back there come on up oh yeah stay back there stay back there are we live okay all right I think we're live so we're going to get started yeah we don't have any these tonight okay all right are you ready we ready yeah okay pursuant to section five chapter 231 Public Law 1975 this is to State for the record that adequate notice of this meeting has been provided to the public by posting and maintaining the annual notice of regular meetings on the bulletin board of the municipal building by mailing the annual notice of regular meetings for 2023 to the news record in Star Ledger in December 2022 and by filing said notice in the office of the Township Clerk Mr Adams here right here Mr Duca here M angle here mayor daffis present whereas chapter 231 public laws of 1975 cing knows the open public meetings act part will meetings of public bodies be open to the public and where section 7A provides as the governing body has a discretion to permit prohibit or regulate the active participation of the public at any meeting and we desire of the governing body to comply with the provision this act same time to conduct its business in an orderly and expeditious manner now therefore be resolved by the township committee Township mwood does hereby prohibit except to set forth in the formal agenda active participation in the deliberations of the governing body by the public except as otherwise prescribed by law does limit the public to the observations of the actions and discussions of the governing body at all of its regular and special meetings so moved second Adams yes M K yes Mr Duca yes SLE yes mayor daffis yes please join us salute to the flag States America justice for all welcome everyone to our last meeting for 2023 it is December 19th and this meeting is hybrid as uh we have been the the past few months we welcome those who are here with us in person special night we're going to be honoring our dear Township attorney for the past 30 years Mr Roger desiderio let's give him him him an Applause 30 years of distinguished Public Service we'll get into all of that in a little bit Mr desiderio thank you to Mr desiderio's family for joining us it's wonderful to have you in person we also welcome those who are with us online and and uh we will get to public comment shortly uh we have no proclamations tonight uh we're going to get right into boards and committees our first agenda item we will be appointing Mr Andrew Howell to the environmental advisory committee and then we will segue into our first of two public comment periods so we usually have two public comment periods the first one is for agenda items only and the second one at the end of the meeting is for any Topic in light of uh those who wish to speak up tonight about current events um I'm going to do what I've done before and and be courteous and offer folks to speak about anything during the first public comment period And I will um set the rules for that uh as soon as we get to it all right then we will have our third public hearing thank you Mr Palama for being with us about our cdbg grant uh constructing ADA Compliant curb Cuts in various public intersection intersections within the township that will be led by our uh community development director Miss dep Palma who's with us welcome Miss dep DePalma we have no new ordinances to introduce on the last meeting of 2023 that makes sense we will segue into um our administrative reports we follow the same order we will begin with the township administrator then Township attorney Mr desiderio followed by our Township Clerk Miss fritsen reports from elected officials the order tonight is Deputy Mayor Engle followed by Committee Member DeLuca followed by Committee Member Adams followed by Committee Member kpe I always go last as the chair we have three discussion items tonight uh committeeman Duca will be F leading us through the demographic study of membership ship on our various boards and committees we will then vote on the community host agreement that we proposed to Bud and leaf delivery LLC this is a local resident who has applied to be a Class 6 cannabis delivery lensey within the township their application was approved at the last Township committee meeting subject to uh the mutual execution of a community host agreement we'll be looking at that tonight and then we have uh a discussion by Deputy Mayor angle about our 2024 pool fees and that's exciting because we're moving in the right direction about making our pool truly a community pool that's open to all and affordable to all and then we have a consent agenda the consent agenda has been previously published as the rest of the agenda has um I want to note that we have with us tonight um our new Township attorney who will be taking over for Mr desiderio Jennifer cedido welcome Jennifer there you are over there uh welcome to Maplewood we're delighted to have you and uh that brings us to our second public comment period and then we will adjourn and meet again the 1 of January our annual reorganization all right so let's get things started uh I start the meetings with our land acknowledgement we uh acknowledge that we live on Stolen land that the land we now know and occupy as New Jersey has been the home of the LPI people for thousands of years uh and that we offer our respect to the Lenny lenapi tribal Nation collectively the lenapi and recognized the force diaspora of the the Delaware tribe and the Delaware nation of Oklahoma and the Stockbridge Muny community of Wisconsin and and acknowledge that the municipality was built on the small portion on this small portion of the lenapi hoking we honor the lenapi in New Jersey and Elsewhere for their environmental sustainability and their cultural resilience throughout our nation's history we firmly commit ourselves to promote the well-being and growth of New Jersey indigenous communities and to provide opportunities for indigenous peoples in our community in housing economic Mobility employment and cultural or artistic opportunity thank you uh and before we move over to our board and committee appointment this evening I just want to acknowledge and I hope you'll join me in a quick moment of silence we lost a dear friend here uh at Town Hall someone who gave nothing but love every single day unequivocally and who helped us get through some tough times who made us laugh who calmed us down um our dear dear golden retriever Gemma our loyal companion and the loyal companion of our Township Clerk Miss fritsen so let's just take a moment for Gemma thank you thank you mayor you're welcome Miss Ritz and we'll allow you to make remarks during your report as you wish we miss Gemma I'm good okay so boards and committees um I don't see Mr Howell here with us is he present was be okay he wasn't able to attend so um I move that we is he with us online or he's not not able to attend but um I please um uh Mr Howell has uh is excited to join the environmental advisory committee he got his toes wet working with Mr Duca on a different project and um has met with u Mr McCoy our chair and he's excited about the good work our environmental advisory committee is doing and I nominate that we I uh motion that we appoint him to our environmental advisory committee I'll second the motion Mr Adams yes kite yes Mr DeLuca yes M angle yes yes and thank you Mr Howell for um volunteering to serve the public in this important capacity we look forward to working with you okay public comment as I said for any agenda item I'm going to let our administrator Mr warry administer public comment but let me say the following first we are opening up our first public comment period to any item we are limiting public comment to three minutes we're going to enforce that tonight to the best of our ability only because we recognize that there may be significant public comment and we want to get to everyone we want everyone to be seen and heard we will offer public comment as we do in person we start with inperson public comment and then we we move online please note the following it is our policy and again tonight the TC will not the township committee will not be engaging in back and forth dialogue during the public comment the TC will be offered the opportunity to make remarks after the conclusion of public comment and may refer to those directly who offered public comment for those who are um going to be making comments publicly about the Middle East conflict um I I reference our recent resolution that this space this beautiful building and and this governing body continues to Foster and make available this room and online now a safe space for differing opinions we welcome open dialogue we don't silence our residents we don't silence our committee members we encourage during public comment and dialogue respect and civility we can disagree let's just not go after each other we discourage we discourage personal attacks and any conduct that may be perceived as threatening or aggressive toward anyone threats of violence will not be tolerated disorderly conduct will not be tolerated disruptions of the meeting will not be tolerated such conduct is not advocacy it's just a disruption and Chaos mostly we ask folks to choose their words carefully as have as I myself have learned to do better recently consider the existing harm that folks are feeling out there throughout the world and especially right here in our community the existing islamophobia and anti-Semitism so choose your words carefully do not use slogans that will further harm folks again we're not here to harm we're here to speak to each other and hopefully through our dialogue connect and connect better so with that Mr warry you have the dis distinction of administering public comment I will uh offer those who are here in person the opportunity to speak first about any matter so are there folks in here with us who wish to to speak come on up to the mic please introduce yourself welcome again and um let us know what you want to talk about is that on it's lit but it's it's lit but it's not on ah okay thank you much better thank you SEL Abu Maplewood res um first I would like to thank the committee for passing the resolution at the last meeting on December 5th I appreciate that the Maplewood Town committee unequivocally condemns anti-Semitism and islamophobia second I'd like to personally thank committee person um Duca uh for stating that not being a fan of Netanyahu and his right-wing government does not make him or anyone anti-semitic I wholeheartedly agree with that statement and I Echo the same sentence that being able to criticize and debate Netanyahu his right-wing government the occupation apartheid in Israel are democratic Liberties that we proudly exercise in the United States with no intention of being critical of Judaism or Jewish people third I do want to address some of the comments that of the responses um to the last public commenters demand for a ceasefire um some of the comments made dismiss the Civil losses now at about 25,000 as a consequence of Hamas using um innocent civilians as human Shields you know this is not only so dehumanizing of Palestinian life but it itself is a right-wing talking point um you know we're making progress here um and I urge this committee to consider the efforts efforts that are being made to recognize the Arabs and Muslims in our community um you know via the resolution via these kinds of conversations to avoid dehumanizing Arabs in that kind of conversation when the Som Community calls for a ceasefire it's for the the purpose of saving innocent civilian life which is in grave grave danger gsin are not only dying from the indiscriminate bombings but they're dying of starvation dehydration infection we also call for the release of hostages hostages were released when there was a ceasefire and we need more of that and we need it permanently you know no one here is advocating for no one who's calling for a ceasefire is advocating for Hamas um you know we're advocating for innocent civilians um and you know it we're demanding that there's a SE fire because our tax dollars are funding war crimes um you know I have several quotes I don't know if I have enough time here but you know President Biden is starting to criticize Israel for their indiscriminate bombings saying that Netanyahu must change Mike Cheryl just signed a letter O with her concern um to Biden about netanyahu's military strategy in Gaza you know I'll kind of go through it quickly but basically saying we urge you to continue to use all of our leverage to achieve an immediate and significant shift of military strategy and tactics in Gaza the New York Times Gaza poll released today said that three4 of the respondents think that Israel are not taking enough precautions to avoid civilian casualties the world is seeing this you know the world is calling for a ceasefire the UN secretary gen uh Security Council the general assembly had two emergency meetings last week so listen we the people of the United States we're demanding a ceasefire and I hope that you understand why we call and we bring it to your attention you know do do you understand that it's because we value human life and that's it we just value human life in all of its forms and those of us that are calling for the ceasefire we're trying to be on the right side of history and that's why we bring it to your attention thank you thank you thank you for that powerful and clear other members of the public here in person who wish to engage in public speaks anyone please well we'll give you a minute to catch your breath any anything you need to do to be comfortable almost [Laughter] anything glad you modified that yeah hi welcome please know who you are and what you like to speak about so my name is Dana luchano um I am from Maplewood um and I wanted to thank Township Committee Member Jermaine kpe um for addressing the ceasefire Sunday rally this past Sunday urging a ceasefire and Humanity Arian aid for the people of Gaza I stand with Miss kpe and her desire for an immediate ceasefire in light of nearly 20,000 deaths in Gaza at this point 70% of them women and children and the displacement of 1.4 million Palestinians from their homes now it is fair to say that not all Maplewood residents agree with this position some who have deep cultural or even familial tied to Israel believe that Israel is Justified in carrying up this war on Gaza however passionately I differ in this position and I do I respect their right to hold it and I believe most of them would respect my right to hold my own opinion as as well as M kp's right to speak at the event unfortunately a very small but vocal group of our neighbors does not respect that right um Miss kpe may have heard actually all of you may have heard at this point um call denunciations even calls for her resignation from Township committee simply for having um the tarity to speak out at that rally great um most recently um some members of this very small group um have uh posted a YouTube channel based on Stolen videos of the rally accusing everyone of being Hamas supporters right um this group has set themselves in opposition to the constitutional rights to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly and have harassed doxed threatened slandered um and otherwise bothered community members whose political positions vary from their own based in part on the false weaponization of claims of anti-Semitism in the movement for ceasefire now make no mistake anti-Semitism is a real and a growing problem from the vile graffiti written on a hall at Columbia High School last week where my own Jewish child is in the 10th grade to the murders carried out at synagogues by men espousing white supremacism and replacement Theory but expressing opposition to the policies undertaken by the Israeli government both now and for the past 75 years is not anti-semitic attending a rally and calling for ceasefire is not anti-semitic the claim of anti-Semitism that is often charged in the slogan from the river to seive palistine will be free is not in fact anti-semitic it is not a Hamas slogan it has deep roots in Palestinian culture for decades before the formation either of Hamas or of lud the extremist Israeli party that also adopted a version of that slogan uh it is upsetting that the mere expression of a desire for Freedom by Palestinians could be taken as a call necessarily for genocide there are many ways that Palestine can be free entirely non-violently um I want to be clear again opposing the actions of Israel no more makes one anti-semitic than opposing the actions of Donald Trump made one anti-American the latter of course has been claimed for all sorts of repressive purposes and many of those who've done so are now weaponizing the former claim as well indeed the increasing collusion between these two false claims betrays their partisan deliberately divisive and anti-democratic purposes I ask the township committee to stand with us in our affirmation of the rights