in progress I'm going just check yep thank you you thank you welcome to the chadam township committee meeting of April 9th 2024 can I ask everyone to rise for the pledge IED Alle to the flag United States of America and to the for it stands indivisible andice all okay we are returning from executive session so um adequate notice has been given we did um receive confirmation of that and we are opening our hearing of citizens Mr lante can you read the guidance for the hearing of citizens members of the public are now welcome to come up to the microphone to address the township committee this is an opportunity for any member of the public to be heard about issues which are not topics scheduled for public hearings tonight those present May step up to the microphone to be heard if you're watching via Zoom you may speak during any of the public sessions by following the zoom instructions to raise your hand whether in person or online when you are recognized to speak please uh mind the following procedures please say your name spell your last name give the name of your street you do not need to give your street number all public comments will be limited to 3 minutes rather than use any of your time answering questions the township committee will wait until you finish speaking before responding there are two public comment sessions on tonight's agenda each member of the public will be limited to one comment of up to three minutes during each public comment period written comments submitted to the township clert before 3 p.m. today will be read during the Public Public comment sessions written comments are subject to the same guidelines as oral comments duplicative written comments may be summarized rather than read in full according to guidelines issued by the New Jersey Division of local government services thank you do we have anybody on well did you get any um messages uh we did not get any written comments for this evening thank you and how about on M uh let's see we have one hand on Zoom okay uh Mr car you're live hi this is steuart Carr from three Crestwood Drive can you hear me yes hello Mr Carr hi good evening Stuart Carr c from three Crestwood Drive in chadam Township uh speaking tonight briefly on the Oprah item that you have on the agenda kind of paraphrasing some of the comments have made uh via email over the last uh couple of weeks uh number one item is again I assume that we're going to be challenging the attorney to kind of critique the statements by attorney Griffin and kaery and Kevin Walsh etc etc down in Trenton during the um Senate hearing on the 11th of March in order to kind of do a counterbalance to the uh presentation that the attorney made uh at the last meeting which again was very good about the positives of the Oprah but didn't really go into the uh by the way got's component to the opr so I'd like to again hopefully see a more balanced presentation today and have a pretty active critique by the members of the committee back and forth on some of the pros and cons of actually what's going to be going on with that legislation again absent the uh uh school boards Association all these other folks are very very few people who are actually proponents of this amended legislation except for those who again have a selfish interest I think in uh doing that um and again perhaps I'm misguided perhaps all those other attorneys are misguided but it looks like again um they're on to something and really the public is not getting the best end of the stick with respect to this so I'm hoping that again the attorney can give us a balanced View and that we could have some critique you know in dialogue relative to that again we know that mayor Conley over in Madison is now the uh incoming president of the New Jersey Conference of Mayors just found out the other day and he obviously has a very strong view apparently on the benefits of this legislation I'd hope that mayor Ewald and also her sister over in Sister town in um chattan burough mayor Dempsey can speak with him publicly and kind of figure out from his perspective just why that's so good for the residents uh versus what these other whistleblowers SL um good government types are looking for at that point okay um again I would also encourage everybody if you haven't to take a look at that uh 4H hour presentation that was done a 4-Hour hearing on the 11 to get a little bit more uh view of what some of the different people said about that particular uh activity okay so again hopefully I'm wrong hopefully I'm out to lunch with respect to concern but I really think that we are not getting complete you know Clarity on what exactly the potential concerns are with respect to this legislation and there are a lot of specifics in both the written and oral commentary hopefully the attorney has had time since the last couple weeks to uh look at that and put that out because again it's very good for administrators very good for clerks very good for most uh elected officials to have this lower level of transparency but I think again as the fiduciaries for the residents of chadam and again politicians in general would hopefully be looking out for us uh even though against potentially your selfish interest with respect to transparency and accountability and that type of thing so anyway I look forward to hearing the comments uh in a little while from the folks and thank you for your time thank you you have any other comments from the public no that was the only raised hand okay thank you and seeing no one in the audience I will close the public hearing so we're going to uh start with ordinance 2024 d07 oh no we're gonna because we have it on the uh on the reports on the um we we'll be discussing that later so okay um okay uh ordinance 20247 Bond ordinance for property acquisition uh and this is the we're opening the public hearing do I do I need to motion no just okay so we are opening the public hearing specifically for ordinance 20247 which is the bond ordinance for the acquisition of what is known as commonly known as the feny property on sou no h thank you actually we do have H now Mr Carr hi Stuart Carr once again from three Crestwood Drive in chadam Township just double-checking versus a couple of weeks ago whether there's been any change with respect to the status of the uh purchase and sale agreement or the general negotiations with the uh current owners of the fensky property if we can get a brief update on that that would be appreciated thank you Mr shotty do you want to there's really no update to give the update is that the ordinance is on for public hear and adoption this evening that's all the update there is nothing else can be disclosed to the public other than removing the process Along by way of this ordinance yeah well I mean the only thing I would say is we're all um in support of moving forward and and trying to wrap things up as quickly as possible um normally we wouldn't take action during a workshop but this is something that we want to make sure we get done timely so that's pretty much all we could share at this point um yeah okay so anybody anybody else public hearing any other hands raised I no other hands okay so I will close the public hearing for ordinance 20247 and this is the adoption then for this one yes okay my timing is off as to what's happening with what okay so I need a motion to to adop uh ordinance 20247 I'll make such a motion and can I get a second second thank you can we get a vote please call vote Mr Lois yes Mr McHugh yes Mrs Roland yes Deputy Mayor Troy yes and mayor ewol yes motion passes thank you ordinance 20248 authoriz authorizing the property acquisition uh I will open the public hearing any hands raised no no okay and seeing that no one in the audience is rushing to the mic I will close the public hearing for 20248 and I will ask for a motion to adopt that ordinance and again it's authorizing property acquisition so move second thank you and I any discussion say last time I would just like to say just for the Public's benefit just you know just summarize what this is from in my understanding it's just this is we're authorizing the acquisition of what's known as a fensky property it's a piece of property right alongside U Nash field and it's um could be added to the open space of our town and the the previous ordinance was a bond ordinance which is also referenced in this and is up to a maximum of $199,000 in U in principal amount in terms of the bond so um this is a good thing for the town the bond ordinance that backs this could could um eventually when the note is converted to an actual bond that bond has a amortization life of 40 years which is a you know a wonderful thing in terms of paying it back and useful life of acquiring you know property in chadam Township we have a wonderful vibrant town and that we are gaining more value than than um now and for the future I I I think for Resident so I think this is a great acquisition and if you could do it with your own funds I think you would so it's a good that's a good litness test for the public regardless of of all the other benefits the recreation space so it's it's a good Financial move in my view it's a good move for recreation it's a good move for uh open space it's a a good move for the beauty and um you know live ility of of our town for the quality of life here so thank you anyone else okay let's go to a vote Please Mr Lois yes Mr MCH yes Mrs Rand yes Deputy Mayor tro yes and mayor e yes motion passes okay so we have resolution 202 24-105 local Recreation Improvement grant for Mountain View playground uh Mr shotty could you give brief overview for that thank you mayor um so again the reason this resolution is on the agenda Workshop agenda is because uh the grant deadline for this is uh coming up after rather before our next meeting our regular meeting now you may recall that we did do a resolution for the local Recreation Improvement Grant uh last month uh I believe it was uh earlier last month or yeah last month um we made the deadline at that point the deadline shifted the state extended the grant uh deadline so uh in an effort to put together the most robust application and one that we thought has the best chance of succeeding and will serve the most people um was my feeling that we should probably shift that application from Colony pool playgrounds to the Mountain View playground reason being is the colony pool playground uh is seasonal and it is restricted to numbers so um in terms of when the uh state is looking at these and benefit analysis and they looking at the um you know the ultimate uh Improvement and who will benefit from that this has most uh of the population of chadam that can benefit from it as opposed to just the membership so uh John's team over at M McDonald is putting together the application what you have before you is just the shell sort of a draft I haven't reviewed it because I didn't want to get into the nitty-gritty of it but also solicit your feedback because there was some feedback at the last uh Grant application uh and then you know incorporate whatever thoughts or feelings you have on this or if you don't want to shift from coling pool to the mountain VI playground then we can continue to focus our efforts on just that grand application um and so I didn't want to you know incur more time and effort on this if that's not wish of the goverment body well and just to be clear they're both going to get funded the question is what what puts us in a better position to get get money from the correct um both both playgrounds uh number of playgrounds a number of facilities uh were flagged in our Capital plan which we'll be reviewing in in May um but you know the playgrounds were all deemed to need updating upgrading um and so it's as you just said mayor we're not taking money away or Improvement away we're simply shifting what we think would be the most advantageous for getting brand dollars okay thank you and so if so two two questions is do you support this resolution and and then two are is there any feedback or commentary on the application that you want uh want us to incorporate okay so we'll start out with a motion to uh approve this resolution 2024 105 105 so yeah second uh any discussion I think Mr shotti you know explained why we're Switching gears on this and we want to be in a better position to get those Grant funds so I'm in support of this I'll just make a couple comments about this I think that um at Colony pool at least from The Colony pool uh committee the this improving improving the playgrounds