you very much I'm just going to share my screen real quickly is everybody seeing the slides in full screen mode yes thank you fantastic okay so uh council president council members thank you so much for the opportunity to present to you this evening I am here presenting the um C hoboken's 2024 budget supplementary materials for the Department of climate action and Innovation director Gonzalez if you is screen for everybody else yeah Jen you're present you're in a strange presentation mode that's showing you your notes not in presentation yeah let's see let me see how it shared the screen um let just perhaps try sharing my full window instead there we go is that better yep yep um all right so we'll start with our mission which is to prepare our residents and um most vulnerable residents to adapt to the impacts of climate change and drive greenhouse gas emissions reductions through planning policy procedures capital investment and Community Education uh we collaborate across City departments and with other levels of government nonprofit and private sector Partners to deploy sustainable and innovative solutions that enance the delivery of capital projects and city services as you know this is a new department that was formed um at the the turn of the the year so um we have five divisions in this department of climate action and Innovation all of which collaborate with other City departments to achieve our mission and each other director has provided at least one or more designated Liaisons to climate action we um are five divisions are sustainability and resiliency and that division is responsible for our emissions planning and climate action planning as well as Energy Zero waste our certifications and benchmarking uh Community Education Partnerships uh engagement and Outreach our engineering division um which is responsible for Capital project delivery engineering design bidding construction management and inspection as well as management of our Municipal right of way code enforcement associated with our Municipal right of way and overseas the water utility which we'll have a separate presentation later this evening uh Capital planning that oversees Capital program management our project Planning Development and concept design so really um projects can start in the capital planning Division and kind of flow from concept design right into the engineering Division and engineering design um so there's a more streamlined workflow now uh we also manage grants funding management um and other sorts uh types of non- taxpayer funding of course um project stakeholder engagement asset management and fiscal and climate impact assessment of projects as well um will be performed by the capital planning division our Innovation and data division oversees egovernment um and when I say egovernment I mean digital government services so any way in which we use information and Technology to deliver services within the city as well as um communicate with our residents and provide those services to our residents um also oversees innovative solutions deployment internal data management and open data management specifically for Public Access lastly we have our information systems division which oversees information technology and uh cyber security our accomplishments so uh while our team members were in different departments in 2023 we collaborated on several major projects and programs which are reflected here in our accomplishments um within energy we completed construction of our community solar facility that provides 100% renewable energy to uh residents of the Hoboken Housing Authority uh 622 households three HHA properties and that saves about 3,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent per year um in addition we continue to implement our renewable energy program which allows residents to uh get more of their electricity from renewable sources and since starting the program in 2021 residents have saved more than $650,000 in their energy bills and we've also reduced our our emissions by more than 30,000 metric tons in the waste category we uh expanded our composting program which has now diverted uh 290,000 uh pounds of food scraps just in 2023 alone we also developed our zero waste plan which aims to reduce waste expand reuse and repair programs and improve Recycling and composting efforts to manage discarded materials and resources um includes 18 recommendations ranging from expanding educational Outreach to establishing waste requirements for large Building Development donation programs Etc flood mitigation um as many of you know we saw an 88% reduction in flood events because flooding was prevented in 107 out of 121 storms uh nsa's wet weather pumping stations operated for about 286 hours and pumped out almost 600 million gallons of bar out of Hoboken um on the city's part we uh opened Brazilian City Park we completed the final design of Southwest Park expansion and the concept design of 800 Monro and together these five resiliency Parks will manage more than three and a half million gallons of storm water in each storm event over the last two years our existing resiliency Parks manage more than four million gallons of storm water during storm events um collectively and in addition we worked closely with New Jersey D who broke ground on the rebuil by design project including Harborside Park which will resist storm surge to reduce Coastal love Risk by 85% for Parks we completed upgrades to the synthetic tur fields at Stevens Park little leak field and Catra Park we also completed improvements to the Waterfront walkway including the rehabilitation of the pier uh at 16th Street a new walkway at the former Monarch site and Waterfront railing replacement in several areas along the walkway we also completed Vision plans or concept level designs for Church Square Park the multi-service center and Maritime Park as well as for restaur rooms and a press box at Mama and Johnson fields and that's in partnership with the Housing Authority lastly for facilities we relocated the Public Works facility we installed a generator at City Hall and we completed final design for improvements to the Portico and the north stairwell at City Hall um you know which we just received bids for so onto our goals um here are some goals for overall for the Department of climate action and Innovation uh we aim to obviously reduce greenhouse gas emissions from uh primarily from energy transportation and waste because those are our largest sectors of emissions uh achieve Net Zero Energy by purchasing or generating as much energy from renewable sources is consumed and ensure that our clean energy transition prioritizes economic opportunities and Investments for disadvantaged communities so overall our energy efforts include things like planning like our climate action plan and our community energy plan that was actually just released our city programs the community solar and capital projects such as Energy Efficiency upgrades in municipal buildings we also aim to achieve zero waste and that's by um reducing waste increasing reuse repair donation Recycling and con and composting so really the concept of of zero waste goes beyond disposal at the end of the products life cycle and looks at at um earlier ways to reuse that preserve value and minimize impacts um we do this through things like policy uh we'll be looking at setting waste requirements for any future large Building Development and guidelines for existing buildings and um we're also looking at programs several of them funded by the bipartisan infrastructure law um such as a grant that we just applied for to develop a community scale reusable foodware System Program and we're we're certainly working on engagement working very closely with the youth advisory Council um to provide education on energy waste and several other climate action efforts uh Mitigation Of flood risk of course that kind of goes without saying that's a lot of our prior accomplishments um we are um looking to manage mitigate flood risk from sea level rise and increasingly frequent storm events by doing um capital projects like our resiliency Parks Southwest Park expansion 800 Monroe um four rideway green gug gray tanks this year and two rideway ring Gardens um we'll also be uh supporting nhsa who will begin construction this year on the Madison Street infrastructure upgrades project which will replace the combined sewer on Madison Street in the area of 9th and 11th Street um our engineering and capital planning division work pretty closely to manage and Implement our comprehensive Capital program for city parks infrastructure and Facilities um this includes Asset Management Capital planning preparing our six-year Capital program that was included in your budget document and providing Financial projections um we will be actively managing uh project status prioritization timelines tasks budgets in a digital portal and actually making that information available to residents of Hoboken so that we can communicate our Capital program transparently to our constituents um certainly working on several Park development projects and City Hall preservation and lastly managing the public right of way um and implementing roadway Improvement projects in in um supporting our our department of transportation and parking um to keep our roads in state of good repair and support their Vision zero goals um the uh last goal that I I'll touch upon is really our use of data and an e government and I know that this is kind of a new Focus but it's it's really one of the biggest points of feedback that we received when we met with council members at the beginning of the year um during this reorganization there was um I would say sentiment that everyone is looking for better access to information um a need for better digital government services specifically concern report and tracking and making that information more accessible so we've spent the past three months with every city Department evaluating different digital Solutions and we'll actually be coming to you shortly with recommendations of a new Digital customer service portal that will help address resident concerns process applications and uh will be integrated with a new meeting management platform to upgrade aella um I will leave the uh the drinking water goals aside for the presentation the water utility our organizational chart our sustainability and resiliency division includes the environmental planner who is previously in the director's office of Environmental Services um also myself as the chief sustainability officer and Caleb Stratton as the chief resiliency officer are not are also very um involved in directly managing and Performing sustainability and resiliency work um which is not reflected in this org chart here our engineering division moved from the Department of administration so it includes the city engineer the water engineer and civil engineer and our Capital planning division includes the manager cap of capital planning who was previously um in the Department of Community Development and that role just moved our Innovation and data division includes the manager of data analytics who was previously in the department of administration that role also moved and we are proposing um One new hire in this budget which is a Solutions analyst who can manage the projects that we just discussed related to egovernment add ing quality of life concerns improving the delivery of services just like the deployment of a digital service a customer service portal upgrading our meeting management platform improving our City website and launching a a Hoboken all all with the effort of improving um resident services the last is our division of information systems and that includes a manager of Information Technology and supervisor of Information Technology you'll see also one Administrative Assistant um that role was in the engineering division in previous years and we're now proposing to move that into the director's office who would serve as an admin for the entire department so the employees that uh we just discussed in the organizational chart um are listed here in changes from 2023 to 2024 our goal with the reorganization was to be budget neutral so that the Personnel that you saw on the prior slide all existing roles with the exception of um the solutions analyst in the division of data and Innovation you'll see the division of engineering only shows two employees while the last sh last slide showed three and that is just because the water Engineers salary is fully funded by the Water Utility um the reason we're proposing this new H is because uh you know our that role is really critical to improving our e-government services transparency and accessibility of information so that brings us to our budget introduction uh the department of climate action and innovation is 1% of the total City Appropriations less than $2 million of the roughly $137 million City budget the 7% year-over-year budget change figure shown here is uh it's actually the change from the 2023 Environmental Services director's office so it's not exactly an Apples to Apples comparison um because we also moved you know some sub accounts from other other departments into this um without increasing them um and I'll explain that further on on future slides the largest components of the D Department's budget are the divisions of Information Systems formerly um it at 38% and Engineering at 31% the department Appropriations are roughly split in half with 53% salary and wages and 47% operating expenses so here's a budget breakdown by division as I mentioned before um the year-over-year budget change is more of a reallocation of budget lines from other departments um not a a direct comparison between the two director's offices um the sustainability and capital planning divisions remain flat engineering reduced by 2% and this reduction is due to moving the admin to the director's office and also moving uh a software budget line from engineering to Information Systems which reduced duplicative line items um likewise the increase in the director's office is due to moving the administrative assistant from engineering and also we moved supply lines from uh Information Technology and Engineering into the director's office to consolidate and reduce duplicate of line items the increase in innovation in data is directly related to um the one proposed new hire in the department and the increase in Information Systems is due to moving software um you know from engineering to it and also just increased software licensing costs um and these are largely outside of our control we need to continue to pay for our licenses here is umor here is a budget breakdown of the information that we just discussed on the previous slide um simply broken down by appropriation type and Division and then the last slide that uh I'd like to provide you this evening is a a summary of our revenue and grants so there's one source of revenue for the department and that's Road opening permits which are administered by our engineering division last year uh that Revenue was $94,000 and will likely be higher this year as construction activity continues to increase but we kept our estimate at 0% change just to be conservative um in addition our team secured $7.8 million in Grants that are currently open as we complete our capital projects and we anticipate at least $1.2 million in Grants this year that includes grants that um we've applied for and also those that we've um received you kind of conditional Awards pending environmental review Etc uh it does not include several bipartisan infrastructure law funding opportunities that were recently announced for which we are working on applications and it also doesn't include um uh you know bipartisan infrastructure law opportunities that have not yet been announced yet we know are coming um the the money is certainly flowing through that um through that bill and going through a variety of different federal agencies and we are keeping track of it so we can make sure that we maximize the amount that we apply for for um for our residents to offset the cost to taxpayers so in closing um the department of climate action is is bringing in more funding than what's necessary to operate the department um by an order of