welcome everyone to the township Council Workshop meeting May 6 2024 this meeting is now called to order mayor Damiano lead us in the slide BL please I the United States of America naice all thank you Madame clerk please read the statement of public notice take notice that adequate notice of this meeting has been provided in accordance with njsa 10 4-8 and njsa 10 CO 4-10 as follows a notice of the meeting meeting was permanently posted on the bulletin board at the municipal building located at 225 Main Street Little Falls New Jersey on January 4th 2024 a copy of the notice was sent to the north Jersey Herald and News and the record on the same date additionally a copy of the notice was filed in the office of the Township Clerk on said date a link and a telephone number to join the meeting virtually can be accessed on the township website at www.l fj.com electronic Provisions have been established for the public to participate during the public comment portion of the meeting thank you Adam clerk at this time please call the role council member Patel pres council member Murphy pres council member habblet pres council member van Cherry president council president scova president mayor danam Mano the floor is yours thank you council president uh this evening before we get into the meeting agenda and agenda item I there are two proclamations that I would like to read this evening the first is a proclamation in support of mental health awareness month and it reads whereas mental health includes our emotional psychological and social well-being which can affect how we think feel and act and whereas one in five adults experiences mental health problems in any given year and such problems can contribute to onset of mental illness and whereas one in 25 individuals live with mental illness such as major depression bipolar disorder or schizophrenia and whereas approximately 1/ half of chronic mental illness Begins by the age of 14 and 3/4 by age 24 whereas long delays sometimes decades long can occur between the time symptoms first appear and when individuals get help and whereas early identification and treatment can make a profound difference in successful management of mental illness and recovery and whereas it is important to maintain mental health and learn the symptoms of mental illness to get help is needed and whereas every citizen and Community can make a difference in helping end the silence and stigma that for too long has surrounded mental illness and discouraged people from getting help and whereas public education and Civic activities can encourage mental health and help improve the lives of individuals and families affected by mental illness now therefore be it resolved that I James bord Damiano mayor of the township of L Falls do hereby proclaim the month of May 2024 as mental health health awareness Awareness Month in the township of Little Falls to increase public understanding of the importance of mental health and to promote identification and treatment of mental illness in the second Proclamation this evening council president is a proclamation in support of Lyme disease Awareness Month in re whereas May is a time to help bring awareness to Lyme disease and tickborne diseases and whereas Lyme disease is a bacterial infection brought on mostly by an infected Deer Tick with symptoms that may include headache fatigue skin rashes and fever and whereas the Center for Disease Control and prevention estimates that 476,000 people are diagnosed with the disease in the US each year now therefore be it resolved that I mayor James bord Damiano on behalf of the Little Falls Township council do hereby Proclaim May 2024 as Lyme disease Awareness Month in the township of little fall Falls and then is a good time for the PSA with the weather warming up to make sure that when you come inside from being outside for extended periods and your children as well do a check to make sure they have no no ticks on you before especially before getting into bed for the night my counc pres that's all that I have as far as proclamations and now on to the appointments for the library board so if I may uh council president I am asking for the appointments of an kaadi Nancy Friedrich and Tom kasmar to the Little Falls Library board for a 5-year term which would expire May 31st 2029 and that is with the advice and consent of the council and for the council's consideration these are three members who have been on our library board these are reappointments to the board and the library has been heading in an absolutely brilliant Direction over these past handful of years with these current uh board members and I would ask that the council reappoint these individuals to the library board have a motion to approve the mayor's appointments at this time so moved moved by councilwoman habets second second by councilman V Cherry this is a roll call to approve Nancy Fredick and gu and Tom kasmar to a 5-year term please call the role Madam clerk council member Patel yes council member Murphy yes council member hav yes council member van Cherry yes council president scova yes I I see that there's two trustees from the library board in the council chambers if they'd like to speak at this time you're welcome to if not we'll continue Mr Di Maria the floor is yours all right and if you just give me a brief second I'm figure out how to share this pad up there right now stand over over here a little formal Mr D Maria just uh tell the the people that are listening and those in Council who you are and what you do for the township so all right so my name is James de the construction official who also serves as the flood plane administrator for the township of Little Falls um we were uh notified by uh njde uh about two years ago uh that were required to adopt a uh change in our current flood damage prevention ordinance uh the flood damage prevention ordinance within the township uh has been in place for several years um but due to all the events and insurance losses um they are um making it a little more difficult and trying to be a little more safer with um how they treat U houses that are being being um renovated and damaged after events so uh since there are some substantial uh changes that uh the council may get phone calls on in the in the future we thought it would be best to um just take some key points out of this uh model ordinance that's been changed uh to give you guys a better understanding of where it's coming from and how it works uh um because you'll see it's um it's it's a little intense okay so a few things uh that's built into this uh little presentation is uh we're going to go over what is flood damage prevention uh the requirements for the adoption uh the properties affected uh a few key definitions uh that are changes uh in this uh proposed ordinance and the substantial damages to give you guys you know the large uh you