please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance Al to the flag of the United States of America to the Republic for which it stands one na under God indivisible please be seated thank you good evening uh Al to order of the uh serval planning board Beth has this uh been advertised in accordance with the public meeting act yes chairman it has I ask for a a roll call please Mr hich Mr algra Mr Bolton here Mr Elm Miss Miss Len Mr Muller here Mr Shaw here councilman zabowski chairman Tha here Mr Cornell here Mr Fowler here Mr sordillo here we have a quorum thank you very much do we have any moral moralization of resolutions none uh can we have a um I need a acceptance for the minutes of last meeting motion to uh accept the minutes with uh minor modifications second all in favor I oppos okay communication agenda then this evening thank you very much that's easy subdivision hearings uh this evening 2069 Highway 35 LLC preliminary and final major site plans Mr chairman uh this meeting uh this application has been requested to be carried uh they had not uh uh ready to proceed back before the board uh that means uh the next dating it's it's scheduled for is uh for May 15 2024 so if anyone here is um here to hear or speak on the application for 2069 Highway 35 LLC please be advised your your notice is now being provided that the uh hearing will continue on May 15 2024 at this uh in this room at 7:30 uh and no further public notice will be provided out side of uh being notified here at this meeting now I'm going to need a motion to make that uh official to uh change that date motion second I have a second having a motion made in seconded to change the date to May 15 uh roll call vote Mr Bolton yes Mr Elm miss lman Mr Muller yes Mr Shaw yes councilman zabowski yes chairman Tai yes okay old business new business administrative matters uh this evening we have U the master plan process overview with h grin Associates good evening chairman members of the board John Barry with higher gr and Associates um I'm a professional planner and have been working with the burough in several different capacities over the last uh five or six years represent the zoning board currently and my firm has been working on the master plan updates so we were requested to come to the board to introduce the process a little bit to some of the members who haven't been involved up to this point who are um recently appointed and to give everybody else a refresher on what a master plan is why it's important and where we are in the process of of the update right now so for a for a basic overview the master plan functions as a legal document that's um required for the foundation of zoning in the municip IP ality but it's also a general policy road map for the town and how it makes its decisions how it's going to invest its resources in different areas so the um the land use law the municipal land use law in the state calls for a master plan to contain certain components the most important of which is the land use element which as I said is the foundation for zoning so you have your your policy vision for the town the land use element sets out where things can be built different zones what kinds of uses are permitted in those zones how large things can be Etc um and then that gets translated into the in the law the ordinance the zoning ordinance um by the governing body of the town so the planning board's role is to guide that vision and adopt the master plan as a policy document um so right now what we're working on is an update to the land use element a new land use element for the burrow along with a circulation element that deals with Transportation so any road improvements any new facilities that may be related to movement of goods and people throughout the town and a c a community facilities element which deals with different types of public facilities um touches on schools touches on community centers things of that nature um the uh there are many other elements that could be part of a of a master plan but right now we're just focusing on those three so the process really kicked off last year with the preparation of a reexamination report the law calls for towns to reexamine their Master plans at least every 10 years so the last master plan that was done comprehensively for the burrow was in 2013 last year 10 years later the reexamination report was done and identified some recommendations that would be translated into full plan element updates um the elements are think of chapters in a book really but they're they they stand alone but they also have a connection between them uh and pretty much everything ties back at the end of the day in one way or another to the land use element um so right now we have draft documents my office has been working with both Jay and Mike on refining those documents making sure that that we're covering all of the pertinent aspects and reviewing the drafts that are um that have been circulated we're going to be um in the next little while I can't I can't tell you exactly how long but we're in the process of finalizing those those draft documents for public review and review by the full board um in the meantime I think there's a desire to create a subcommittee of the planning board that would help refine and finalize those documents take the draft work that my office has done the recommendations that Jay and Mike have provided and bring anything else that the the board may want to see in to that so that we can wrap up those drafts and then move forward with the public review process um during the reexamination process we did conduct a digital survey and there were several public meetings that um were open to the public for comment and we had Outreach with some of the the key Municipal stakeholders different officials throughout the town and so forth um so that's where we are right now the master plan um process is you know we're fairly far far along with the preparation of these elements so we I know we had the the turnover with some of the board at the beginning of the year we wanted to make sure that everybody's up to speed on the process itself and to know that there'll be some draft documents for review coming up pretty soon and there'll be an opportunity for another round of of public review before the board during a a hearing for those so I'll be happy to answer any