magnitude of 9:1 um we're bringing in significant amount of of Grants um you know to to offset the cost of our our projects so I look forward to taking your questions uh director could you just go back the the bottom of my zoom screen blocks out the bottom of your the bottom line here could you just scroll up like just a little bit so I could read the bottom of of of this slide unfort or is it Poss you can't just scroll down just a little bit as opposed to all you can do is go to the next one yeah it just takes me to the next slide all right all right never mind I can't make this bottom oh it just went away never mind thank you faces blocking the slide yes exactly thank you thank you Council questions um so on the revenue slide um is it uh is it safe to assume or to take away from the slide that the Top Line the road opening permits that's Revenue basically for the operating budget but everything else is for capital projects that is correct okay and is there another presentation on the summary of the capital projects no we were not planning another presentation in capital projects so can you go back the slide to OE so on what what are the what are the OE in both the engineering and information system so engineering OE is largely comprised of um uh Professional Services contracts so we do need Engineers to do um projects that are not related to capital projects this is things like Waterfront inspections um which is actually a large chunk of the of the OE this year it's also things like um Road opening p uh inspections um any other RightWay management inspections those are offset by the $94,000 in Road opening um you know costs but we do need some Professional Services to complete certain inspection services that we cannot complete in house um with information systems bulk of that is software licensing um computers equipment it's all uh you know related to to basically surprise and software and is the road opening expenses are those offset by like are we pricing our Road opening permits appropriately if we ENC is is like in the 405 do you think it's 100,000 for Road opening permit so it's close to what we charge or is it maybe 200 of it and we need to rethink what we charge for Road open increments because I feel like if other people want to open the road um the city shouldn't necessarily pay for for it um I actually think they're they're pretty fairly priced and and if I understand correctly the ordinance was updated recently to provide a um you know a better rate for those Road opening permits um you know that is I wouldn't say it's a one for one wash but I do think it it covers the cost you know there's um a large amount in there for a waterfront inspection report that we really need to do because it should be done every few years and hasn't been done um since I think it was the mid-2010s don't quote me on the year um and then there's also lsrp services in there um I should note that we are required to have for any of our um projects that are in the site remediation program got it and then so something like the containerization project that I know you've been working on where is that in this budget like where that is actually yeah that's actually not in this budget um because you know we have not approved a a pilot program yet we we're only in very very preliminary discussions about potentially doing a pilot program yeah um so that is not in here the consultant that is working on that um received a their their contract in actually last year's budget and they're just working through that once they're done there is no uh additional funding for that project it would need to be approved as a new capital cost so again we don't even know coming to you that yeah I was just using it as an example it was it was more of I know we had a more like where does something like that does it sit in your operating budget or is it a capital project so the consult the actual consultant so last year like where where did that cost end up in the actual in the operating budget or like a capital funded that was actually funded out of the sanitation operating budget last year but if there were say we did go ahead with um a containerization program and it were to be funded by um you know Capital um we we would probably look to for that to be a you know implementation of that program would be a totally separate project and that would be funded through Capital had it okay great we go ahead with it which is a very very big hit yeah here that councilman pres Zano uh thank you director Gonzalez for the uh report I I'll keep it brief so this way we don't have to take up too much time can you break down engineering information systems and just send me an email uh later I'll make it easy on you uh I'd like to see those numbers broken down a little but too all right thank you any other council members Jen you want to take that down it makes my makes it EAS for me to view am I still sharing how do I yeah my zoom went away that is there you go that's perfect thank um cancel if any of the members any members of the public have any questions please raise your hand Manny y Manny uh yes Manuel R Soler um coun president um I'm surprised I'm the only person here but I would like to know if director can explain a little bit for members of the to understand the um information and data you see the breakdown that it goes up on the budget and division can the director tell us it's it's 116 2023 budget and it's um 160 2024 is that the salary of the prer or what does anybody know or can she explain why on this one I'm so I'm I'm not understanding what you're asking I don't know director Gonzalez are you I am not either which num are you referring to okay you if you would be looking at your slide from it says 2024 introduction of budget by division so I'm going into uh Innovation and data and then I'm looking at those two numbers can you explain to members of the public the difference between those two numbers is that the salary of the new hire or if it's more that is the salary of the new hire we allocated $45,000 for that new hire okay directly that one for one uh number um I'm sorry director and Manny just I'm going actually I'll let you finish Manny I don't hear her speaking though she confirmed that it was the new hire was the difference a $45,000 difference okay perfect than thank you U vice president just or so um I won't take up too much time I know we have other people and and and other budgets um I would like to also no um the the budget that's being presented tonight um the director is saying that we are 7% above um last year's budget is that because of the new changes that's gone on or this new this new um this new I don't know how to say it the climate Innovation is getting his ducks in a row and it needs to find out how much it is can you tell me why the the higher she say from the 2023 2022 what year are we in 2022 environmental service budget 2023 environmental service budget which now she has additional items that fall under her therefore the increase correct director um effectively yes thank you and that's 7% yes but it has it's not that it's going up 7% it's just there it may be going up slightly there other items coming in from other departments that now that were not in Environmental Services in 2023 so it's not Apples to Apples to to I follow I follow as well as the the possible grants which are not technically in the budget but work in favor of the budget is that correct meaning can you hear me yeah yes you you're answering yes the answer would be yes okay thank you thank you Mr um council president and director um Gonzalez for the presentation I got I got it I just had those doubts thank you very much thank you um we have no other members of the public signed up to speak motion to close public portion all in favor I Mr lore we now do have a quorum again yes we do yep thank you all right uh just call the role councilman Cohen is absent councilman doy hi councilman Fischer yes councilwoman Jabor yes councilman pres Zano present present yeah I was just confusing just call the role because we have a qu now ter is absent councilman Ramos is absent Council Russo is absent and council president gatina here all right thank you Council from pres Zano when asked if you're here you should say pres Zano I just didn't know when they said yes I was like wait I'm like okay I didn't mean to make it confusing I'm sorry I didn't mean to makeus no worries I'm just saying yes I'm here all right okay are we ready are we ready for our um Olga yeah thank you very much director Gonzalez much appreciated y council president if you can Elevate Olga from attendee to panelist she will be and if you could keep uh director Gonzalez in because they're gonna it's mostly Olga but some Jen yeah I'm G Olga I'm changing you to panelist there we go okay Olga is in all right Olga you're awesome afternoon um thank you everybody U thank you council president Council vice president and members of the public uh let me start my by sharing my presentation share screen going to be presenting this screen two Jerry can you tell me what you see you see the full screen no no you know what um the way though we're just seeing like a little SLI uh better oh wait we just had it yeah it was the notes VI got same issue as M okay so I'll do the window screen how about now great now you're good ogga you're all set good this oh here I guess but I lost everybody now I don't see nobody here we can see you yeah we're here don't worry you go okay I look gray that's the most important thing great good afternoon good afternoon everybody um um thank you for spending the evening with us we're going to go over your water utility budget it's um we're missing our water engineer but I'm here for you and to ask and answer the questions let's go over let's go over our mission and responsibilities our main mission is to provide safe and reliable jinku water and maintain infrastructure systems that provides water transmission and distribution services to the 55,000 plus residents commercials and Industrial establishment in the city of hoken just an idea um what our water distribution system encompasses it encompasses uh more than an excess of 40,000 miles of water mains ranging from 4 in 6 to up to 30 in in diameter we have 475 large pounds 709 most vales for 4500 service connection along with 464 hydrants just so you know I know most of the people know here our infrastructure is a bit old it's about you know roughly 100 plus to as recent as babies in STO in 2023 our main goal is also to enhance hoboken's Water Management efficiently and waterers management efficiency and sustainability through state-of-the-art technology and I I'm going to go through that um in a few slides in in in in the future um we also plan and Implement Capital Investments such as what are main replacement projects we manage the connection permits policy development and program planning and fiscal management for the water utility uh one of our main goals is also that we oversee our contractor operator that is violia previously sus who is responsible for the daily system operations maintenance including repairs water main brakes the they have the operator's license to operate our water utility and also they follow the water quality accountability accountability act compliance and record keeping for our water um utility now one slide employes of one like director Gonzalez previously mentioned the water utility budgetarily covers um our full-time water engine that is cover under here and I'm going to go over other details as to other salties that are covered for purposes of this presentation um the budget includes one full-timer which is the um water our water engineer Bill Lup accomplishments um accomplishments we completed the installation of 260 Advanced Leak Detectors as you can see on the picture I don't know if you have seen them before they are those red boxes that are attached to the hydrants and what those leak sensors do they ears to our water Ms and they correlate The Sounds they typically measure the sounds on time about 3 in the morning for 10 minutes 15 minutes intervals and it's process through Ai and aquarios spectrum and they correlate if there's differences in noises as you can see there they establish contous Acoustics monitoring and pressure sensors across the city water system we thanks to those sensors we are able to detect um early on and identify the precise location of underground water leaks we prioritize and we prioritize the replace the repairs and the replacement this system Aquarius allows us to prioritize the noises that we hear are there there uh prior number one two or three and that's allow us to dispatch our um members from molia to go and investigate this is of course is a proactive approach and that's what we want to focus we don't want to be in the middle of the break we want to be proactive and be able to take care of that as soon as possible as soon as possible this is very significant This was um this was thanks to the leak detection sensors um that was something that the water utility budget was not hit for the installation of the sensors these sensors cost um 65,000 that the B the water utility was not um did not encumber those funds because that's what part of the camon siment of last year's water main break situation we also were able to install um 48 out of the 163 large size meters and large size meters overall in the water utility Encompass 80% of the water that we consume that our residents consume in the city of obok so by having accurate readings you utilizing newer large size meters AC acoustic meters by the way uh it will allow us to pick up and cover um the non-revenue water the water that goes through and we unfortunately cannot account for that also did not hit our water utility that came at a price of $680,000 that is being covered by ARP we're estimating the large size meters to be installed by the end of this year and hopefully by next year when we um have this presentation again we can show the results of of the accuracy of the meters and and and it will it should demonstrate that we're if we can read it we can charge it so that's important to us another big point that that we accomplished that I wanted to highlight one of the big points is the fact that we updated our cicle after the incident that we had um in which we were able to include escr founded inspections for projects and excavations that are occurring um near or within the proximity of water Ms that are larger than 12 Ines in diameter even if there are in a RightWay that is not per se under the jurisdiction of city hokan like in our case may be Hudson County but that allow us to put that in place to again more ice on on on the excavation and and have that support which we PRI prior we didn't have but because of what occur now we do and thank you for the support of the council members here in this endeavor what else of accomplishment what everybody wants to see this year 2023 we were able to install roughly 1.6 miles of water mains that's the big um the big construction job that occur this year with our contractors J Fletcher shoger um and violia and doing the inspections along with our other consult Consultants that perform the inspections those are the streets you can go ahead and read them the big segments are Grand Street from third and8 Park Avenue from 3rd to 8th and the services of Park Avenue between 8th Street and Ninth Street Castle Point Terrace between a Street and 10 Street and so so on as part of this water main capital Improvement um replacement project we were able to remove from our system um 78 lead Services lead Water Services meaning that they're not partial they were replaced from the main to the meter and we're very grateful for that because that improves our inventory and we're mandated by um D to remove that all of them by 2031 and that's another conversation that we'll keep going this is a graphical representation that shows you in yellow dots the pressure management system the pressure sensors there only 19 of them that shows the sensors and the pressures throughout the system that tell us right away when there's a drop in pressure meaning signifies that it could be a watermain break and then we have the locations in purple circle delineating um detailing the location of the leak