of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly the need to remain Vigilant against both anti-Semitism islamophobia and racism where they do threaten and the right of all people to live in peace thanks thank you are there other members of the public here in person who wish who wish to engage in public comment please welcome it's good to see you please introduce yourself um hello everyone I'm NADA alabi um I'm a maple woodan long time ago I've been in Maplewood for 25 years and recently moved to Union and actually today the 19th I signed the contract for the house so it's like one year I can't believe it's already a one year um congratulations thank you uh I'm here today um I don't have a speech with me I'm just gonna speak from my heart the community in Union in the Islamic Center of Union County which I'm part of it 75% from Gaza and I cannot express you know the the sorrow you know like the mourn that you know like the status that they are in right now is devastating for us what is the guilt that the gazam people has had in order to be you know like treated this way every other day I have to go to the mosque in order to give condolences for a loss and it's not one or two or three it's like by hundreds our families are large over there I personally don't have any family in Gaza or in the West Bank uh I'm originally from nablas my grand great-grandfather sorry was kicked out from his land from our land in the 67 and he has to for forced to move out of um to Jordan and I guess that's why I'm here today otherwise I wouldn't be here he would be killed so um I want to hear from you why not seize the fire why carbon bombing bombing on the civilians in Gaza why not go fight in the battlefield with Hamas what do we have anything to do with Hamas you know like this is civilians so if we are asking to seize fire it's a simple requests for Humanity these are people they're human if it is one of your relative and put yourself in the shoes you know like what would you say about that would you say no don't seize fire and keep you know like feeding them you know like giving them our tax money in order to you know to kill our people over there I mean I cannot express more than this I mean Mar you know like they uh did they did all the good talk I'm not going to add to them I just wanted to say you know like why not seize the fire thank you thank you thank you NADA it's good to see you other members here in person who wish to speak going once going twice okay we will then um allow folks who are joining us online to speak Mr warry if any members of the public joining us on Zoom would like to speak please raise your hand now and you'll be moved into public portion I am moving over Melanie gersman Miss gersman you're now in public portion you can unmute yourself and speak great thank you thank you so much um hello everybody um I have two points to make um the first I just want to address the ceasefire folks um I think it's easy to say that we all want a ceasefire we are peaceful people uh all of us across the board however we have seen historically that Hamas does not honor ceasefires while the ceasefire folks believe that they're asking for peace they do so with the assumption that Hamas will participate in that peaceful time but we have seen at least 15 times throughout history and then every day of the most recent ceasefire that Hamas will not cease fire they continue to bomb and bomb and bomb there are a 100,000 Israeli citizens who have been displaced from their homes there are there is an 11-month-old baby who is still in a tunnel somewhere we have seen that Hamas will not cease fire and they do not value human life their Doctrine seeks to destroy all Jewish life and they'll do so at whatever means necessary you can be on the right side of history when you actually understand history and if Hamas puts their weapons down there will be peace if Israel puts their weapons down they will die they're this Doctrine will spread everywhere we have seen it historically we have seen small inklings of it in our own town and that brings me to my second point it has recently come to my attention that Miss kpe recently spoke at a ceasefire rally in town I'm not an opponent of free speech regardless of how much I disagree with the content what I am opposed to is that she proceeded to confidently spread disinformation while owning that she quote does not know a lot she has made she then made lots of uneducated conjectures about an extremely complicated global conflict with hundreds of years of History she reduced Israel to some random country putting up a wall instead of acknowledging the extensive Defense work that has to be done in the face of Decades of terrorist attacks both in tatas amongst other smaller events I'm alarmed at the prospect of a town Committee Member a person with power in our community taking it upon herself to share biased and factually incorrect information in a public forum and in a town that has just this week had to address at least two anti-semitic acts of vandalism a month ago at a previous meeting we shared with her her that her unnuanced take on the crisis in the Middle East was ignorant at best and hurtful at worst she seemed to understand that she needed to take time to better educate herself on the history of the region and the harm that oversimplification has on affected people all over the world in the time since she seems to have ignored the Jewish community and any attempt to understand both sides of the conflict she has not shown any good faith attempt to connect with Jewish or Israeli Town members regarding the history of the conflict or why things are the way that they are she has consistently ignored the very real pain of our community she stood against unity and Peace by using her position as a town representative to voice a one-sided opinion words matter they cause harm we have seen this this past week the endless stream of anti-israel propaganda has culminated in real violence against Jews in the diaspora including here to propagate that in our town as a representative of the people is unconscionable especially as local threats toward Jewish Community continue to grow I moved here because this is a Bastion of progressive values and diversity what I see now is a growing sentiment of anti-Semitism from Town members who per kp's own quote do not have skin in the game but who have a lot to say regardless and without any context and with a Tik Tok based education in this War I believe in three strikes we've asked multiple times in good faith for Miss kpe to listen to us and to understand us and she has not done so my final request is for Miss kpe to engage with Jewish representatives in town so that she may unlearn some of the historically incorrect rhetoric that she has found herself repeating on December 27th and other days and so that she may stand on the side of peace and Humanity if she's unable or uninterested in doing so then I strongly urge her to resign she does not represent many of the voices in this town and her seemingly endless capacity to tokenize Jews while indirectly calling for the destruction of Israel makes me fear for the safety and well-being of my family my neighbors and folks in this town thank you for your time and thank you for your consideration and thank you for your empathy thank you for your for your comments I am now moving over Heather sski Mrs slavsky you're now in public portion you may unmute yourself and speak thank you um I think compared to others this may sound trivial but I have some very local issues to bring up I reside on Porter Road in the lightning Brook neighborhood of the Hilton section of mapelwood we are in desperate need ofle clear and preferably large signage regarding tractor Trail eyes and semis these large vehicles cannot safely travel south of Newark way when they're on Rutter they have destroyed signs damaged Vehicles damaged power lines and proven time and time again that it is simply unsafe to allow them to Traverse these very small roads that are down here I would note that relatedly if the no parking rules on the west side of ruter between Bernette and Newark way were actually enforced it would probably prevent this problem in some respects it would certainly enhance safety and I think it would likely result in trucks and tractor trailers using the spaces that their companies provide rather than continuing South on ruers it would result essentially in an about face while they're on Newark way if they used their own space and essentially turned around there today alone there were two very large Vehicles back to back um carrying cars the there's a very large parking lot for them to be doing whatever they needed to do but they were parked back to back on the no parking section making it a lot more difficult and unsafe for people to pass that were going in both directions it was morning time during school drop off hours separately but additionally our neighborhood is really dealing with a lot of fireworks and I'm not really sure how we get those law laws and ordinances enforced but they need to be we have children here there are veterans people's pets are upset by it people with sensory needs as well as just everyone who needs peace and quiet and sleep we deserve some level of enforcement there are certain homes and sections that are just doing this incessantly um it it it's not July 4th I I think we're all trying we all try to be lenient around then but at some point um it it's got to stop and on another note since I do have three minutes um but also another local issue I really believe that leaf collection must change in our town flooding is terrible throughout our town we've seen that this week the leaves contribute to that the cost and the time spent by DPW is extraordinary I don't understand why residents aren't asked to bag their leaves for a pickup or to drop them off at Deep gpw in bags and I recognize that some will find this controversial but if you can ban leaf blowers then you can require that leaves be bagged so they don't end up clogging up every place that water needs to go so it doesn't go into our homes further just to anyone watching please if you can leave your leaves it's good for your garden it's good for your lawn it's good for the environment thank you thank you Mrs lski and I will have a response to the issue about the large trucks on pter field road and on ruers and in the vicinity at the end of the public comment period and about about parking enforcement okay next public comment I am moving over Tyrone to public [Music] portion Tyrone you're now in public portion you may unmute yourself you have three minutes to speak hello my name is Tyrone and um I'm following up on uh the tractor trailer uh problem that Heather spoke about I'm not going to repeat everything that she said because I think she described everything that's going on great um my house is actually on the corner of well near the corner of Porter Road and field road so I see multiple trucks come down that have taken out stop signs almost hit cars Etc um so I just want to make sure that the town gets some signage up to stop trucks from coming down Field Road and trying to turn on the quarter road which is a very narrow Street um the angle of the uh uh Street is angled more towards one way than it is the other so it's exceptionally difficult for trucks to try to go right it's probably easier for them to go left but nonetheless they should not be coming down the street and I look forward to hearing the comments though and hopefully getting some action as soon as possible with signage thank you very much thank you sir I'm now promoting Nicole Klein bom Miss Klein bomb you're now in public portion you may unmute yourself and you have three minutes to speak hi I'm not sure if you can see me um welcome hi um my name is Nicole Klein bomb I'm a proud Jewish Maplewood resident I'm here to address recent statements made by committee person kpe at a rally in South Orange miss kpe you may remember that you and I were co- captains on the bus down to the women's March in Washington DC back in January 2017 where we marched and chanted all day in support of intersectional feminism not once in your speech did I hear you decry the murder rape torture and kidnapping of innocent Israeli women and girls I guess you were only Marching for the rights of all women unless they're Jewish in your speech you said you hope that people get home because they deserve to live their lives I didn't hear you say anything about the nearly 130 innocent Israeli civilians still being held hostage in Gaza who would very much like to go home instead of demanding their release which would be the best chance there is for a ceasefire you chose to condemn the Israeli government for their response to the deadliest attack on Jews since the Holocaust war is not pretty civilian deaths are tragic and yes civilians will die because Hamas uses their citizens as Shields but these are the consequences of their actions you characterize Israel as some random random government that just showed up to claim land Jews have lived in that land that is Israel continuously for thousands of years when you call for a ceasefire did you do you know that Hamas has stated they will repeat October 7th again and again you said in your speech that you had no skin in the game because you didn't know anyone who had been impacted by this let me remind you that you have Jewish constituents and many synagogues in this town do our lives not count as skin in the game for you you work at a church you know how to contact the many Jewish clergy leaders in our town to educate yourself to hear them and listen to the pain our communities have been experiencing those who cautioned you not to speak at the rally probably understood your limited knowledge of an incredibly complex issue at a fraught time for the community if you're going to speak out about something like this educate yourself don't stand up in front of a crowd repeatedly State you don't know enough about what is going going on and then throw condemnations and Hamas talking points around as though you do know you stated you quote can read and quote can see the news so I encourage you to do so you can get up and say whatever you want in front of a microphone we live in America not Gaza in your position of power and influence here in Maplewood there is an expectation that our community leaders are educated and knowledgeable about issues that have a real impact on our lives and safety in our community at the end of the day a Jew is a Jew and Hamas wants us all dead there's no peace with them you parot their talking points you are associated with them and their agenda when I told my children I would be here tonight speaking out against what you said they were horrified and scared that someone in a position of power in our town would say these anti-semitic things I want you to remember that your words have power and consequences I am here demanding you resign from your position on the township committee you clearly do do not represent the best interest of me or my family nor the interest of maplewood's Jewish Community thank you thank you I'm now moving over Lauren Levy I'm now moving over Susie L what's happening the first um attendee had declined to be promoted so I promoted the second second can you hear me we can welcome yes we can hello yes we can hear you please proceed hello yes we can hear you please proceed hello hello again welcome yes let me get my can you hear me now yes we can yes we can I apologize um thank you for having me today my name is uh Susie and um I would like to discuss um the the YouTube video that was shared as you know um and Miss kpe um this past Sunday it was it was I was a bit appalled um by what I heard from from her this is someone that's supposed to be representing the community um and she has every right to speak speak what she feels is right but spreading lies and misinformation is not only offensive to the Jewish Community but also very dangerous with your lies you haven't once even mentioned condemned the terrorist organization Hamas for their atrocities on October 7th or that Hamas is using civilians as human Shields or that they steal humanitarian aid from Palestinians or murder anyone who speaks out against them they need to be held accountable this is not a rightwing speaking whatever that other person was saying this is real like there's videos of Hamas using GoPro cameras on October 7th so that they could show the world what they did and if you really cared about a ceasefire why not add that hamash should surrender but there weapons down and return the hostages not once did you mention anything about the Israeli hostages do our lives not count this is our family that are taking hostages our family we are 0.2% of the population so one person one Jewish person you know it's like it's like your family I don't know how to explain it to you but the fear that we have after seeing what they did is an attack