escalation of costs but we need to we need to put ourselves on a on a plan trajectory for funding these in the long term good I just want to say thank you to Keith Bob Olivia Steve all Finance for all your help streamline this present to everyone tonight and thank you mayor and Council have a nice even evening John thank you so much thank you Chief Mr Molino building department last but not least here I don't think he's last actually you saved the best or the easiest to laugh I don't know I see 16% staring at me I went down a little bit I went up a little bit some things some things I was able I was able to reduce and some things costs like the rental that where we keep our records in in Glenrock some costs we we can't do anything about it and they and they went up it's close to it's 1% the finance department put down a 1% increase so Tony why don't why don't you begin with the uh the two requests for additional part-time Personnel yes um we're we're severely underst staffed based on the the amount of work that we have um there are two women in the office two technical assistants in the office who have jobs to do uh the one request is for for one person to be able to deal with mainly with people at the counter people that come in people drop off applications they have to be review at the counter takes time if um and I before I retired I was the zoning officer here and I knew what it was like to start a review have to get up see someone at the counter go back try to figure out where I was in this review you know so and it happen all the time um a person who could you know when application has to be reviewed again at the calendar we're looking for signatures we're looking for raised seals from the professionals uh we're looking at information like a riser diagram for plumbing or for a gas Riser those things if we catch them at the counter when it's at when it's applied for uh it it makes it easier for the code officials to re make a review if there if it's not in there they have to make a phone call uh or send an email out saying I'm missing something so that's a delay uh um and again there are phone calls there are people come to the counter uh requests for inspections all these things have to be done by just two people in in the in the main office and uh it just takes so much time from all those other things that we have to do UCC is specific about um how we do things we're we're governed by the DCA and there just certain certain process um as to how we have to uh take an application from start to finish so Tony you're asking for are two part- timers the other part-timer is for an electrical inspector actually so the first part-time would just be to work in the front desk an administrative uh I think it's a keyboard clerk as the title for what you budgeting that at I'm sorry what what's the budget for that what do you what are you thinking that's going to cost I think uh we we talked about it and I think and Bob you can correct me if I'm was it 20 or $22 per hour for a part administrative person and these are both part-time positions we we're not looking at U uh benefits and things like that so was it 20 $22 an hour for 720 hours 22 for the year that's 15,840 for the two people or for one no just for the administrative just for the clerical just for one the electrical was $40 an hour for 1,50 hours for the year for 42,000 okay yeah I um I I don't know that we would need that so we have a electrical sub quote official he's full time and I actually I printed out what he has done I only did last year I looked at the year before and it's comparable U as to the number of inspections so he comes in he can do a plane review or two and he runs out and does inspections comes back maybe can do a plan review or two in in uh in 2023 he made 2,136 inspections the one guy and there's always a pile this high on you know for him to review and and those get chipped away a little at a time a little in the morning a little in the afternoon uh a part-time and I don't think but what was the number you said the number of hours for that you you estimated 1050 the electrical is 1050 1,50 um I don't know that would have to because Steve will still go out and make inspections be able to split it up a little more evenly in the office and outside um I don't know that it would need to be that many hours but I mean it's I guess it could go so it could go higher in in in the busy season it might be a little bit lower when it's not so busy you know like now although it hasn't slowed down there's a village I I worked here for 30 years it's never slowed down not in all all those 30 years and it seems to be just even busier now than it ever was uh but I it's people want to live here people want to expand people want to uh you know make their homes better so Tony just so you know every inspector part-time inspector we've assumed 1,50 hours so it's all it's consistent across the board some may be higher some may be lower the plom inspector all four existing part- Tim are estimated at 1050 right hours right the our plumbing inspect see we we have three Plumbing inspectors one only for one day a week uh so I don't think that I I you know I didn't think to to see how many hours they actually worked uh but I don't know that it hit that many because we have three guys you know we split that up amongst three and right now it's just one guy doing them all and so um be very helpful we're behind we we we supposed to make an inspection after 24 hours of the request 72 hours we have to be out there within three business days we just can't we can't do that and State's been up here asking that question and he said it's the same everywhere we go no one is able to to you know stay within that guideline that 72h hour guideline it's just I mean it's busy everywhere you know the entire the entire state of new country is busy you know but I'm only concentrating on on here and people are waiting there's a new the new rule from Trenton that would allow a contractor to hire his own