sensors and as you saw on the prior image those leak leak sensors are located on our hydrants blue is are the segments of that were completed between 2018 and 2022 Encompass right up off the back what stands out to you Washington Street Hudson Street and phase one and other minor things that we have done um that that is a total of 3.19 miles right 2023 alone again reemphasizing we installed 8,435 linear feet of water and that was a total one point roughly 1.6 miles so in 2023 alone there was a lot of infrastructure work that occurring that um a lot of our members here are still going through with regards to the restoration but it's very significant I wanted to show it to you graphically to absorb what has been done and what are our goals we we never end what our goals I'm just showing you real quick what our our goals are for 2024 our goal is to replace uh the waterm on 13 Street between Park Avenue and Bloomfield Street the Reon why it's at priority because we receive a grant from the do and that um those two blocks have been identified that we we wouldn't PVE if we not we need to replace the water main and the services the following three other streets U one is Adam Street that's related to the phase two with nhsa and the waterm will be replaced on Adam between 13 and 15 Street and then we have the Madison Street which is Madison between 9th and 11 and the two segments one segment on N Street and another segment on 11th street that will be replaced as part of the um project with nhsa that we're looking forward to have a preon meeting in the coming months and breakr this year uh we also one of our main goals is to finalize this year the um design with a pressure reducing valves at our existing interconnect at Newark and Harrison and in addition to have a second interconnect at the intersection or another feed at the intersection of Henderson and observer um so far we're moving ahead we're meeting monthly with d to move that project alone and U we working in coordination with jcmua and and moving that project um the third one is at least to commence the design of phase three those are the segments I must knowe that phase three will involve some federal funding that we've been notified that we'll be getting but we haven't received the letter formally to expedite that and um that is our plan for 2024 and I want to leave you with this to share with you this is a an extract I know it's a lot of information this is an extract from our asset management plan this is our map and I'm not expecting you to digest all this information I just want you to stay with the visual of all the work yet to be done and recommended to be done and and I just want you guys and members of the public to understand that that word work is not finished there's still more work to be done and there plan and priority all this work has been based in in in data from our electronic sensors also when emergencies have occur breaks and when bolia goes in to do a tap into a water mate they discover information in the field so you put your you put your AI information and your field information you come up with this uh this is also in line with our Prospect and our water race studied what we um calculated and what we calculated to be able to invest in in Capital Improvements but I'll I'll go let's go into the nitty greedy here the budget hope you guys like the slide took me half an hour to make that happen just kidding the budget the introduced budget 3% of the $12.1 million budget for the water utility is being transferred to the city of hobok general fund and I'll go into detail later the year um the budget change from last year's is 11% why is 11% just to just to know this is a Balan budget we are covering the revenue and the Appropriations balance 11% I'm going to give you a more idea but let me just go over the slides real quick the biggest percent of for the 95% revenue is water rents the the invoices that our customers pay for the water that they consume in the city of Hoboken as you are well aware our Council in 20202 2022 approved a water rate study that had incrementals to cover for our Capital Improvements and our uh operating expenses along with um covering 81% of our other expenses I have a separate slide for that um but I just want you guys to digest that 12.1 million how it's breaking down in the P the anticipated Surplus and let's let's go to the numbers here are the numbers let me let you digest that and let me go real quick what stands out here so what says out here water rents 13% from $10.1 million to 11.5 million that's due to the water rate increase um that we have apply in 2023 we had a a total water rate increase in 2023 of 9.4 plus CPI of 6.8 and that's why it's reflected um on the increase of 133% so our total increase was 1548 but the increase here is 13% we're being conservative please note that that number the the numbers in the introduced budget of 2024 they do account for actuals for rents received for January February and March and we are in line and on target to meet our budget goals okay and you we'll see more stuff later on another point that I would like to um um point out is the Surplus transfer to general fund last year was 240,000 this year is in under the Appropriations Appropriations the third line from the top this year is 350 mostly most of that money is for um the water utility to pay back the CD Hoboken for the um de um for the dep requirement uh of the water projects that we did prior to the water utility becoming a water utility the water utility became a water utility on July 1st 2019 uh that dep service is to cover prior depths such as the Washington Street um watermain replacement and which is an i bank loan another um another point that I would like to point out is the salary and wages 275 to 420 that salary and wages covers the 420 now we are since we are funded now the water utility thanks to the water rate and administration of the water utility we're able to Now cover a portion of the overhead um that assist us to for us to manage this water utility and that increase in there that's just showing % of the overheard of certain departments such as the mayor the ba the city clerk's office purchasing um benefits and pedal city council so that's just 60% so that's why you see that bump there that at the end of the day the city the water utility benefits from that overhead and we're absorbing uh it's 6% because 6% represents the overall budget of the water utility compared to a percentage wi compared to the overall budget of the city of City okay let me leave that there we're good in time now the proposed other expenses the big chunk right $9.8 million dollar it was A8 Mill 8.9 million before now what is what is it what is this the bulk of the project the bulk of this is the bulk water the water that we purchased from our neighbors from the from Jersey City jcmua um 2023 that was the adopted budget 2024 in reduces $5.5 million why they increase um we have uh we are being conservative and we also adding the proposed 9% increase to take effect on U March 1st for uh from the jcmua so um that's what it's reflecting we're already having preparated the 9% increase for the 2024 biia for those that know because this is just a repetitive of last year's um um last Year's it's a name presentation for but for members of the public or Council new new council members that are here I just want to point out that the second item the $2.3 million that's to cover that's the base fee that's what we pay violia to uh operate the system and that's that's that amount and um that goes up every year by the CPI in this case in 2023 I believe that the CPI was 3 point the CPI the CPI for 2020 for 2024 was only 3.91 so that's what it went by he should have went by capex I'm going to touch base on that on the next live but what that means capex is what we call our mainest cap our account when we put money for mainest expenses for the water utilities such as in which we use emergency water repairs water man repairs and change meters hydrants that need to be fixed Etc some some other services some other software that we B is under that it's under that uh 1.2 1.2 was what was a do day last year and we are introducing the adapted to be we're introducing 1.4 uh Professional Services why the big bump there we put in there like $200,000 to cover to allow the water utility to do some test pits and be able to place at a minimum 10 um Le services that we're mandated to do between July 1st and between July 1st and June 30th of every year for this year we're good um we we managed to replace 78 but come July 1st the number restores and we have to accommodate for that that's why you see the bump under Professional Services there for that and um that is pretty much for that let's go to the next one the main escap yeah the one point this is this is the actual for 2023 if you remember the pr prior year we adopted we put 1.2 42 so our actuals this year was 1.57 um these are this is the breakdown of what where that money goes where that 1.1 57 goes and 83% of that or 963000 involve emergency work which is you know water M breaks or emergency hydrant repairs emergency some hydrants are tapped to a 30 inch or a 16 inch and they can be like in the $20,000 range and when we have emergency work it also means that we have to do throw Restorations so that number that you see there the 83% is not only the water main break but whatever Road restoration needs to be done um there I let you absorb that a few seconds and now a fund balance this is a question that we're always being asked every U presentation what is our F fund balance this is um the number the audited number as of December 31st 2020 2022 was $1.4 Million 2023 December 30 20 31st is $2.1 million and that's why for 2024 we are only projecting or recommending to use in the budget $200,000 and that's the story open for questions by I don't see nobody so that's great I have a good question um council president yeah just wait for to oh sorry that's okay see how can I it's okaya can you go back on the fund balance really quick yes so you're accumulating money in the fund for what you started it 5 8 and at the end of 2021 you added almost a million dollars in 2022 yes right you added another 700,000 in 2023 and what's the concern what what are you going to use it for so the like any budget for a home or or water utility you want to have at least three months of operating cost included on your budget and that's what the fund balance represents our goal is to be able to a minimum have three months of of budgets also there may be we've been okay with emergencies but there's been instances in which we have gone over and an emergency can cost um roughly $700,000 we only need two and then we are out of the park so we need to have those funds there to be able to go in um just out of uh for your information I know you know but Jason can jump in um prior to or when we took over the water utility there was an emergency appropriation that needed to be done uh because we didn't have any funds and we just last year paid off the last payment for that so you want to have that money at least three months of your operating budget that's that's um the right thing to do um and you know to be able to cover per emergencies and so what is remind me what three months of the budget okay so it will be um a rough like 3, 300,000 on a 12.1 million budget got it thank you you wel president J my turn yeah sorry councilman you got it all right uh thank you for the presentation um I wanted to ask a couple questions the money that you're setting aside the fund balance is that and again is that included on the number uh that director Freeman presented to us of interest if that money is just sitting around in the bank account or waiting or we invest not investing but getting interest paid to us from the bank if that's sitting somewhere uh one to um of the Inc or of the water pipes that we've replaced how much of that has been from uh give Backs from uh Builders or or or developers uh in in what we've currently done let's say for the last year those projects that we perform this year they're all related to our capital projects managed and funded by the city hoken through the ibank small interest loans none by other um developers okay and question is yes regarding the interest go there director Freeman that's in your that's in your the uh in the in the overall budget that we laid out yes that it's inclusive of all yep okay thank you no problem and the answer is yes we do we do we did get um we did get a um let me see what is the name of that oh we sold some bonds and we got some cash on that at one time we sold some bonds and we got $38,000 um of of cash that we're not accounted and $85,000 from let me go back to that slide so you can see it so you see the 405 the revenue 85 you see the difference of around 110,000 so 85 $5,000 was from interest that we made in the bank because we have the money there and also the $38,000 of those was for because we sold bonds um and it was put in in this number that's why you see that's where you see it in the bline I don't see nobody here right here that's right you're just not you're doing such a good job are there any members of the public Paul are you done done any other council members I think I can see us all any members the public wish to speak I see everybody now look at that Manny oh I had a question for you Olga I'll ask after council president you can go right ahead that's all right thank you Manny thank you then council president Manny um uh Miss alga thank you for the presentation and yes we were able to see you and hear you and you were looking lovely um I just want you're welcome I and as well as you miss Gonzalez uh I just want to ask a question in regards to this budget is your are you letting members of the public understand that the budget that you presented this evening is balanced yes it is balanced yes same Revenue coming in it um is what we're intending to spend okay that sounds good um my next uh inquiry would be um I saw in the the chart that said um salaries and wages um just so that members of the public who are watching this will be watching this perhaps um in Prior meetings some of this was explained in regards to um salaries that are now being um funded for other Personnel in the in the admin not in the administration in the city meeting council members and such is is that the reflection of this 53% that is correct so not only so full-time we have our water engineer also partial U we have some percentage of my salary and some two other members of the climate action um Department reflected here they range from 10% to 20% depending the level of involvement and on top of that this year what is difference is that we have 6% of overhead um from the C booking that assist us managing this water utility and then as a which is fair you know we benefit from the CDM from the overhead um just so you can think about it it it saves it water utility money having to hire those independent Services instead of you know just using what we have right now at hand the same situation I don't know if you were at that presentation for uh director sharp with the traffic uh parking utility that's the same concept that we use the overhead for the city and some of that salary is transferred to to pay depending on the percentage and what the water utility or whatever utility represents compared to the overall budget of the um City Hoboken thank you that just I appreciate because I just wanted members of the public to and understand that that 53% I was there thank you um my next question quickly and this is just um when you in maintenance when you express that you have hear in the chart that says hydrant repair and replacement uh it's it's not a large uh amount but I'm just wondering is that a constant replacement of fire hydrant is there it is always going to be some type of I know maintenance is always going to be there but replacement of the fire hydrants yeah so replacement repair so replacement is when you have to do the entire new hydrants now as you see when we do water mains and capital Improvement projects we take that opportunity of removing that entire hydrant and putting new ones so what we do is we take those parts and we keep them with the parts that we need and and keep them in the