know picture um so uh the purpose of uh flood damage prevention uh Ori is to promote the public health safety and general welfare and to minimize public and private losses due to flood condition uh these regulations in conjunction with the uniform construction code provide minimum requirements for the development located in flood Hazard areas including the subdivision of land and other developments site improvements and installation of utilities placements and Replacements of manufactured homes placement of recreational vehicles new construction and alteration repairs reconstruction reab Rehabilitation or additions of existing buildings and structures substantial improvements of existing buildings and structures including repair of substantial damage and in insulation of Tanks temporary structures and temporary or permanent storage utility and miscellaneous group U buildings and structures and certain building work exempt from permit under the uniform construction code and the building and development activities now there's a lot involved in that but the most key important item here is what's highlighted and that certain building work exempt from permit under the uniform construction fod um currently we have a development permit in place here in town but it takes a lot to be triggered you would have to be doing an addition to your property or uh experienc significant damage during a flooding event uh so what happened was the state of New Jersey through the uniform construction code um amended um the requirements for a permit when it comes to ordinary maintenance uh ordinary maintenance is the direct replacement of your kitchen your bathroom replacing your roof replacing your siding um all these items uh could be done without no permit from the building department and you just go ahead and do what you have to do um you know uh house flippers could come in pretty much redo a whole house and not even be required to to pull per uh so when the state changed this mandate it kind of took uh the D out of the picture here so you could do a lot of work and that's a lot of money too you know you figure you know Roofing siding uh some improvements in your house you could really tally up some money and then the property gets you know damaged and and a claim is put and it's it's pretty significant so you'll see as we go on how significant this will be um so who's required to adopt this uh NDP has required uh the counties below to adopt by November 2022 so uh they start off pretty much uh down south with uh Union County glester County and Somerset County um in in July 2023 Pake County Essex County and County uh were supposed to have adopted this uh model ordinance uh already uh per the njde 220 municipalities have adopted uh this ordinance that uh is going to be put in front of you in the near future so you say why happens that we refuse to adopt uh the township of Little Falls will be severely impacted if this warrant is uh not adopted by October of 2024 uh that's when our CRS uh which is our community rating system uh comes up for our uh three-year audit uh it's pretty significant this is what affords uh a lot of our residents who have flood insurance a 25% discount on their policies um so if we were not to do this and follow the rules that the uh nfip and FEMA uh want us to abide by we could jeopardize our class 5 CRS rating and uh the township could be suspended from the nfip which means uh flood insurance policies will not be available and any uh policy that's currently purchased uh would be voided so who is affected uh the township of Little Falls uh obviously is no stranger to flooding events and you know we do have quite a substantial area uh that is located within the special flood Hazard area um so uh even if you own your property outright and you don't have flood insurance you still have to abide by this because the next person purchasing your property you know might not be as fortunate to you know own their property out so these are some areas in town uh we have the Jackson Park section which is riy Harrison uh Jackson Madison uh that back up to uh the DPW Yard um we have the uh Hops and a section uh which also has this Cedar Grove Road section uh you know with within that area uh Francisco and Cedar Grove Road you know these are properties uh along the pepon river uh we're fortunate enough to have two bodies of water that are subject to flooding uh so uh you know we also have the seniac area and wlef area that experiences is the Pake River flooding so if you were to take all those properties you know we do have a substantial amount of houses that um are going to have to abide by these new requirements you know uh estimated well over 300 properties uh so pretty significant you know it's a lot of people um so some some more key definitions and changes uh this is the ordinary Building Maintenance and minor work that I talked about uh this Improvement is defined as ordinary Building Maintenance and minor work uh projects by uniform construction CL including uh non-structural replacement in kind of Windows Doors cabinets Plumbing fixtures decks walls partitions new flooring material Roofing uh Etc uh they shall be evaluated by the flood plane ad administrator through the flood plane development permit to ensure compliance with the substantial damage and substantial Improvement section of 86.2 six of this ordance so pretty much what this is saying that although there is not a uccc permit required to do work anybody's house that is located in a special flood Hazard area they are going to have to obtain a flood plane development commit which is going to trct which is going to track how much money is spent in that Improvement um and uh there's going to be a major uh Outreach necessary to inform these people that you know these property owners that that live in these areas that they're going to have to you know pull this permit and um you know it could be you know a house over here that's located in a special flut Hazard area and across the street may not be and you know you'll have oh you know I can do a roof with you know no permit and but my neighbor is subjected to um you know being required to all this flood damage prevention or this foot plane development permit um so we've heard the word substantial Improvement uh substantial Improvement is any reconstruction Rehabilitation addition or other Improvement of structure taking place over a 10-year period the cumulative cost of which equals or exceeds 50% of the market value of the structure before the start of construction um so pretty much what this is saying and it's very similar to um the substantial uh damage bar on the next slide is if you exceed 50% of the improved value of the structure only land is out of it you would be required to elevate your house so uh we know how pricing is today um so it wouldn't take much to get to that amount to put