never came up as a recommendation and the reason was that we had done uh quite a bit of you know requests to make repairs there and they the recent in last year and the year before the DPW had done a couple things including a we have a tremendous machine shop where they're able to fabricate and and paint uh metal and weld so they were able to do some substantial repairs of rusted parts and um for uh the playground so the playgrounds there were very stable there there were some splitting wood they they replaced that they you know they binded things I mean we it took some work from the committee to to feed that you know back but all those repairs were made so those those are in pretty stable condition um the thing that would really be needed at at Colony you know along these kind of lines like this is is slides right because the slides they kind of leak all over the place and they've been there forever the the water slides themselves so but in any case I just think for the future we should you know maybe kick the way we kick things to the planning board or we kick them to the zoning board just for comment it would be interesting to just you know formally kick uh if we have the time to formally KCK these resolutions you know to the pool committee just for feedback um and whatever committee that that would be you know if it's in the Parks and we can kick it to open space for feedback great right gives gives them those committees some structured um area to comment on and uh in terms of moving it to Mountain View I I fully support that I think that highlights the need at Mountain View to you know take take a look here at this at these grounds to put them into um to into better use and I think part partially and we can talk about this later you know that has to do with open space as well you know at here for the Mountain View playground and then um the last thing I to say about this Recreation Improvement Grant is that um the descriptions and the way it's written um you know certainly comparison to to what was at colony is robust and and fine in my view so I want to commend the staff on that job well done great thank you can I get a vote Please Mr Lois yes Mr MCH yes Mrs Roland yes Deputy Mayor Troy yes mayor e yes motion passes okay so we are closing out of not formally closing out but closing out on a formal section of our uh agenda and moving into our Workshop agenda so all of the action that needed to be taken was taken at this point and everything else is up is for discussion for the next meeting on the schedule okay is there a particular order you wanted to go in to make this manageable or uh I would suggest mayor the engineer like anything related to the engineer um that way we can get him out of here and there weren't really many other things other than what's under admin as well for discussion um so everything else go through does start around uh sure let's go to well let's do so um first one under engineering uh he's got a professional service contract for pool improvements um that is the pool wall uh that is at Colony pool that is in serious need of repair um at the next meeting with the approval of the governing body we have a resolution to authorize this and award this contract to M McDonald to do those improvements so that way he can start putting together the bid specs the design all that and that way we can go out to bid um and have that ready to start the goal is to have that start as soon as theol so um if anybody has questions for John on that joh coms on straight put detail in for public contract you know you can't select the contractors you want to put enough detail in there so that you know they build what we want so it's going to be engineering PL specific Services there are a couple May that that fall under the other departments but John's here and is involved in all of them so I'm going to bounce around before we go back to the road surfacing uh topic the next one is the rejection of bids for the fiber Loop project um those bids came in again very high um but John the chief and I are uh working uh to figure out how we can get that scope in a more manageable way we're looking at um you know John you want talk about the two big drivers sure you know the the original whole Grant application we were working with a particular vendor who made representation of what the the value of the cost for the project would be and so you know that's why we had the bid we went out the bid and actually went out the bid twice and that vendor never never bid the project so we ended up get bids from from other vendors and so um you know after the bid was received and point to reject it we did speak to that that other vendor and just got some some feedback from them regarding what necessary to bring the cost down and and the one thing that um we did we did expand from the original scope of the Grant application but it was minor but we had fingers going off to uh support um the Wastewater uh facilities the plant the pump stations and so taking those away will bring down the cost um we also discussed the alignment of going staying out of the County Roads does bring down the cost of the project um and of things that they recommended is that there is um you the cost is not just them to run the lines but it's also to get the permits and have the utility companies either JCP now Verizon to make room on their polls for this additional line so that's additional work they can estimate what that is but they don't know exactly what that number is and what they suggested which is a good recommendation was to just um when we structure the bid the next time we we put it in allowance for that and that can um you know put in so they they'll they will they'll just we'll just pay directly to the utility company of what that cost is versus getting a markup on them so that should bring the cost down we're in the process of of identifying all the polls we're going to forward that to JCP and verage because both holding down and try to get a better handle on that cost you know the the vendor made an estimate he's thinking it's in the range of about $400,000 a very substantial half the gr is going towards JC so if we can bring that cost down we can um you know certainly get a handle on and uh also the the police you know we have a police they wanted to pull that out out of their and put that into an allowance police that way so the next time we we go out the bid we're thinking of scaling back the the amount of cable that would actually be installed and just do exactly what the grant was intended for for the police and then we can always expand it later on um and then also uh we we can um if we got out the bid we award um the it's a design bid contract so they'll basically design the fiber they'll they'll go out for the permitting and then once we get that cost back from jcpnl that will give us some latitude if we want to make a minor chain and do something else after they've designed it and after we get these costs back from JCP just see how we may even negotiate with them and try and get things so so we are taking a much significant change in the scope of work when we go out the bid the next time you know the first two bids were just really just going based on the Grant application expanded it slightly um but our expectation was that we were going to get more uh you know interest in in contractors bidding it and we didn't so so we just you know certainly the vendors that bid for the last two times they shown an interest in bidding it again so we want to make sure that when time you adjusting consideration okay have have you looked at the number of fibers in the bundle and and yes in terms of bandwidth yeah we are looking at the number and we do want to get the cable we do want to have the numbers to accommodate future build out you once we get that wire we want to be able to use it for other purposes in the future we can build off of it so we didn't want to cut back on the number of fibers and just do just the for the police we want to have that ability to expand in the future I'm sorry to put you on the spot but is it like m is it like 96 fibers is it is it like maxed out is that what you're spe we went with the Mac we didn't max it out we went we went we looked at what facilities we might use in town and that's what they do I don't honestly I don't my head I don't recall but that was worked out with with with our engineering the police and working that out what what the needs were what the future might so I'm trying to understand you said avoiding the roads how are you avoiding the county roads because that's well now well we're still going to well initially the the expectation was to go on because the one group was going to go from Nash field and go around to Shunpike field and then up to Lafayette up to noi and then going that run they felt that going we we we definitely need the Run going down Southern Boulevard but they felt going up noi and going up La yet was just knowing the poles not keeping off the county they felt that that would be so even though slightly longer footage they felt that that was more know economical okay and then frankly in the bed we can just give kind that that's something that we can give them the option because we have specific um locations that we want to have monitor so they end up going different that's not there's no facil that we contemplating that connect the other rout seems to be that might be less expensive so nothing none of the facilities have been excluded though from what plan is so for example it was supposed to come here I think the last version had the the network coming here to the municipal building correct correct but that but we we have um the ability to come here we're going to be going down Mountain we may just shave that off just to make sure we can build the minimum infrastructure given the grant amount we can always expand that later on we can certainly ask for another Grant application that focuses then on instead of the police it focuses on utilities and that we're focusing more on the the sanitary sewer and those those infrastructure and as part of that Grant application we can ask to go to the police so you know we really want to I really want to be able to bit this that one more time and be able to award it that's why we're cutting it back down just the bare bones just to meet the obligation of the Grant and we actually did the chief did reach out to uh the grant administrator expain said yeah we can do this this amount and still satisfy the grant requ okay that was my other question okay and I know this was set up for a loop for redundancy purposes have you looked at eliminating the loop aspect and just going yeah the the original Loop aspect was actually starting to go into the burrow so we we we we've just abandoned that to get you know let's let's you know stay within the grant scope the grant funding let's not because we might as well you know in spending more of Township money let's apply for another Grant and try to expend further with another Grant versus taking too much any other questions so the next meeting we'll have a resolution to again reject the authorized biding okay another one this one's under public works but John's also been involved in that if there's any questions this seems pretty simple though we did get bids on the DPW roof replacement and um they came in less than we budgeted and expected so that's a good thing right a good thing it's a pretty much a straight replacement of the existing roof that metal roof that's out there bells and whistles to it it really was the roof is repl John I looked at the two of them are right on top two of the bids are right on top of it right and then one's about 10% lower is there any concern with that Gap um there's always a concern but there's really no um you know the bidder didn't um you the New Jersey public contract law does allow a bidder if he makes a mistake he can actually within three days you you know identify that I made a mistake and get out of his bit um I it's lower but not so much concerning that um I would want to be push the envelope because we have no basis to reject it right okay thank you John remind me again what the original um notion was and and that original notion was struck down because we did not account for the underlying plywood or something to that effect no the the the the original the um we did have someone go out that that would gave a price for under under a co-op and uh so so that it kind of points out the fact that you really you know even though you know there's