on the whole Jewish Nation do you realize that in this town there are Israelis who are impacted directly by what happened that day and that this anti-jewish anti-israel speech you gave shows that you did not educate yourself as you claim have you reached out to any Jewish organizations Representatives synagogues I really don't think so and the most hurtful offensive and insensitive thing you said in my opinion was you don't get to roll into someone's neighborhood and take their stuff and then get mad when they push back push back you want to call mass murder rape torture beheadings Burning Alive Burning a baby in the oven as pushing back do you hear your words let's unpack the first part too which is false Israel didn't steal anything from anyone and if you want to speak about Gaza Israel left Gaza in 2005 gave it all for peace peace what peace do we see none Israelis had green houses in Gaza for them they burnt it all when they moved dead because they don't want anything from Israelis and then they appointed Hamas to rule them knowing very well that their Charter calls for the destruction of Israel in its entirety hamas's one goal one goal is to annihilate the Jewish people take the land all for itself and there's no hum no women's rights nope there's no lgbtq in Gaza either they want an Islamic extremist country this is not about land this is their ideology that we're fighting here and implying that Israel stole land from Palestinians is just wrong anti-semitic stating this does not help any side of the conflict you're only fueling the words of Hamas and Hamas probably thanks you for your support because that's what it's looking to do it's using Palestinians for their Cause And getting people to feel bad for them and give them more money so that their leaders can live their lavish lifestyles in catar Susie Susie can you hear us I hear you very well okay uh this is Mayor Dean daffis and you have gone way past the three minutes um I hate cutting you off or any anyone but we we have to limit it to three minutes uh in order to get through all the public comment we encourage you to send us the rest of your statement by email um and we appreciate the time that you've taken to express yourself thank you I appreciate you giving me the time thank you thank you I am promoting Mindy Greenspan to speak Miss green span you're now in public comment you may unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak hello can you hear me yes we can welcome thanks hi um my name is Mindy Greenspan and I've lived in Maplewood for 25 years and I'm here to speak as a Jewish member of this community uh and there have been several uh people who have spoken prior uh to me who have um spoken as um as if the Jewish Community here and anywhere in the world is monolithic and I really reject that um I am proud of my Jewish Heritage my tradition and values upholding the sanctity of all life my Jewish Heritage has long-standing roots in struggles for justice equality and freedom for all people and this tradition predates the formation of the modern day state of Israel my identity and safety does not depend on Israel Israel is a world world power that is perpetrating the kind of Oppression and violence on the Palestinian people that it was purportedly created to protect Jews from there is an assumption and overwhelming consensus in this country that being Jewish equals blindly supporting the state of Israel and if criticism is made it represents danger to the Jewish people and therefore is anti-Semitic this narrative is being promoted by the most right-wing anti-semitic racist forces and is itself truly anti-semitic in nature and dangerous we've seen this consensus stifle and repress Free Speech nationally and we are seeing it in our in our community with attempts to intimidate and punish those that stand up and voice opposition to the ongoing Slaughter starvation and dehumanization of Palestinian people by the Israeli state with us complicity I'm here to speak in support of Township Committee Member Jermaine kripe who has shown courage taking a stand for justice and freedom for Palestinians and for a humanitarian ceasefire to end the killing she has done this against the threats and attempts of intimidation from members of our community who don't represent our stated values of diversity and inclusion let let alone American values of free speech I don't believe that criticizing the Israeli government and wanting a free free Palestine is anti-Semitic as a Jewish person I don't agree that Jermaine's participation in a ceasefire rally isn't any way anti-semitic and I resent that a certain group of people in town feel entitled to speak for the whole Jewish Community you do not speak for me and I say not in my name cease fire now thank you Miss Greenspan thank you I am now promoting Ted Dorset to public comment Mr Dorset you're now in public comment you can unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak Mr Dorset you're now in public comment you can unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak has he been converted over he accepted the invitation to come to public portion but has not unmuted himself I can move him back while maybe he works on any technical challenges and move to another speaker if you'd like please I I I'm back now I'm sorry can you hear me yes we can welcome Mr Dorset thank you thank you for for taking my my hand my raised hand um what I would like to speak on is the traffic situation in not just uh well the tractor trailer uh situation coming down field to Porter but the traffic situation I want to say townwide with the what I like to joke about is St optional stop signs um the the intersection of uh Newark and um Ruckers um I believe it's Ruckers the big intersection on Newark it's it it it's impossible to get through there without having an accident there have been multiple accidents there including one where a car has flipped over people are being injured but the whole area in Hilton stop signs are like I said optional people roll through stop signs people don't stop people don't understand that first come first serve basically when it comes to a stop sign if someone's there before you they get to go without you just rolling through and also the stop signs are not right turn on red so it's people need to stop and and obey the the the laws there are children there are people there are school buses in the mornings everyone's yes trying to get to work trying to get to where they need to be but all of these need to be all of these signs need to be recognized I remember when they were putting the the big intersection the stop sign the four-way stop at the the big intersection on Newark um that not I'm sorry not Newark well Newark as well but on Bernette and and Ruckers is the the the major intersection that I'm I'm speaking of um one person said that they didn't want a light while everyone else voted that that a light should be put there but then we put stop signs and I have numerous videos that I've I've sent to kitner I've said posted on Facebook of people just five minutes of video just people just rolling through the stop signs I mean there stop signs for a reason the the uh surveys have been done to slow down traffic to stop people but no one's abiding by them and there's no one sitting and and and keeping watch over them so where I'm saying that these need to be watched or something needs to be done to stop people at at these intersections because it's inherently dangerous something needs to be done with policing something needs to be done with signage something needs to be done in some way to slow these people down and stop them at the intersections someone's going to get hurt even more so than than already has and and where are we're going to be we're going to be at at a death or an injury in an intersection where it could have been alleviated with signage or lights or something but um yes I it's it's there are multiple multiple issues including the the the tractor trailers that I recently had to I took a video of where a tractor trailer came down was hitting the tree hitting wires to to people's houses and almost destroyed one of my neighbors uh Vehicles it something needs to be done to with signage lights um better ways to police people not running stop signs coming down streets in residential areas with giant tractor trailers it's just very dangerous that that's all I have to say Thank you Mr Dorset I am promoting Karen Kosar to public comment Karen Kar you're now in public comment you can unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak thank you I'm here today to shine light on the rising anti-Semitism in this town Miss kp's speech on Saturday was just the most recent example we are seeing a growing trend of people shouting anti anti-semitic rhetoric disguised as reasonable criticism of the Israeli government when we the Jewish Community label that bigotry for what it is we are vilified ignored and gaslit I'm not an anti-semite they say I just condemn the Israeli government and yet the reasoning for doing so is littered with propaganda false information distorted historical references and calls for the full dismantling of Israel I'm not an anti-semite they say as they justify and celebrate the Slaughter of our brothers and sisters this group the group Miss KP stood in front of and said I'm on your side they erase the complex multi-ethnic history of Jews mislabel as settlers and colonizers make Zionism the dirtiest word in their vocabulary and you know what Jews are used to it we have always been the most hated thing imaginable at the time we've been accused of killing Jesus starting the plague controlling the banks being communists the reason Germany Lost World War I what's the most thing you can be in 2023 racist colonizers and so the mask of anti-Semitism has morphed again and again our history is being distorted to fill in the slot of the most hated thing imaginable Miss kpe why have you let down the Jewish Community because you promised us you would educate yourself but you failed to do the work you did not own your unconscious bias instead you found books and articles that confirmed your bias after only a few weeks you decided you have figured it out on Sunday evening you stripped the Jewish people of their historical connection to Israel you called Israel some random country you drew lazy parallels between a 3,000-year-old history and some foreign invasion of Som but I think the worst thing of all is that you called October 7th push back you said you can't be mad when they push back October 7th was planned for at least a year the target was civilians it was an act of genocide and amasa said they will do another October 7th again and again until every Jew in Israel is murdered they said and I quote October 7th was just a rehearsal your statement of push back not only lessens the horrific tragedy it justifies it that ceasefire you mentioned in your speech the one from last month that you held up as a shining example of what Israel should do Hamas broke that ceasefire 15 minutes after it started and they broke it again and again and again there is no spark notes for this conflict the hubris of people to binge read a handful of Articles and some books and to think they have it figured out you promised us the community you were elected to represent that you would honor our history and our trauma and then you broke that promise within weeks here is my ask of you recognize your unconscious bias meet the local clergy who I know have offered up their time to you do the hard work avoid the temptation of confirmation bias and rebuild trust with your community thank you thank [Music] you I'm promoting Andrew Patterson to public portion Mr Patterson you're now in public portion you may unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak uh all right thank you I will not be needing the full three minutes try to keep this brief uh hi my name is Andrew Patterson I'm here to speak in support of Jermaine kpe I'm I'm a resident of South Orange a Jew and an attendee of the rally on Sunday where Miss SCP spoke her Presence at that event meant a lot not just to me but to many members of her community knowing that as a public figure she would immediately be targeted by the bullying and harassment campaigns that we've seen Time and Time Again by those who wish to label as anti-Semitism even the slightest criticism of the actions of the Israeli government calling for a ceasefire is not anti-Semitism expression of solidarity by official with members of her community who are hurting is not anti-Semitism the idea that Palestinian people should have a free and safe existence outside of the borders that were forced upon them is not anti-Semitism as a Jew I resent that a faction of people has taken it upon themselves to weaponize an entire groups collected trauma and suffering into a way to shut down any idea that they do not like that's all thank you Mr Patterson I'm promoting David Lewin to public portion Mr Lewin you're now in public portion you may unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak thank you can you hear me yes great thanks very much everyone um I just wanted to say um M I'm a Jewish resident of South Orange been here since 2017 and I just want to add my name to those who have spoken before me who supporting uh jamain pre for her very proud participation in our ceasefire vigil on Sunday and I also want to shout out to others who have pointed out I think Dana Luc alluded earlier to the fact that what we are witnessing here the genocidal assault on Gaza that we are witnessing isn't anything having to do with October 7th it is an extension of 75 years of systemic Zionist racism dispossession dehumanization and state sponsored brutality against Palestinians and I also agree with her when she said that the liberatory phrase free Palestine from the river to the sea is just that a phrase of Liberation it is a call for a pluralistic society the opposite of what the Israeli apartheid state is about it's a call for everyone to be treated equally regardless of their ethnicity or their religion there is nothing anti-semitic about it and I can only conclude that those people here tonight and throughout the the the the town throughout the area who slander this phrase and people who say these kind of things as anti-semitic I can only assume that they cannot refute the argument on the facts or on the morality so they have no other option than to silence anyone who speaks out for Justice by slandering them as anti-s and I also share I think it was the previous speaker the resentment I feel that enablers of a Israel in this town have assumed for themselves the status of being the Jewish Community as if the rest of us who are Jewish and identify as anti-zionist we're not really Jews in their eyes we're not part of the Jewish Community I hear people here have said why has uh why is Jermaine c not come to a synagogue I've been living here for seven years no synagogue has invited anti-zionist speakers to come and address their congregation ations to explain why we say things like free Palestine from The River To The Sea why we call for a single state with equal rights for everyone why we oppose a regime that in the words of Israeli historian ilam Pape Israel is a state where the value of ethnic superiority and Supremacy overrides any other human and civil value why are we never invited to speak so I just want to again just end by saying that I am so proud in this town when I see the people who have come out including jamain cry to stand on the right side of History to stand up for justice in the face of these Relentless this Relentless barrage of smearing and slander and I hope that more people come out and stand with us on this ceasefire Sundays that we have and Beyond until there truly is a free Palestine with equal rights for everyone from the river to the city thank you very much thank you Mr lwin I'm now promoting Lauren Levy to public portion Miss lovey you're now in public portion you may unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak okay can you hear me yes we can welcome hi okay I just want to uh make one point um this is about the conflict that's happening right now um this is not a partisan issue this is a bipartisan issue um most of the people who are speaking on behalf of Israel and anti-Semitism are not right-wing we're don't live in a right-wing area um so this is not just about um partisanship so I just wanted to make that clear um and I'd like to address the cease rally that took place on Sunday specifically in reference to miss kp's speech um Miss kpe uh two months ago at a town council meeting spoke out against Israel and referenced false information about how the government of Israel Works highlighting most not by saying Pakistan several times instead of Palestine when members of this community spoke to her about her statements she apologized and promised to learn more about the region its history and the current