you over that 50% which then becomes a major burden on the property owner to come with to come up with the funds you know to comply and that's you know where we're getting into the impacts of this uh of the changes of this ordinance uh one beneficial thing that they did in this uh part of this uh ordinance is when we discussed the market value uh previously they would only allow us to go by how much was uh the house was ass that for the Township Tax Rec uh usually that assessment is a little lower than if you were to get a third party assessment so I would have no choice but to go straight across the board look at the tax record if the improved value said the the improved value of the structure is 100,000 well if the work exceeds 50,000 or the property was damage more than 50,000 they would be required uh to uh elevate but they they now allow a third-party appraisal which will bring up uh the value to today's standards of the current market rates so that house that might be on our roles as 100,000 when um appraised by a third party you know maybe 150 or 200,000 which gives a little more uh of a of a buffer uh when things like this happen um the flood plane development permit uh that's required um and this is just uh it's a little redundant of what I just spoke about but pretty much anybody in the special flood Hazard area will be required to pull this permit whenever they're doing uh any type of work if uh they do it without the permit they got to stop work order you know and and a violation for for doing such and um we will be required to enforce this because every year they will come in and they uh when they do our uh Insurance audit they will want to see proof that we are enforcing you know our ordinance in good faith so this is uh an example of uh how fast this could add up so um if somebody had come in and filled out a permit for uh a new roof that cost 20,000 uh we would look at the market value of the structure that we just spoke about say it's 140 ,000 which means the cost of work can't exceed uh $70,000 so here they look like they're okay because they're only spend the 20,000 but if we do the look back as were're required back to 2010 uh back to 2014 because it's within a 10-year period they already spent $60,000 on other items they would then be forced to elevate their property and not be able to continue with the work I do have uh some some good news regarding this this and I I spoke with the mayor earlier today uh we are able to take that 10year look back and reduce it down to three years so it's a quicker reset so God forbid somebody did have a major expense or a major funding event maybe they could span it out where you know God forbid they don't have the money they could uh do that we would lose um some points in our CRS program but I I think it's uh I think we can pick up the points elsewhere and uh you know decrease the burden on some of these uh property so I'm I'm I'm sure that Council would be you know in agreeance uh to that um not saying you can't ex you know exceed that amount in three years you know uh you know we experience a flooding event and you know somebody had just done a major repair on their house you know it could easily exceed that but it it's it's not as heavy so uh what changed so no work of any kind may start in the NJ flood Hazard area or femur or FEMA special flood Hazard area until all permits including but not limited to a flood plane development permit or issued uh work on properties will now be tracked in cumulative total value of work within a 10-year which will now be switched to a three-year period will govern if the property needs uh to be elevated uh the township will be required tissue violations and stop work orders for properties operating uh without approval uh another part of this and it's going to be probably one of the most difficult part because emotions run high is making repairs after flooding uh we used to have the ability to say uh you know people got water in and they want to get back in their properties uh a lot of the work fell under ordinary maintenance so we were able just to say hey pull the sheetrock replace the sheetrock move back in no questions asked now all that stops because we have to document the clost make sure it's not exceeding so you know when large neighborhoods get affected there's going to be a you know major um task of the building department to um get these permits out and track everything uh down and uh you know try to get these people uh back in their house but if they do exceed that 50% that's where um we have to say you know sorry you know you can't proceed until you comply with ORS that's all any any questions if I may just shed some additional Clarity and light on this for the the council members who may not be as familiar as unfortunately I have become lately the I know you talked about homeowners would eventually need to elevate their homes in the event they exceeded 50% be very clear the homeowner has to pay for themselves yes the elevation of their home it is not something that there are programs out there readily available that once you exceed it you need to that that you can go and get funding for you need to elevate it yourself and what does a private home elevation cost nowadays and on an average home in Little Falls that uh between relocation permits design utility disconnect uh just sometimes up around $200,000 it's very hard to get companies to come up north to do this because they a lot of mobilization uh there's a lot of material that has to be bought up to just lift the house alone so it does become very difficult and that's the scary part of this you know we're going to be holding our residents to this you know strict ordinance and uh I just hope they it's easy for them to so again a huge thank you for all of your work and getting us to become a class five here in Little Fall is probably one of the very few non- coastal towns that have are we are we the only non- coastal town uh pan is but there's not too many east of the Mississippi yeah non we are one of the very few non-title class fives uh not not only in New Jersey and you know entirely east of the Mississippi uh which gives our residents a 20 25% reduction on what their FL what their flood insurance costs are uh now you may think well should we do away with this and deal with the burden of not having any rating anymore and not allowing our residents to have 25% reduction as here James said there's about 300 homes in Little Falls that are paying for flood insurance some of them paying $4,000 or plus some some up to $10,000 a year in flood insurance even on the lowball number of $4,000 a year in flood insurance at 300 homes we are saving Little Falls taxpayers $300,000 probably closer to5 six 700,000 in total flood insurance cost by remaining in this program so to not adopt this ordinance in my opinion is unfortunately not something