a means of of of not having to bid we could have went with a co-op program and and not had to bid it but then we more money that you know going through a co-op or Bing it so sometimes it is advantageous a bit of project um and and the issue with the original the original concept was that let's eliminate the tin roof or steel roof and let let's just put um ply wood down and put Nashville sheno grof um but the trusses um were concerns with the weight of the trusses you know it was the building is just a preat building it was it was something that the trusses are just not you know initially we were talking you're looking at possibly solar putting on top but the trusses just aren't enough and we're going to spend a lot of money to reinforce those trusses okay yeah thank you for reminding refreshing my memory because I was trying to figure out how the bid was lower if we're just putting the metal so I was thinking what was the original plan how how do we have a higher number but now it makes sense okay great one other item I'm sorry under Public Works that I U came in after uh the preparation of the agenda so and and that is speaking on topic of bidding and state contracts the tree uh bids we did go out to bid on the tree bids if you may recall last month you authorized us to do that John helped put that together T reviewed speaking of what's cheaper not cheaper those came out more expensive than the co-op so we're going to reject those bids okay um and that's that's that for engineering legislation and so I'll take us back to his report and I know there were some questions on that and then we can talk about his 2024 Road res sh project uh plan so did anybody have questions for John on his report and I know I had questions but I think I got answers in the room that's what I'm looking for now One update on my report Unfortunately today I did get an update from the do regarding the 2014 safe schol they did get back to you they did get back I reached out to the governor off so so we're in a process of either having to um reject the bid or give the contract an option to appeal um we try want to try to avoid giving them option to appeal because the do was told it takes even longer to go through this appeal process and get hearing and so um they're getting back to me if we can just reject the bids because the it was above the engineers estimate and so we can reject it for that purpose and we may want to do that in case to avoid this appeal process because it's basically they said cont option to appeal but D you're not going to win because they they obviously didn't submit submit the appropriate paperwork and so they're going to go through this whole process takes months and months and months and just end end up heing it's not their so um so with that we may be this again we may be building this next year by time you know we Reid it and by time you know civil civil rights department and the do then Rie reviews his next bid takes another get back that is a very problematic office it's been a very very very much of a a waste of time and dragging us down rabbit holes that just spin circles I mean we went through the we went through where we had a pre bid meeting where we had civil rights um people um there at the hearing you know to tell contractors how to fill out these forms and this contractor that filled out the form wrong was at the hearing he was told opportunity to ask any questions on the Forum and and he still filled it out wrong so um though unfortunately that's where we are I also got an update on the 2016 and 18 um the 2016 it's it's in uh under review within their RightWay section they do hope that that's going to break soon so that we can advance that project in 2016 um and I was told looking at the 20 they're looking at 2016 wanting to get that advanc so we can go out and B with that one they're not even looking at the 2018 they want to get the 2006 16 authorized before they even look at 18 so if you look at my report it basically it says that the final design is under review by the do well you know they're not even reviewing the 2015 project they want to get the 2016 project can't you get 2014 you get 14 so um not I I did have some questions on the awarding of the engineering professional for colon pool the pool Improvement the pool wall um it looked to me like that was like a more than a half a million dollars is or I believe maybe I saw that in the capital plan is is this the kind of range that we're in or I I think we're in the range of about 300 in that range as part of this process you go through but I think we're in that range and this is the side wall both side walls both side both side walls connecting to you know the new concrete that we did I believe in 2016 it's finishing off it's just I mean just I it's a tremendous amount of money happen you know what is the is there a is there Antion or a possibility that that perhaps we would improve the pool more substantially just building what we have you know like Splash yeah there's always been yeah there's always been like talk of like hey can we get something Clear Water you know a clear water section um how you know does that make sense to look at that how much more would that be you know because if we're doing both sidewalls we're doing a major project here do can we turn the lap Lanes into Clear Water um but we did look at filtration because right now there's no filtration water you're just pumping ground water treating the you know chlorinating the ground water pumping it out and just overflowing so there is no filtration I know so we did look at filtration and that that was hundreds of thousands a lot of money when you say a filtration system when he's saying clear water taking a concrete pool because you've got to two walls in the other so if you have a discrete section of the pool of the pool you're still saying to put in a filtration system well again how you want to move the water if you're doing a Clear Water Area the only way you're going to do is isolate that the rest of the PO and have to it's separate yeah we can consider which is going to be much larger project we reps reps yeah no because that's that's been something uh that's been tossed around for years is uh we we lose people because they don't want they don't like the Sandy Bottom I don't get it I love the beach my kids love the beach but um and some people are just nervous you know about their kids and there are people who like to just exercise and be in clear LAN so uh that you know that has been a question that's come up many times is whether or not to convert that that blade section to concrete if you have to do the two walls anyway and we're talking 300,000 and I don't know is there a way to get some kind of estimate to do something like that just we have an idea what we're do what exactly you want to do put concrete floor basically I certainly throw I canly put some quick together that's just I think my recommendation would be just just kick it to the advisory committee at least we have a committee that is functional can work on this a little bit if you don't want to do that that's fine too um whatever we have to do with this though I think it's going to require something Innovative because if you were even say hey I'm going to make a regular clear bottom pool and it's just going to be in the lap Lan section let's say you still have the issue of there's sand everywhere else and so now kids are going to be moving onto the dock and then bring sand into that pool there's going to be a lot of sand in that pool it's be very sand Bottom now you could you could vacuum it all the time you get or could is there a system where we could just push water through it because currently the way the system works is well water pumped up injectors put chlorine into it it gets basically pushed into the pool the pool has one Outlet everything eventually gets pushed through the pool so the water whatever it looks like it's some of the cleanest water because it doesn't stay in the pool for very long relative to another type of pool so cold too it's so cold yeah because the water's moving through it all the time right but could we just simply push water through that that concrete section or can we do a graded bottom there you know like yes it's concrete but it's graded and then somehow that the sand gets pushed out right because there's going to be a lot of sand and the purpose of this would be like really for swim team lap Lanes follow the line on the bottom you know a visual really those are those are my thoughts like I don't know that just a straight up like hey let's throw a backyard type swimming or or regular Olympic style swimming pool like in the corner of colony would work I think it's requires a little more thinking than that because of the unique situation we have there that that's my input on it but I do think it's worthwhile just to look at it in terms of cost because even if it's a million dollars even it's a million and a half dollars for the taxpayer having that clear water I I believe that will attract more people and I think makes the pool more viable for for a long time Colony pool for the longest time I mean it's before 2021 every single budget presentation it was you know oh we got these three issues you know health care costs you know Personnel costs and Colony pools dragging us down you know I mean that was that was always so if you can plug that 200 $300,000 that comes out of the town every year you know if that situation arises again it's a pro it's a real problem it's a real problem so this could fix that and it's not really a million dollar sounds like a lot of money but you know if if you got $150,000 of membership dat more every year that quickly goes away so yeah I I don't know what we're dealing with so um I think it's does anybody else have any comments on the topic no I would just think there's a lot of things to consider like what what even the capacity what what what are we missing with the current membership and then what's the capacity and how many more members can we add and it has to cap out at some point so what's the max amount of Revenue that we could get even at the current rates or even if we raise the rates so we'd have to do kind of that analysis we can't just say we're going to add thousands of new members to cover these costs because we're going to have to capita some amount of people so I would like to see that kind of analysis like how many people how much would we have to charge for membership and that kind of thing and how long what what's the return on investment of say a million dollar that's I would like to say okay so we need information gathering and I think if we hit it at all angles that's fine by me so if we John kind of thinking from his end if you want to bring the advisory committee I get their input and um I don't know if we're able to I don't I've never we've never hit a point where we had to worry about reaching capacity a Col so that would be a good problem to have um I mean there's there's code that you know goes bed again chlorination volume the space how many bther per I mean there's there's regulations on all of that so it's not that hard to figure out but um you I just want to impress upon you that we are in April the pool you know the pool off season is going to be September to next May yeah um and so whatever project you know is envisioned has to fit either within that or there's a result in maybe a delay of some sort to the pool seasoning cool season opening and then um you know the debt I mean whatever it is if you're talking about one point I really don't see how doing that is going to be less than 1.5 because you're talking about again pump systems filtrations you know a lot of other issues but leave that to John I've seen other pool projects before and I can't see it being less than 1.5 um to to get that especially because you got that mixed with the sand and the Clear Water yeah and then you know what is your desired you know what is the expectation and desire time frame to recoup that investment in addition to you know the other costs so you know how we get to making a decision on that and then being able to go out to bid and award it to get started um we're working within a tight time frame uh this is you know this this reared its head at the end of the season you know the crumbling of the wall so it's not like you know we're leaving this to the last minute we're moving as expeditiously as we can sorry I'm jump good so we need to get the walls fixed this year because next year we're going to have