conflict on Sunday evening Miss kpe incorrectly misspoke about Israel but this time for her re her rhetoric wasn't just ignorant it was dangerous she stood in middle of downtown South Orange and proudly condemned Israel but didn't even men Hamas once didn't mention the massacre didn't mention the slaughter of babies didn't me mention that this was on civilians she drew a f a false parallel between Jews and Israel to some random people committing coming into invading Soma it's the diminutive approach to 3,000 years of history of land that has changed owners dozens and dozens of times she framed off October 7th as push back let that sit with you push back rape torture Slaughter of innocent people targets of a terror attack that took at least two years to plan that was GoPro and celebrated she is entitled to her thoughts and opinions but she's promised our community members that she would do her due diligence I have reviewed the books and articles and news sources that she referenced but to be candid she took the thread of confirmation bias and didn't let go she supported her predetermined bias with more information that supported it and took no effort to learn from from Israeli history of perspectives her actions are Fanning the Flames of anti-Semitism in this town her rush to be enlightened after weeks of learning about a 3,000-year-old conflict is irresponsible I ask if she has any interest in being a representative of this town one that's beautiful diverse strong and different and a large Jewish Community then I request that she sits with a member of our town rabinal clergy perhaps several do the work unravel her conscious bias show us that she is an ally and that she is on the right she is the right representative for this town and I just wanted to Echo what one other member said about um coming into our synagogues to have these conversations and anti-zionists coming into our synagogues um that doesn't really make sense anti-zionists coming into our synagogues our synagogues are zionists we are a rooted people in history of Israel so um unless anybody would like to meet clergy members outside of our synagogues that are anti-zionists um I just I just want to think about I want somebody to think about that comment having an anti-zionist come to our synagogue I mean that's just kind of as an oxymora but anyway that's uh that's all I wanted to say and thank you for your time thank you Miss Levy so Mr worry how many hands up do we have there are three more members of the public with raised hands okay we are going to cap it off there with the three members who have their hands up current ly we welcome others to send in their statements To Us by email and we welcome folks who wish to comment tonight to uh do so at our next public comment portion at the end of the meeting but we do have business of the township to get through as well um important things that must be done tonight so um we're going to move on after those three people Mr warry I'm moving over Michael Goldberg to public portion Mr Goldberg you're now in public portion you may unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak uh good evening can you hear me okay yes we can great uh good evening I am Michael Goldberg a 25y year resident of South Orange and former in South Orange where I proudly served for six years I can say firsthand that the primary responsibility of every elected official is to make sure that all residents are safe and that all residents feel safe I've watched the videos of the recent rallies and can say that the appearance and speech by Miss kpe in spota park in my town of South Orange on Sunday did nothing to make us feel safe and in fact as a proud Jew and proud Zionist yes Zionist I use that word proudly not not as a derogatory term I can say it did the complete opposite saying you are on their side quote unquote to a group that has not once condemned Hamas and the atrocities of October 7th where over 12200 innocent civilians were murdered burned raped or taken hostage including many Americans did not make me feel safe and yet again tonight not a single supporter has condemned Hamas saying you were on their side to a group that has called for the elimination of Israel quote from The River To The Sea did not make me feel safe saying you are on their side to a group that has not once acknowledged the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish Democratic state in its current location with secure borders did not make me feel safe saying you are on their side to a group that marched through our downtown calling to quote shut it down and harassing local businesses did not make me feel safe saying you are on their side to a group that literally called for inata does not make any of us safe if you're not aware two intifadas occurred in Israel from the late 1990s to the early 2000s and thousands of people were killed Often by horrific suicide bombings against civilians this violence led to in your words quote some random government putting a fence around where they live but you know what that attempt finally lessen the Bloodshed understand nobody nobody is condemning the Palestinian civilians we all empathize with the humanitarian crisis however uh M kpe and these groups need to understand the only path to peace is to call for the surrender of Hamas and for all hostages to be released immediately and for free elections to be held for the first time in 17 years it's really that simple that is the path to peace not a quote unquote ceasefire with a barbaric group of terrorists who have broken every other ceasefire ever given including on October 7th vict Toca has rightly and unequivocally at the last meeting stated that the horrific situation is solely the responsibility of Hamas of Hamas which started this war in October 7th and is accountable for every single death he's absolutely right Hamas is determined to destroy Israel and western civilization and the values of women's rights LGBT rights Democratic rights environmental rights that we hold in such a here in South Orange and Maplewood allowing Hamas to remain in power will only continue the cycle of violence and continue to jeopardize the safety of everyone including all of us here in s that is the side you should be on as a South Orange resident I cannot comment and will not comment on what Miss crib's future should be I leave that to the voters of South AR I'm sorry to the voters of maplehood and her colleagues I thank you for your time and uh have yourselves a good evening thank you Mr Goldberg I seure you're now being promoted to public portion IND that that would be indust sh sorry you are now in public portion you may unmute yourself and have three minutes to speak okay looks like I'm unmuted um but not getting a picture so maybe I won't bother with that it looks like it's backwards um I'll stop the video hi um I am Inda sexer um good evening uh I request that Miss kpe resign her position on our Township committee Township officials have every right to attend rallies and public events but it is unacceptable for a town official to speak publicly in support of a group that advocates for a terrorist organization and chance for genocide of Jews Miss kp's apology last month was apparently disingenuous Miss kripe is calling for a ceasefire there was a ceasefire through October 6th which was broken on October 7th by Hamas perpetrating atrocities in Israel and taking more than 200 hostages I have never heard Miss kpe condemn the barbaric atrocities by Hamas on October 7th in Her speech at the rally she referred to O October 7th as quote push back really atrocities are now just push back a ceasefire with Hamas will cause more October 7th type genocidal attacks as is the stated inent intent of the Hamas leadership calling for a ceasefire is in effect supporting Hamas terrorists and more murders of Israelis and Jews worldwide Miss kpe is speaking for and supporting a group that calls for inata and from The River To The Sea which are most definitely calls for the dismantling of the state of Israel and genocide of Israelis and Jews per the Hamas Charter it is a group promoting deleg delegitimizing and destroying Israel erasing an entire country a people and a culture my family my friends and my ancestral Homeland the the type of language and intent of Miss kpes misinformed bias statements are contributing to R Rising anti-Semitism locally and publicly and in our schools as stated and reported in the media the Arab countries and most of and much of the Western World want Hamas gone just like Isis and alqaeda Israeli soldiers are bleeding and dying fighting a proxy war for the Arab and Western worlds and yet here in s hate is rising what we including Miss kpe must demand is the surrender of Hamas and release of all hostages when H Hamas surrenders the war would come to an an end the his horrific death toll in Gaza would end then the world could sort out how to facilitate a Palestinian state that can live side by side with Israel decades ago Israeli Prime Minister golden mayir said if the Arabs put down their weapons today there would be no more violence if Israel puts down their weapons today there would be no more Israel so it is to this day Israel must secure its borders and its People Israel has entered PE negotiations many times these were always rejected by the Palestinian leaders because they do not want to share the land they want it all without the Jews Egypt and Jordan moved forward with peace treaties with Israel some 40 years ago those borders have been quiet ever since no violence so it can happen if there is will a will that is this is what Miss KP should be demanding not into and genocide of Jews Palestinians and Israelis all have the right to life in secure and peaceful borders our community needs to lead as the best example of Co coexistence anywhere which has been a stated goal of our community Miss kripes stated and I quote directly I have to speak up and if that costs me my role as a member of the committee the sacrifice is worth it unquote and so it is time for her to resign tonight thank you thank you our last and final public comment during this public comment portion Mr warry Mayor there are no other hands raised okay seeing no other hands raised we will close oh I'm sorry the person who had their hand raised before has re raised their hand so can move them please moving over forah cougal to public portion please provide the instructions three minutes miss cougle you are now in public portion you have 3 minutes to speak um can you give me one second I just uh okay I think I'm I'm good all right we can you we can hear you welcome you can hear me yes yeah I actually have a crying baby if you can just give me a second crying baby okay can you hear me yes we can did you hear everything uh we can hear you loud and clear please proceed okay thank you my name is Fara ch I'm a resident of Maplewood I had intended to speak today to extend my gratitude to Committee Member jine krip for expressing solidarity with her constituents and families asking for a ceasefire in Gaza which to Simply put would save innocent lives but I'm appalled by the entitlement that some of the racist bigots and ignorant public speakers have displayed here today what part of her speech makes them so angry um the part where she said that she's learning about the history of the conflict or the part where she felt the pain of the families uh who have family gatherings so that they die together when a bomb is dropped or the part where she acknowledged that speaking up may blow up in her face as it has but she realized that she ran for office not to gain popularity but to bring about change to become the voice of people our racist and ignorant neighbor on the other side have gotten into the habit of banning censuring any voices that go against their privileged positions for example maps of Freedom School okay at the rate that they're going it's not far fretch to imagine a scenario where they accuse a restaurant of being anti-semitic just because they put less salt in their sandwich they just bully you to entertain such ridiculous demands and it's granted because institutions who are supposed to protect students teachers civilians with free speech just bent over backwards to the slightest pressure put on them either willfully because or because they're corrupt or because just that they're just too power to take a corrective action on October 7th I saw a sign of I stand with Israel after those horrific attacks it's been 73 days since continuous carpet bombing of city where innocent children and people continue to die hospitals universities mosques schools churches ambulances even refugee camps are not even spared still there is no sign of I stand with Palestine from this committee if that's too much to us then at least a no ceasefire call but only sounds of crickets on the contrary we have seen Worst Behavior standing with the oppressors and trying to suppress the voice of people like Jermaine CR who are standing and demanding justice as I spoke here likely innocent children's Souls have departed this world due to the actions of baby killer n Netanyahu and the Zionist how many more need to be murdered before you speak out enough is enough if there is Injustice or cruelty happens to any of our privileged speakers or members who are afraid to accept the truth because believe me it will as they say karma I assure you people like Jermain and all those shouting free Palestine will stand with you every Sunday a community stands shoulder-to-shoulder Jews Muslims Christians Hindus black white brown yellow all stand in solar solidarity with humanity and if any of the speakers who spoke before me against Miss K would have attended would know this okay the whole world is calling for a ceasefire when are you going to stand up thank you thank you and that concludes this public comment period this evening and we shall move forward with the business of the township so um I'm going to ask our community development director Mr Palma to lead us through the cdbg public hearing welcome actually Mr Palma I'm sorry um yeah go ahead lead us through that go ahead let's good evening members of the township committee Roger this one's for you uh you put the mic yes good evening good evening this is the third of two public hearings um um seeking the township committee's endorsement to apply for a Community Development block grant from Essex County for the purpose of getting about $213,000 in funding for the purpose of installing um ADA Compliant curb cuts and the ancillary concrete work that's required at intersections so we have gotten U money for this purpose before we do have a uh responsibility under federal law to make sure that our intersections and public facilities are ADA Compliant um we hope to get about 30 of them completed with this funding and uh I just urge us to go forward with the application by the way the locations are in various parts of town uh to the extent possible we are trying to connect them with our road program wonderful anyone have any questions any questions from the township committee we'll allow the public the opportunity anyone here in person wish to comment about this seeing none we'll offer folks online an opportunity to comment about our cdbg grant if any members of the public joining us on Zoom would like to comment on this grant please raise your hand now there are no raised hands mayor great we will close the public hearing okay thank you thank you and I know you're Gathering signatures and we will follow suit before we move okay yeah it's just a requirement to gather signatures of those who are present in the public hearing further proof that we had a public hearing thank you folks for signing that okay before we move over to the next item which is Administrative reports um I'm going to offer the township committee an opportunity if anyone is interested to comment on any of the public comments that we received this evening anyone Deputy Mayor angle thank you mayor um as the Jewish Town council member I felt like I should respond to some of the statements we were getting from um folks in our Jewish Community um and our Muslim Community and members of the public in general um for myself for Miss K for many of our members of our two towns and our Board of Ed this topic has taken over our lives for the past two months um I personally as a Jewish person love the pluralism in our Jewish Community I don't think we all agree on this issue we're not all zionists um but we all should be one Community not only the Jewish Community here in s but a community that lives in Maplewood and South Orange and that's how I feel um Miss kpe and I have spoken separately about the parts of her statements that personally hurt me um I feel like we had a good dialogue about it I feel like um Miss kpe is a good person has a good heart and I don't think that Miss kpe and I are going to be able to solve the problems going on in Israel and Gaza today this is a