inspection service and we'd have to reimburse them this is new state law the the end of last year we would have to IM reimburse and we're talking really big projects we don't have really big projects here right now uh but that can happen where an inspection agency can come in do the inspections for us basically because we're not out there we're slowing jobs down because we're not out there in time uh to make these inspections we would have to reimburse the contractor for those inspections I don't know if it'll happen here so far they're able to um deal with the delays they they plan ahead we're not supposed to schedule an inspection till the work is actually ready for it if I did that I don't know we'd be dead we we will take make an inspection request down the road I'm going I'll be insulating in 3 days can you come out on the fourth day and we do that only because it just makes life easier for everybody we're not supposed to by state law everybody does it though because if we wait it for you to finish now you're going to wait for three or four more days and you won't be able to do your drywall or whatever comes next in your job so I mean I hear everything you're saying but I keep coming back to some of these numbers you know you're at 713 appropriated you spent about 700,000 your credit 72,000 you're actually under budget last year which is great I don't want to hold that against you and you're asking for essentially $130,000 more than you spent last year I I hear everything you're saying but I think you got to sharpen the pencil on this I mean and I'm not sure exactly where that comes from and I'm going to defer to you on it but like what I'm seeing a 16% increase and we're seeing a lot of this stuff I mean it's really easy for us to sell everyone these are all really worthwhile things and we need to do do all this stuff but at some point we have to make some hard decisions and I again I'm going to have a lot of trouble finding $130,000 increase over what you actually spent last year what what is the 16% increase what is that so I'm showing your over percent you 16% appropri appropriation you asking for now versus what was appropriated to you last year so you got 713 appropriated to you last year you're asking for 8:30 now but even that's a little skewed because you didn't spend the 7113 you only spent 702 and by if I'm getting any of this wrong please correct me because I know you've looked a lot more at this than I have and and I'm saying the same thing I'm saying to all the other folks that I mean nothing you're saying to me I disagree with and everything you're saying sounds reasonable and we should do this but at the end of the day resources are not unlimited I understand um yeah there there are there are expenses that we have no control over and yeah I'm not saying it's going to be zero just saying it can to be 16% I understand I I you know what I I don't know where I I and our permits the permit numbers are down just a little bit from 2023 uh 2022 slightly the the revenue um did change a little bit that's another thing about revenues it comes in it's done differently if you build new volume we charge by the cubic foot if you you're doing other than building brand new volume then we charge by the estimated cost so that's why that can change the permit number of permits can be exactly the same but the revenue can go up and down and change just because of the way we have to again we're we set a fee but we're told how to do it you know so we could we set the numbers so that we're supposed to run so I can't you know if if we have a bad year the revenues are going to be the revenues will be down all right um but the number of inspections can be exactly the what I what I think what I think Tony you need to do here um to the councilman's point I think what we need to to do is we need to go back um into your part-time staff and we need to evaluate what hours they worked in calendar year 23 uh because all of their salaries are based off that 1050 number that Bob alluded to earlier as is the potential for the new part-time electrical inspector so I think it it behooves us because you know when you go to the actual um expenditures under part-time employees it's lower than what was budgeted for in 2023 and significantly lower than was what was budgeted for in 2022 so I think it would behoove Us in order to to again you know fine-tune that salaries and wages budget uh to go back look at see what folks worked last year um sort of get a little bit of a handle on that that part-time electrical inspector and what the actual hours you would need them would be um and then we can revise this particular issue yeah all right any you know anything would help and I could probably do a really good close estimate as to what would you know be ideal I guess for us at this point uh what one of the one of the things that I I did want to ask because one of the council members asked me about it earlier today um are there any fee adjustments uh that you would recommend that the council consider by ordinance in 2024 um where you feel like we're either low or not competitive with neighboring municipalities or anything of that nature we're we're up there whenever I did talk uh our fee schedule in the past I looked at Westfield I looked at Summit similar communities to ours and uh we are up there some it has if you want a break down I can give it to you because I have it and I don't I don't see any any recommendations to make us go way up and Beyond what those other two towns are are charging right now um I can break it down and show you exactly hours compared to those two if you want me to do that do you think right now we're competitive yes uh we're again we're higher in some areas and we're even I don't geez I I did this last year I have these fee schedules from last year for both those towns we're not I don't think we're lower anywhere in the fee schedule and if you are you talking just UCC because we have you know we got a dumpster permit we have talking