I mean every year the deterioration has been more and more significant DPW does a patch job this year um you know they did another patch job it's not going to last I mean chunks of conrete have been in the in the pool um yeah this this is not repair for this year this is to get the bid documents ready so that we because this this going to take if we were to do it now we're probably not going to we take the season out you not going to be a up so we we like we did with the last wall we had the bid specs done we had the the contract awarded preconstruction meeting and they started as soon as the pool wait so the joh the the the contemplated wall repair is anticipated to start fall of 24 right corre yeah okay right thought corre his what we're talking about now is authorizing his Professional Services work to put the specs put the the documents do all the design all of that so that way it can then go out to bid we'll probably you know if we do this authorization with the next meeting John gets to work then we're looking at probably those documents are ready to go end of June maybe July for authorization to bid we go out to bid receive the bids open them in August and then award uh you know end of August early September so that way the working if we can do it sooner we'll do it sooner because this way you know you put in the bid that the they have to and if we just rece bids a little earlier you know gives us the opportunity if we have to reject bids and Reid it gives us that opportunity we want that window so we'll get it out as soon as possible but typically they would do the concrete work in the fall you know the winter usually hits and then in the spring before Theon opens they do you can't be done in the spring as soon as not enough time yeah I you're talking about because the walls on the sides slope in right so if we rebuild again in a slope what that's going to do is really for at least the deep end or if we were to make any kind of clear water it would preclude that it would so really I mean there is a happy medium here where you could say like well what if we did a straight wall right on that part and then maybe we could add to it in the future I mean there are ways that we can get creative we can do a straight wall on one side want than the other just that on easier to design so on the deep water where the lap lanes are you're saying that would be yeah we can make that a ver wall the through yeah those that wall is dangerous anyway because people go walking on it it's very slippery okay and then the other one so it's the opposite sides of each other repaired I'm sorry I'm trying to remember you said two walls yeah put either side you the last time when we did in 2016 we just did where the div board slide that that wall is the primary wall that we replaced but we did we turned in I think we may maybe went 10 15t and then from that point from the point where we left off all the way to the end to the shadow area place on the side okay okay so we're doing Capital Planning in May anyway um if we wait till May is that thrown off your Timeline is that really putting everything at risk I just I mean it's not really changing my timeline I mean we did put in some money uh for this and other improvements but I mean either way going from you know 500 to one something million because all that would be then coming from open space which also you know has a capacity yeah yeah I I don't know what dollar amount we're talking about we thr numbers I have absolutely no sense of yeah I mean I could just bling fiber is bids are coming in at 1.2 so you're talking about concrete structural pumps a whole lot of things I really can't see this coming in less than 1.5 and that and you're probably going to not get it all done in the winter time May a challeng start get that's over million okay so we so you're going to move forward but we're thinking about where the pool where the deep water is with the idea that it it's built in a manner that potentially could be converted at some point if we want to yeah we we we can you know vent out a little bit more may maybe we we look at um a bigger picture and then we phases this could be the first phase just to repair the walls and then allow the wall to be vertical in a certain location so that it can be expanded in the future okay you know that's something we can can look at everybody go that okie dokie thank you all right there report we we we're going to report in Road surf the report so report we bounc back to the Colony pool resolution so uh we had left off on the engineering report if there were any questions uh and then the2 Road Project proposal so I did have a question you said something about preparing for njd audit which I know uh Mr shot had answered you know what that was and it is new is my understanding we were um recently audited by the DDP regarding our storm water compliance um and uh we passed theine colors um just had to you prepare for it make sure you know DPW had all their you know paperwork that they do on their side we just make sure that they had it all you know neatly tated that to present the D you know the uh you it still took a couple hours to go through everything but you know we're full combines okay do anybody else have any questions um I did want to could you uh kind of speak to the damage at the colony courts what what happened there um yes the um the contractor did have a punch list and there was some um cracking that started um to emerge um over the winter and um basically the contractor started to make the repairs without notifying us so you know what you saw out there was him peeling the tape that he put down on the crack and he just you know we thought it was something sign more significant but it was actually the contractor was the one who was prepping that and and to to refix the cracks and so um it was just and unfortunately with this contractor that's been hiso from from very from over the summer you know we we just could not get a schedule out of them and um he just would show up periodically so you know that's what you know we got him on the phone and we gave him an earful about it um but he's working on it now and he says he's going to continue to work on it weather permitting and you know repair all the punch list items that he has to repair so it was it was actually the contractor that made it look worse than okay the challenge of dealing with Bitters and I mean by all accounts I mean this contractor not irresponsible because they do striping on a ton of other projects around the state but this is probably one of those yeah this you know this this always seemed to be a fill in for them you know they would just even though when they were doing it over the summer they weren't constantly coming every single day it was like every other day every second day they were just coming in and doing it as a filler and was very frustrating so any sense when they'll be done or generally speaking well this is a touchy area kind touchy time of the year where we have to watch the temperature we have to watch the weather so you know they say they're committed to to get it done as soon as possible so they probably I think they they said they going to be going for at least two weeks to schedule Tennessee the schedule I got today was did you see that one or no it was next Wednesday basically they said they could be here every day it wasn't really a schedule they were just appeasing yeah that's because it came from the uh the tennis coach right so we're in tenis season right now so it's in barely going to affect the availability Courts for the high school teams okay yes I've been in touch with them so they do have some matches next week I don't know what their workarounds are I just all I can tell them is what we what we know with our courts and you know as regrettable and apologetic as we can be but it's out of our control there's really not much we can do but I have been communicating with them to let them know so you're understanding right now based on discussions with the contractor it is a two we job to complete whatever repairs what happens if it's materially more than two weeks and it really impinges on Tennessee well I I think you know I think when we getting you know towards the end of the week we're going to lose a couple days because it's you know get rain they can't do any work in the rain so it's going to go on two two weeks I would say possibly so I think we could certainly ask him if we wanted to to postpone the ask to do that well at this point they've already damaged they do something and um you know they started without our without our without our knowledge they just kind of showed up and we also don't want to push them too quickly because if they do crappy work or just a rush job then yeah we don't want to J going after their maintenance Bond and chasing them Mr Choy if your if your concern is about the tennis program they have have uh the JB courts in the burrow right slightly smaller but when they converted courts to basketball courts and they Revitalize their courts they they weren not usable and they shifted to us and so there is a shift possible I'm sure it's not good for uh the programs and you know I I certainly empathetic with the whole situation but it is beyond our control and um I don't believe this is going to disrupt tennis in you know obviously I want to fix yesterday but it's I don't believe I don't know if that's your question is that where you're going well I think at a minimum we should contemplate if things do slide which certainly can and it really is I mean we're in we're in April it's Tennessee they need courts yeah the fact they have some courts available in the burrow I think it mitigates the issue but I'm sure they plan on using those colony court so you know at least keep them informed and um I I think for ourselves be ready for a contingency scenario if it if it stretches out materially more than two weeks at least have thought about it given his behavior and his performance he said he's going to show continues work the courts as as long as weather permits but I frankly I won't be surprised if he's not going to show up one day and we're going to be looking for him like where are you you said you're going to be here that's the days that we had okay um and then my only other question was um regarding Dixie Dale the sidewalk uh because I there was something about um I can't remember what it said in your notes but if we're looking at uh what kind of escro and punch list items they have that sidewalk never looked like it was complete or I don't know if there's runoff on the sidewalk but it just some punch list related to the they need to address but it but it was always the planning board approved it as a as an Asal path was not approved as a concrete sidewalk inand yeah know that part I know but there there is there's one section that's not connected yeah they're not they're not completely done okay there's still yeah okay um did anybody else have any other questions okay Ro resurfacing oh y other one um just because you I know in the past there been some questions or comments about the road selected um so John and Rich uh put together this plan for 2024 um at least since I've been here trying to is allocate about $500,000 a year towards Road improvements um and you know why certain roads why some these like smaller ones you might think oh there's a bigger road that needs a lot more work those are the roads that tend to make for Prime targets for Grand applications from the state so um you know that's why the more local roads are on our task list and then the bigger roads are the ones that go for the local Aid the municipal Aid grants the um John or does anybody have John questions for John first on these roads or is that fly now we did go out and and evaluate the roads again and just you know not every single Road in town we have a prior a list that we know is rated low and we just went out to look at those roads again to make sure things didn't shift one road deteriorated faster than the other we need to adjust the road so we did go out and just kind of validate the numbers again so on you know doing roads with with the the lowest rating and being the priority Road okay I'm trying to find the was that s separate I know I looked at it um it's labeled as 4B oh that's it okay thank you 4 B2 yeah I know I when I saw question well actually the only one came we forever have Britain Lo on this list so we are going to repay it I yeah I didn't understand this was is there a list here because I think this is