questions that we start a subcommittee when would you want to have those meetings uh as as far as how soon or time time or date time time and and and evidently we'll have it here but I mean afternoon evening um I think my office is generally flexible um if the board if the subcommittee is available during the afternoon it does tend to be less of a scheduling conflict for us just because we have many night meetings so um but we can we can try to coordinate um as as needed all right for everybody that sits on the board is anybody interested being the chairman I'm going to sit and we can have three other people on this subcommittee and all we're going to do is review what we're going to bring back to this board and then when that's done we're going to put it out for public correct chair I would like to be that's one I'm that's two okay that's three thank you very much gentlemen that wasn't too hard huh that wasn't too hard little little reluctant well that's right well you know my two Heavy Hitters are on vacation oh well they should have been chosen by default they didn't show no I would never do that I've become chairman of too many committees on that you know you're missing you're it um okay so you're going to get back to me on a timeline and then we can discuss is everybody good for the evenings or the afternoon what would your preference be anything that works for you Mr chair generally night times are better but all right we'll try to do it at night on like a Monday what what's your schedule you busy on Mondays or Tuesdays or we'll we'll get together and and find a a common date because before we leave I'll give you my business card with my name number on it you can get in touch with me all right great okay any other questions of the uh master plan may I ask a question go ahead be my guest so my estimation in I think a three square mile radius in our buau there's two elementary schools an upper elementary school for all the fourth and fifth graders the middle school for all sixth seventh and eighth graders High School 9th through 12 we have the library we have the only supermarket in the area we have the main Park in the area with all the facilities two ball fields and a slew of commercial properties and in my estimation that has created a traffic Armageddon in the bordon town ernston Washington Road area and I understand that ernston road is a county road but we're not getting much much help from the county in dealing with it and it's it's become it's become a nightmare um and last last year this board in part um based upon the traffic conditions there had recommended that the Board of Education not put a Transportation Center in that area to add 80 more buses to the road my question is can anything be done by this board in the re-evaluation process to address this problem because it is a significant problem and I fear it's going to get worse so without getting into the specifics of a potential solution conceptually Now's the Time to lay the lay the groundwork and one of the things we want to look at when we're setting the master plan up and getting it adopted is think about future obviously that's the whole point of planning and think about how we can approach outside entities whether it's the county whether it's the state you know depending on the different circumstances if it's the um setting the stage for some kind of study or project to try to help alleviate a particular condition or problem anytime you have support for that in a municipal master plan it goes a long way toward trying to get it kicked up the ladder trying to get the funding that you might need for that kind of project if it just comes out of the blue and it's never been talked about and doesn't have that kind of more institutional policy driven support it may be a little harder but so Now's the Time to get those issues on the table and as part of the subcommittee conversations I think that you know it's something that we'd be happy to to look into thank you any other questions that's it thank you very much you're welcome uh we have a memo from the municipal PL uh clerk on resolution 2024-25 referring to the buau of sville planning board and review of certain proposals and amendments to the buau of ser landfill and Melrose development plan as reported to the mayor and uh council do you want to speak on that Mr chairman that the board was involved with reviewing a Redevelopment plan for piece of property in Melrose and the landfill site on Journey Mill Road a number of years ago that Redevelopment plan was written around the proposed development of a power plan there were agreements in place with that power plant plant they received planning board approval and it fell through so the finan correct fre development agency received rfps and there's currently a proposal for the development of Cold Storage Warehouse on that property so the Redevelopment plan amendments that are in front of you revise the previously adopted Redevelopment plan to kind of tailor it to fit this proposed development the attorney and the engineer for the applicant are present this evening I thought it would be important just for them to give you kind of a quick overview on what they're proposing that way you understand why the amendments are being made to the Redevelopment plan so you may take the name and state your name and firm good evening everyone my name is Jennifer Phillips Smith I'm an attorney with Gibbons PC and I am here today on behalf of the designated redeveloper for the landfill site which is known as cpmd Journey Mill Road LLC the designated uh redeveloper was in fact awarded uh this opport through an RFP process that was run through the burough and Sarah once it was determined that the prior plans were not able to move forward uh we have entered into a Redevelopment agreement with Sarah as a designated redeveloper and that was in January of 2023 and with a purchase and sale agreement with the burrow the landfill is burrow property the burrow was looking to sell it in order to take the landfill and return it back to an economic opportunity for the burrow uh that purchase and sale agreement was signed last year um and as Mr Cornell indicated as part of the Redevelopment agreement and the purchase and sale contract it was uh acknowledged that the current Redevelopment plan does not permit Cold Storage warehouse but