everything within your perit all right well West Westfield and Summit or UCC only I didn't ask them for for for their if they have a dumpster permit fee I'm just looking at UCC and Tony just to this end um last year I know the fire department looked at their fee schedule and like you they have a lot of different kinds of charges and they instituted some nominal fee changes that added up to a real number at the end of the day and I think what what Keith is alluding to is perhaps something similar again we're not talking about 20 % increases on on anything but if you put out a lot of permits and you add a couple of bucks to each one it it adds up to a real number that perhaps can fund a part-time electrical inspector or or a keyboard uh person your department is unique in that it is one of those departments that generates money and so I think if you're again to to evans's point um you know if if you're looking for more I think you have to take a look at your Feast schedule and again no no giant hits but there's money there yes um I will do that I'll present I will lay out hours now and the two that I would compare with um I can do that easily I can raise the fees not ask ask you guys to approve a fee change but but the Paul's point you know minimal increase but again spared out over the number of permits but we have to figure out some way to pay for all this stuff yes I understand you know if if we charge five cents a cubic foot you know we look at maybe maybe five and a half cents or six cents it would be small an incremental so this that's exactly the type of stuff so take it away get with Keith and Bob you know we can show some sort of offset when you come back that will I think help make the case I do think you're still going to have to find some savings here in addition but meeting somewhere in the middle is probably the the best course okay Tony you have one Capital request um which is a which is an additional vehicle um do you want to explain to the Village Council what you explained in the uh director's meeting on Capital on Thursday morning please yes uh one of my one inspector wants to use his personal vehicle all the other inspectors have part of our Rolling Stock out there and I don't have a car I've been borrowing Dawn's one of Dawn's vehicles uh and and if I may the issue with that is Dawn will be now traveling to Mawa under the shared services agreement so that opens up a need for Tony to be able to be mobile during the day but continue your thought yeah I mean it's more important for inspectors to be out there every day I don't need to go out every single day but if I do then or or if I get C in I I get cold in from time to time fires overnight or a tree down on the house or something I I'll come down here I've got well actually I shouldn't use that as an example because there's five cars down there that I can come in and grab the keys and use but if if everybody's out and I don't have a vehicle then I can't go anywhere right use my and there are times during pending storms that Tony you know I've authorized him to take a car home in case we do have a call overnight that he can respond immediately and have the necessary equipment that he might need in the truck and how much are we asking how much is the C 4 how often does that really happen that everybody's out and there's no cars for Tony and he's out on an emergency so I I as a side note I I I do support this or I wouldn't have put it in the recommendation for for Capital um but we are going to be undertaking as soon as this budget is complete a complete Fleet inventory um and actually understand who is actually riding in each vehicle um talk about Surplus talk about what potentially could be surplus vehicles so that is a project that Bob and I are going to be undertaking with Mike Juna help but we're going to reserve that until we get this budget adopted so and again Keith I'm not trying to give anybody grief but why are we going to buy another car until before that that review is done because there's there's cars in his Fleet that are going to be retired through that process do okay do we know if any of them are ready I just don't want to put a $45,000 expenditure in the capital budget for just like sounds like when what will be an occasional need if the case is we've got three cars that we're going to retire there's a larger need you know that car can be available as a floater for other folks that may be in a similar similar situation to Tony where perhaps they just need a car occasionally like that's a better argument but $45,000 because occasionally all five cars are out and he's needed our emergency is again it's a little tougher to and your point is well taken you know the the the reason that I was comfortable recommending this and I think Bob agrees with me is because we did have two department head sharing a car but now that other department heads uh need for the car is going to escalate significantly because she's going to be all the way up in Mawa for for part of the week as well I also just want to say I mean obviously I'd like to see it lower but um you know people when they have a home improvement really want this service provided they're really relying on it and Commercial development as well so I I mean I know we're I agree we need to do a little better but I did want to say thank you and I think when people wait two to three days to open a new business or get have their construction project Move Along that's very meaningful as a service to that business and that citizen um so I feel like I just want to add that and I am grateful that you're doing things to streamline that because I know that you're keeping most people mostly happy and we've heard we've seen this especially on Main Street where people really want this process expedited since being on the council we've had two or three people um since Keith's been here there's been two that Tony's really hopped to it and so for every day that a business doesn't open it's a carrying cost and for every