just a CRI rating and there we're doing every road on this list no so what what are we doing there four roads right four there was a memo that we did you should have we were only proposing six roads for the local then we have um Bon and River Ro we didn't receive a grant that was the full I apologize I think we don't have the list of Roads or the amount you can yeah yeah would it be the first six roads on the local roads list is that Woodmont oakill Southward Ferndale and Oxford was the xord was the the six roads over you know Britain we pushed off again again just the DPW did some repairs um last year they can do some minor repairs again just to keep that you know Britain Road is just a very expensive road to to who knows when the landf is going to be done but nevertheless it was you know just hesitant about discussion it committee um and then we uh I think Gates we were proposing to do Gates withad neighbor now what do you mean it's part of a a grant what do you say with other roads excuse me what do you mean with other roads in the neighborhood at another point no they just you know try to group roads when you have um you know it the contractor you had them remobilized one road us you can get them lumed into a neighborhood sometimes we do that we try to make it you know this just to you get a complaints right away you do one Road in NE Ro why didn't you do mine complaints so we try even though the numbers aren't matching perfectly sometimes we do try to group roads so that you we're hitting a neighborhood so that people just appreciate that okay any questions so the total dollar amount was um was $400,000 was what which was for those six roads plus the dot Grant typically doesn't cover 100% of of the road it usually covers 80% plus so we were proposing 45,000 supplement yeah so I I live on Gates and uh you know it's high on the list there and it's it's not being uh paved and I guess so it connects to Mitchell which makes a loop so Gates and Mitchell and then uh to Garden that area was micro paved in 2010 it's one of the oldest areas in town that has not been touched before that it was there were neighbors that lived there in the 70s and they say has never been fully paved I don't know if that's true I didn't live in the town but it's very possible possible and it's one of the only areas that's been micro paved um you know driving on Stafford driving on Gates would just challenge anyone to take a look at those two roads and say that they're in any way comparable another it's hard these numbers are very close you know numbers are very close and I I I have the same person do it um just just so that their rating you have to have the same person doing it all the time so that you know because it is very subjective you know we we could there's more sophisticated ways of doing this we can get a service in that actually does a video of the Road by you know um the computer actually calculates it based on it and so we're we're doing it based on a visual inspection percentage of certain cracks and so you know ours is a quick and dirty takes a day to go through the whole town and just kind of identify that but so there're our objective question spend more try rank we did that a few years ago maybe maybe next year or two want to do that again to Fresh look at all the I have friends on so you know but if you just simply look at Stafford and you look at this you know forget my road forget Gates go to Mitchell it is not it's not close and um Club Road it is really in bad sheap and um Valley and and we did fill in a giant hole on Club Road um and Valley View was is half with Long Hill and you know I don't know I I'm I'm I wish we would take some time and maybe get some more feedback on this list because this it this does not seem accurate to me to say the least feedback what kind of feedback looking at this is looking we looking at from a technical you know we got but it's not technical if you look at these age roads and you look at the CRI numbers that were from you know previous years now it seems like you know like things have been tossed up in there and I I could I could you know bring those spreadsheets in and show you that this is a scrambled in my opinion this is scrambled eggs kind of situation with the roads you know you know throughout Gates Avenue because I live on that road and I I I don't want to you know be biased to that I'll just say all the way over the other section of town where Marty lives Club Road I mean that's that road is it's just I'm not proud of the way that road looks to live in this Township like I'm just not proud of it comp and you compare it to Stafford so you're talking about a sixo difference in the rating is is what you're saying is uh inaccurate Stafford you know the review here has it as a 57 and Club is at a 63 I'm just saying look at the list Mr charot no I'm looking at the list so that's why I'm ask the list Gates is being skipped Gates and Mitchell are connected they were micro paved at the exact same time the last time they were paved completely according to the neighbors in that area I can't validate this but it's possible we've been told it's possible was the 70s fully paved in the 70s micro paved in 2010 the road is degraded to the point where there's been you know holes at storm water entry storm water uh um you know collection points the the um basins um it's it's it's in bad shape and I you know if you go to Club Road it looks like there are rubber snakes all over that road because of its condition I just think that this that this maybe need some more feedback and I'm wondering how how I can best be productive in doing that and what you know what more information we can have because I'm saying subjectively I'm no I would always say I it's going to be subjective but I would just say visually or living on these roads I can't agree with the way that they've been ranked so it it sounds like to me because I'm looking and we've got the neighborhood of Stafford wood you know it's one neighborhood so what you're a grouping ver this year versus uh I mean if I just look at Geeks and then Mitchell's right over there right Mitchell um so it it sounds like potentially those might be on the Slate next year I mean if we're looking at things by I think those going to be on the Slate next year you know I and again I another reason why I know where all you live and so I don't want to R you rank your road so I have my Engineers do it you know so they do that and then they um and they take this list I give it to Rich Young Rich you validate this does this road to make sense to you and that's how the process goes so you know we can certainly have you know look at it closer but that's that's how it I'm not suggesting that there isn't room for improvement I'm just when we say we need more feedback what's that mean is it feedback from from you is it feedback from the residents because everybody's going to have their own personal feelings about it well everyone's going to advocate for their correct so when we say feedback your road is always the worst right so that's why I like when you say feedback I you need a little more rigor right you need rigor in terms of you know at least in every town I've been in uh I've always pushed for a very numerical you know very fact-based just here you've got longitudinal cracks transverse cracks drain all these different things that come into a rating and there's a rating right so you know every year because we're not going to reevaluate all the roads in town every year so what I asked John last year John and Rich was okay take the top 25 whatever it is 10 15 and reevaluate those because you're not going to have one that's all the way down at the bottom all of a sudden jump at the Top If it is you know DPW is going to raise that to our attention but you're going to move around within that top 10 every so often and you just keep sliding up so it's never going to be perfect this isn't a science it's not Perfection you're always going to have you know disagreement about a road or two but as long as we're trying to be consistent and transparent in it I think that's the best you can do every town you go to there's always going to be arguments and disagreements about which roads get paved what I suggest is just have a system stick to that system and don't you know uh you know and try to be consistent now you have a budget you have certain rationale that you know John explained um sometimes a road is longer or shorter and you don't want you're not going to be able to fit that in within your budget so you know I'm fine moving is why it's here for your your review your discussion um what is our budget for road paving this so we put in uh I try to put in 500 every year uh for at least what makes sense here in chadam also based on last year with what we could afford with the capital Improvement fund 500,000 that includes for whatever the match is on the dot plus local roads and throughout the year I like to leave a little bit of a cushion because there's other things that come up during the year that you need to tend to whether it's a curbing issue or a pop you know some damage so you want to have some money available uh for that so we put in 500 based off of you know John's estimate here what was it John I'm sry three almost almost 400 in change you said right about 400 FL change for the do roads and our local roads okay we could change it but we're $100,000 under the target I had shown a way in the C in in the budget in the on our last presentation I've I've shown a way to to free a 303,000 additional dollars without you know affecting the taxpayer we could potentially use that here if we're going to say 300 3,000 I'm sorry I can go through the those again if you weren't listening the last meeting when I presented those there was 33,000 that I that I had uh identified was easily available to it's all a shell game like you're just playing Shell Games moving money from one area to the other yeah that's right that's exactly what we're doing we're taking it okay so it's not finding money it's just Shell Games you're just moving money around and the money that is needed is still needed if that's your opinion of finan no no that's that's my fact you don't do Municipal Finance we're going to say that we're if we're going to say that objectively that we're doing this objectively the first and second roads that we're ranking as worse objectively and that have been on the list for years objectively are not being attended to and if you want to say that well the road is too long in one case and if you want to say that well it's connected to another road that is uh should be done at the same time well the problem with that is if you look at our past CRI indexes and our our past rankings those roads were right next to each other and in fact last year when we talked about this we did say there there were comments made that well those will be the roads for next year and that's not being carried through so this is not an objective system is my is my concern and of course it can never be completely objective and we have to be reasonable and there has to be a way of of moving forward in a rubric but we cannot say because it's disingenuous to say that this is in some way scientific nobody said objective nobody said that or that there's a system there is a system no there's a system that gets constantly tweaked and moved and nudged and whatever and system and what I'm saying what I'm saying is that um if take a look at Club Road take a look at Valley View I've said that these of course these things are subjective and people are going to look but I I look at those roads I don't live in in those neighborhoods certain I have friends in those areas I don't see those roads as being in the kind of condition that these other roads are or if I look at Stafford my friend's on Stafford I don't see Stafford Road as as being in the same condition as some of these other roads and I'm saying we need some other feedback that's what I'm saying but what is the feedback that's why I keep asking I'm not arguing you want to change the list that's your decision what is the feedback you want because you keep giving these like sort of amorphous ambiguous things like we need more feedback from who you're you're right here right so who do you need more feedback from you got feedback from your engineer your Public Works director your administrator Finance what is your feedback who do you need more feedback from you want to take a poll every time we're going to PVE roads so what is the feedback you need