centuries old issue dating to basically when religion started there's a huge it's a huge crisis it's really hard there's moral dilemmas there's devastating loss going on in Gaza there's hostages that have not been released it is heartbreaking we are all filled with emotion on every sides no matter what you think we are all touched by this conflict happening and it is really hard but I believe that Miss kpe and I need to be role models and show that just because we might disagree on this issue and there might be things that hurt us both on this issue there are other things that we can work together that to solve that are important for our community like infrastructure a lot of us got flooded with this past storm infrastructure is not going away that's something that Miss kpe and I can work together on we can work together on making it safer for our residents to be able to ride their bikes run our streets walk to school those are issues that are affecting everybody in our community that we can work productively on together and collaborate together and so what Miss kpe and I have talked about and what I would like to do I've spoken to some of my Township committee members is to put together small group listening sessions or moderated conversations where we can come together and talk through these issues and learn skills for civil discourse because we don't need to all agree on an issue it's good to have conversation it's good to have debate it's good to hear all sides what's not good is to be so mean and violent to each other because we all live here and look what's happening to our youth look what happened to our schools there was hate speech written in the bathrooms of our high school our youth are watching how the adults are reacting and how we're talking about the situation and we need to be role models to them because this is a generational conflict there's generational trauma and we need to be the grown-ups in the room and start showing our kids how we can work together to make change and make good and peace in the world so that's what I wanted to say about it thank you I'm so glad that was recorded because that was really eloquent and powerful thank you um are there other members of the township committee who wish to remark on any public comment that was made okay I do have a remark I want to uh make as it relates to um the trucks on Porter Road Field Road um New York way and so on um Mr War once again our residents are speaking up about the lack of enforcement in our town even where we have signage it's not being enforced so what's it going to take I'm not asking you to answer that I'm being rhetorical um we really really need our Police Department to understand that we need enforcement in our town we're not talking about quotas and we're not talking about anything improper other than they're serving the people of Maplewood the people of Maplewood continue to speak up in various forums in various subcommittees and before us here in this room about the lack of speeding enforcement the lack of parking enforcement we heard that again tonight and the lack of enforcement of our laws in general but those things in particular in this time of year as it gets darker earlier and we have folks using pedestrian crosswalks where they exist there's a lot of danger out there on my way here tonight I saw someone literally miss someone right on Walton uh and Jefferson this person was a commuter using The Pedestrian crosswalk and the person had their Apple iPhone light on they were clearly visible unless you were in a hurry distracted and just downright inhumane so let's give tickets let's enforce the law let's stop this Behavior as it relates to the trucks thank you for those comments we really really appreciate the residents who are speaking out about this in addition to signage in the neighborhood there we can do something else too there is precedent there is precedent of townships adopting ordinances in New Jersey to prohibit trucks of a certain size to uh um enter certain neighborhoods Hamilton Township did it not too long ago in the Crown Heights neighborhood the way it works is the governing body adopts an ordinance and they submit their request to the Department of Transportation in order for the Department of Transportation to um in order for the Department of Transportation to accept the request we need petitions signed by the residents in the affected neighborhood and we need legislative support it's great to see our assembly woman elect Miss Garnett Hall with us and uh Miss Hall I know you live in the neighborhood I know this is real and personal for you thank you for being here tonight um so we'll need your support if this Township committee will discuss it in the new year is willing to adopt such an ordinance and make such a request request to the Department of Transportation we will need your support in order for DOT to grant that and that could be your first win yay right so so let's discuss this in the appropriate subcommittees Public Safety engineering planning and Public Works um and take it from there any comments on that from the township committee fantastic see we can solve some things um okay great so we carry on with our agenda and we are now at administrative reports Mr warry thank you mayor um first we had gone out to RFP for homelessness Outreach and support services in the township uh we had a very narrowly tailored request with very specific requirements of respondents um one of those being um to be able to staff hours here in Maplewood so we understand that uh that narrowly tailored request would limit the amount of respondents we fortunate to receive two very good responses and are in the process of evaluating those now we have a meeting um Thursday with the evaluators to discuss those responses and expect to have a recommendation to the governing body next month U on the teric thank you sure on the agenda tonight is a resolution to hire a police officer Mr suon interviewed with the township committee a number of months ago we are excited to bring him on board he will begin the academy in January and he will replace an officer who has a plan retirement this spring and lastly on the agenda tonight is a resolution reappropriate open space money U this resolution doesn't exactly change the original intent of the appropriation from open space the original intent was for the demolition of of the uh the tennis courts and the construction of a spray park that was in one approval we uh we still want to move forward with that the project but we have an immediate need to demolish those tennis courts we received notice uh from our insur who made the recommendation that they be demolished and so we want to to take the money that was originally intended to demolish the courts and separate it out it's a maximum of $40,000 separate that out strictly for the demolition of the courts so it's the same purpose but the way that the original resolution was worded we couldn't just use it for um the tenis court so that is what that resolution was and I want to make sure that the governing body and the public was aware of that change that is my report thank you mayor thank you Mr warry are there any questions for our administrator from the township committee uh does that demolition include um making the area safe or doing anything what will it look like after the courts themselves are demolished the what we contract for will leave that area with more like a natural surface so it'll just be a dirt surface that we can we can choose to do other things but our immediate need right now is to demolish those tennis courts right so there's right now there's not a planned upgrade as part of the demolition Beyond bringing it down to surface level okay so the concrete will be gone the fencing will be gone it'll be left in an area that we could plant grass in should we choose free or another Improvement okay thank you any other questions Mr worry thank you Mr worry Mr desiderio your last meeting I actually have a report tonight mayor he has a report and you have a report for us on your last meeting should we well you could proceed with your report something should be yeah so with regard to the property at 1350 Newark way Mr deserio we need you to speak a little bit closer with regard to the property at 1315 nework way the township committee and the township had previously granted an easement to the proprietor uh in building the wall and the driveway he exceeded the allowed easement he has now come back and asked for an extension uh reflecting the new property uh we calculated at the time uh a price for the easement uh and we have done a new calculation based on the additional 692 ft and that would be $6,950 so with your permission on a motion uh we will uh Grant an extension of that easement to include the new space uh there's a $110,000 escrow we'll allocate that between uh the township and the property owner and move forward great I'll move the the uh the extension Grant is there a second second yes DeLuca yes yes may yes Mr desario do you have anything else in terms of an update report well I have comments for later but I don't have any okay so what we're going to do is this okay we're going to get through the reports uh I know that the elected officials including myself will have some warm things to say about you and salute you um and then we will turn it back and our Administration as well and then we will turn it back to you for your remarks Fair yes sir okay all right all right uh Miss fritson Township Clerk I really wanted to say no report but I can't do it um just quickly a couple of things I want to report that uh parking passes are available they've been available uh commuter uh update to um township lots merchants and uh you know you have the online option as well as uh coming in person so that's um up and running uh my other report just quickly is to um tell the township committee that and and the public that we will be back in this room on New Year's Day at 2:00 p.m. for our annual reorganization meeting going to be extremely exciting because it is our first in-person annual reorganization meeting in four years so um looking forward to that and uh you know formulating details and I appreciate the help I'm getting from Township uh officials Township committee members and that is my report thank you miss fritson any questions from the township committee for Miss fritson all right reports from elected officials we'll begin with Deputy Mayor Engle um thank you mayor my one report is um last week um Mr wary and I and um some other folks from Maplewood met with Dr Gilbert from the school district at the site of the proposed Greenway so we continue to move forward with hopefully getting uh making Headway in getting approval from the schools in order to see if we can do a Greenway so I just wanted to update since that's been a conversation we've been talking about um so more to come on that and that is my only report thank you uh thank you not required any comments uh to Mr desiderio that you like to make yes yes Mr desiderio so I'm the newb here and I always say that in almost everything but I just want to thank you so much for all the time that you've given me and all the help and all the wisdom and all the guidance in this year of learning how to be a government official and Maplewood is so lucky to have had you um for your service for 30 years I'm lucky to have known you for one of those years but I'm so grateful for all that you've taught me and shown me and I hope that you still come to our meetings maybe sometimes I see a crowd of people there but I'm not sure if they're like excited for you to retire and come home or if they really want you to just stay out of their way so to see if it was really going to happen always welcome here so thank you for everything and I wish you all success in this next chapter thank you thank you Deputy Mayor any questions for the deputy mayor from the township committee okay Committee Member DeLuca thank you mayor um I have no report but I do have two statements first mayor I want to thank you oh thank you because this is your last meeting as mayor and uh hopefully not for the last time but we can wink wink I am evidenced that you can come back to life okay I you know you you've I I've said this publicly to the Press when we ran together you were one of the hardest working Mayors we've had and want to thank you for that um you got us back into this building having meetings you you worked you know to get us into a hybrid situation and it was uh uh took a while but we got here and I think we're a model for governing bodies around the state there are many who either do this or do that but don't do both so thank you for that you've um really kept us uh focused on being transparent being open uh communicating with the public and I think those are tremendous qualities and values to have so thank you for your leadership um you'll be sitting in another seat but I think you'll be of tremendous value to miss Adams as she comes in and um that's what's important important is you know as opposed to um what we saw in Washington a few years back the transfer of power works here the transfer of power worked from me from a longtime mayor to Mr McGee from Mr McGee to you from you to to misss Adams and um that's the the the beauty of this system of government our Township committee and it's the beauty of democracy so thank you um you will be remembered you will never be forgotten I'm not going anywhere so the mayor you'll be remembered as mayor and and I said as you said uh you know you might you might get up to again you never know uh and my second comment is um to this guy over there um Mr deser Dario you and I have been no no no well you've made me cry a couple times over the years so good way yeah both both of of sorrow and uh and happiness um you know you and I have worked together for long time and and um we've seen administrators come and go I was trying to figure there about eight administrators dozens or so uh department heads um many many Township committee people and the glue that kept us together was you um you kept us all in line and I mean that um in a very good way uh you are one of the most honest um strategic thoughtful um people that I've ever worked with so it has been um my pleasure and we've done a lot of good things together we've we've we've made a difference here in town um from affordable housing to some of the Reconstruction that that took place um you and I didn't always agree it was a time publicly at a meeting where you called me a weak mayor and we straightened that out right away um you you were he was describing our form of government that's how it works it is it is really a weak mayor but we we worked that out right Roger supposed but you know people take this as a job you never did you took it as this is your community and this is your passion and um and it showed it showed everything you did you didn't do it halfway you did it um completely you did it honestly uh and so thank you for everything you've done uh this won't be your last harah you're still going to be here and maybe Denise will put a little more of a leash on you you'll be you'll be you'll be going you know doing a few other things um you'll be more time to be a grandpa which is I know something that you hold special um so again it's just you certainly will never be forgotten uh for the 30 years that you put in for the township and I've had the pleasure of working with for 24 and and other times even in even the times when I wasn't on the township committee so um I just want to thank you for being my partner being my friend of being a resident being our attorney U and just being a good guy so thank you very much Roger thank you thank you very much thank you Mr DeLuca uh Committee Member Adams oh I wasn't following the agenda um so I have no report I promised you that so I don't know if you saw my text but um I did want to um I'll go in the same order that Mr Duca did and thank you uh mayor Deus for your hard work and your leadership in um studying the ship as we came back in person and and making sure we got hybrid and and just um being communicative I think that is uh something I hope to be able to do as well because I think it's important as especially in a committee form of government that we all kind of know what's going on before we come out in public um so I just want to thank you and I I um am counting on you so I'll be there for youell phone number will be there for you y um Roger thank you so much for everything see I get for clumped he doesn't he holds it all in um but um I I've admired how you speak up uh when the rest of us are are working on are discussing something you're like uh you can't no you can't you can't do that you can't talk about that that's and and try as as Mr Duca said keeping us in line um I appreciate your love of of this job and uh I know that you're going to miss it a lot um and I appreciate you telling me that um when I'm serving