day that an electrical permit's not issued it's a displacement from a home so look I want it to be lower but I feel like the service that the building department does is valuable to both our business district and our residents and there are situations like if if you were waiting for an electrical inspector and the Ridgewood was saying there's no Transportation I think that would make that person very angry and I think it would we don't want to see delays particularly in the commercial side where people are carrying rent so I I do want to say thank you because in the rare situations that the Departments had to hop to it and streamline it and thank you you to Keith these are things that it's not just about the cuts it's about the service we're providing so thank you and through you mayor again this capital budget is fluid so you know this allocation is in there as of now as we go through things and set priorities over the next month you know that we can we can make some adjustments if the council deems it necessary I tried to get um a more definitive number uh and I talk with with Mike Mike jent and he he he asked he inquired to wherever I don't I don't know which dealerships and when I talked with Bob I said I'm not getting a number and the suggestion was 45 I don't know that it has to be that much it's a number we put in that Bob suggested um so when you have a more confirmed number Tony from Mike just just come to Bob and I and we'll we'll have that discussion well I did it last year actually did this last year when we started this budget process so the suggestion was for from Bob because I I I needed to give him the the request M and I didn't have a number so we just put that in there so if I can do that as well I will um ask again see if that number can go down I will look at the U my fee schedule and uh can always raise fees we can always do that you again I mean I don't want to do this on the back of permit holders I think Paul's right if there are small increases that will add up over time that's great but if you're going to try to justify a $45,000 car by jacking fees up I'm not going to agree to that and listen Maybe it's getting late and I'm getting a little cranky but like this just feels like a real nice to have as opposed to a neat to have um if you're looking at a car does it have to be a SUV can it be a smaller car can't I mean does it have to be a giant SUV no what is it what giant SUV is about $70,000 exactly, what are you carry what does it have to hold my personal vehicle is is a giant SUV and it's really expensive those things um I the biggest I guess the biggest concern is getting around in the snowstorm um if you remember superstorm stand Sandy we I couldn't go anywhere I would here and be stuck had to turn around back up uh flood waters snow all that stuff so the the the bigger deal would be to get around to carry I don't need a lot of stuff good I know Subaru makes a really small SUV and they're very good in the snow are you have you and and I would also like you to consider a hybrid uh careful just careful I just letting you know we're gonna we're gonna we're going to talk about charging stations when Rich calbi comes in for his budget hybrid doesn't require a charging station okay no no hybrid's better than all electric electric I I have this thing about all electric vehicles I'm all for I'm all for conservation and all but do and this is a bigger conversation than I want to have at 9:24 any other questions for Tony yep I know what I need to do um and I appreciate it thank you thanks for the uh the support really thanks Tony really appreciate it through you Mayor Bob and I are going to recommend that we hold off um on his divisions uh amongst his Department until our next budget meeting them all now thank you the the next budget the next budget schedule on February 5th is slightly lighter um so we will uh incorporate Bob into that rotation okay thank you very much um then with that uh we're going to do the wrap up or no that was a wrap up good job then we're going to go right to public comment waiting patient go over there is it it is on there's a green light hello hello hi I'm Robin fiser and as some of you know I please Robin uh 412 North Monroe I live at the corner of North Monroe and Glenn and I came with the idea of begging for the sidewalks um which ones West West Glen um so as I've sat here and seen all the wonderful things you guys do I just wanted to say thank you for allocating and finishing this project and personally a week ago my two boys were on the corner that you guys fixed just this year and we about to get run over by a car who wasn't paying attention so my boys lives are literally things to you guys cuz they were in a safe spot where someone ran the light on Saturday I woke up to my 15-year-old crying because she heard a girl who's probably an early teen just got her license she had been T-boned she had the right away someone just ran the red light and she's crying on the phone saying to her mother I'm okay I'm okay I'm okay you guys fixed the light at that corner and she had a sidewalk that she stood on while she waited for the fire department the police department the ambulance the tow trucks everybody came within seconds by the way cuz we have the extra fire station and she had a place where she could stay until mom came and picked her up so again I know what I saw Saturday night was a terrified young driver who did the right thing and what I saw was a man who probably was exhausted I didn't see a drunk I didn't see someone who was out of control I saw some someone who made a mistake and that's what we need the sidewalks for because it's not intentional nobody goes out and says let me kill some civilians today well okay most people don't but again mistakes happen and we still have kids walking the sidewalk or that area because they're cutting they don't want to do the Long Walk they're lazy they're tired I get it but that's why what you're doing tonight and approving the sidewalks