what criteria what feedback do you need committee man Lois if you have an objection to the list then tell us what list you prefer let's move on like we like we go through this every year Mr shahadi to be fair to to this committee you didn't send us the document that actually told us what roads are being paved what we received was a large list of possible roads and and it added up to an amount that's far it would far exceed the budget we never received the actual document we would say you you never gave us a list this isn't like oh we've had a list of Roads these are what's being paved okay the had it so this just came to us value at all to any to the process at all that we're done everybody's vetted every okay so I I haven't heard anything that in my mind would change anything we have input from all directions and I understand where you're coming from I'm looking at two roads Britain Road is its own unique situation and then we have Gates and then there's a neighborhood so I I would ask that next year the gates vitual neighborhood be seriously considered but otherwise let's just move forward that's that's it we've got all the input we need okay can we I'm sorry mayor just so there's no confusion can we go can I have John just read off the roads again that we're talking about sure I think it was St stord wood fale oakill was River year then Stanford Woodmont oakill South Ferndale and but you also said that the do roads they don't cover 100% that always typically respons $5,000 allocated towards that road for and the total recommended budget was $398,000 so you know if if the committee wanted to increase the road there's one other thing I think we can all agree on which is that Fairmont Avenue which is the county road the county portion is badly in need of being paved and you know that that's a that's a county thing right so I did I I do have follow that oh you're talking about for so I heard from a resident and don't feel it's appropriate to share his name but followed up with the county and they are going to come in they have a contractor lined up to come in to fix the 400 and 500 section of Fairmount I have gotten a couple of complaints on that so um but I haven't gotten any complaints on any other Road um and Fairmount definitely needs it but as far as I know it's that 400 500 section they said they Mill and and pave which I surpris okay thank you may may I ask just one question so do you at all do you enrich at all cross reference either the utility companies or anyone else who maybe have anticipated uh Road cuts every year we request it they're not always ACC yeah I understand that part but at least we're we're referencing that we do that diligent every year we reach out compies and it seems like right after we as they to change cut it up but we do ask them Conant and they ask us and there's another town that um claims that they don't let they they repay and then they don't let their utilities or whatever touch those roads for five years or something of that sort is that something that is um we have that now in okay we have a five okay we do allow utilities to open up for emergencies okay if there's an emergency but they also have to pay a sear charge on the application thanks for that clarity um I I don't recall just so I know the future oh future NJ do sorry just read that category okay yeah we've had the utility company want to open a road after we PID a year ever and and we've made them repay the entire Road right right great do we have anything else for John I I mean I don't want to believe her the the request or at least is the concern that Gates and Mitchell are not on the list is that it they're going to be conc for next year okay I certainly can add them well how much was the price Gates was 52 Gates was uh in terms of I would recommend going to Mitchell because you wanted you want to do the neighborhood so Gates and Mitchell Gates is 52 and your Mitchell is 44 so that's the other 100 can we do Bud was five spent for what was the 45,000 the the do mat so that's that's part of that 400 398 okay street is very small Road and we just cross that out to see what it I'll is that fine I think if we just Eng okay there is a dra issue that complains thead is too flat that would be good yeah y I hav't heard anything okay um okay that's it wonderful thank you have a good night okay what's up uh back to uh admin should really discussion action items um the goals and priorities uh and then a followup on any resolutions if so desired to take a position on Oprah and the affordable housing legislation um so do we you know what let's just make sure there's we got clar construction so there were no other resolutions there's resolution under tax assessor but we can uh discuss that at the ex ex we discuss that in exact okay let's let's hold off on that one um okay so did anybody have any other questions that they uh get answers to you so far um from the other categories before we dip into the administration well the only question that I have is is more General it's just that you know recreation's been lumped off here and I do understand we've lost our Recreation director um but what is the I mean it's still in our ordinance it's still part of the town what's the what is the plan going forward as a topic subject area for workshops for discussions and for reports well pool reports uh will be included under Administration okay so I need that would be captured under Administration correct okay thank you okay um why don't we do Oprah and affordable housing legislation first um and I think affordable housing legislation well let's we start we run on time good um okay so we had a discussion that uh we want to we're considering asking our legislators to give close consideration to the rewrite of the op legislation that they were considering uh and that's what this discussion is about is to get input um and and Kon had given us some information at the last session I don't know if you wanted to touch B on that again but otherwise we all had an opportunity to kind of research and evaluate and give consideration um so I guess I would open up up for discussion did misson did you want to no I I think what we're I think the purpose of this is to find out if there if the committee wants to have a resolution in support in opposition requesting changes whatever that may be yeah I mean my my comment back was uh I would support uh some a change I would support legislation but that I think that the um has the state legislature has to look at it more closely uh to make sure that um you know there try that we support transparency so I think there there can be some improvements from what I read um and it was just some subtleties and I Mr Lois had brought a couple of them up you know the fact that you wouldn't be able to request emails um I I think that's that they can revisit uh the whole Discovery piece I didn't quite understand it make sense to me why they would be included but anybody else have any in terms of specifics that we would ask for them to give reconsideration for or consideration the exclusion of text messages is it I mean it's just that doesn't seem to be like a good incentive to just exclude m text messages um another one is clear definitions of what is harassment and I think harassment the harassment laws that we see especially like in Europe or the speech laws that we see uh definitely in Canada those type of laws are are always start as harassment you know oh you're harassing you're doing something harassing that's a standard that we've never had I mean I have to be willing to to be persistent I have to be willing to be labeled harassing I mean that's it's just that's that's a a blurred line that even the word even using the word harassment I would have to say needs to be fleshed out or dropped anybody else have any other particular things would or does anybody think it's fine the way it is it's legitimate also I mean part of this is if we or we don't have to make a statements in the state legislators either I mean it could be just individuals with their opinions to the legislators or you know doesn't have to be full resolution but there's consensus on something meaningful yeah I'm not sensing a lot of passion from the group is is that just because everybody's in support of the legislation as is or just just wonder I'm not I mean I would have to say it's intent right I mean I'm not in in favor of using public employees for commercial purposes to data mind I don't think that's appropriate um I don't think it's appropriate for people to be able to get information for for bad you know for any kind of terrible reason right whether whether it's stalking type of things but you know in our society we're going to have to risk uh abuse of the system and for openness and I would be more in favor of openness transparency and I've seen just because what I've seen from government I mean even even with things as open as they look it's very hard to figure out what is actually going on under the surfice and so I I I I think that that it could be narrowed to the point where it only imp applied to the intent of of someone who's making um like all the Oprah changes maybe only to someone who's made more than 20 Oprah requests in a year I me that would be a standard I would start with because somebody who wants 10 documents from a town whatever they may be that that could be a resident you know somebody who's going repeatedly around the state maybe they could have a database where they collect the names of you know um people that are making Oprah requests and if you're on this list then you get the extra scrutiny but the average person who has a problem to run into the stumbling block we we have this problem right in our own uh you know for Oprah requests for construction documents right for construction documents you want to go in there even for your own house even just to look at your file with to do or request um it's already restrictive and then to make it further restrictive I think is problem so um I'm curious Mr lante yeah in terms of the specific things that were ways that are kind of questionable the email text messages uh emails text being eliminated and we're saying you know we want that reconsidered harassment that's what I have the the request emails the exclusion of text messages and clear defition of harassment and what I have written just to maybe point us in the right direction is a resolution supporting legislation but requesting review and further consideration of the elimination of emails the exclusion of text messages and providing clear definitions of harassment that's what I have to in particular I would support the clear definition of harassment just so that way you know there should be an objective standard it shouldn't be left to one person's interpretation and what about the emails and text messages um I've never received an Oprah request for text messages so that's sort of a moot point and I've always advised people to be careful what you put in a text because they are currently subject to Oprah I have no problem with that being still subject to Oprah you know my support for the legislation has more to do with wanting to protect people's reasonable expectation of privacy um while I'm in very much in favor of transparency uh transparency shouldn't be at the cost of of citizens privacy um transparency should be about finding out what government's doing not about what your neighbor is doing and that's why I'm in favor of the legislation okay um I'm I'm kind of torn on this one because uh I'm not seeing a lot of passion so I'm thinking maybe Mr Lois and I just write our letters with Mr Carr and uh and as opposed to having a full committee resolution well I I'm I'm in favor of transparency I just don't know how some of the stuff is administered so for example in the case of text messages how do you how do you parcel out business related versus anything non- business related and how do you even cost effectively do that well and and I'll jump in here because um I um I think that's that's part of it right and I think you know I can appreciate the um the the concern for residents privacy I can appreciate the need for transparency and I look at it maybe in a slightly different angle and that is from the business side of the municipality and satisfying these requests and balancing the the resources necessary to satisfy the requests and the and resources they don't just mean money I mean time effort by multiple people not just R and um you know you take things like text messages so how would we get those