next year that I can contact you anytime with you've been get him in trouble did he really say that any any any historical questions or restaurant recommendations anything like that but no I appreciate your Council and your guidance and um I will miss you very much on on a day-to-day basis thank you very much and happy holidays to everybody so that's my report here thank you Miss Adams and uh I move that we extend our meeting beyond our 9:30 cut off we're getting pretty close second all right second Adams yes right yes Lua yes shangle yes mayor daff yes thank you Committee Member KP thank you mayor um just a couple of things um the end of year has come along for a youth net so um if you are in the process of thinking about your annual giving we have amazing programs at our middle schools that are supported by the contributions of this community so please if you find yourself with a little spare change and or more the money that folds versus the kind that Jingles um that you uh consider don't ating to youthnet so that our kids have after school prog programming and support um that will help them develop into better stronger better citizens here in Maplewood um second thing is the seniors advisory committee has drafted a uh statement for um in regards to the the situation here in um well not here in um the Middle East and I'd like to read it into the record the seniors advisory committee supports the statement by the township committee regarding the vand ISM of signs in front of congregation Beth ephriam on Prospect Street we also express our concern with regard to the act of vandalism recently committed at Columbia High School we're grateful for the measures being taken by the township committee and the Maplewood Police Department to make sure that our community and in particular all places of worship is safe and to ensure that hate has no place here in Maplewood representing a constituency of older Maplewood residents many of whom either personally or through their immediate forebears have experienced anti-Semitism is phobia and other forms of racism and xenophobia the senior's advisory committee urges the township committee to work with the school district local clergy community- based organizations neighborhood associations and other community stakeholders to identify ways in which we can build a cultural of mutual acceptance and good neighborliness we further encourage the township committee to create and promote opportunities for Maplewood residents to gather in neighborhood-based community activities volunteering and social events to get to better know their neighbors and to feel safe and included in their Community it was a honor to help draft this with our our community of seniors and um a big special thank you to not only um Joan Crystal the chair of the committee but step seckle the gentleman who did the majority of the writing as we all toss ideas as that committee tends to work at each other um finally I would personally like to extend a big bout of gratitude to the numerous clergy um Educators and members of the who've reached out to me personally over the last month or so including our Deputy Mayor Deb ble who we have had conversations in regards to um educating ourselves and finding ways to be able to disagree without being disagreeable um I will be drafting up a statement to offer for another date not tonight um in regards to um some of the things that were said tonight that were complete falsehoods and um we'll go from there but I do want to thank the community for their concerns for their desire to make home area safer for one another and for supporting the um communities that are being hurt currently the people who are hurting um we are proud to say that hate has no home here but sometimes it manifests itself in ugly ways and I hope that through the next years as we learn and grow together that we'll get better at it and I'm looking forward to those circles I really am I've had a lot of great conversations with organizations as well as mental health professionals who are interested in coming in and helping create those spaces for our Township to come together and share their their feelings and be able to start listening to each other in a more healthy way and that is report Sir Mr desario ah yes M I'm not the Newbie anymore but I will say that as a newbie um you were one of the things that kept me afloat there were a few many times that I could come home and spoke to my husband specifically and was like I can't do this I don't understand what's going on and you would almost my Kismet would send me an email and like you seem like you had a question and it was very nice of you to do that for me and it was wonderful to have that Ace in my pocket of someone who I could ask questions even if I thought they were stupid questions you would answer them and I see you was not only a Advocate you comfortable to ask uncomfortable questions and you wen't never afraid to say I might not have the answer but I'll get back to you and that's respectable for someone who's been doing this for 30 years so thank you for being such a model and creating such huge shoes that jent's going to have to fill because you do it you make it seem easy you make it seem easy and the community that you've created in this Administration as well as within the various members of the township committee that have come through your 30 years here is a testament to who you are as a leader as a as an attorney and as a man so thank you for being who you are and enjoy the time with those gorgeous grandkids oh my gosh look at them it's a it's a beautiful family I'll introduce them in a while thank you thank you Committee Member CRA uh I have a couple quick updates uh and then I will offer my gratitude as well to Mr desiderio uh first legislative update it's a really busy time in Trenton right now uh during what's known terrible terrible uh the lame duck session uh that means the uh the hurry to get some bills passed right now before January 9th when the new members of the legislature are sworn in uh but there are some important bills um that are moving forward um including a new affordable housing bill uh that's being promoted uh by all of the the top most influential Democratic members the Democrats uh in our legislature uh this is a bill that proposes to officially abolish COA replace the current Court settlement process with mediation panels um officially say no to uh RCA's re Regional contribution agreements which is how a lot of municipalities have thwarted their moral obligation and legal obligation to create affordable housing uh within their borders um and to generally streamline the process the details there's a lot of more details in the bill we are watching it very closely uh it may affect our next round of negotiations uh uh round four start uh in July 2025 is our round ending um and we're watching it closely but this bill it has a lot of traction and it is moving um I'm I'm glad to report uh the quite opposite about a bill uh that may have affected the uh Oprah or opma we love our we love our acronyms in government that's the open uh Records act or the open uh meetings ACT public meetings act um there were were some efforts to uh what can only be described as uh demolish transparency in requesting um records from from government and uh create unnecessary burdens on private citizens and companies and nonprofits in uh making requests for information from government uh this bill seems to have lost traction and the legislators who were promoting it are now saying well maybe we should take more time and be more thoughtful so let's talk about being more thoughtful Roger if I may um it's no secret to anyone that I came here a blazing right fist up in the air um impatient cure in my advocacy and we buted heads in the beginning but you made me more thoughtful more strategic and overall a stronger public servant thank you for your mentorship and uh we've become friends too during the process so I want to thank you for for what you've done for me and I want to thank you for your tremendous tremendous public service to the great community of Maplewood and I see your family here your beautiful family I want to thank them especially Denise for sharing so much of him with us 30 years of sitting here instead of being with you and being with the rest of the family and to our youth in the crowd yeah I'm speaking to you all handsome youth they're like you're such nerds listen to an old guy up here on the mic spend as much time as you can with him listen to him he is truly an incredible human being and you will be better off for it really I'm serious I know you guys are what teenagers and you have a lot of more important things to do and friends to hang out with but this is a man you should grow up to be he really really is so happy retirement Roger thank you mayor um I also um want to say that personally um you know I always get emotional at these things um I can't help myself I always say I'm never going to do it um you know being the chair has been incredibly thrilling and rewarding I've enjoyed it a lot um as some of my colleagues have already remarked I think I've been collaborative and communicative and uh I've led us through some tough times the past couple of years in Maplewood and uh I look forward to remaining collaborative uh remaining uh a strong public servant and I'm really really excited to step aside and let our women take over and I'm excited for Committee Member Adams and you bet you I will be by your side to offer support whenever you need it we will look forward to your leadership and to Deputy Mayor KP look forward to your leadership as well and my thoughts to the community um it's been really tough out there um there's a lot going on around the world and right here and we don't always have the right words and we have to do better and we have to connect um we are not healthy when we are where we are right now I think Deputy Mayor Engle really said it best we have to come together we have to listen to each other we have to see each other and everyone has to feel like they're included in the town that they live in in our sister town because we are one community so I pledge that I will love more in the new year love is not just a feeling it's a an act You Love by including You Love by sharing You Love by supporting and I pledge to do that more in the new year with everyone our Arab and Muslim neighbors our Jewish neighbors and friends and everyone and find ways for us to continue raising awareness of anti-Semitism and islamophobia and in bringing us together and at times it will be uncomfortable but as I always say through pain comes growth and last but not least I hope that we all will find the time to let a little joy in our hearts um as we head into the rest of the holiday season towards the end of the month so happy joy More Love happy holidays and that's my report thank you now I'm going to turn it over to our administrator do you have any comments for Mr desiderio I do thank yes please Roger I I have been here eight short months in that time you've been a tremendous mentor to me and and that's something that um I feel you did with a great amount of purpose um and and I thank you for that I am fortunate that we had a lot to do in those eight months we got to work together um closely I'm fortunate that it feels like I worked with you for longer than eight months so uh so that is uh a benefit to me you are a fair and steady hand in a position where that's incredibly important and your interest in the success of Maplewood is evident in all you do and I thank you for that thank you Patrick thank you Mr warry and last but not least Miss fritson I know you have a few words so um first mayor I want to start with you and I want to say that you know I tell people I tell the other department heads I have the honor of sharing an office store with the mayor which no other employee here has and you're chuckling because you're a former mayor so you know like I have like uh you know a direct path into the mayor's office and he has a direct path into mine and you and I have had fun the last two years and you are the first mayor in my tenure here that has ever burned candles and I love it and and I love it because I think it was a really calming effect for both of us yes it was a calming effect you know just because just because you snuck in the back office door all the time he lost his key she's telling all your I always heard I always heard that oldfashioned uh guard that's on the door when you were coming through because we always left it unlocked for you we Gemma adored you she was on your security team I think she was good for you and you were good for her another calming thing and I thank everybody the township committee included for allowing me the privilege to bring my golden retriever to work since covid um for three and a half years she had the greatest life um I told you when you became the mayor that I would tell it to you straight if I thought you were doing something that wasn't going to be popular or wrong I did and you and I talk things out all the time so what if I have you know 30 seconds notice for a proclamation that you have to take Saturday morning I also took your calls um but we had a great time together and I really want to thank you um for being the person you are and we had a lot of laughs and we got lot done yes we did so mayor um I'm going to miss you on the other side of the wall and you did a great job you you you've been super for the people of Maplewood congratulations I appreciate that thank you but don't be a stranger and I really loved our lunches too okay Roger so um you know what I'm gonna start off with a little history first because I have access to history and then I'll say a couple of comments personally so you were first appointed by mayor Grassmere Jay Harry Smith Ellen Davenport Connie Cosgrove and Jerry Ryan um and you serve with nine Mayors Robert H Grassmere Ellen Davenport Gerard Ryan Victor Duca Fred or profetta Jr Kenneth Pettis Victor Duca Frank McGee and The Honorable Dean Davis those were the mayors I am not going to read every Township committee person's name but you serve with 25 of them and that's a lot but guess what Roger only one [Laughter] toship um then I always like to do my statistical thing um so 30 years of Township committee meetings and I always base it on the minimum of 25 meetings a year which is two a month plus rorg right so um if you do the math you're looking at minimum 750 meetings in this room and based on tonight's meeting and others it depended on who the mayor was they were even longer I base them on uh four-hour meetings and if you take 750 meetings and do a mere four hours uh you've had over 3,000 hours in this room that's a lot that's a lot of hours you were there every minute of everything so um Roger one thing a lot of people don't know if you and I have known each other longer than 30 years because when I worked in the recreation department previous to be being promoted to be the Township Clerk you and I first met there you were a coach of your two daughters that I've known a lifetime and I was a program supervisor and Senior citizen coordinator and um I remember you at our coach coach mentorship um programs I even remember you vividly at a first aid class I taught for coaches in the Civic house so you and I have been together for over 40 years I would have to say um I want to thank you for everything you've done for me over the past 30 years that you've been here I've only had uh two other Township attorneys one for a year and Morty cats for four years so um you've been it and you've kept my feet on the ground you've kept me calm um you and I have certainly two different personalities and um you've always kept me out of trouble that's the main thing and out of jail and out of jail and out of jail when when o when Oprah came in Liz was concerned about going to jail I still am um you've been a friend I speak to you more on the phone every single day than I speak to anybody including my children um and and you don't mind calling me on holidays weekends nights and if I had to call you I would do it as well so we've had like I would call A a partnership for 30 years that you've been the township attorney and I've been the Township Clerk um I don't know what I'm going to do without you because it's just what I'm so used to is having you to lean on rely upon and to guide me and um I know your whole family Denise your daughters I get every Christmas card those kids get bigger every year uh um so when you work with somebody for 30 years and you're as tight as you and I are we all get to know each other's family and you get to know mine as well and my kids grew up with Mr desiderio calling me um Roger I'm gonna miss you terribly um I can't believe I'm not crying I think it will hit come by my house on Friday nights you know drop something [Laughter] off I think it will hit me um eventually and um I mean you've