that is what's being proposed that's what was in the RFP and so therefore that the Redevelopment plan would need to be amended for the project to move forward what you have before you this evening for a determination as far as consistency with the master plan is a proposed amendment to that Redevelopment plan the the amendment was reviewed by Sarah along with Sarah's uh engineering and planning professionals and it has a number of um changes to it primarily to allow Cold Storage warehousing to be a permitted use now note it is only cold storage warehousing not General warehousing which Cold Storage warehousing is of a different type usually more automated lower impact as far as number of employees Etc uh there's other changes just to address things like the height of the proposed building with Mechanicals um to put lighting standards in place to address some landscaping and storm water standards but we thought it would also be helpful to give you an overview of the proposed project now keep in mind we are going to have to come back to you if the council does choose to adopt this ordinance at that time we can file a full site plan application and would come back before you with all the details on the proposed buildings and lighting and Landscaping and storm water but we can show you a conceptual plan just so you can have an idea as to why this particular project is being proposed and why the Redevelopment plan would need to be amended to fit it so I'd actually like to ask um Michael stickle who is an engineer with Colliers to just give a quick overview of the location of the property and the proposed plans we'll be quick yeah mind my uh thank you Jen so the proposed development um as you can see on the board here is located on a it's about a 46 acre uh former US EPA superf fund site known as a sville landfill number three it's located just west of Journey Mo Road uh which you can see on the right side of the map there uh it's just across from the intersection with Red Oak Lane uh it's about a quarter mile north of Starland Ballroom and the VFW and about um mile and a quarter north of Bordentown Road and on the other side Washington Road is just over a mile to the north of the site uh this site was Dlisted from Super Fund in 2011 which was the beginnings of the original uh power plant project mentioned before the subject property is block 58 Lots 2.01 and lot n uh lot nine is owned by the burrow of sville lot 2.01 is owned by the applicant uh the property is in the eco-industrial Redevelopment area within the landfill and Melrose Redevelopment plan so what's proposed at this site uh Jen thank you for pulling up this is our overall site layout um the applicant is proposing to construct two Cold Storage Warehouse buildings with trailer storage areas and other Associated site improvements uh this is proposed in two phases phase one is building one in the front along Journey Mill Road the right side of the page uh this is about a 250,000 square foot uh footprint for the cold storage Warehouse that includes the freezer space cold docks and also office space uh there's 88 parking spaces proposed 36 loading bays and 76 trailer parking stalls and then phase two is in the the back the left side of the page um which is building 2 which is just under 100,000 ft it's 9952 Square ft for footprint including freezer space docks and office um this has 58 proposed parking spaces 26 loading bays and 40 trailer parking stalls so access to this development is proposed from three driveways all along Journey Mill Road first at the North side there is an Ingress only driveway uh Ingress only because of sight distance issues along Journey Mill Road the central driveway which is aligned with Red Oak Lane is a full movement driveway so both in and out and the southern driveway um on the south side of the building there is a full movement driveway as well uh other than that there's storm water management facilities proposed throughout including small scale bio retention basins porest pavement areas and a detention Basin uh everything is designed in compliance with the uh D standards and jc7 colon 8 and then yeah utilities are proposed to connect to Journey Mill Road landscaping and lighting will be provided in compliance with the ordinance and I think that's all I have so as I mentioned those the details concerning lighting storm watering everything like that will come back back before you in full-blown site plan should the council adopt this ordinance and as I also mentioned this is part of a purchase and sale contract because this is burrow owned property ultimately should both buildings be approved uh the applicant would be remitting up to$ 23 million to the burrow in connection with the acquisition of this property if both buildings are approved um that is it for this evening from US unless you have any questions any questions of the applicant thank you very much for a concise uh report Mr chairman what the board is is being asked to do is confirm that this is consistent with the master plan you're not approving the application you're you're basically looking at the changes to the Redevelopment plan and confirming that they're consistent with your master plan and instead of 18 uses we now have 19 uses being called storage as one correct but also the power plant use that was previously allowed is being eliminated correct so that would be the 19th that was gone okay excuse me you have your ordinance 1024 in front of you what's your uh what's your desire do I have a motion to accept motion Mr chair I have a second before discussion second any discussion on this matter if not I'll take a roll call vote Mr Bolton yes Mr Elm M Len Mr Muller yes M Mr Shaw yes councilman zabowski chairman Tai yes thank you do we want to do public portion first and then go into executive session okay so we'll make a motion to open to the public I need a motion to make it uh open to the public open second all in favor say I I any oppos anybody like to speak before the board tonight if you do please come up state your name and where you live and just a reminder to the to the members of the public um we're not allowed to hear any testimony or comments or question regarding any pending application that's uh before the board that may have a public hearing coming up that will be something that has to be heard when the public