we can do because it will cost Little Falls taxpayers or Little Falls residents hundreds of thousands of more dollars in Insurance because one of my considerations early on was let's just not adopt it unfortunately it will cost Little Falls residents hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of dollars and I say that because we are in my opinion being handcuffed by these regulations and I know one of the considerations and early on we had discussed a 10-year lookback period in learning now that there's a three-year lookback period while we do lose 40 points on our CRS rating uh we're gonna have to work hard to to gain those 40 points somewhere else um I know we were looking to achieve as low as a class four or as high as a class four rating which the numbers are are backwards but a class four rating is better than a class five rating uh you know even if we were able to sustain and maintain our class five rating for our residents by achieving more points elsewhere this three-year look back versus the 10-year look back is going to give our residents the potential to make basic improvements to their home that that they may need like a new roof like new siding all of those things it may allow them to do it without having to elevate their home which I fear is going to drive many homeowners into foreclosure frankly because what are they going to do when you realize you have to come up with $200,000 to elevate your home out of your own pocket and if your home does not have $200,000 in equity in it to take out a helck to do that or it's not financially feasible to pay even an additional HELOC of $200,000 a year more on your homeone these homeowners are going to let their homes go and we are going to end up with wide sections of town that these homeowners let their homes go to Banks and then the question becomes nobody can then come and buy that and flip it because that same 10year or now hopefully three-year window applies and if the repairs that you me need exceed that 50% threshold you then have to also or that home flipper would have to elevate that home for an additional $200,000 which is going to make that home a frankly non-profitable home for them it's going to sit there vacant and eventually I believe the municipality would have to take action on these homes at our cost to demolish these homes that Banks own that nobody has any interest in anymore and we are going to end up with vast sections of town and this is not just this is in the middle of riner's Road this is Hobson AB this is the entire Jackson Park this is the entire Parkway section of town the entire Woodcliff section of town Francisco a all of these homes fall into this category and to think to replace your roof it's essentially Counting against you to make a repair to do a new kitchen to do an upgrade to your home it's counting against the amount of dollars that you can spend before the state of New Jersey says you need to elevate your home at a cost of $200,000 out of your own pocket oh and good luck you're going to be living out of a hotel for three months during that period too it is a terrible thing that we are being forced to consider but because we have this CL five rating because we are saving residents hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of dollars every single year unfortunately it's something that we need to pass before we lose this additional coverage for our residents or I should say this reduced coverage for our residents uh if we had no rating in CRS there would be zero incentive I'm sure some but a lot less incentive to put through this ordinance to put our residents in a position where they may have to elevate their homes uh but because of the tremendous savings that they receive through the CRS rating that we have I I believe we are somewhat handcuffed into having to move forward with this I've tried to think of every single loophole and apparently they did too when they drafted this because they have come up with a defense or an answer that doesn't get us further as you try to play through every potential loophole that may exist to avoid having to do this uh and and and my heart honestly breaks for people who just want to improve their home who want to redo their kitchen who want to change their roof because it's leaking it may cost you $300,000 to read or $250,000 to redo your roof that would have cost a fraction of that you know had you not had to pass this ordinance so unfortunately I think the service that we're providing our residents in the reduction outweighs many of these residents having to in potentially short time abandon their homes and the equity that was in them so uh like I said this is not something that I'm thrilled about this is not an ordinance that I am looking forward to hearing yes votes on but it is unfortunately an ordinance that I believe we need to pass to continue to afford our residents hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars in savings every single year on their insurance so that they can remain insured uh and in fact I think one of the loopholes that I tried to come up with would have resulted in them having no no ability to have insurance in the future was that even one of right so our residents's home policies their entire policy would be terminated or suspended and God forbid there was flood damage caused to their home 100% of repairs would have to come out of their pockets so this is not something that we can that we can do we just can't and unfortunately I need to sit here and encourage the council uh and I think everybody understands the significance of it so I don't mean it like that but encourage the council to to pass this so that we continue to have coverage for our residents here in Little Falls M Mr thank you mayor Mr de so if our resident who is in this flood zone if their assess value of the home is $250,000 and on their three-year look back you determined that they spent $30,000 over the last flood to fix up their home they're left with $220,000 um and 50 half of that 50% that's 110,000 right is 110,000 110,000 they could spend before it triggers any situation now this doesn't come off the books this stays with the home owner for perpetuity is that correct or does it come off the books no that's why I'm encouraging the a three-year look back period period rather than what was previously discussed as a 10year look back because if you made improvements to your home 5 years ago that will not count towards the amount of money that you can spend improving or repairing your home so the shorter look back window will cost us some points in our CRS rating again I think we can make those up in other areas of the rating system and I think to allow our homeowners and our residents in town the ability to make improvements without it essentially being charged against them for too long shortening the look back period is critical to a