yard or whatever that is um but um our goal is that as we move there's certain segments of the city that we cannot get to it but the hydrant need that assistance to be repaired so that's what that number represents and I think that's going to keep going until we get to a point that we have updated all our hydrants some of them are working and they don't need but you know the parts and the repair u they're important but what I'm trying to say is that you see that number but that number is way bigger but we have cover that under our Capital Improvement project so it gets absorbed by the other projects capital projects great uh I appreciate again the answers and I appreciate the presentation uh thank you so much and um council president thank you so much for allowing me to speak thank you have a good evening thank you Manny uh oh God you know I just wanted to ask you you had said 10 you have to replace 10 every whatever the time how is it is it mandated on how many lead lines we have in town or is it just a set a fixed number correct no it's mandated on how many lead lines or ONN you have uh in town and that's why I was proposing that for an our budget that the increase that we do test fitting and be able to replace at least 10 Le services so we can you know abide by that number I don't know that by next year we're going to have phase three Full Construction right or or or covering that but um it's mandated by the state of New Jersey by 2020 by 2031 all lead Services meaning from the meter to the main need to be removed no lead and um fortunately this year we were able to remove 78 so that's really good but now we reset to zero and the more unknowns you have and just take a look at that and I'll I have that sharp but I don't have it right in front of me the moral knowns what we go in like as a point it was a higher the the older the road the higher percentage of lead the newer the newer the water main the less percentage so what we do is we say 25% 20% of the 4500 Le services that we have there may be leg Services some we confirm they're not some Unfortunately they are thank you're welc thank you very much thank you for the presentation you got it thank you Olga um council president if you can Elevate director fanti uh Chief peskin Berlin vilant and chief agar oh and Kevin Cruz is there as well we're not going to have any attendees left we wanted to stack the panelist room oh wait I missed someone here we go just moved the chief AG are trying to get him over okay I think everyone oh Anton here and Anton's here yep we're all set oh there it goes okay chief I meant sorry good evening Jerry are you able to share that the presentation yep one second can everyone see presentation yes but it's not the full screen okay let me see I mean your your view is not the full screen let me just see something uh Jerry try um I say try bottom right that's the notice Jerry on the bottom right I think there there might be a full screen option yep try that How About Now Yep great all right uh okay good evening everybody so just go back to the first one Jerry so we are there are several of us that are with here tonight for the public safety budget presentation this is going to be very different than the eight others that you have been through uh I would like to give a thank you to Haley Alman from the finance department who uh assisted me putting this presentation together over the last week or two and of course Chris Baldwin all the work we've done over the last several months so with the Public Safety Division you have a division that has a department that has oversight or touches on eight different divisions in the city of Hoboken which is your Police Department your fire department your OEM EMS our court attendance and security guards our Communications our social workers and also for the first time this year in 2024 our health department where this is going to be very different than the other eight that you have seen it is very Personnel driven you'll see later on as far as the percentage of our budget it is Workforce is Workforce intensive so that we can provide Public Safety for the city of Hoboken you go to the next one Jerry so the the key thing with there's our drone one vehicle that uh through lur enforcement trust fund several years ago we created a drone team where we have two uas FAA approved pilots and several spotters and why is that a picture of out Public Safety because Public Safety in the city of Hoboken without eight divisions is about interoperability and collaboration as daily these eight divisions are working together on our next page you'll see our miss our mission statement for the public safety department where the city of hoboken's Department of Public Safety is committed to providing the safest environment for all of our residents visitors businesses and employees we're also committed to engaging with our community and being sensitive to the needs of our residents our community leaders you as our elected officials the media and the work stat of each of our divisions I think all of you are seeing that daily as far as the interactions that you have with our Public Safety department and its Executives on the next page we have our responsibilities for five of the main divisions our Police Department where our sworn and civilian staff of HPD are responsible for protecting and serving the community through both crime prevention and detection in our fire department we have our sworn and civilian staff of hfd maintain safety in our city through inspections fire prevention campaigns and when needed fire suppression and rescues our office of emergency management has a responsibility of prevention mitigation preparedness response and Recovery to the many emergencies that we see daily our Hoboken Health Department is the division that manages Health inspections provides consumer and environmental health services and also maintains all V Vital Statistics in the city and lastly our court attendant and security staff the court attendance and security staff maintain the protection safety of the Municipal Court as well as the offices of City Hall and other City officers that are are housed in the multi-service center on our next page this is the the non-pd and FD sta Staffing you'll see that on different pages uh our director's office has two full-time staff our Emergency Management you'll see when from five and one to 5 and3 as we've added two part-time employees for this coming year our health department consists of eight employees and our building security consists of 14 on the next page our police Staffing So currently as we sit today regards to our table of organization we are six police officers below our table of organization now if you remember over the past year we're in upwards of close to 20 below out table organization but our police Administration on the chief agar Lieutenant KS have done an outstanding job with recruitment and trying to way find every way possible to add policing uh in our in our city just to be aware that this is not a Hoboken problem this is a a n Nationwide problem State Police used to get 18,000 applicants per year where now they only have less than 2,000 Hoboken used to have 400 applicants for every test every three years in 2023 only 134 people in the county of Hudson test to become police offics so our police staff had to do many different ways legal ways under state law to find officers to come join our our ranks and they are doing an excellent job as I said we currently sit six under our table we have two retirements on June 1st which would leave us eight but we have a very strong confidence that with the background checks ongoing right now that we will have those eight spots filled come July but we'll discuss later as far as when those actual new staff members will hit the streets on the next page we have out fire department Staffing so our fire department Staffing currently sits as 10 below the table but this is a positive because you as a city council approved the ability to increase the table by eight firefighters this year background checks are currently uh being commenced we also anticipate that there will be two retirements mandated retirements because of firefighters aging out which will leave us to needing to hire 10 firefighters we are 12 firefighters we are confident that come this summer we will be sending 12 firefighters to the fire academy and we're going to have a fully staffed table Organization for our fire department by the end of the year and for the first time in many years all of our fire engines will have three firefighters and one captain on on every on every engine so it's going to be that's a National Standard that uh is something that many in the region only aspire to we aspired to this over the last year or two and we all worked this including you as the council uh to get this done it's getting done in 2024 on the next page we see our budget allowances now the Department of Public Safety takes up 32% of the of the city's Appropriations it's $44 million realize that the Department of Public Safety also manages 65% of the workforce in the city of Hoboken so two-thirds of the workforce is coming out of our division and with the many hires and promotions that we've had and due to retirements Grants and just smart management of overtime and expenses we're going to have a zero year-to-year budget change from 2023 when you see the end of this budget presentation on the next page is our budget breakdown within the Department of Public Safety so I just want to go on the right one first as I said we're we're Personnel driven 97% of that $44 million for the Department of Public Safety is salary and wages because of personnel and that's we need firefighters we need police officers OEM Health Inspectors Public Safety is a is a Workforce driven uh Department compared to the other eight so now when look at the left we have six that actually show some type of fraction that would show up on a pie chart we have the director's office takes up just one% the police department 49% the fire department 45 so 94% of the budget for Public Safety is police and fire we have Emergency Management takes up 2% the health department another 2% building security one now we also have two other numbers seven and eight which is our um Communications doesn't take up a percentage point because it's only one salary and also the social workers we brought on two social workers last year which the council and administration worked on together collaboratively and we have a salary of one of the social workers could potentially be brought and covered by a grant that we're working on so that is not finalized approved but we're confident that we're going to have the social workers salary covered by Grant so we go to the next page so the next page is the line by line of each of the uh six main departments that have a tangible amount in in the budget so our director's office you'll just see a $7,000 increase from 2023 uh that is just due due to a stien offset overtime that occurred in 2023 uh the police department with the amount of hirings that we have uh you're going to see $300,000 or % decrease in salary and wages from the fire department you're going to see a 2% decrease and that is with the increase in the table organization now why is that we've had retirements of high level senior police offic and firefighters with 30 plus years of service uh at top longevity and here's where we always like to look further out Finance always says the the biggest savings is in year two after the retirement why is that because the officers and firefighters have retired this year we have to pay out their uh vacation carryover and also their terminal leave year two is which is going to be in 2025 we will see more savings from those retirements that we've had in police and fire now emergency management you're going to see this 22% increase why do we see $120,000 here well two reasons we brought on two new part-time employees in the last month one to respond to emergencies and also want to work on as a as a clerk to handle out oep which is the uh hiring of the police officers for all of those different construction assignments and emergencies so that's half of that $120,000 we also have monies that had to be paid out in vacation time to a retiring member of OEM so that's why you see that $120,000 uh increased number from 2023 when we go to the health department you're going to see this 7576 ,000 increase 25% why is that we have not increased our staff our staff is still at eight so we apply for Grants each year uh Chris baldman myself uh Berlin our assistant Health officer very confident that we are going to have Grant coverage of some of the salaries in the health department we cannot budget for that as an assumption that we're going to get it until we have a confirmation that we're receiving that now what you will see as we go into summer and fall hopefully as we receive Grant monies you'll see it come before the council to accept those monies in and then Finance can put a account line to that so there is a good chance that that $176,000 that you see there will turn to a z% with the coverage of the Grant and last is our building security so out building security you'll see an increase of just $20,000 4% uh not going to get into specifics but just that on May 8th we have a contract negotiation starting with our court attendance and building security so uh we have some funding in there that has been already uh pre-planned and put in on the next page so we go to our Police salary and wages so in our Swan line uh you'll see the 2% decrease as we talked the civilian line 6% uh some of that is because we also had a civilian employee from uh police come over to OEM uh so that's why you see the decrease there but the key thing we need to discuss is our overtime uh police department did an outstanding job keeping overtime down in 2023 and you got to say why is there an increase request of 68,000 and $180,000 over what was spent that is going to be for two reasons the Hoboken Police Department currently has 10 recruits in the Police Academy when we hire eight in July which we're confident is going to happen they're going to have 18 recruits in the academy that is 18 staff positions not on the street with summer vacations and with the busiest time which is between Labor Day and Santa Con that is the busiest time for needing overtime for police we need to keep that $900,000 number up that possibly can come down next year because we're going to have a fully staffed uh TFO Now where's the other $68,000 there are different items that become major city attention let's call what is the the ebike Enforcement issue last year a couple officers were assigned each time uh to give summonses 200 summonses plus were given out uh the city Administration and the City Police Department is committing overtime funding so that come June 1st there will be a full roll out of a strong enforcement campaign to do a number on these Rogue ebike operators both either on a sidewalks going through stop signs going the wrong way and this is something that hopefully I think everyone on here wants to see this corrected and this is just one of the tools to help uh correct that Rogue Behavior we go to the next page and we have our fire salary and wages uh the 2% decrease because of the retirements and lower staff people civilian stays flat and the overtime uh because of retirements people leaving injuries illness people aging out that is why it was slightly overspent in 2023 we're going to request the same 855 that we we requested at the beginning of 2023 uh because remember we have 12 fire 12 fire recruits that are going to be in the academy for three to four months and then need to uh do some inservice training when they come out of the academy in order to get three firefighters and a captain immediately on those engines when we hire these firefighters we need to have that overtime line because we're increasing the minimum safing from 20 firefighters daily to 23 and those three additional will put that fourth firefighter on the three fire engines that are operations in the city we go to the next page so tonight with us we have a division heads and Reps from four of our main divisions you're going to hear from Chief agar talk about his main drivers