##VIDEO ID:q9bDbBSe2DQ## e e e e e e e e e e good evening everyone in accordance with Section Five of the open public meetings act be advised that a notice of this meeting was made by posting on the bulletin board in town hall and forwarding to the officially designated newspapers that this meeting would take place at Town Hall at 7 pm on Tuesday October 15 2024 meeting details and the draft agenda were also posted on our Township website please stand to salute the flag [Music] roll call vote Please Mr Cohen here miss puus Deputy Mayor sakandi here Mr Stoler mayor Romano yes thank you I would like to make a motion to revise the agenda to pull resolution 24239 24-240 and 24241 appointing members to the citizen advisory committee on affordable house may I have a second second roll call vote Please Mr Cohen yes Deputy Mayor sakam Mandy yes Mr stoer Mayor Romano yes thank you may have a motion to approve the agenda as revised may have a second all those in favor you may I have a motion to approve the agenda so move may I have a second all those in favor I may I have a motion to approve the October 1st 2024 regular Township committee minutes so may I have a second second all those in favor I may I have a motion to approve the October 1st 2024 special Township committee minutes so move may have a second all those in favor I okay reports uh Deputy Mary do you want to start this week sure um so the environmental commission um wanted me to let everyone know that the final open space trust fund information session will take place Wednesday October 23rd from 7: to 8:00 pm on the second floor auditorium at the library EC would like all residents to bring their questions and hear the opportunity for the benefits that an open space trust fund will open up for milberg one benefit of which residents may not be aware is that the county and State dollars that will become available to Milburn for acquiring and improving open space Playing Fields Trails parks and historic places the many New Jersey municipalities that already have an open space trust fund have access to these matching and other open space funds the surveys that have been conducted over the past few years in Milburn show residents resounding desire for more open space to enjoy all types of outdoor activities when you vote this November the ballot question for which you should cast the yes or no vote is the question asking if you decide if you want Milburn to have an open space trust fund please attend the October 23rd info session at the library to learn more you can also find more information on the environmental commission page on the township website and just a reminder if you vote by mail Please be aware that the open space Trust on the ballot question is printed on the back side of your ballot so please don't forget to flip over your ballot I just want to add I'm thankful to the environmental commission and Priya for all the work she's done all summer full to get the word out on that um committe I don't have any reports the planning board to me uh Comm M okay um Recreation committee registration for winter Recreation programs are open uh programs are filling up quick so make sure you he on going Community pass and sign up uh basketball leagues and the ski program is renewed this year for 6 through 12th graders uh that's skiing at shaune my daughter is on it so I'm going to be up there on every Sunday uh special improvement district uh the annual meeting and budget introduction is this Thursday at 5:30 pm here in town hall um we're going to go over the uh final proposed budget uh as well as the key performance indicators we set up to measure the the effectiveness of that of that improvement district um Town Hall Plaza live music on Saturday from 6:30 to 9:30 uh and the local new local business experiential Milburn indoor golf will have a table so any questions you can go up and talk to them about it October 15th uh explor is teaming with a paper mill Playhouse for a celebration of Hispanic uh Heritage Month uh starting at 6:30 at Town Hall Plaza and there'll be storytelling uh and music from Columbia Town Hall Plaza kickoff downtown Halloween event on October 31st for all the children then the tour of the Town social campaign continues we've had 20 businesses already released B Board of Education two new students uh representatives were sworn in at the last meeting Junior Jackson Ruddy and Senior Zachary Gat uh there was a huge turnout of parents and students to discuss the new grading system uh the new student representative glat reported that in his survey students 86 lik the new grading system uh and uh sophomore bager DT bagery submitted a petition from parents uh supporting the new grading system joint Fields uh we're gonna have an on-site meeting at the high school to go over and discuss the feasibility study that's on I believe Friday uh emergency dispatch um we're reviewing the lease and with more details to come uh flood mitigation uh committee uh this is going fantastic um we have a uh meeting on uh October 28th a public session at 7 p.m at the Milburn Public Library uh I really encourage everyone to come out and see the work that the flood mitigation committee is doing um we're also uh bringing and exploring additional instrumentation for both branches of the raway the Van Winkle Brook that will improve our data GA gathering capabilities uh this gives us ability to formulate potential solutions to the ongoing issue of flooding so I'm going bring that up in front of the uh uh TC soon and they we're also going to install seven video cameras at key