been like you know a catalyst for my long career because of you and I love you and I thank you thank you Liz I do have some comments mayor is this the appropriate time yes it is I actually want to make comments with regard to groups that I have um worked with and and been responsible for first to the residents of Maplewood I have over these years always tried to treat you with the respect that you deserve I've tried to answer every phone call I've tried to answer every email I've not always answer given you the answer that you want but I've always tried to be responsive you deserve no less and hopefully I discharge my duty in that regard if someone I missed I apologize because it was never my intention to do that to my co-workers the staff here in Maplewood I always tried to offer as much support for you as possible I've tried to always be accessible to you I've tried to make your job easier I've tried to never ever leave you unprotected or leave you out on a limb I think with regard at least to the last part right Liz I've done a good job with regard to that this is a dedicated staff they're hardworking and I enjoyed working with them engineers and police Chiefs and Fire Chiefs and administrators only one town clerk um but anyway um but you know when I wrote this I said you know singling out people is tough because somebody's feelings might get hurt but I can't not do this um Liz you've been special to me okay if we talk once a day we talk three times a day uh and it's substantive I mean it's not just it's not you know she's actually doing her job I don't want to suggest that she's not but uh you know we'll talk about agenda items and we'll talk about resolutions and we'll talk about ordinances you know and am I taking care of this or what do we going to do with that and we're coordinating um and she is special um she deserve all she deserves all the accolades that she gets from the state and from her Association she is the best all right and Liz I love you too okay and just as an aside I keep Patrick weary I think he's a keeper yes we agree we agree we agree to my uh my bendit Winestock uh family um I've been there 43 years I think uh and over those uh last 30 obviously they've supported me uh with regard to being the township attorney there were several attorneys there who I would bounce things off of uh some of whom you know some of whom you've met Chris tily uh or is was available to me uh she helped with affordable housing she helped with rent control uh when we had first amendment questions she'd be the one I'd go to when we had conflicts between the uh the issues of on religious issues okay she was there my other one was Bill gold who um always had an opinion sometimes they we even right but he always had an opinion and it was a good person to bounce things off of um and then over the course of the last two or three years uh hay uh in my office would be my assistant and was helpful in uh in in uh doing all of the work that we do here uh but I would be remiss if I didn't talk to person who helped me for the first 27 years stand up there miss Patricia when you talk about LoveHate relationships okay uh Patricia and I were together 27 how many 30 27 doing Maplewood stuff uh she left once she came back she quit several times uh she came back I never fired you though you did quit I did fire you just once but I will tell you that it she's been where's Jimmy thank God for you buddy um but she is a friend uh she she's just delightful she was always supportive I think she couldn't love Maplewood more than I [Music] love she she certainly could not have done I certainly could not have done this could not have done this without her to my elected officials and I call them my elected officials because that's the way I always felt about every one of you um it was not always easy because sometimes you guys had different opinions and different thoughts and different suggestions and I would try to bring everybody together I have to go back Liz I'm I'm I'm hate to correct you but I think you were wrong about who appointed me I have I have I have in 1994 Ellen Davenport Bert Leeman the late Jerry Ryan that's true because I had 1993 I thought you 1994 okay elected official by the name of Susanne Gibbons Susanna Gibbons okay you remember Susanna okay and Liz remembers her and and Bob grassme was a member of that first Township committee um and they formed the government and they said uh you know well you'll be the township attorney and it was kind of like the blind leading the blind okay because Ellen had never been the mayor before although she had been on the township committee uh and um and we took it over and we did okay and 30 years later we're here uh and doing it uh wrapping it up actually I again at the sake of of of um offending anybody I have to talk about Vic Vic is special okay uh as much as I love this town he loves it at least as much and maybe more okay we'll go to meetings especially when I have meetings with people from South Orange I say I ble I bleed Maplewood bleed Maplewood would and I do okay and Vic does as well his his work is tireless his work with affordable housing has been has been great he is effectively building this Library okay I couldn't be built without him his efforts are unbelievable um I thank you with the exception of calling you that weak mayor I think I think that's the only thing I can think of that that we may have had a disagreement about so and I was talking about the form of government I wasn't talking about the individual but anyways thank you so much Vic for everything that we've we've done together I feel that we've accomplished so many things and I and I appreciate your friendship uh and I appreciate Janie sharing you with us so thank you very much okay moving on to my family you're not getting away with anything so first my grandchildren okay so if you would stand up this is Luke spel and this is James bavard and this is Ryan spel and this is Jackson babiar and this is L Fel these are my five grandchildren who who who I love who I love unconditionally and who give me support and and and happiness and and joy to my life so thank you all guys I appreciate you all so much thank you my daughters okay chrisy and jackling okay you have to stand up too yeah oh is said that good story and some of you some of you know this story maybe everybody knows the story so I did run for office in 1986 got my butt kicked I guess okay but we all all Democrats did back then it was it was just kind of we were just kind of you know Harvey Harvey weissbort and Ellen Ellen lost the first time I feel by name of Pat roach I mean good candidates but at least I thought they were good candidates okay but quick story sorry Jack so so so we we we had the election in November obviously and we had the after party at our house on colinwood road where we lived then and Jacqueline was seven I guess five okay five years old in any event so we're there and listen you know we didn't really expect to win I think oh yeah yeah you do honestly you don't run if you don't think you're gonna win you never think you're gonna but anyway we're it up and having a drink and I see Jacqueline's crying I said what's the matter she says I can't believe that people wouldn't vote for you a now fast forward if it was the year 2020 we didn't really lose that election they stole it from us they stole it from us there you go in any event my two daughters have been great their support their support has been um you know endless and and and you know you just have the joys of life and when you have family there is nothing better and thank you girls so much for it back in the back corner okay is my son-in-law Tom spel and Tom Tom is is someone that I can bounce things off of and he keeps me balanced and it's just it's just great okay so thank you Tom but he he's said he's recovering from a cold so yeah ostracize from the then of course there's Denise okay my wife had 50 years all right uh I know she doesn't possibly be my wife for 50 years but she is uh we couldn't have done this without her support okay with her thank you okay we need you we we we we we couldn't do these things without the wife and support of our wives so I thank you so much our spouses I don't mean to be sexist [Laughter] okay tran okay but you were there every step of the way you were there when I'm leaving is it going to be a long meeting I said well it's not too long uh when Mr profet was mayor I said yes it's going to be long and there were times we come home at midnight or after midnight and it was kind of crazy but you were always there for all of the years and I thank you so much for all your support I'm almost done finally to our Maplewood in 1981 1980 okay Denise and I had moved to Maplewood in 1976 and we bought our first house on boen Parkway and then we were looking for uh our our second home where we live presently and people told us that we shouldn't we should get out of Maplewood it was shot that was the word shot okay what was that Code for ah it's becoming integrated okay and we said what kind of baloney is this okay so we bought our present home where we raised our two children okay and um had a great marvelous experience this is a wonderful vibrant place to work it is welcoming it is everything uh that it could possibly be I have to comment about this building every time I ride by this building on Valley Street my chest pumps out I'm so proud of this building it is an edifice to this town it is the stability of this town this building was built I think was dedicated 1939 or 1937 39 39 yeah think about that no that this that means this building was built in the heart of the depression okay in the heart of depression they they had the foresight to get this land build it across from a spectacular Park and build this building and it just it's great pride that I that I am so proud to be a Maplewood resident and to have worked with Maplewood so while I recognize that our Maplewood is not perfect it sure in hell is better than 95% of the other places to live so I am just happy to have been a part of it so thank you very much you're here so we're going to take a 10-minute recess and then um carry on with our meeting to anti room for a snack right yes we can grab a cookie and come back 10minute recess we will uh rejoin 10 five uh we're back on we're resuming our meeting folks we had a little bit of a recess thank thank you for joining us again um I Believe Miss Al zubi you wanted to address us please I'm not sure we can hear it uh the mic doesn't seem to be on hit the button again thank you please okay that's a lot okay all right so [Music] um I just wanted to say uh that I think I came here or my me coming here today is not a coincidence it's Destiny and um although I came you know like with broken heart of what's going on uh the bright side that I've seen a lot of love and appreciation from all of you to each other and this shows that we do have um a very you know like beautiful heart and um great minds in our leaders and I know I left it's 25 25 years I've never seen this moment today I'm witnessing it it's um you know like I I've learned about you today but I haven't learned in years exactly and every one of you it's like so amazing to learn this about you in like one hour or like less than an hour uh I really appreciate you and although I left the city but I'm still connected and I'm going to reconnect to connect you to connect my existing Community with my new community we love that thank you I love you all thank you very much okay we're moving on to our discussion items we have three we will start with a presentation uh by Committee Member Duca our demographic study of membership maplewood's boards and committees Mr Duca thank you mayor as part of our process every year we do a survey of the membership of our boards and committees uh this is an anonymous survey it is voluntary we send it out um I just say we send it out I send it out about five times because it's hard to get it's hard it's hard but uh I got the last few this afternoon and and put this together I'm going to go through this real quickly this is part of our commitment of diversity and inclusion and um can you rot yeah roll roll that down a little bit we're going to see a chart come up so the question as you see we asked these questions and um so this is a question of how they identify and um what you'll see is this is the current year so 62% of the respondents are white 26 black africanamerican Latino and you can see the chart there and then it go to the next uh chart I guess I move this here okay why you okay I just try to show that's that one there yeah so this is just a trend line so again this takes it from uh 2018 so you have one two three four five six years and this shows that in 2018 our membership on boards and committees was 74% white and 14% black African-American um and now we've uh as we wanted to do we wanted to uh increase the diversity of our boards and committees so we've gone from 14% to 26% black African-Americans and we've reduced the white membership uh our Hispanic membership has grow grown to 6% um from under 2% six years ago um the Asian and uh multiple races has pretty much stayed the same now just to give you um if you go back to that pie chart again just give you a quick so our demographics of the Town white 50% African-American 33% Latino 8% Asian 3 and two and more races of 3% so um we're we're we're right on with our uh Latino Hispanic we we have 6% and the population is 8% Asian we have 1% population's 3% two or more we have 3% and the population's 3% uh White is 50% the population we at 62% and 33% African-American and 26 so we still have some room Room to Grow but all the trends are we going in the right direction so yeah it's great um and then if you go to the next charts this is the we ask just to identify if male female non-binary so again 59% of our appointees are female 40% male 1% non-binary if you go to that little uh chart again you can see we flipped from Over the six years we used to be uh more men than women and we've uh switched over the years to switch that around and just to give you uh the demographics in the town uh male is 51% and female is 49% in the town and then we talk about the age again uh what we found over the years is The Sweet Spot of being involved in membership on boards and committees is 40 to 60 years old and um that happens to be the top age group in in town it's 45 to 65 so uh it pretty much corresponds with that um we are getting a little better and some of the younger ages but um you know that's gone up a little bit but again you know if you go to that chart there you can just see these are just trend lines we don't really have to go over these things but you'll see that when you do we do ask uh if the person next next one is the person is a tenant or an owner we have tried over the years to uh involve more tenants um we our high here was in 2021 we had 9% we're being pretty consistent around 7% but most of the participants are homeowners so that's something we can continue to work on over the years we've increased our representation of from the lgbtq plus Community we're at 6% um and that's gone up from 4% six years ago you go to the next one uh this this is a very busy chart but this shows you're living here in town um again uh the the real high number is uh the 30 30 years and over we we have a lot of people who have been here a long time and it makes sense they're they're vested they want to stay in the communities they they stay on the Committees for a while um and they want to um uh give back to the community and so you're here for a few years and you say I want to be on a on a committee um let's see go to the next one is the chart here so what's interesting here is that 57% of our members of boards and committees those are the first two columns all the way to the right the first two lines 57% are on our committees for under five years it's a relatively new group which is good because we want to we want to have the benefit of having new people on some seasoned people and people in the middle and that's what we're seeing here but clearly 57% are five years and and um and less and then uh if they've been reappointed again 57% are in their first term or have been reappointed once and that's good to see um and then just to wrap it up on the next are they familiar with the code of conduct yes 87% we asked um you know their committee meetings and and uh we saw 55% in the last 30 days so our committees are very busy um we had 1% that didn't meet this is good for us does your committee have an active participation have active participation from a Township committee Mee member 93% said yes so we're there and do you think your committee is making progress again 88% said yes this is actually a little down from last year um and that could just be you know who answered and and something that gone on so um this is something we we uh do every year as I said we'll do a final because there