of his operating expenses we have fire chief peskin with us we have our s we have our acting OEM coordinator Kevin Cruz with us we also have our assistant Health officer Berlin vilant with us so I'll start with the o with the director's office the $5,000 is just for for training caps meetings and basically stationary that we need so that's why it's a very low number uh for the O and E uh for the director's office so I will now turn over to Chief agar and as he explains what drives the o and uh monies for PD evening council members uh can everybody hear me okay I gotta yes good okay all right uh as a director as presented Although our budget has decreased by approximately 1% our o budget as presented has increased by approximately 3% uh it should be noted that this increase Falls slightly under the March 2024 inflation rate of 3 and a half % um due to upgrades in technology and moving to an inperson training module we're able to realize several decreases uh across multiple o lines these decreases were reallocated to other line items where we have seen consistent increases year after year such as our maintenance contracts line um which is our largest driver of O uh that includes uh everything that's service based for the police department which are services that are to running the police department uh they include but aren't limited to all of our it our record management system our scheduling system our document management system uh and any other type of services that we uh use for investigative um purposes uh anything that requires a contract falls under that and that's our ma major driver uh driver of our o lines uh the next most significant increases to our o has been to uh our Police Department medical testing and services line and our basic training line items these increases are related to hiring of the 99 that was just presented for our uh police officers 15 of those are actually new hires uh from this year that are actually in an an academy or pre uh pre pre Patrol training positions meaning they're not on the street uh as as of right now until they complete their full training um curriculum as we attempt to fill the current Table of organization the cost associated with hiring impacts the O budget line uh greatly uh these are the most significant changes in our uh in our o um the medical testing line item has increased significantly just because of that hiring process everything that we have to do in order to onboard new Personnel uh comes with a cost and with increasing our table of organization or trying to actually fill it that's where we we are spending most of our money from our o outside of our maintenance contract line and our uh our medical testing line um those are the major drivers of our o nothing else has really changed again we kind of realized where we saw some decreases and it had to fill those gaps where we saw the the increases uh coming uh that concludes my presentation and I'll be open for a question and answer uh when everybody else is done we now have Chief peskin to discuss the on for for fire Chief you're on oh sorry all right I got it hello again uh the three main drivers for my o in 2023 2024 and moving forward will be vehicle maintenance as you know I have 10 large diesel apparatus and uh I'm happy to report that they are DOT road worthy uh we have a maintenance officer that uh keeps them running and but everything involved with diesel equipment is expensive we also have roughly 10 SUV type Vehicles so I have a lot of vehicles vehicle maintenance is is the main driver of my o uh there's really no way around that uh equipment maintenance also is one of my main drivers uh we have mandatory testing that needs to be performed on on our equipment that we carry every day as well as regular replacement and repair uh we have prosha mandated uh mandatory ladder testing aerial testing we have to test each length of Hose we have to test every pumper and we have to do flow test on our scvas that's the air packs we used to breath and uh last year we hired eight new recruits this year we're doing the same uh plus4 and uh each recruit has to get background checked we have to pay foris their turnout gear is is upwards of $6,000 a piece I've tried to offset quite a bit of that with grants uh last year I believe I secured $65,000 in grant money from the state and the federal government for PPE but PPE the coachs pants helmets and such have a 10year shelf life and we're supposed to replace them after every 10 years and actually the industry is moving towards two sets of gear for every firefighter based on cancer risks with the PF PFS chemicals that are in them right now also uh we have to pay for the psychological exams for new hires as well as physical exams for new hires but new hires drive my o which is a good thing and vehicle maintenance and equipment maintenance and those are pretty much my three main drivers training new hes equipment maintenance vehicle maintenance and uh that's all I got for you guys thank you Chief our next o presentation is going to be our our acting OEM coordinator some of you have already had dealings with him in his first month in a rle with earthquakes and all new type of experiences he's brought on with us uh but I turn over to Kevin Cruz hello can anybody hear me can you hear me I have you yes unfortunately [Laughter] yes um my uh my main driver for my o i mean if you look at it you're like oh wow 44% and but my budget's the lowest one out of all of them um it really was just uh replacing old equipment that we had we had a couple of uh generators that we needed to replace we had the um DPW maintained in them but it would got it got to the point where they were just we they were obsolete so we had to get new ones um some lighting and some training that I have for my staff but that's really the main Drive is just equipment that we need to replace that were U that were obsolete mine's the shortest one well said thank you Kevin and our last one tonight which first of all it's our our new employee that's the assistant Health officer or Berlin vcamp and it's also our new division that's under Public Safety so I turn over to Bon thank you thank you good evening council members um members of the public and my distinguished colleagues um as you can see on our operating expense budget it has not changed from 2023 to 2024 the main driver of um our o is our contractual uh service agreements and that's mostly with a Hudson Regional um Health commission in which they respond to uh public health concerns that we do not respond to including like air quality control and um uh noise complaints and other things that I can't remember but they do respond to other things that we do not cover um and another part of the uh contractual agree um Services is the animal control services that um as you all are aware of that we are still in talks of but we have budgeted uh to ensure that Jersey City covers our Animal Control um and Care needs for the city of Newark I mean I'm sorry city of Hoboken oh boy um some of you already probably may not know but um about $100,000 is uh um dedicated to animal control and the fee is based on our population they charge um a160 per person in um the city of Hoboken so that's what equates to uh the $100,000 and that's it thank you thank you Berlin and I know some of you thinking well where's the eroding control so we also have $126,000 to Paramount which you had approved as a council for Road and control but that's actually being paid for out of uh ARP fund so it will not be in the public safety budget there's also one other part of O under Public Safety and that's for the EMS so Hoboken volunteer ambulance course Emergency Medical Services is our Sole Provider for emergency services Emergency Medical Services in the city of Hoboken uh this is going to be year two where we have a hybrid system that includes billing and paid EMTs I sit on that board as the Department of Public Safety oversees those operations now and we no longer as a city of hobok have to pay $250,000 per year for insurance uh they basically are self-sufficient for equipment uh the city of Hoboken pays a Max uh donation of $40,000 to the volunteer C there is a volunteer component still that operates uh overnight and on weekends and at Major festivals and we also pay for the gas for those for those rigs because they are operating as our Emergency Medical Services so uh it's a $210,000 savings times two so we're up to $420,000 have been saved over two years uh from that form of payment so that is all we have as far as our o salary and wages and I guess pull up the screen and feel free to ask any of us any questions you feel councilman preso thank you for the presentation everyone um I had a quick question so we talked about the cons and that it was extra cost overtime we have to bring in people from other uh cities there is nothing that is from the organizers of the con that they don't get we don't Bill them for those hours is that that's correct from what I'm hearing I mean that's what I understand but I just wanted to ask that question Jerry is there a way to go to the screen so we can see each other because I we just see this white screen of Q&A up sure what's uh there we go great there we go which uh page you want wanted me to go to no none no we're there we're there Jeff right so the short answer councilman and I and I can turn over to director Brandy who's handled this while the moment that the city enters into a contract or an agreement with one of the operators or the organizers we're essentially condoning and approving what's going to happen and and it's always been for as long as I've been here I know back and forth in terms of like what's the best way to do that yes and ultimately I think the moment that that the city gives any sort of approval that we're supportive or or or um we're supportive of of these events happening I think it endorsing them thank you Jim our councilman it it I think there's a all the sudden becomes a shared liability the moment something happens so that that's been part of that conversation okay but there's no way there I mean that's an offline conversation I'll I'll talk with you and director frany about that not a big not a big thing but thank you it's not as organized councilman as you know if if if there were one unified yeah entity it'd be one thing but when it's just everyone participating as they so choose it's kind of you know 20 different restaurants and bars and you know it's so it's but anyway yeah Jason tell you the history that it councilman thank you thank you I can't remember the the emergency generators is that like generator I know this is a stupid question but like an emergency generator at the PlayStation is that the power goes out there but are these like mobile emergency gener yeah yeah council president this are the uh the small ones the um the mobile ones yeah we had uh we had about six of them and they were just being maintained by DPW and they were getting to the point where just they wer turning on and we had to purchase a couple of them which we did and uh water pumps as well that we usually use for basements When people's basements flood in situations where they really need it and we can't get anybody out there we do it ourselves um and then would it be possible or I know it's possible can you send me the the actuals what we spent in O and E uh sure not you in part like for all of them not really you so much because yours is so painy but that would be helpful anyone else all right members of the public Manny Manny yes of course it's Manny's not gonna want to talk to uh the chief uh thank you once again council president Manuel R Soler um good evening to everyone now um I have a question or several questions but I'm I think I'm going to put it this way first of all the the the budget that's being presented tonight is not over it's meaning it's on budget is what I rather say well the it hasn't it hasn't been adopted so but for tonight's presentation there are three different presentations man right so are you asking about all three combined whether they no I'm asking hold no phones I'm asking for the presentation that was done this evening that's right now finished the one that was given now for um all of the Departments and I see it says 5% at the end there I'm asking is this presented Budget on budget meaning it's not over what was presented just now um it's it's what they want us to adopt as their budget so they haven't even they haven't spent all the money yet and they can't go over budget they can't spend more than we've allotted to them they would have to have a line item transfer if that were the case at some time in the future but the budget they presented to us is what they want us to adopt so and in relation to 2023 M it's as with the eight all eight divisions combined it's a flat uh budget compared to 2023 and there's 2% decreases in police and fire because of the attrition and turnover from 30 to 40 year employees to new recruits okay that's fair thank you um and I'm just gonna take off a few things and just this is just anybody would be able to answer them I'm sure um the director for an could do that um uh I wanted to know when when Health Department was presenting they said 100 100,000 for um Animal Control um can anybody specify um what or that 100,000 is again as council member just said that's that's an approximation what we want to have in case we need it that correct no it's actually exactly $100,000 we're going to have it on the council agenda on May 1st uh the rate that Jersy City gave us in a shared services agreement was $160 per our residents uh in from our census and this is for any uh animal control as far as wild animals loose animals um animal bites Sheltering of abandoned animals and all the Staffing for that they are providing us that now in uh our assistant Health officer Berlin and I were looking at other cities in Hudson County we saw this as about a 15 to 20% lower amount than what other cities are paying so we saw this as a a very good deal and it had to happen because we had to find another animal control because Liberty human was shut down in December uh so we had no Animal Control they had been out animal control for about the last 10 years I appreciate the explanation just one little little so that means irregardless if we use the system or not we have to pay $100,000 is that correct yes yeah okay okay good we probably use them on average of a couple times a month where it's either a resident or the police department contacting them that they need to come and get a wild animal now the one additional service that they're going to provide for us that Liberty did not is Liberty had this ridiculous policy that they wanted the residents or the police Department to secure the wild animal cage them or Corner them then they would come get them which was a major risk Jersey City said they will upon call from a resident or the police department they will respond to take control of that animal which is a a major Plus in this in this uh contract yes that would make sense because then you actually in the prior one then you were actually doing the service ridiculous I appreciate no I appreciate this then I appreciate um very quickly then um the the budget also reflects that when in Fire and in police the recruits we have already budgeted for it we we are already asking for those funds so that we have them and in case we do or we don't either we decrease or we don't you know we don't get the what I'm trying to say that we don't get all the recruits or they don't all pass we still have the budget um for them what I had done when I sat with Chris Baldwin from finances we we budgeted for the for eight new police officers effective July 1st because we feel about July we're going to be able to bring them on and the 10 to 12 new firefighters also July 1 so we we basically did it down to the exact month and uh when Chris and I get together we are very specific as far as what month someone's retiring what month we're hiring so it's it's very close to precise okay lastly thank you uh once again lastly the equipments both equipments and um uh Emergency Management and in fire when emergency manager says that they are replacing their equipment being that they are the lowest on guys here as far as funds