three-year look back because the 40 points that we lose between a three-year look back versus a five-year look back is the exact same loss of points so shortening the look back period is going to assist our residents in not having prior repairs made years past count against them so getting back thank you mayor getting back to that example so the homeowner now has $110,000 and they go out and they have to spend unfortunately another flood comes and they have to spend monies uh and after three years it gets reset is what we're [Music] saying recently had just before Christmas and then shortly into January that's that's two items that go against that amount and if they did you know they moved in a year ago and did a substantial amount of work and it was documented that would all be you know so so right now if this was in place we'd be looking at from today pretty much back to 2021 on you know anything that may Ur just don't know what's going to happen and this affects those that have a mortgage and those that do not is that correct okay and um as far as the other there's two other questions some of questions I have for homeowners in this Zone that if they want to put up vinyl sighting they want to do a kitchen they want to do some basic no I wouldn't say basic but uh ordinary maintenance they have to go through a permit process unlike other homeowners that don't live in that District there's no long work there's no labor they have a guideline set up where there's you know parure labor cost for you know what it cost you know to do that so you can't even you know regulate and bend the numbers and make look like oh no it's only material I'm doing all work they they won't accept that right so I decide as a homeowner to go to Home Depot get my own cabinets and I call up a friend of mine to help me put the cabinets in doesn't matter I'm going to be assessed a certain amount and that amount goes uh against the valuation it's on the books now for three years so if that whole job I bought the cabinets for $55,000 and Al though I did my own work it doesn't matter they're still going to calculate some work into that formula whatever $2,000 there's a formula that they're going to come up with so $6,000 is going to go against uh me as a homeowner in that home that I just now spent 6,000 and now the it starts to tick off and I have to wait you know three years uh and getting back to if we do occur another flood unlike as you mentioned in your comments residents have to wait longer I would imagine to go through the process to fix up their home as before that we were they were allowed to go in as you said rip out shrock do what you need to do we'd have the containers on site they would be dumping in and doing everything they need to do so that the residents could get back into their home on a quicker basis you know well versed in this so you know how so council president this was something that I was considering uh sending out an informational packet to all the homes that will be impacted as well as hosting a town hall meeting for residents to be informed of uh this is this is not a happy go-lucky Town Hall that we'll be having this is really just bad news um but unfortunately something that we are being forced to uh to address right so um I'm sorry let me just finished this so as a resident I really wouldn't know because no one's really watching our meeting I see are they maybe we have three four people on uh they really wouldn't know so if I was to go out and start to fix up my home I would then find out this plan and it's kind of late I already ordered materials I already ordered stuff I got people on site and now I'm like oh I'm going to be assessed $48,000 because I want to do my bathroom you know I want to do my bathroom and some other stuff so yeah okay other questions from the day concerning this important topic uh councilman Ben Cherry thanks uh council president wel Li on Hopson AB this is fun news thank you for the state for doing this uh ironically too last week uh most of us that are in uh these zones got a letter from the New Jersey office of emergency management where they mentioned the fact that you've been affected by floods and they're doing a brief survey to get a sense of what you would do if you presented these options and ironically it was elevation buyout and then just kind of fixing the walls around your home and everything else so they are kind of doing some digging and it is frustrating especially to because we had the flood what less than three years ago the last time we had on September 1st and I know I spent $80,000 to fix my house so right away if there is another flood in that threee I'm screwed so and you know how long yeah and it was a three Monon process to get things done and it's unfortunate and mayor I think it's a great idea to have a town hall I would even put this presentation on the website and when you are sending out your next tax update or just another Communications I think we really need to make sure people understand because again there's three people watching this meeting right now it's not really beneficial to everyone and what's going to happen is there's going to be an ordinance that's passed and someone's going to come to Mr D Maria not too happy about what they have to do so we need to make sure we tell them tell them tell them and councilman to your point you you just mentioned 2021 right yeah the three-year look back would essentially expire for you September of 21 right where if there were a 10year look back of course any other improvements that you would have made to your home seven years even prior to that would count towards that's why shortening the duration AB to a threeyear period three-year look back is critical to help our homeowners here in town uh the shortest that we could possibly go is more beneficial to our residents definitely because of the time frame what's happened because even if you look back the last one was 2018 so that's sort of wiped off the book which but then 2021 absolutely it could easily have you know it gives you a little hope but yeah just never know and what I'm wondering too is with this presentation obviously you can send it online but maybe to taking a few of those slides printing them out and maybe mounting them on some easel here at Town Hall maybe in a Civic Center maybe in a library so people see this and are aware of the areas that are going to be affected because again they're not going to know and you're going to get the brunt of it more than anyone because you're going to have to enforce this ordinance basically so that's why like the May the public Outreach the it's gonna have to be substantial yeah and I would even take advantage of upcoming events you know you have the farmers market that's coming up might be worth having something set up there and other events where we know a lot of people are going to come to