is so crucial and I know I may be the only one here tonight but I can tell you there's been a flurry of text back and forth and Mom's saying thank you for standing up thank you for staying thank you for putting this together because you guys are making a big difference so from the bottom of my heart from my family thank you thank you for putting this front and center Robin thank you for sharing that wonderful wonderful story and look we get tired we get cranky but we love that kind of feedback thank you so much thank you and we have one person on hybrid access uh boy loving Boyd you're up good evening mayor and councel good evening Bo Boyd a loving 342 South Irving Street there was some discussion about the $341,000 structure that might be constructed at Hackle Park and I believe Ms Bigos indicated that the structure would be available for use by the tenant there uh on a reserved basis I don't understand that the tenant has a rent pays rent and is set at a certain amount now the taxpayers are going to fund a significant Improvement on the property and the Tenant is going to be able to use it my position and I'm sure it's one that would be shared by many other taxpayers is that there should be an assessment made to the tenant for the use of that new structure or the rent should be increased appropriately there should be no freebies when it comes to that if the taxpayers are paying for that structure the tenant should not be able to use it unless she kicks in some money and that's my position on it and I hope that's shared by at least one other member of the council the other concern I have is there was some discussion about bringing in trucks from another town to the lake view compost site nice in the fact that we are going to get some money but what about the people who live on Lake View and live on Godwin and live on other streets where all this additional truck traffic is going to be coming in I think this needs to be looked at very closely before we allow the manager to negotiate a final contract uh there was some discussion about roads being paved that additional truck traffic might create a situation where we might have to pave roads quicker than we would if we didn't have the truck traffic so let's not think about how much money we make are going to make on this until we are sure that we're going to make money and not lose money on the on the situation um very I was very very surprised tonight to learn that there apparently has been some discussion obviously not in public about closing the firehouse at Glennon Monroe thankfully the manager has indicated that there would only be a $10,000 a year Savings in doing that and that Firehouse will remain open that's a big safety concern getting fir trucks up the hill particularly in bad weather I would feel very badly and very sad for the people in that neighborhood in the height section if that Firehouse were to close that Firehouse provides very fast response for people in that area and under no circumstances should that be closed particularly if there was a secret meeting about it that's all I have to say for now but I will have more to say at the next budget meeting thank you so much thank you Boyd and my only comment um uh do we have any anyone else no then I'm going to close public comment um there have been no secret meetings about this or any other matter anybody else have a comment mayor through you um I just want to reiterate you know we're not in the business of having secret meetings we don't have secret meetings I was asked by one council member very early on in my tenure here it may have even before I started um to just get an assessment of what the costs for operating that particular building were it was provided and I think everyone that I shared that information with which I think might have been individually two council members who had inquired about it um that there there really wasn't uh a realization of any true savings um in closing that even having a discussion about closing the firehouse um with regard to the truck traffic uh near the leaf composting facility uh these are both small municipalities adjacent to us um contracts don't expire until closer to the end of the year so we have a lot of time to talk about this and the impact of it um so but I I don't think that there would be substantial truck traffic additional truck traffic um heading into that facility but obviously we'll take that under advisement as we talk to the other two municipalities I I'd also like to say something so since I asked the questions on the record here at the meeting often when we go back out into the public or ask questions particularly about Public Safety Council member reyolds has talked about that we are always asked common questions how many police off officers do we have how many firemen do we have and how are they allocated equally with fire we're asked about the volunteer program particularly with the merge of EMS so for me these are good numbers and why I asked the question is we are always asked how many what do the retirements are and those that is why I asked those questions I am unaware of any discussion ever I wouldn't go to a secret meeting but from the The public's perspective at least from my ventage point when we talk about public service police and fire people want to know expressly how many police do we have and how many cops do we have and that is a question that we're asked the second question we have on new hires is how many are retiring so I do want to say that I'm really grateful for the information the reason I asked the question is a bulk you know salaries and benefits are a bulk of our driver to our budget and they are I think all five of us would Echo that we are asked these questions frequently oftenly and I wanted to have the question out there clearly we are grateful to police and fire and now we have a better answer all five of us for it thank you anybody else and with that I will entertain a motion for Jour so moved second all in favor I I I po