locations so uh during uh major storms We Have Eyes on uh which is very important and I'm also going to bring that along with the instrumentation so uh big big shout out to all everybody on flood mitigation for making these improvements and I want to see everybody at the uh library on the 28th that'll be on next meeting is agenda yes uh and then affordable housing I could talk for a couple hours on that I'm going to defer to councel uh there's no lack of uh of surprise every time we get something back from uh the fair share of Housing and judge s tomorrow but I will bite my tongue that's it thank you um so The Pedestrian safety Advisory Board met last week and uh we're continuing our uh C our safety campaign and the school has been um great to helping us uh and helping us to share the message we're also going to try a uh show me the flag initiative if I said it right um Springfield has it on um I guess it's myel or Springfield misel where um on the corners there's Flags um by I guess it's a stop sign there and when someone wants across the street Mr bomber you had mentioned this I think um you hold the you hold the flag up and you cross the street and then you put it on the other side so we're going to um try it uh in town and see see how that works um also we're going to be putting a flashing be flashing Beacon up at um on Highland Avenue over by Christ church and then the chief just reported with um the stops that they conducted uh over the past couple of weeks so interesting there were uh 29 in the downtown there were 45 on Bridgewood and Winningham and oh I don't have hogard and Highland sorry about that and then there were ALS they also did uh speed studies and the average speed on Woodland Road was 24 miles an hour the average speed on Park viw was 26 and the average on mountain mountain view was 26 so found that uh very interesting um [Music] um I think that was it did I miss anything is there G to be education on the flag on the flag yes I think DPW is gathering everything and putting everything together and then figure it out from there so yeah uh oh yeah sorry uh just another announcement the general election is on Tuesday November 5th for the those who vote at Community congregation church at 200 hardn D drive due to the construction at the church there is a polling location room change and voters will be entering through the front of the church and will not be entering through the back as they normally do parking will be available on hard torn drive and in the back of the church handicap parking will be available immediately in front and voting will be at the same location and just in different rooms and voters will be entering ing from the front of the church so that's for districts 5 8 11 14 15 and 16 Mr um not too much to report mayor but uh just in answering the question about the show me Flags uh yes once we have those in place we'll make sure that we do uh a short educational video on that to put out for Via social much like we've done with the uh flashing beacons um so just continue to encourage people to push those buttons so that they uh make the cars aware that they're looking to cross the street um just has there been a problem with SE with these flags I mean no I I I drive through Springfield a lot and they're always there and people do use them across the street okay I mean it works sorry sorry it's like an orange flag I pushed the button and it flashes and I still almost get hit I'm not sure what the flag you know well when you're when you're standing in the street and especially children they're holding up these flags the cars stop and myelle that's a busy road both both of those things are about providing awareness to the drivers that doesn't mean that they will necessarily stop so it's important that step two of that after you push the button is to ensure that the vehicle stop before you make eye contact and make sure they stop um just uh a reminder that there's um coffee with the cop on uh October 30th up at the Short Hills Mall uh Starbucks from 9:30 to 11:30 uh for residents if they'd like to go um have coffee uh with the community policing unit um also just wanted to announce that there's going to be um a little bit of a change to all day parking in lot three um just that we are going to make it uh more noticeable for those that utilize that all day parking uh we've had although there is signage uh in the road that allow for all day parking and there you know that is directly um adjacent to the pay station uh we are going to put up some additional signage as well as paint the parking spaces um a different color and have all day painted on the uh parking stalled so that it is abundantly clear that those are the all day parking spaces uh there's just been some confusion over there in lot three uh which is directly across from the short Hol train station so just wanted to announce that that uh that change will be coming forward um and then I'll talk about some other uh things when we get to the new business thank you Mr K thank you mayor good evening um just a brief fure housing update um there's been a considerable amount of filings uh since our last meeting uh I'll go in order of how things were filed um RPM filed in order to show cause um seeking temporary and preliminary restraints um the temporary restraints that they sought were that 22 East Willow uh the township takes no further action on that um property until the return date and they also so an order having our mayor and Deputy Mayor appear in court on the return date to testify um we opposed the temporary restraints um the