so that they're aware of what's going on because if you don't get them all the town hall going have to another Council Habs thank you council president so I just wanted some clarity actually so when we say our CS our CRS rating uh we wouldn't qualify for that anymore if we do not um do this ordinance so playing Devils Advocate if someone's flood insurance was $4,000 taking that 25% away would be about another $1,000 a year about a100 hours or month give or take but then that person would be able to still do anything they wanted but you're also saying that even if that's what the route that we went then they we still have um fear of losing our flood insurance as a town so oh yeah it's not fear it's the nfip will they they will not insure you because that means you are not taking the precautions to have a flood safe uh neighborhood so the CRS is the bonus it's like the good driver on your you know in you know Insurance you know the township is doing good by public Outreach enforcing this to make it safer to you know inform the residents so that's where we get the 25% which I think it equates to approximately $542,000 they're about in savings for uh all the uh ferally back written flood insurance policy um so it is substantial but you know the biggest thing is we don't adopt this no one's going to have flood insurance so knowing that my suggestion at when we're giving out information is to really focus on the fact that they will Lo they will lose their flood insurance and the bonus is that we have the CRS rating and we will also lose the bonus so the the bigger picture to take away from this would be that you will lose your flood insurance okay thank you councilman Batel do you have any input on this topic well I just uh maybe a clarification so essentially it doesn't matter right whether it's a necessary Improvement or just like you want to add an addition to your kitchen right so you're you're going to be accountable for anything you do nice to your house that falls under that flood plane you know flood plane development perit so if you want to redo your bathroom where typically you'd be able to to do like say you know I want to rle the wall replace the toilet replace the sink redo my shower you don't need a UCC permit you could just go ahead and do that you don't have to tell me I can't you know violate you or anything now you would be required at a minimum to pull this flood plane development permit where we're just pretty much tracking how much money are you spending on your property you're not even getting an inspection this is just pretty much we have a receipt of what you did Kevin point if somebody had a leak in their roof right this is not a I want to make an aesthetic impr this is I need to fix my house so it doesn't leak that counts against you as well so it is not just aesthetic improvements it is any Improvement so since they're tracking the monies that you're spending on your home they want the township to track right since it's being tracked um is it reduced by money that you're reimbursed from the insurance so it just doesn't S another the insurance doesn't want to give out the money anymore and that's that's the issue the the payouts are just substantial you know substantial and you know you can come in not even tell the town you could redo a house beautiful without permits and flip it for $700,000 you know and somebody comes in buys it and unfortunately get hit and the insurance company has to pay out now all that additional money because of the upgrades that were done and you know that's what's going on the radar so as soon as they pass the ordinary maintenance you know you know they started looking like all right how are we going to track this work and they said hey you know what we're going to include it in the flot plan development permit and there's a change in the ordinance so it's councilman Murphy I have two questions so if a homeowner wants to make improvements to their home to sell it and they use up 40% of the valuation and they go to sell that to a new buyer that new buyer does that person take on the 40 perers that automatically start new oh they they take it on and I assume you know just like when everybody sells now they file an O requests uh will be part of the op by showing that hey well they pulled the flood plane development from and they already spent $90,000 um and I'm not too sure somebody might know better but I believe there's some type of new notification that's also required now uh some type of disclosure statement now uh about your house being in a flood Hazard area you know I'm not well versed on it but I believe there is some type of uh so you know it'll start you know coming to you know people's attention more and hopefully you know the Realtors and you know the cling attorneys will you know realize this too um secondly just if we have a three-year look back and right now nobody's pulling permits for kitchen remodel or flooring how how do we know exactly what they spent in the past three years like what's what's the valuation how do we figure out what the last three years was well right now you wouldn't so you know unless they had you know major damages you know say in 2021 that required permit work we would have that that on record so we would be able uiz that for instance a lot of majority of the properties that you know experience flooding where they just removed a little bit of sheetrock from those rooms you know we really wouldn't have a dollar base on that you know maybe some HBC equipment you know which is still but uh you'll really start seeing the impact of this probably you know in 202 you know 6 27 you know once it you know really takes off right thank you thank you Mr D Maria for your thorough report uh we appreciate you coming in this evening and explaining to the council and to the public have a motion to open the meeting to the public for General matters and agenda items sove moved by councilman Murphy second by councilman vent Cherry there's a Voice vote all those in favor all those opposed motion carries Madam clerk anyone wishing to address the township Council may do to the council president it is preferred if you give your name and address for the to for the record comments are are to be limited to 3 minutes however if appropriate you may be granted additional time in the sole discretion of the council president members of the public who have joined the meeting virtually and desire to provide comment shall raise their virtual hand in the zoom application the meeting moderator will cue the members of a public that wish to provide comment and the council president will recognize them in order members of the public who have joined the meeting by calling in must press star six to mute and unmute themselves and star 9 to raise their hand members of the public who have joined the meeting via the zoom application must click reactions