hearing is scheduled on that particular application okay I understand that um however uh well so my name is Jennifer Edwards I'm from ten Vincent Street sorry I just had like like a coughing fit out of nowhere um I I just wanted to on behalf of the residents of sville follow up on our request from two weeks ago um requesting a religious land use attorney um to be hired to review and assist on the application um for the ernston road house of worship while um I know that there are qualified people on this board our concern is that they don't include uh religious land use experts and would be beneficial to have those experts to advise um and help preserve as much quality of life for the surrounding properties and the rest of cerville as this will um obviously impact the entire town since there's a delay in in hearing the application and I know we still have two weeks to go um it would be great and time appropriate to bring on these professionals now if we can and uh to assist the town and demonstrate to the residents that everything is being done to secure the best possible outcome if uh the Rupa lawyer exceeds the planning board's budget it's my understanding that a resolution may be passed to request funds from the council um and we would just like to request that that be considered um we believe obviously that the proposed location in the size and I know we're going to repeat this um of the house of worship pres uh presents significant challenges and conflicts with the local code regulations and the Burrow's master plan as it is currently um and as S as such sorry a thorough uh Rupa review to assess the implications of moving forward with the application in its current form is warranted having an expert professional in religious land use law really uh will be able to help the plan guide the planning board and uh the community to make sure that it's a fair and transparent process for everyone involved um because transparency is vital regarding a project of this magnitude we're also requesting independent studies be performed for traffic environment noise light and other impacts to the community and we hope that the planning board will carefully consider our concerns thank you are Jennifer what was your address uh 10 Vincent Street Parlin thank anybody else from the public i' i' like to thank you for coming out tonight and I'd like to thank you for coming as a group it saves us a lot of trouble and it's going to save us in the future if you could do that when when this application becomes before us we are in the process of uh looking into hiring the attorneys and the traffic study um the burrow Council has given us you okay Mr chairman my understanding is that there are funds in place to assist with a legal counsel Rupa if there's a traffic IND independent traffic engineer the escro fees posted by the applicant will be utilized to finance that expert okay so that's where we sit is everybody happy with that okay the one thing I'd like to caution everybody is that this is going to be a long process we're going to make sure everybody gets a fair shot um the one thing we have to do is when we hire this Loop attorney is to pay attention to what they said there's a rabit hole here that we don't want to go down so whatever it takes we're here for the people of the town but we also have to remember that everybody has rights to do what they think they can so um thank you again for coming as a group it's going to save us as as it and we'll go from there anybody else under uh good and Welfare if not I'll take a motion to close public portion second second all in favor I having no further oh having no further M matters before the public we're going to go into executive uh session so we can do some business that you asked us to do okay all right I'm G to read the resol we're as section eight of the open public Act njsa 10 colon 4-12 B 1-9 permits the exclusion of the public from meeting in certain circumstances and whereas the pl planning board is of the opinion that such circumstances currently exist and now therefore be resolved by the planning board of the burough of cille County of middle sex in the state of New Jersey as follows the public shall be excluded from discussion in closed session at the P at the board's meeting on March 20th 2024 the general nature of the subject matters to be discussed are as follows contract negotiations Professional Services minutes will be kept once the matter evolving the confidential confidentiality of the above no longer requires that confidentiality then the minutes can be made made public the board may take official action of those items discussed in executive session upon completion of the executive session discussion entering back into Open Session may I get a motion motion second second roll call I I I opposed okay um looks like looks like close the door will close 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 okay under closed session we spoke about litigation that the uh and and hiring traffic studies and and a Lupa attorney um I need a motion to accept the loopa attorney uh attorney at law uh MB Blum motion we have a second all I have a motion made and seconded roll call all in favor we'll do roll call yep uh Mr Bolton yes Mr Elm yes Miss Len Mr Muller yes Mr Shaw yes councilman zabowski chairman Tai yes great then the second I need a motion for the traffic study for bright bra view engineering to uh to hire them Mr chairman let me just they're not going to be performing a traffic study they are going to be reviewing the documents the traffic report submitted by the applicant and they would be providing a report to the board but it's a review report not a separate study correct okay yes motion to accept having having said that we need a second all uh roll call Mr Bolton yes Mr Elm yes Miss Len Mr mher yes Mr Shaw yes councilman zabowski chairman Tai yes hi so on the agenda the next meeting is April 3 okay Mr chairman that is as we discussed early the Maj Sor Community Center house of worship site plan that's the only application on the agenda that evening that's it it's enough uh open the public portion we did that um I'll take a a motion to adjourn motion second all in favor thank you very much for a very good meeting we'll be in touch and let you know what we're going to do yes I'll start working on that first thank you very much than