is that every year we're going to have to replace the old equipment and in fire um again the same question once we fix the equipment do we need to once again put it back in the budget or do we just assume they're going to break and we just have to put it in there in case in the budget meaning the monies it's not it's it's not annual and different things are dependent on their you know some things may last three years some things may I'm making all of this up specifically but some things may last five years something so it's not the same amount every year and and nothing is I can't think of any of equipment that's replaced annually yeah it's not the same amount it's not the same equipment it's not the same damage it it's it's very fluid it changes all the time yeah that's used gets broken yeah that's correct that's correct in my situation I'm not going to be replacing these things every year uh well I appreciate the answers from everyone they were very uh clear and quickly uh answered um council president once again thank you very much thank you um everyone for their presentation this evening especially uh director fante and all the captains and the head of departments thank you and good evening actually I did have one you had mentioned that the um I don't some I can't maybe you there's so many chiefs I can just say Chief and no one knows I'm talking to so it's perfect um something with cancer in the I think it was Chief yes it was in our turnout gear the uh P it's it's been identified one of the chemicals they use in our Vapor Barrier and our exterior shell has don't quote me on I think it's PFS it's a cancer cling agent posos yeah pfas but it's in fire fighting retardant uh and it's an emerging contaminant that is just this last week the EPA you know designated it as a hazardous substance and it's a it's a substance of of significant concern even at very very very low levels so so why would that I maybe I misunderstood you like why would they want you to get two of them is it something that breaks down like it's not it's not a contaminant when you have a new one so you could wash your gear and if say you're working one day and your gear gets wet get yeah so you have a sp the gear yeah it's not in the gear it's thank you that's I was being confused actually is in the gear bu oh it is in the nothing we can do about it at this time except be aware of it wash yourself and wash your clothes and the industry is aware and they're making changes thank you yeah uh do any other council members have any questions well thank you everyone for your presentation very much appreciated thank you we don't have to we don't have Forum so everyone have an excellent evening thank you very much Goodbye guysone by good night everyone good night thank you will --------- oh yeah can you hear me we can hear you yeah okay yeah so this is you don't you're not obligated to say anything but this this is your opportunity just to add any commentary you know supplement what Miss Holtzman has said or you know what whatever you might like to share with us I think like just from our point ofv viw we kind of went through the process and did whatever we you know an had asked us to do um think we we were just listening there it seems we might have made a small mistake with the know the certified and the non-certified let you know mail like I I think as Brian said we're probably gonna end up in the same position but we're happy if it you know meets the stay alone whatever to resend them out by certified mail we have the mailing list here still um you know really it we we were just unsure about the appeals and you know what what the I suppose what issues there was and we're happy to answer any questions that you guys have or anybody else okay thank you um but so you confirmed that there was a that the certified stuff was not was not satisfied but that you're obviously willing to well I think I confirm yeah I think I confirm we have a receipt from USPS for the for it being sent out but it looks like it wasn't actually certified that it was we we printed the mail in you know all the labels and and sent them off yeah no I'm I'm not trying to harp on it but yeah so so you acknowledge that that's that's that's fine um do you by any chance um you know one of the one of the the possible reasons for denial would be um issues related to you know Tavern sheets and things at the at the existing bar do you are you guys in good shape I with regard to the Alcohol Beverage Control with your current operation yes okay all right thank you you're welcome so I I Jen I I don't have anything else I um I don't have no do you want to okay I'm going to um if no one has any questions for them I'm going to put you guys back in the attendees but if we need you we'll bring you back yeah we're happy to come in and answer any questions that you need thank you thank you guys thank you thank you so I think what we should do Council uh councilman is if uh any of the me if any members of the public would like to speak use the raised hand function if you have any questions or you just want to speak use the raiseed hand function um I would appreciate if you guys could do that now because that's going to determine how much time everyone gets and if you know only someone just lowered their hand doesn't mean I'm going to give more time um and council president I was gonna add that I I do think strictly speaking um you know the the code suggests that people uh who would file an appeal of this prospective decision would essentially write a letter to the clerk's office and so I think for sorry for our purposes I think it's fine to just let anyone speak who wants to speak you know B rather than saying have you formally filed an appeal or not as far as having the opportunity but I would um you know for the sake of of the proceeding um you know if if you're going to reiterate what the person in front of you has said if you could be concise and just say I I too agree and you know we want to hear from you but we don't necessarily have to hear the same thing over and over and over I guess what I'm trying to say politely right because most of you have most of the people raising their hands have emailed us probably and we we're all well aware of everyone's concerns so um I think we're GNA do two minutes because we have eight president yes I'm sorry if I may just something for the council to consider if the council was going to consider um not for the people that are currently with us and that have filed an appeal but for others who may not have known about the appeal based upon the certified issue if you were going to consider having them resend those notices one of the things you might want to consider is making that decision now and then adjourning this hearing until though that mail hits and we see if there's anyone else that wants to participate so you still only have one hearing instead of recreating it if you find later that you've heard from you know the attendees that are with us now I see nine hands raised but now there's four other people now we have to redo the entire hearing um and the council doesn't get to consider everything at once you can also go forward with this hearing as well I'm just throwing that out there that might be something you might want to consider however Council to proceed as far Corporation Council do you I know that um Miss Holtzman you know plays a lawyer on TV um but uh no the the the statement that um that you know a a noncertified letter can be deemed to be acceptable upon proof that letters have been received is do you agree with that I agree with Miss H with with with Miss Holzman on that issue completely agree um but the issue becomes we have a group of people that not withstanding the certified issue received and they're here with us today they weren't disenfranchised so they don't have any uh in my opinion claim that somehow the certified male should rule the day but you might have somebody else who didn't know about the hearing today and didn't know about the application because of the certified so that other unknown person might actually raise an issue I'm not saying that so such a person exists I'm just throwing it out there if the council is going to ask for the certified to be sent um it might be beneficial to have that certified sent now and then come back um and and have the hearing all at once um for I'll call that other group of people that might be out there we don't know Mr ly I have a question as far as then what happens with the time frames that are Set uh that you know for this to be if that happens again does that reset the clock or does that uh that would reset the clock because everybody will get Ren noticed okay it's it's almost as though right now you'd be denying the application based only on the certification issue they would recertify and then we'd come back here presumably the people would still have you know residents would still have the same appeal um and there might be more residents right that that join it because of this they now get certified mail and they you know were maybe the other mail they didn't receive can't hear me I'm saying this hypothetically but if tonight we were that's only if tonight we're granting a yes vote that that something like that could happen if there are other reasons for denying the parklet that's that's correct councilman Doyle what's your um thoughts I don't it's not it's not my call I mean in the sense obviously I get one vote but um I don't I think we should I my opinion is we should just hear from the people and yeah and then make our choice you know decide if we're going to have a vote or just deny it because of the certification I agree anybody else object all right so uh attendees we're gonna I'm going to allow you in to speak I'm G to allow you to speak just keep in mind you have two minutes and again like councilman Doyle said if your complaint is there's too much traffic and the person before you just said all of that we appreciate your time but please be a little bit appreciative of ours as well because we do have a meeting after this so keep it as concise as you can and I'll be I'll time the two minutes thank you uh Elma krael yeah good evening everybody can you hear me yes okay very good um I am deeply uh uh concerned with the fact that uh this uh dear mod parklet was approved Without Really um listening the concern of all the Neighbors in the surrounding area um it has come to a chalk to me because uh this is something very um important to the neighbors especially because this parklet really is going to disrupt the quality of life of all the Neighbors in this area um I uh I have a uh a unit at right across from a deer mod a 100 Garden Street Windows facing bedroom facing the street and I cannot imagine the disruption that is going to cause to uh this uh to the tenants in this building and uh the same concern is being um addressed by other neighbors in the same building uh we are extremely concerned especially because we feel like the city has approved a park leg to a restaurant that is not being H by space the other day I was walking in front of the restaurant and to my surprise uh the city has approved them to put tables on the sidewalk okay um now um they want to take a a parking spots from the street uh in a city that we are Hur by parking uh we all are very aware of that and um not just taking a few parking spots but also disrupting the traffic on that street because it's a very narrow Street and I don't even know if a big truck will be able to uh uh to pass by um another issue that uh is not that is extremely important for you uh counselors to consider is that um why do we want to keep uh infesting the city with rats uh this park L really uh caused this this big problem in the city um I live in another building across from a parklet and um I cannot tell you the nightmare that we had um uh uh with this parklet uh a lot of rats came in the surrounding area we never had this issue before in uh 20 years living in this building and as soon as this parl was placed there because of the co situation right um Elma I'm sorry Elma can you hear me your two minutes is up so if you could wrap it up I okay all right so my I will ask you counselors to really consider or and listen to the neighbors because I would like you to protect us right why to protect a restaurant not hard by space and I really would like you to uh sink in the residence first thank you very much thank you very much Sergio Sergio yeah hello can you hear me yes Sergio I'm just going to raise my hand when you have 15 seconds left just for a cue I think that would be helpful much appreciated uh council members and P pres uh H and I don't want to repeat what uh the other person said just said uh my concern is uh the noise as one of the main issues that we have currently as a licensed professional being an architect I I understand how sound transmit how Sun waves uh develops and basically having a three wall sided wall parklet whether it's 9 ft tall or 15 feet tall the sound will prop with disperse uh and would be incredibly incredibly annoying to the neighbors just the other day we live next door and uh they open the door that is supposedly for igis only and it was I think Friday night it was packed the place and the noise that came just for that single door was unbelievable we had to shut our Windows because we couldn't have dinner comfortable on the same hand um the the problem of the uh right infestation is also incredible we see them loading up our sidewalk with tons of uh trash guns and bags and we've never seen rats before and now we see them almost every every day so I I will really appreciate your consideration for denial because covid is over and the benefit of the parklet three years ago is not the same as now so unless you build bubbles that are acoustically isolated a part will be a tremendous noise maker for everybody and I appreciate your time thank you so much thank you Sergio well [Music] um Lucinda yes hi um I will try to not repeat I have the same concerns that everybody else has um I am concerned about the noise um and I appreciate what Sergio said about the about the noise coming out of the parklet I also do want to say that I I I read the ordinance at least parts of it and I know that uh the uh restaurant owners are required to deal with clenis and rodent control but spilled food and Spilled drinks are inevitable and I just think that rats are going to be more rats are going to be attracted to the um area causing a problem I also want to bring that first street is a very heavily trafficked Street and I think that with more access to deod that we're going to see more lift in Uber drivers uh more pickups and drop offs causing more problems and finally I I do want to say that I am concerned that the owners did not notice that um that the notification needed to be sent by um by certified mail um the I'm also surprised that it only has to go to one person in a building I think that's a little weird um but that may not be their problem but if they missed that what else are they going to miss so again with everybody else I really would like you to deny this application thank you thank you Richard hello this is Richard Cole I live at 98 Park Avenue actually I'm raised my hand because I wanted to react um to the township officers um perspective on on sending out uh the the letters that people must have received them because they responded well this is not how it works we heard about the letter at at second hand um the it was not and we're concerned with with the and therefore responded but we we had not received the letters and this um is rather unfortunate jumping to conclusions and this this raised the question in my mind about oh the parklets not going to change the issue with getting out of the garage the the parklet completely fills up the place it's a rectangular block when a car is part is not necessarily filling up the space completely outward to the limits of the seven feet um because obviously people park close to the curb in order to minimize the chances they're going to get hit so I think there will be a little less room for people coming out of the garage in practice even if legally um the the the seven feet could be occupied by by a parked car um other otherwise I just I agree with what