icon and then the raise hand raise hand icon icon once the process is complete we we will return to the regular order of business the floor is now open Mr Kia anyone in our chat seeing no one else come before us in the council chambers can I have a motion to close the public comment so move by Council Patel second by councilwoman habets all those in favor I all those opposed this motion carries Mary D Damiano items one two and three please thank you council president the first item is a resolution to adjust a pilot account on a pro property unfortunately there was an error in the original in the original assessment of the property as a result of the error in the assessment uh it was over assessed and upon review I believe there was a dispute whether it was I think it was listed as a three instead of a two-bedroom unit uh It ultimately was a two-bedroom unit and not a three therefore the assessment it was over assessed and as a result uh instead of a tax refund as we would typically see on a property like this as a result of essentially in a field we are going to just do a pilot adjustment on the property uh so that is what item number one is and the first resolution a is this evening uh the second is a resolution releasing a performance bond and as we do uh typically through uh whether when developers have larger developments that they are that they are developing they are required to post performance bonds once the work is complete and signed off by our Engineers the performance bonds can be released and that is what item number two is uh this evening and I are there any questions on items number one or two I didn't ask after one hearing none item number three is ordinance 1496 amending the hours of operation for cannabis businesses uh unfortunately when the need to adopt res ordinances early on in cannabis in New Jersey there was very little guidance but there was a deadline under which we had to adopt uh ordinances in order to not allow all class licenses to automatically be acceptable in the municipality and in doing so some of the towns that were earlier in the curve were Bergen County towns and because Bergen County has a blue law one of the towns that we mirrored our ordinance after was a Bergen County Town that did not allow the sale of anything on Sunday including cannabis and as a result in order to meet with more local standards having businesses open on Sundays and not being restricted by the Blue Law uh ordinance 149 6 would allow the operation cannabis business to operate Monday through Sunday seven days of the week are there any questions on three just quick question on that mayor coun Murphy I know this is just amending from Saturday to Sunday which I don't see any issue with um just when I was reading through I noticed that it was 6:00 AM to 10 p.m um I looked up some towns around this and again I know this was done in 21 but you know like Monclair Patterson Bloomfield most of theirs open around you know start around 8 or 9 a.m. and my only concern would be like with 46 traffic you know in that time period just wonder if that's something we could potentially take a look at maybe pushing it back I know most of these establishments don't open till 9 or 10 anyway um but just want to see if there something we could check out correct the resolution that I believe the planning board will likely be adopting at its next meeting I believe the Cannabis retailer uh was the hours of operation were I believe starting at 800 am okay on days of the week uh typically or oftentimes what I see is ordinances that allow for a wider range of things and then resolutions at planning board level kind of narrowing or honing in on specific things which I think is what we see here um I don't disagree but I mean this would give the other applicants an ability to ask for as early as as 6: am but I believe the planning board resolution will curtail that to a later opening time gotcha that provision in the ordinance covers all licenses so you can have a grower right manur start ear so you can't typically go class five could you go you could specify class five right the reason it's like that gotcha yeah and Manufacturing I understand right that'd be 6 am I don't see why they should you know just a traffic issue on like 46 would be you know potential but that was it just want to see if something look look at thank you have a motion to approve resolutions a through C so move mooved by councilman inhs second second by councilman vent Cherry this is a roll call to approve resolutions a through C Madame clerk all the rooll council member Patel yes council member Murphy yes council member habblet yes council member Venter yes council president scova yes have a motion to introduce ordinance 1496 so move move by councilman Murphy second second by councilwoman habetz please call the role council member Patel yes council member Murphy yes council member Hab council member vaneri yes council president scova yes council president sorry I just have to read the introduction of the I'm sorry my I apologize let's backtrack please read the introduction for the record introduction of ordinance number 1496 an ordinance entitled an ordinance amending the code of the township of Little Falls administration of government section 33 cannabis with a second reading and public hearing scheduled for May 20th 2024 that is my fault I apologize sometimes we um we live with this agenda from like Thursday till Monday and we kind of get these embedded in our head and but we forget that everyone join us is the first time hearing it so I do apologize M clerk thank you Council reports let's start councilman Murphy want to lead us off thank you council president just real quick I know last meeting I brought up uh that June 19th we were looking to do a presentation with the domestic violence prevention committee at faake Valley High School um there was an issue with that June 19th date they had to move some testing to that day so U speaking with the superintendent we're looking at a date of June 3rd or June 4th uh to do our presentation along with the prosecutor's office for the seniors on safe dating so just just for everybody to keep in mind maybe June 3rd June 4th once we finalize those dates but it will be one of those twoo that's all I have thank you councilman Venter thanks council president I'll be brief too um this week uh mayor I'm going to send out my usual uh to-do list uh for the upcoming grade concert the end of this month you know for Memorial Day weekend I'll put all the uh paperwork together in terms of what we'll need from a police uh DPW and uh fire an EMS so I'll I'll get that to you this week so you can review it and let us know if you have any questions on it that's it for me Council thank you council president um first I would like to say uh congratulations to the appointments of our library board trustees uh to Tom an and