well greag probably can't do that if you if someone's requesting and and so we need an IT person to come and do that like how does you have to think practically and a lot of the times even just look at Greg's report don't quote me on the numbers but I thought it was very telling in three months he's had almost 300 over us I mean that just gives you an example of the reality the business side of Oprah and what it is costing municipalities and the efforts that have to go through and some of that is why some of this legislation is there and and you know text messages are I do not claim to be an IT person but text messages are an example it's great to say text messages should be included but how would we do that how if if a requestor said I would like all text messages of the township committee members regarding this subject how are we doing that's my pointt so my hesitancy here is not so much I'm I'm 100% behind the concept of all I just don't don't know I don't I don't know how the legislation gets drafted to be honest and how it's administered to so unless the day comes when every elected official down to the municipality gets a separate phone a government phone you cannot do it cost effectively and even if you have a government issued phone you can't really do it anyway well at the municipal level at the county level I would imagine at the state federal certainly but I just want to point out though we're looking at at from our lens here at local government right this affects every state employee as well right so there's there's countless agencies departments offices that are affected by that that do have government text you know have government cell phones they are being run through the state the oit ours we don't issue you cell phones so if you get an Oprah request it's hey comedi Deputy Mayor we need your text messages you got to screenshot them send them in and that's it it's your you know your honesty at that point uh and you know when I was an elected official or even as an administrator I've had my you know I've had that requested if I don't do the right thing then potentially if that leads to litigation those that work request leads to litigation more and now I have not provided everything that I should provide now it's like wait a minute you said you provided everything you didn't so now now I lie so you know it's it's your your honesty but I think it's important to also realized that you know as Tiana just saidon said you know one resident was talking about how oh you know this is selfish interest so you know we're not looking at it from the what's in the best interest of the resident I would challenge that because of the fact that the clerk's time my time our money the attorney has to review these things that is taxpayer money that is now being wasted on either frivolous or an abundance of just op requests that really are and it's taking away from work that needs to be done or legitimate residents who do want to submit an open request and now they're in the queue and we're dealing with all these other things so you know it's it's a trade off but right now you know it was temporarily withdrawn so I think also wait they've heard the feedback let's see what the next iteration looks like and then maybe offer some feedback based off of that yeah I mean my my feeling is um I'm advocacy for transparency but I understand the uh unint consequences that that was clearly materialized so I I respect the notion of uh considering and implementing some guard rails right good bit guard rails um but I I think like for me I think I have I I feel like I have the understanding holistic of this matter as a fourth grader when I really need to be think a PhD have a PD level of understanding really alline intelligently on how I I mean I'm fine with the resolution but I think the resolution uh you know if it specifies those three points I think conceptually I'm in agreement with it um but I I I'm certainly not a subject matter expert on it love to be a VI time I think it's the theory versus practice incredibly complicated matter well to that point I mean look this isn't the first time O's been brought up right I mean like any ordinance resolution you pass they constantly evolve you know we learn technology text messages weren't envisioned the you know the original things emails I remember you know back before government officials when I got elected we didn't have Township email accounts so it was also you know your AOL or Yahoo account and how do you deal with that so you know these evolved there's never going to be a perfect answer and I think that's the important thing to remember with something like this is you got to sometimes let things play out to see how you're going to fine-tune them also it's not the perfect answer but there are attorneys and some of the attorneys that have been referenced by residents uh in support or opposition in the proponents they're making their living off of Oprah as well so you know to say that they're just these benevolent you know public Advocates that's that's crap they're really they're making a living being those people who are the thorn in government government side or elected official side to make money off of these as well uh so you there's no there's no saint in any of this okay so I think what um based on what I'm hearing and not hearing um why don't we just purs it individually for now and then we'll just keep an eye on stuff and decide at some point if we want to pull the trigger in terms of putting um or opinion out there to weigh okay okay um before you go yeah if if sending something in as an individual uh sorry you can send it as a Committee Member representing me the comme okay you can certainly say I'm a Committee Member and yes that's my question thank you read me like a cheap nov and for what it's worth whatever your opinions on the subject may be you'll probably get a lot further with assembly people and state senators as individuals rather than doing a resolution that no one other than the um uh five six eight eight of us will actually read yeah thank you which I've done that too so um okay so moving on to the affordable housing legislation which I think we are all in agreement that we would like to see some amendments there um and I don't I think you had said that uh leslee London was going to yes provide some more detail relative to where we are yes Township how we're impacted yes for the 20 the next yeah we're still April April 23rd April 23rd April 23rd Yes and she'll be here for that meeting okay so I don't know if you want to I don't know if you want to wait to hear that before you decide um it's up to you um April 23rd April 23rd Leslie will be here she'll provide her Memo and she'll be here to answer questions and review it yeah and she is working with the the township planner to put that together okay um I mean the feedback I had sent in was uh you know again requesting an amendment and for things like uh you know environmental constraints um but uh that's and I don't know what else was sent in related to that but that was kind of the the idea was that we would have a resolution and you know asking the our legislators and of course we can reach out individually as well um to reconsider the affordable housing or or to implement some amendments um and then provide specifics um was there did you have a list of specifics you received no only I mean I got um I would say two sort of General comments feedback on it but one uh specific and that was new yours very like specific points okay I forward that to Tiana okay this afternoon all right well it's legislation so we can wait till the April discussion do anybody uh RSE to that idea mayor I had sent you two articles of towns near us that had been that had rebuked it and if you or you or somebody would share that with the wider Community Committee because I can't I can't email the whole committee with uh just the Articles yeah if that would be appropriate okay um sorry I'm just confused what you you're talking about with Oprah or because I know you said housing legislation I I had sent you just two uh two articles of uh local Town one was in Bergen County in Ridgewood and the other one was I believe the mayor of Madison madon yeah yeah just those two reviees of you know specifically picking AP part age you know the affordable housing at this point yeah if you can sub that to me and we can get it to the committee sure thank you thank you okay um goals and priorities um I just wanted to start out so the the idea of the goals and priorities is that uh there's a lot ofu got to get done and a lot of it is uh you know it's big and it takes a long time and the other reality is our administrative staff have a lot of things that got to get done um so this a little bit provides it's a a map for us for the community to provide input and for our Administration to know what the priorities are what they need to get done um so that's that was kind of the impetus behind this and um I appreciate everything that everybody sent in because it was really great there was a lot of great information in there I think we're very much aligned on a lot of things it seemed like there was a lot of alignment on yeah yeah um now I would ask the general category of capital planning which was a big one we know we're going to cover next month so I would say let's push that whole thing off to next month so anything that fell under that category um I think a lot of us had talked about uh events event planning um I know I had I think a couple of us had communication improving Communications uh what I would say for Capital planning even though we're going to drill down more so there was a lot of discussion about um more uh uh thoughtful strategic uh planning process in terms of you know we had talked about for example getting a um kind of understanding our our Fields you know the useful life and which I know um our record director wasn't able to get to us but uh think so we have a sense of we can map out you know Shen Pike has five more years of useful life we're going to anticipate it's going to be two million and we've got to spend in five years because that's when shik's going to you know some section of shik so a more thoughtful plan in that sense that's mapped out uh but we do have some big items in there which we all agree on so this building being one of them the police station being one of them so in terms of having a planning process uh we will go into that next time but I think it was the process was something also that came up not just the um the specifics um affordable housing we're all uh have input on that any other major category I'm thinking um trying to parse these into categories our financial planning which is goes hand in hand with a lot of this um uh Mr Lois categorize one section is quality of life which weit on few things where I mean and that's what I'm wondering is if we could take this information and break it into categories because you know we're in no rush here but um consolidate some of this information so when I talked about events to me that's a quality of life item Public Safety was another category that came up which includes summon of capital planning for the police if you like my categories you can say it you can just say you know Mr Lois used categories for every year they were the same I'm just saying we could we could do it it's uh I did not actually I didn't notice it until now there I so can't commit to that just yet all of a sudden you're like I agree with that guy yeah we're two for two this evening Oprah also um okay so rather than drill down on the detail is that is unless does anybody have any general comments or input anything that they saw in here and they were like oh wow I really like that I really hate that mayor might I suggest maybe uh referring this to one of the subcommittees either maybe the admin subcommittee or whatever to go through this together and uh you know I certain this is going to be your list your goals your priorities so that way uh they can all be reviewed I'll work with you know whatever subcommittee that is but I certainly don't want to uh pretend to either interpret or misunderstand and Mis categorize or you know I think it would be great if uh there's a bit more involvement from the governing body on that okay that's fine so we'll send it down to the administrative subcommittee to kind of piece this together pull everything together um great if there's no any specific input we wrap that up for now but the idea is to put together these goals to get input from the