might be some more coming in and then we will uh put this on our website and we share this with the Community Coalition on Race So and this hopefully will guide us as we go forward and think about appointments in 2024 we do have some holes we want to we do have AO U vacancies we and we probably need to be a little more intentional to make sure that we're following this pattern fantastic thank you committee man DeLuca any questions or comments Township committee before I Eat My Cookie yes go eat your cookie um our next item is a uh proposed Community host agreement for applicant bud and leaf delivery LLC they are a classic cannabis delivery applicant who was approved at the last Township committee to operate uh delivery service within the township of Maplewood subject to the uh mutually beneficial execution of a community host agreement the community host agreement that's uh being proposed to the township committee this evening has been circulated to the committee in advance uh and it has been shared with the applicant and I'm pleased to um to report the applicant uh and her attorney have agreed to the terms the community host agreement is uh nearly identical to the community host agreement that we have required of the other cannabis licenses thus far operating within the township uh it's slightly modified to account for the different Revenue model of delivery lenses uh they work essentially off of commission of delivery of product uh they're not retailers themselves and so we had to adjust our community host agreement uh to that so I um I'm going to open the floor to the township committee for any discussion of the proposed Community host agreement any comments or remarks I think it's good you did a good job thank you I will move the community host agreement to I have a second second Adams yes M K yes Mr DeLuca yes SLE yes mayor daffis yes thank you I believe the applicant is in the audience is there you go I can see you do you wish to make any comments why not tonight is the night of comments of comments yes welcome please introduce yourself yes my name is viia Jackson founder and president of but and leaf delivery I thank the committee for approving the community host agreement and reading it I aligned it aligned a lot with my values and what I want to commit to the community and I already feel very excited about and already in my mind are like what am I going to do how am I going to get um uh you know the association in Hilton and I was like I want to you know more than just Hilton the greater encompassing community just rather in the section that I reside in um so we've modified that and just the I'm I'm excited just not for the business Point portion to serve the community but to serve the community in general um with the ideas and initiatives that I have so I thank you guys very much for the approval and now I'm on to my next initiative to go to the state so we're just treading along this it's a lot it's been a very long journey to year and I want to thank um the committee and mayor Dean daffis and Roger for you know helping to get that um host agreement intact in a short amount of time that we had so I really appreciate that absolutely thank you for your presentation at the last meeting it was very comprehensive and thoughtful and congratulations uh we have the resolution uh of local approval on the consent agenda tonight Mr does Aur you want to comment about that I was just going to say that after you pass you can if you need want to pick up a copy from Mrs fren she can sign it because she has to submit it to Trenton so okay okay yep thank you thank you thank you very much and just for the Public's edification out there nope that's fine did you want to say something else no oh I know everyone loves a mic right um so for the public certification all cannabis lenses within the township that have been approved uh our approval was always conditioned on a Community host agreement that means that in in return for our approving their application so long of course as it meets all the requirements of the state regulations to operate in the Cannabis space we also require them to be good neighbors that's what a community host agreement is meaning the host is the township and the applicant or the lensey rather agrees to be a good neighbor they agree to work with the neighborhood associations they agreed to sponsor local events they agree to host local events they agree to contribute to our Municipal Alliance which is a partnership that we have with school district um and through the county of Essex that does anti-substance abuse education and programming and support um they agreed to be a neighbor and a partner and uh we're delighted that um this applicant will be doing the same and we wish them all the best in securing their state annual license okay um the next item is 2024 pool fees Deputy Mayor angle thank you mayor um so this year in our health and Community Services meeting we've had a lot of conversation around um our current pull fees and how um they make uh an unaffordable for some people to join our pool and it's called a community pool and what kind of pool do we want to have here in Maplewood and historically our pool has been set up as a separate utility with the Mandate that it should be self- sustainable um but it just feels like costs are rising and is that mandate even actually possible um and so we've been talking about it I'm very um lucky to have Mr Duca serving on that committee with me this year because he brings the histor iCal knowledge and the understanding of Municipal law and Municipal budgeting and how to actually get things done um and so what we want to talk about today is a policy decision um for us to discuss um and I'm just going to read what Mr Duca wrote and then I'm going to send it over to you which is for reasons of Financial and climate Equity beginning in 2024 the township committee will balance membership fees with an allocation of Township funding to make the pool more accessible to all um so Mr jca do you want to just take over from there and continue the conversation thank um thank you so the idea here is as you said is to have a plan over the next few years to reduce the fee and we've talked about some targeting of trying to reduce the fee about 50% and um it really will depend on the amount of available resources we have year to year in the budget part of that is we have a cap situation and that you can't make a major infusion in one budget year because we have a limit of three and a half% cap in uh increase that's a cap in our budget so during our budget process that begins in January we will take a look at what is our cap space What can we expand the budget uh by what's the amount and then we'll look at all the other needs that we have in down because we have salaries going up we have other cost utilities go up and things like that some of those are outside the cap some of those are in the cap then we'll make a determination of what we have and we'll make a proposal a monetary proposal of how much we can allocate to the pool now just to be clear we've already we already do some allocation both uh formally and informally we allocate last year we allocated $225,000 we also informally allocate resources of our finance office Department of community services so there's a lot of support that goes to the pool already from the town side and this is just a a cleaner process and what we're talking about is that we'll make some reduction in the fee next year again based on what that cap space is know that we'll determine that in February we'll pass an ordinance to uh set that fee so that who memberships will be available in March uh the idea is as you said we will um keep the pool as a separate utility so this way money that comes in uh can stay in that pot it doesn't have to go to the general fund but we will eliminate that self liquidation fund self- support notion mandate so this way we'll be able to put money in and'll be able to open the pool to more people we hope that even in future years because an increase in membership that will have additional fee Revenue so that any allocation of tax money will even be uh either mark you know not go up as much or even if if we were to explode in membership be able to maintain that levels but but I think this is we're all in agreement we've talked about this a long time making the pool a more open pool um and making it accessible to to more folks in the community and this is how we intend to do that thank you so we wanted to bring it here to this meeting as a discussion item to just see if we had our colleague support to move in this direction as we start looking at budget season and playing with the numbers so I don't know process-wise if we have to do anything or well I think we first have to all be on the same page with this policy yes I'm a yes yeah 110% my goodness please make the community pull for the community right okay so do we need a official vote on that loud Adams yes spr yes Mr DeLuca zle yes mayor yes more to come more to come forward to it yes I move that we uh adopt our consent agenda second Adams yes PR yes Mr Luca fangle yes mayor dfish yes and this brings us to our second public comment period um are there any members here with us in person who wish to yes please sir welcome come up to the mic introduce yourself three minutes welcome it's on and my name is Paul Parsons I live at 10 Park Avenue in Maplewood um I'm really here tonight to congratulate Roger um I first met Roger you know I've I'm like a 46 year res president of Maplewood uh we raised our four daughters here two of my uh daughters are raising their families here um just had a granddaughter graduate from Columbia last year oh my God but that's how I met Roger years ago probably coaching um his daughters Jackie and chrisy were uh elementary school friends of two of my daughters so that's how I first got to me him but the reason I really came up is to thank him um for the last 30 years or so I've been the municipal tax assessor in Union Township and as you know we share a border quite a lengthy border and um sometimes it's a complicated borderers the Border doesn't down the middle of the street some a lot of properties so over the years there have been certain times when I've reached out to Roger and if he W you know nor normally I'd get him right away but if I didn't he'd get back to me immediately um and it's not just you know there were certain issues that involved Maplewood and Union that we would talk about but then I found as I got to know him a little bit more that way that when I had a situation in Union that I wasn't quite sure about I could call a municipal attorney who was very knowledgeable in another municipality and he would spend as much time as this was necessary to uh help me through the situation so not only has he been giving advice to May Woods Municipal officials but uh unions also at least to me um and so I I thank you Roger he would spend as much time as was necessary and uh it was always very much appreciated um now I'm just a finish and I'm not sure if you know how competitive he can be um he probably doesn't remember this but when uh his daughter Jack I think it was Jackie not Christy and she was probably about 10 um he was coaching her team and I was coaching with another fellow my um my daughter in the girls softball there were about 10 I think anyway it was the last game of the season we were both tied for first place I'll tell you why he doesn't remember it we were tied for first place and the game ended in a tie there's some young man umpire who doesn't really know what to do so we have a conversation says what do you want to do so I mean I didn't I was okay walking away but Roger Roger said no I think we should play it out um I think we should play the game out and Champion okay that sounds so the reason I remember this and he doesn't who do you think won I just wanted to thank you for all your help um when I was the assessor I was appreciated and thank you very much thank you thank you for sharing that wonderful story I thought he was gonna say rock paper scissors so other members of the public here in person who wish to share remarks seeing none we will move to online any hands raised Mr warry yes mayor I'm moving John Gordon over to public portion Mr Gordon you're now in public portion you have three minutes to speak please unmute yourself hi this is actually uh his wife Carrie um I wanted to say I'm thankful to miss kripe for speaking out on the side of freedom and justice instead of apartheid in fascism my family is Christian Palestinian this is not a religious conflict this isn't a centuries long conflict this is about 75 years of occupation which is maintained by apartheid and ethnic cleansing my mother-in-law is a Palestinian refugee from 1948 she fled bombing and her family was not allowed to return to their home she still has the deed and the key she remembers living with Jewish people without conflict she remembers that they participated in each other's holidays if Jesus were born today he would be born under Rubble Mary and Joseph would have to travel through 15 Israeli checkpoints and scale a 30-foot wall to reach Bethlehem when Palestinians say from The River To The Sea Palestine will be free they may leave it living in Freedom and equality which includes Jewish people it is not anti-semitic to criticize Israel apartheid or genocide under international law people have the right to resist occupation to give an analogy if space aliens came to Maplewood kicked everyone out of their houses and walled us off in Memorial Park Would we not resist of course we would this is about occupation um please I hope the rest of the council will educate yourselves look Beyond CNN and New York Times follow Palestinians in Gaza every day day I see the most horrific pictures I've ever seen in my life and each the genocide gets worse um please I really we need a ceasefire now resolution please I beg beg the Maplewood Town Council I beg our assembly members I beg our Congress people I beg our son Senators uh we need a ceasefire please please it's really desperate it's horrific this is not right we should stand against genocide silence is complicity please ceasefire now ceasefire now thank you Miss Gordon any other raised hands I am moving over Zoe to public portion Zoe you're now in public comment you have three minutes to speak um hi can you hear me okay yes yes we can okay uh first off I just want to say hello my name is Zoe um I am not a resident of Nabor wood or South Orange but I live uh in your neighbor West Orange um and so as such I felt a moved to come speak here um I first off am uh 17 years old I attend West Orange High School where we have also um been exposed uh to the opinions of zionists in our town um unfortunately West Orange has a large population of zionists um and as a Jewish person myself um the descendant of a holocaust Survivor um the conflict happening overseas to me is not a conflict but history repeating itself and I think at this point there is no convincing zionists uh pro-israel um people of uh the need for a ceasefire the only thing that we can do is lay out the facts and evidence we can show them the photos of children under Rebel crying for help we can speak the names of the martyred Palestinians we can do all of this but we cannot do is show them that Palestinians are worth uh living and I feel like just as a Jewish person uh as someone who thanks my great-grandmother my bubby every day uh one the oldest of seven siblings and the only one to make it out of that genocide uh I thank her every day for her strength and I just mourn the fact that we do this the world does this again and the world does not learn and we do not learn and I just can't understand how Jewish people feel that there is justification for this genocide Jewish people I urge you please please open your eyes and I hate to compare but imagine that it was Jews being bombs right now the thing that you are afraid of is happening to somebody else and because it's not happening to you you don't feel the need to speak up about it that makes no sense to me and so I come from West Orange on the zoom call tonight you know I'm a high school student so I'm supposed to have school tomorrow um I come here at almost 11m to tell this to you because it is so important and it is multigenerational and it is not there is no gray area this is black and white purely this is life or death and we need to do something about it ceas fire now thank you thank you Zoe thank you for joining us from West Orange any other hands raised if any other members of the public would like to speak in public portion please raise your hand now there are no other hands raised mayor seeing none we will close the public comment and I move that we adjourn second M Adams yes K yes Mr DeLuca Miss Engle yes mayor D yes all right good night everybody happy holidays see you on the 1 thank you mayor good night thank those kind words