Nancy I'm truly honored to serve each of you as the council design um I would especially like to thank an kaati for her role uh as the library board president for the past few years uh through her leadership and uh our wonderful Library staff uh the library has just grown keeps and Bounds and I'm really proud of everyone uh so some Library updates um Little Falls own Billy pikney will have a book reading and signing of his book uh passion prevails on May 14th at 6:30 pm um he is just a great kid uh grew up here in Little Falls passionate about baseball uh has worked with the Jackal and uh he has a really great Bookout so I hope that um we will come and support him um also you can register for this Friday's uh mommy's dearest Mother's Day for a special screening of mild Pierce um which is going to be um highlighted by um her own grandson uh Casey lonzi um and also possibilities will be at the library again for a pasta making that is always very popular uh registration is required and that will be Thursday May the 16th at 6 PM uh the Bike Rodeo this Saturday took place it was a great success uh we had over 85 participants uh the weather was beautiful and it was a great day for safety and fun uh thank you to everyone who helped out for the day our gpw our Police Department um Avenues in motion our friends of the library the loose wheel uh Sime Avante um and Kent Bicycles for their participation and their sponsoring we had four great bike Raffles um and also to um Mainline Pizza for their delicious pizza donation all of the participants finished their long ride around five blocks uh with a slice of pizza from Dominic so really thank you to Main Line um also thank you to councilman van cherry and um mayor Damiano for coming out and supporting and then lastly the farmers market starts in approximately two weeks on May 19th and hope to see everyone there that's all I have Cel thank you council president just a few things um the Clifton Board of Health will be at the library on May 20th from 11: till 12:30 doing free blood pressure checks for anyone that needs to get their blood pressure checked uh just a reminder that the dental clinic is still open for children ages 5 through 18 um again they provide exams x-rays cleanings and fillings and all you have to do is make an appointment by calling 973 47020 39 and again that's free for Little Falls residents and then finally um in celebration of mental health awareness month we are going to be ad doing a flag raising on May 18th outside of time Hall at 10 a.m. and the library in connection with clipton health are doing mindfulness classes at the library on May 18th from 10:30 to 11:30 which are individual sessions for parents and children and then 11:30 to 12:30 the parents and children are um put together and for those of you that don't know about mindfulness it's really just a mental state that one can achieve by focusing on the present um the present moment the present day the present task uh practicing mindfulness has been shown to decrease feelings of anxiety and depression improve attention and focus improve memory and help uh essentially individuals deal with their emotions so it's it's a great class um we're really excited to have it open there are two separate sessions again on May 18th and June 1st um and thank you councilman Venter for helping me with all of that that is all council president thank you May 31st uh is going to be the senior uh advisory springling from 6:00 to 9: at the Civic Center uh those wishing to attend please reach out to me um number is 973 25602 49 nonr will be $20 to attend that event music will be by John Morano in the accents as the council heard me speak last time about the veterans uh about getting a GPS system set up so that residents and non-residents can find their uh veteran U those that paid for their ve their loved ones veteran banners easily I had a Thomas metzer reach out to me whose uncle is George metler and asking me where the location of his uh uncle's Banner was um so we're H to get this program up and running so we don't have too much downtime but in the interm I did reach out to Mr contron and he reached out to Ron gamble we found their location pretty quickly and within a half hour that location was given to the family and they were thrilled to know it was on Shady Lane but I just you know in in in term I started to I mentioned this veteran uh I think at one of the meetings but I need to mention him again because I was researching it was one of five brothers who went into Service uh two went into the Airborne and three went into the Navy and uh unfortunately um George was killed when he was 17 when he he enlisted less than a year so I think it's highly important of this program and I want to give a shout out to councilwoman habit who helped out putting a Facebook blurb out um and we did get kind of a rush of uh veteran families reaching out to the council reaching out to the town for uh veteran banners I think we have five now who want to get those banners up and as I mentioned before we're hoping to get a veteran uh to do a voice over and speak about each veteran uh so not only can you find them with your phone but you'll be also to be able to access a biography of that veteran as well and I do suggest that Mr Kon that we put these veterans uh these Hometown hero veterans on our website so people can see them have a motion to open the meeting to the public for agenda items move by councilman vent Cherry second second by councilman Murphy all those in favor I all those opposed motion carries Madame clerk anyone wishing to address the township Council may do so through the council president it is preferred if you give your name and address for the record comments are to be limited to 3 minutes however if appropriate you may be granted additional time and the sole discretion of the council president members of a public who have joined the meeting virtually and desire to provide comment shall raise their virtual hand in the zoom application the meeting moderator will cue the members of the public that wish to provide comment and the council president will recognize them in order members of the public who have joined the meeting by calling in must press star six to mute and unmute themselves and star N9 to raise their hand members of a public who have joined the meeting via the zoom application must click the reactions icon and then the raise hand icon once the process is complete we will return to the regular order of business thank you the floor is now open Mr kushia anyone like to come before [Music] have a motion to close the public comment mooved by councilman Venter second by councilwoman Patel all those in favor I all those opposed motion carries have a motion to close this meeting by councilman Murphy second by councilwoman habets all those in favor all those opposed this meeting is now closed