others have said about noise and and and the risk of more more rats and I will stop at that point thank you very much Richard I'm sorry Amy I skipped you by accident Lisa and hi can you hear me Lisa van zom I also live at 98 Park um you know I agree with Richard on the notifications because I was the only person in the building to get notification it was not certified it came in the mail um I do not collect my mail often but a week later I received it and I notified everyone else in the building and no one else received that notification as well not our management company or the condo association or the residential spaces beneath us in the building so you have you know 10 plus units not being notified and I'm concerned that many others in the surrounding blocks were not notified because not everybody would share that with their building so you could have many buildings that were received that a lot of people aren't aware of this so I have an issue with the certification of of the notifications of this parklet um in addition to the noise the rats um you know the the garage that faces across the street from from deod but the big issue too is that parklets were allowed in this town to help people during the pandemic to help small businesses since nobody wanted to eat indoors during the pandemic so we allowed them to have parklets to take up parking spaces to be noisy outside to play music outside late at night um and we allowed all that because we were in a pandemic the pandemic is long on and now we're allowing one of the largest restaurants in town with the most seating in town and a massive bar with younger children who are very loud and stand outside they have a Velvet Rope at night security guards at night now now we're going to allow them to have outdoor space where it's going to be even more loud than it was before they're going to be blocking the sidewalk so people with baby carriages you know we we have to worry about all the all the mopeds on the sidewalks and the bicycles on the sidewalk trying to navigate that part of First Street is going to be increasingly difficult and not to mention the noise so I would hope that you would deny this you know I've lived here 29 years and this is the first time I felt that it was important to speak at a city council meeting thank you for your time Thank you Lisa Amy hi can you hear me yes hi I am uh at 28 First Street I am actually the one with the garage directly across um I understand that there were you know you know officials out there taking measurements or whatever but what I have to ask you to understand is when cars park close to the driveway entrance and they do they creep over the don't park line it becomes very narrow and you have to back directly out and then make the turn and when that happens it's very difficult um so I think this is going to be a real issue um obviously the noise I haven't been able to keep my windows open in a long time I always have my air conditioner running to drown out the noise um and just the street width itself I witnessed a large truck that was unable to get through that area directly in front of my apartment dear Ma on March 23rd cars were legally parked in those spaces and a police officer had to direct the truck to get up the street because they were having such trouble getting up um that's about it I'm nervous to talk in front of this but yeah all all the noise issues um that everybody's talked about we could go on about 30 minutes about that so thank you thank you Michael yes hello can everybody hear me yes wonderful uh my name is Michelle hear uh I'm at 99 Park Avenue Senor for 20 years um a uh a note and then a question um the the uh certified mail uh requirement um I think that is very important to implement because I have in my possession at least two letters that were left downstairs um by our mailboxes for owners in this building that um are not here they are not living here um and so they definitely did not receive them because I'm I'm holding them right now and uh my question would be um are tenants also notified as being residents in this area or is it only owners of record that are notified because for these particular two letters the owners are on the letters non-certified whereas the tenants living in that apartment were actually going to be dealing with the effects of this parklet if approved um were not notified so it would just be something to keep in mind so I'm I'm I'm very adamant that it would make sense to follow the standard procedure the legal procedure of utilizing certified nail because there was a reason behind it one the lawmakers set that in motion I guess and then my question for the uh owners of deot not not sure if that's appropriate here but just just want to throw it out there there are currently tables and chairs on the sidewalk in front of De mod where um customers sit and and consume and and uh visit the establishment once this parklet is installed if it were to be approved would those tables and chairs migrate into that parklet or would they still remain there on the sidewalk basically in between the restaurant and the parklet making it even harder to walk through so that is basically it thank you m thank you thank you Manny yes good afternoon council president and Council and members of the public correct all right okay hear now we can't hear you and I don't know can other council members hear him properly no you're breaking up many how about now yep that's good okay thank you council president and uh council member public because president I'm going to be brief because I don't want to um take up too much time being that we're getting close to the workshop hour I just want to be on record that I concur with uh the rest of uh the neighbors and the members of the public spoke I think it's imperative and important that um Council consider a other hearing an other hearing where they can be um seen and heard and that the proper notification be given because even though um it seems like somebody got it but um from what we can hear and I'm not a council member but I would if I were one I would say well let's let's vote for it to come back but that's your decision but anyway Council um I would like to just say that because it is important as well for the greater um uh residents of Hoboken because the streets um really belong to all of us and if I don't know if those um tables are going to be there they're going to be moved into the parklet I'm assuming I'm hoping but members of the public who have um disabilities sometimes um when things are in the sidewalk it becomes uh a little bit difficult to maneuver but again that's another issue for for another day but I would hope that um uh the council would consider the CER ification um situation um better cross your um uh te's and Dot your eyes so that it doesn't go to further litigation so anyway I don't know if my two minutes are up but uh again that would be my my suggestion council president and again I've never seen this before being heard here um because I thought that the zoning officer had the final decision but if somebody could be great um I don't know if you can or not we we can explain that um when the public comment is done okay thank you thank you um uh Council vice president I appreciate that anyway that that is my concern um uh Council vice president if you if you can take that into consideration and help members of the public thank you good evening pera pera hi can you hear me yes awesome so I live in 101 Park Avenue and both my bedroom space um First Street so I'm across the street from deont and I have two young children who um sleep there and we already have an issue in the evenings especially on the weekends um they can hear the sound from the bedrooms like we try our best to like reduce the noise we have fans and everything so I'm really concerned that my kids bedtime is getting impacted and it's going to actually get more and more impacted I agree with everything everybody else said about the the issue with space and the fact that first street is actually very important I see a lot of ambulances and fire trucks going through it and um with with with already the congestion that this is going to cause um this is actually a hazard for the city itself and I want to point that out that it's going to be hard for like even large vehicles like ambulances and fire trucks to go through with all the stuff that's going on and Ubers and lifts that would be coming for people that's also going to increase the noise pollution um and the last thing I want to say is um I mean I agree with everything everyone said the last thing I want to say is that um um aside from all of this it completely changes the character of our street right now it's a nice cute street with this big structure that shows up it's completely going to impact our the the the way our street looks today and I'm also concerned about property values and that's something we should take into account and people being able to buy and sell homes here um so so all of the other stuff that everybody said you know I'm concerned about rats I'm concerned about noise I'm concerned about being able to get my car out of the garage and whatnot but I'm also concerned about property values I'm con extremely concerned about noise for young children because when people see um young children young children parents will not buy homes here and that's a concern for me thank you so much thank you y ya hi can you hear me yes yeah uh I'm an owner and resident of 100 Garden Street right across the street to deero um I agree with the you know neighbors who just spoke I also want to bring to your attention um the lack of transparency during this process um I personally find it a little frustrating that like the notice that I I actually received the notice but it did not give much information about how the parklet was going to look for how long it's going to be in place um and what concrete measures um the like Deo owners would take to make sure there's no no uh excessive noise trash Etc um I think the lack of information overall just just makes me concerned about um uh the the the level of effort um the business is willing to put into protecting the local residents um yeah so that's on top of all the other concerns thank you thank you Mary sorry maryan yes thank you very much can you hear me y great um I first want to say that I agree wholeheartedly with uh all of the previous speakers um I just have a few points that I'd like to bring up um I'm very concerned about the increased foot traffic in and out of the establishment and in front of the establishment um both not only to service the parklet but also for people queuing to either wait for the parklet or go into Deer mods this is already a major problem on the weekend and with a family member that has very limited Mobility um you know we've had to go to the other side of the street many on many occasions because we've been bumped into our dog has been Stepped On by intoxicated people waiting in line and I've seen people with children drag their kids in the middle of the street across the street because there's always some sort of you know Mayhem on a Friday Saturday and and even Sunday night um the other thing I wanted to Echo is that that stretch of First Street is not only a very common place for Uber and lift because people are going to Deer mods but there are also an inordinate amount of delivery trucks that are trying to you know do their job and and service the restaurants and other businesses on First Street that I've seen you know for example Raymar and Flanigan just literally Park in the middle of the street and leave their truck there um because they just have nowhere to put it um finally my my other concern is that I really fear that this is going to put an inordinate strain on our public safety personnel the amount of times that people are going to have to call the police to respond to not being able to get past that uh stretch of First Street or if there's going to be loud obnoxious behavior and um you know noise violations I mean look everybody applauds deer mods it's one of the first successful businesses in that location I mean we like to eat there however this is really going cause a strain on the quality of life for our neighbors and I think it's really going to put a strain our public on our Public Safety and I think that's something that you should really be concerned about thank you thank you very much Maran Patricia Patricia hi and thank you council president just going to piggyback a few of the uh callers what they said but I want to comment on Mr Doyle's um comment to a question to an Al miss holstead about the way the notification versus the certification of a regular notice and you quoted the statute 30 40-80 whatever it was well anyway um I think with all due respect they should have did better with the notification of contacting those people in the first W even even though I or Manny don't live in the first w we do support our residents that live here in Hoboken and we just had an issue a couple of months ago with respect to parklets and this is when all you guys was running for office and you made so many promises to the residents that live here about these parlets we raised concerns about the rats the noise the disrespect the quality of life and apparently it was overlooked because here we go tonight with another thing that was almost basically passed if Manny didn't call me the day of this hearing which I found no transparency with that issue either where we you just telling us a day before and that's not fair never alone you didn't send a certified mail and you being an attorney and I'm quite sure Ann holon is very familiar with the law in regular court of law they they sell tell you send it both certified mail and regular mail but anyway that's neither here or there I'm just here tonight to support the people that live in the First Ward and um on Park Avenue and those condos and just to let them know I'm here you know for the support thank thank you Mr Doyle thank you Barry hey good evening uh I I just have three things um and really I I think everyone's um has stated several of these but I I do want to clarify um um a couple items so I know we have concerns with parking uh Hoboken is traditionally uh concerning when it comes to parking um but in the past year I believe that the parking spaces on the corner of garden and first were also reduced um so if you are on uh first there used to be three parking spaces in front of 97 and 95 Garden those are no longer parking spaces those are now loading zones which I can only assume are due to the traffic that has increased on first or the businesses that have increased in the demand to have loading zones so I would review why those parking spaces turn to loading zones because there must be a reason these those changed and reduced our parking um only now to have more reduced parking in the same so that's around parking and and I don't think we we've expressed that part of it um the other one is the safety I know we did bring up the The Velvet ropes Etc um but my concern around safety is this is an establishment that has security and you only need security for certain reasons but now we are bringing a structure onto the street that is less secure than a brick and mortar so I question how they intend to secure this parklet on the street and the traffic that is going to be created in and outside of the establishment and and I think that just bring down the right of passage um we we did mention earlier on uh the concerns about the tables on the street already I would question if those are intended to go away with the park lip and I think that's everything thank you thank you we have we have no other members of the public signed up to speak motion to close public portion we have to make a motion in this Motion in favor I I I council president if I if I could just um yeah I think I we should ask an the question about the current the existing tables and what's going to happen to those uh should this be approved um and if and if you're taking notes the you you describe the the dimensions as 23 foot 7 inches by I can't remember what the seven seven feet just under under just under seven so and so that's 6 feet 11 6 feet 10 like that that's the width of the existing parking