community and then fine tuneing and then that this is a guiding document so that it'll help us uh to move forward in terms of what our priorities are and where we want to spend our money I think that and another aspect mayor is there's there's the things that we will spend the money on but then there's also the volunteer aspect like if someone wants to like adopt a project to you know plant flowers or bushes around the colony tennis courts or pain the Gazebo or so you know maybe there's an aspect of the community adopting a project as well rather than everything being having a cost associated with so maybe there's a category people can volunteer to do some I mean you're not no one's going to volunteer to repay something or do something large but just you know more beautification kind of you know the quality of life like you know fix a trail or do something something like that I think the events are also a great opportunity for volunteers because they that takes a lot of you know certainly the the staff we can facilitate the requisitioning the contacting vendors space things like that but the um the time the promotions the getting out to the community the different businesses uh spreading the word you know those are all things that you know successful events are really from the ground up you know what I've seen also at least here in the the last or so when we tried to have recck events is we're feeding them down you know depending on the day Who's involved what's the nature of the event some people don't want to participate and then it turns into a flop so if it's coming from the community what they want what they want to see how the scale of it where they want it the time of you know that's great you tell us and we'll we'll help execute but I think those are a great opportunity for Community involvement volunteers yeah no I agree with that one and like you said it's when you have members of theity were doing it then You' engage others to participate so yeah it was hard to get people excited when it's you know where there are ideas we're trying to come up with and pick a day for it and and get them going I mean the winter festival has been great um but other things have been hard to get going yeah uh Comm woman Rand I was trying to think in my head how that's what you were talking about is structured because there are groups that are doing a lot of that but it's very disparate and I don't think we have a we don't necessar punch is the thing right and it's always you know I think it's always the same group of people there's 11,000 people in the town and I would you know probably take a couple of hours and go plant something around Plant some flowers Scouts in the environmental commission space the same folks I was just going to say I've seen a lot of pretty significant projects done by Eagle Scouts they do a great job those are great projects that you know ser gold right girl scouts gold Wars right but even just putting it out like I know um some pools like the pool membership you say hey there's cleanup day on Saturday or something and we do that with the environmental commission but there could be a painting day or's you think about that yeah so but so in every example that I've had today or I've heard and the ones that are written here and shared on multiple Pages which means from multiple committee members what I've seen I can agree more with this you're going have a agreement at nauseum here um you know something like a holiday event ground up we have the fire departments that do that do you know they sell Christmas trees right and they have a fire pit so maybe you know if we're going to hire carollers to sing maybe we send it to their event right as to juice their event and then the thing that this Township could do and it kind of correlates with communication is hey we'll put your C your event on our calendar we'll promote your event you know so so the township acts more as a conduit um Grease the wheels and maybe um we can have an application process for local organizations so for instance the the beautification uh with Town and Country Garden Club you know they they do that they did our a lot of our sence thankfully or the Historical Society they put on many different events mostly history related of course um and then we have uh you know the Art League of the Chads I'm sure that they would be willing to do something artistically related right but how do we get them how do we how do we incentivize them maybe there's some sort of I don't want to say grants but there's a Grant likee application and super simple right simple as our block party kind of application where we just say and we can do it through our liaison we just say look you have an organization you want the township support what would you like from us these are the type of things that we've done in the past for Comm commity events so this way it's coming ground up but connecting with the township gets you the communication gets you an official announcement it gets you maybe a something more straightforward from like Mr Lan like if it requires permits or raffling or whatever I mean our staff is great but people don't always have that that exact you know line so I think um if there was some sort of like Grant and then the the kicker the incentive is hey we're going to throw our carollers or the budget that we had for that and the budgets that I saw for the recreation events were always like well managed I'll just say that well managed right we I think we got a lot of bang for the buck but but but if we had more people use them that's even more Bank than you know and I think we could get that from from ground up so um and that's to me that's a small government approach and I love it I love it I think it's great I don't know if that works great okay I think we have uh our next steps for that let's see are we we have everything okay so we have another hearing of citizens and the same rules apply so I will open the hearing of citizens I'm sorry may we did have a late email about a finance discussion that we needed to have about Deb that was related to that there was like a very late email we did get a very late email sorry do we have a hand raised yes we do all right we'll come back to it after this um okay thank you Mr car uh hi again this is Stuart Carr three Crestwood Drive and shatam Township once again on the Oprah item um again sorry to beat direct but I am highly disappointed in the committee members for not digging in but I give you a little bit of slack because you got 95 other things on your desk and that's fine I am very highly disappointed at the council who has not given any of the other sides of this particular issue this is a big time clear attempt to lower transparency and it's unfortunate that the council hasn't done it or the administrator hasn't given any other sides again the administrator talked about the idea of ambulance trasers chasing around and it's not El moary etc etc that's all fine but I guess I challenged the administrator to say okay of these Oprah chasings what is actually frivolous and how are towns adversely impacted on balance okay and again I'd suggest bringing somebody in there to actually explain to you what's going on with the Oprah issue and how big a deal it actually is because the council we have right now um just hasn't done that frankly and that's really really uh disappointing I sent you that 4our um uh tape I'd suggest or implore you to listen to it or at least listen to portions of it the ones that I highlighted and really wake up and see what the heck this thing looks like because that guy down in um New Jersey press Association Mr Caffery said this bill eviscerates Oprah that person knows what he's talking about the people in this room again are like the council said you've been either missing informed or ill informed or intentionally misled and again you guys have other things to do but the professionals really should be laying out all sides of this thing for the board's consideration this is the second meeting and about the fifth email I've sent where that hasn't happened so I'd suggest that people at least read those written reports or written documents that I sent in those last couple of emails and get a flavor for what the other side is again this is a big time deal and you again Council people are our fiduciaries I understand why an administrator and these other professionals have no interest in having more transparency or keeping transparency you as our and even some politicians don't want to have that which is probably why it's happening in Trenton but on balance I understand privacy I understand all these other different things and they are real according to these professionals who are not slouches that stuff can be handled without doing the baby with the bath water we have a trojan horse here we have baby with a bath water here it's Etc and that's something I really think we got to consider now if you want to send it in individually or as a group whatever that's fine but I think again getting more up to speed about that and have the professionals actually tell you what's going on is important I would suggest spending a couple Grand or a couple hundred bucks whatever it is and getting these people who actually know about the good government and the benefits of Oprah such as the controller of New Jersey such as the head of the press Association such as these other folks who actually do this for a living and see what the benefits are for the community that's what we ought to be doing here we're not doing that yet that's minutes is up yep if I'm off base please set me straight have the council go through again real quick R go through those two or three memos I said and have our Council Mr car minutes why that's not pro that why that's not appropriate thank you Mr Carr okay um yeah I mean just in response to that I think I think the plan to approach it individually for now and to kind of wait and see where the legislation goes and at that point we can ask for a more robust which I feel like we did I personally feel like I got pros and cons um but uh perhaps at that point we'll we'll see if we can get a more robust pros and cons um but I think I'm good for now uh let's move on to Mr Lois had reminded us was there there was a late email yes um it's more just informational but sorry I got close I didn't close the hearing of citizens may I make a comment on yeah we have no other hands up there's no no other hands up all right I'm gonna close the hearing of citizens and then sorry yes may may I make a comment about Mr car there sure I just wanted to say that I you know I I do support a resolution from this Township to you know object to this change to Oprah and so I don't know if that wasn't clear from before but I certainly do thank you um yes so it was just uh it's informational but it is required to be passed on to the government body and to be read into the record and that's just the U the summary of the note sale the ban uh which was the one approximate 1.5 million for the affordable housing so you know we rolled over the ban um and because of that I just add you know when I I think I mentioned it uh during one of my budget presentations because of that refinancing we were able to increase our interest as well um I'm sorry ra rather reduce the interest we were appropriating um on the notes so that's that's really there's nothing much else with this one unless there's any questions but it was just the fact pretty much I just I to have some questions just because I I received it so late I wasn't able to go through it so carefully um and so this this has to do with decisions that were made last year not this year doesn't relate to sheet 40b in the 2024 budget or right because that would be Capital planning for this year so this is kind of rrolling debt that was already authorized last year is on our books and you we're just reauthorizing re-upping a 12 month ban is correct that's okay so so and it's not it doesn't show up on 40b because I'm that would be 40b being I'm sorry capital budget current your action it wouldn't be on the sheet right this is uh this is past debt it's uh pration debt correct correct okay okay so would you say essentially that you've received it everybody say yes you've received this band document then um Greg can annotate that we've discussed it and it was in the minutes it's really it okay but I guess we're done there wonderful I think we are right wrapped up I will take a motion to adjourn I move that we adjourn second second all in favor thank you