spot I assume so okay anyway I I did want to just I saw some comments just so people are aware um and I don't want to sound defensive but uh for an but the process that we're engaged in here is Anne's job is to receive the application to see that it satisfies the criteria with of which there were about 28 criteria and once if she determines that they' sat they've satisfied the criteria the notice goes out to give people the opportunity to to do what we're doing here today and I say that because it's not as if you know someone has approved this and now we're trying to claw it back it's it's part of a process of approval so the 28 criteria maybe maybe uh shortsightedly do not include they include the specifics of of as you you know um addressing Rats the type of structure uh the distance from corners but it but it does not specifically uh talk about the neighborhood impact in the sense of the neighborhood I should say opinion because the process of getting a letter and having the opportunity to speak is is provided through this this notification procedure so I I only explain that because it's not as if it was approved you know behind closed doors and uh somehow this this process was you know a surprise to all this is the way it's supposed to work people are supposed to get an opportunity to come out and express their views as everyone has done here so uh with that said and could you tell us about the existing sidewalk tables and whether they would still be permitted or not should this application be granted so sidewalk cafes are completely separate entity from parklets or Street Aries so they the side and the sidewalk cafes have they' they've existed for for decades at this point um and yes the the tables the tables that they have on the sidewalk are part of their licensed Sidewalk Cafe area and would remain separate and and independent from a parklet or streetery okay thank you so and councilman Doyle I know I don't know if you if you said this question but no tenant tenants do not need to be notified the law does not require tenants to be notified I am I am certain of that and unless you want to disagree with me no well we would have no way of right knowing who those who those people would be so we notify the people who are Property Owners yeah I will add that the the planning board many years ago uh a former chairman of the planning board uh sought to actually do what people are requesting this evening meaning changing our local ordinance to require individual unit owners in a building to be notified rather than just uh you know the property manager or you know the president of the condo association and uh state law prohibits well state law indicates that it's sufficient to just notify an entire building and it it would be it we were advised at the time that it would not be legally appropriate for us to Trump state law and require notification to individual units so notwithstanding that it's not ideal by any mean uh means the fact of the matter is that the you know the one notification per building uh rule is state law and they you know and that's what the city of Hoboken provided the list to the applicant to the the parklet application holder uh to to to tell them how who to send the letters too so it wasn't they're doing to try to skirt the list is at least from that perspective so I I don't know um whether Council pres councilman presen Zano wants to ask a question I think yes um Miss Miss Holzman uh have you have we ever denied any parklets I'm try to now you're asking me to REM remember all every application for the last two or three years um sorry that's all right now I I I believe that there were a couple um over the last couple of years that could not meet the criteria um or or could not be approved because of obstructions that they would create over man holes and things of that n nature so they never they were not approved for a parklet they might have those some of those locations have actually actually got switched to doing Street Aries instead of parklets because of the structure um to eliminate the structure um but yeah I think it mostly it had to do with with them not being able to meet the criteria because of of other other existing um infrastructure on the street at the you know in the on the street in those locations thank you so um I at this point we should we are free to deliberate and discuss ask questions Etc and [Music] then well and I guess I'll just say more from a procedural perspective if we determine that the notifications were legally defective and on that basis deny this application uh the party the applicant would be eligible to Ren notify and then as counil as a corporation Council lawyer pointed out then the you know the letters would go back out the 30-day period would start again and we we may very well be back here with with u from a positive perspective with more members of the public having been notified and more people expressing you know their views so councilman uh Council vice president Doyle um just wanted to point out that there is currently uh the stay on new park applications that was recently passed so I believe that if this were to be Deni you know denied today application denied today on the basis of the inadequate notification and were to be referred back to miss holtzman's office it would be subject to the stay because it would have been an incomplete application thank you for that that's currently that that stay or moror is through July 17th if I'm not mistaken so and it of course it could be extended or the law could be changed because the purpose of the moratorium is to take a breath and reconsider some of these so but so it is that's a very valid point it might be that at the very least the application couldn't be approved and the process couldn't go forward until after July 17 so it may it may be a significant delay if not a permanent denial thank you councilman I think an wanted to say something I I need to I um I will respectfully disagree because we normally deal with a time of application rule so um but that that's that's up to you guys um but I do need to leave if if there's no other questions that you have for me well I have another I have have to get to another meeting at 6:30 so okay if we just if the application is denied then application is no more right I mean if we if we deny the application tonight there would be a new application and how would that be a time of application R well if you if you're if you're sending it back to have it Ren noticed that's one thing if you're denying the application outright then that's a different thing okay if but if you're trying if you're trying to perfect the noce issue you're not denying you're not really denying the application per se just it's semantical but depends on I guess what the most how how it depends on how you want to how you want to do it okay all right okay thank you you I don't mind councilman starting jumping in please yep uh so my issue with this parklet and this goes to um you know can can we deny it based on the Block um and what's going on in that block I just think there's first of all First Street has a lot more traffic and I would even say them Washington Street based on like per square foot just because they're really narrow sidewalks I'm talking about pedestrian traffic there's tons of car traffic but there's so much pedestrian traffic on First Street um there's ton of driveways not just on that block but on First Street which makes parking on First Street really difficult First Street is really narrow um there's probably more ebike and delivery delivery bike traffic on First Street then there's a lot on Washington but first Street's probably the next and because of its narrowness I think that also is an issue so based on all of that I wouldn't be comfortable moving forward with this parklet outside of the notification Factor okay uh others anyone else willing to yeah I would I would say similarly like I think um similar to what Jen said uh uh council president said you know this is this I think not all of our streets are are equal and you know we didn't um not all locations are equal not all blocks are equal and I think um not withstanding what uh what an said about when we put this provision in to you know make sure we we put the provision in to make sure that we were looking at the curb management aspect of this so that we weren't you know significantly disrupting parking significantly um you know just disrup ing loading zones the flow you know On Any Given block and our blocks are different and and I think this is a block that um is not you know shouldn't have any you know shouldn't have any parklets on it um for the reasons that uh that council president mentioned um at least not right now I mean the city is doing a curb management um analysis so we're going to understand block by block like the needs the uses Etc um you know we're also looking at all of the um you know whether it's loading zones whether it's parking whether it's garbage containers whether it's parklets um we are going to you know and I and I think this block in particular because of how narrow it is um how you know the the nature of the use is currently on the Block I think it's a block that we shouldn't be approving parklets on um definitely not today um with the information that we currently have available to us maybe that'll change in the future right now I wouldn't be supportive thank you councilwoman um Council council president I I it may be that the the property owners are asking to be heard I'm not really sure that that's appropriate at this juncture um I don't know whether they want to provide information that that we are assuming incorrectly or new information versus just making a a pitch for us but um I'll leave it to other Council people whether we want to hear from them I mean that that might just reopen more residents who want to re reut what they may say and so forth council president yes oh sorry I'm also I'm also just cognizant of the time I know that several of our directors are waiting to go with budget hearings and I'm not sure if that has shifted the members of the public participation but I also am not sure that re-engaging in a back and forth is respectful of their time okay I think I just I agree just my thoughts and I'm happy to be very concise in my remarks as well on the matter okay go go ahead sure uh so I am a big supporter of parklets as a general matter I don't think that this was just for me at least a covid program in terms of how Hoboken positions itself uh as a place to visit uh a place as a destination and beyond that I do think a significant number of residents also appreciate and enjoy the amenity of outdoor dining that said I do think all blocks are not created equal I have concerns about First Street being particularly narrow and I don't think this is an ideal location I know that in the remarks opening um Miss Holzman mentioned that there was some um discussion initially about how the noise might be a consideration and because of that they increase the size of the wall but I think the member of the public who commented um you've faded away she was concise that was really concise um though I am supportive of the program more generally so thank you okay I I'll make a quick uh if I can jump in uh councilman Doyle uh I believe to that the streets are tight there and in that area the buildings are high so the noise tends to Echo I'm not I'm not a noise specialist um but I think I'll refer back to one of the residents that had spoken about it that is uh the other thing you have to think about is the county road as well um and it's busy and if you have seen anything I can tell you numerous times I've seen on Park uh trucks trying to get through and they can't if somebody if two cars park a little bit away from the the the uh the sidewalk you you can't get the truck through and it seems to be a thorough fair for that uh that said um you know parklets are nice uh however some of the concerns that the residents brought up are are I think valid uh but that said the street is PR very tight in that area and again with added traffic with Ubers and e delivery and things of that nature um it'd be very difficult for me uh to think that this is the right spot for this okay um anyone else I'm not putting yeah Jim uh Council vice president I can say a couple words uh you know I I am too a huge supporter of parklets I I agree the purpose of them today is not why they were first put in uh they now exist because it's an amenity that this the residents of of Hoboken enjoy uh and and so that's why we have them there that's why they're regulated uh they bring Revenue into the city um what I worry about here is um us taking into considerations things that should not Council vice president did a good job of uh of explaining what should be considered the Criterion what should not uh you know future potential noise future potential uh clinginess issues or future right so we can't forecast those and I think those aren things that should be considered uh but it is a tight Street um and and I I do worry that we are leaning towards uh a denial based on you know repurposing a uh an element of the the ordinance that wasn't really intended for it um but with all those things considered I do think you know the the the space one to take concerns about you know emergency vehicles getting through are persuasive I'm I'm still going to think about this one but just want to you know folks understand you the things that I'm thinking about as I weigh this decision and things that I'm not thank you councilman um I guess I I'm somewhat troubled by this on two levels number one I I do I hear you uh all of the public as well as my colleagues with regard to this location being tough unfortunately on the one hand these applicants um you know the ordinance doesn't currently distinguish First Street and its width from Washington Street and so they relied on their interpretation here and the criteria that are in the ordinance I think they they lack an important criteria namely neighborhood acceptance Etc uh you know so in some ways they they relied on what what the ordinance says and they and they satisfied these criteria and we've all sort of been come to the realization that it is you know especially for a new parklet as opposed to a a parklet where there's been you know bad behavior of The parklet Operators um for a new one virtually all the things we've heard today um with the exception maybe of the of the the traffic issues you know the the noise that may be generated the you know the the rats that may occur um you know many of these things are future problems that may or may not occur and so the criteria and the code don't talk about prospective problems but that all being said I I really feel that the failure to to certify these letters although it sounds like a stickler you know procedural loophole kind of thing is without it there's no proof that the parties got it and I don't mean to imply that uh that we're being lied to I mean that the post office could make mistakes and there's a certainly land use board applications will live and die on whether they can prove with certified mail that they did what they did as far as mailing out notices so I I kind of you know I'm hesitant because I think the applicants in good faith tried to uh satisfy the requirements but I think that that defect is something that's uh very troubling for me so so I don't know if there's a motion out there that anyone wants to make can I make a motion to deny based on um the failure to notice and the condition of the block second second second good yeah okay and Mr Mr lore would a call a vote yep okay we're voting on The Resolution a motion to deny motion to deny okay deny the approval of it so obviously great thank you uh councilman Cohen is absent councilman Doyle hi councilman fiser yes uh yes councilwoman Jabor yes councilman prano yes councilman cantero hi councilman Ramos hi so is absent and council president G know yes okay it passes a majority we have a majority thank you Jerry yep so council president are we turning immediately we are but I think um I think um will who's filling in for Rod needs 30 seconds do we need to log off and on no no no we don't have to do anything but perfect um they are going to well there's will