court denied the temporary restraints so that was a win for the township um RPM is now seeking on the return date laminary restraints um they're seeking again a 22 East Willow be dedicated um for the relocation of the DPW site um they're seeking their attorney's fees um which were we were ordered to have paid uh on the Court's August 1st order and they're also seeking all fees that they incurred involved with the Township's Appel division filings and their opposition to those um the return date that AAL Clause is currently October 31st um there was a request uh to change that date um I suspect the date will be changed um but we don't have a new date yet and that request has not yet been made to the court RPM was going to make that request either this afternoon or tomorrow to change the date um the township filed its second motion to recuse judge santura um the reasons for that request um are in the filing um so we move forward with um again a second recusal motion um of the of the judge based on appearance of impropriety um fair share housing today filed the motion to enforce Lingus rights um as to the motion for recuse we suspect they'll have the same return date as the order show Clause so whenever the order show Clause is heard uh the motion the second motion to recuse will be heard um fare housing filed a uh motion ating its rights um they're seeking to have a special Mount Laural implementation monitor uh be appointed by the court um that monitor is to determine the extent of the development cost for 9 Main Street uh the existing sources of funding um and what the shortfall um based on the sources of funding and how much the construction cost would be what that shortfall would be as the as the township is responsible the court ordered that the township was responsible for short um there is there's a bunch of dates in what pressure housing seeking essentially RPM will put its construction costs in um we then would have an opportunity to dispute that um the monitor would then um come up with what types of funding that they think it is and make a recommendation the court as to what the shortfall would be the court would have a hearing on that um so the court that currently has a return date I believe uh November 6th I think that date is also likely to get moved and it's likely to court to hear all three on the same date that's not guaranteed um we our office is uh working on opposition um to the preliminary restraints from RPM and working on opposition to the order of force C against rights by fair share housing Corporation um so that's that's where we are for fair share housing is there any questions I have a question a comment uh so just just to be on the record here this dump project is basically going to cost the town about $50 million for 75 100% affordable housing units um with no indemnification for Town residents for any contamination or illnesses sicknesses what happened whatever may happen on that property versus an alternative that we put forth which were two locations for total approximately 130 units with 75 affordable housing uh and the rest Workforce housing for an approximate cost of about $12 million with no legal liability for contamination I just want to make sure I'm understanding that correct uh yes those were the alternative sites that were put forth to the court uh which the court border special Master's opinion was that first was better than the second alternative and this is a special master that actually came out to Milbourne and visited Frank and myself when we walked the properties and we showed him the benefits of those alternative sites that same special Master if I me class yes I was there with you also and it was in our papers and you uh the deputy mayor Mr McDonald and myself all certified to the fact that we took that walk with the special master and he he pointed out um he actually pointed out the accolades of the news sites and the benefits of them and was very critical at the N correct so we got 12 versus 50 million no possibility of legal ramifications off and and if I might say as well it'd be done in a much time more timely fashion uh than the current site which would benefit the constituents or the end users of those apartments that that that was milburn's position that was position we State at the for and I think that those are that's objectively accurate okay and just one other point just boggles my mind a little bit did the judge come out and walk those properties or did Mr Josh Bowers from ferer hous and come out and walk those properties or anybody else involved in the case or was it simply Mr banish who came out gave accolades about the properties we testified that we certified that Etc did anyone else look at those sites for I'm the court um so the court was invited and it was the court was highly encouraged in each of your the deputy Mayors and Mr McDonald certification along with our brief um to come out and look the sites and I think given the impact to this community um and how long this project will likely last and it's going to change you know the characteristics of the downtown um I don't think it was an unreasonable request to asked the court to come and actually look at the properties for making decision I think it was I think it was a very reasonable request and also give mil's proximity to North right and and and she said plainly no okay respond there was no response no response okay just want to get that out there thank you thank you Mr McDonald uh yeah sorry I just uh forgot two brief reports one is that um the investigation special investigation that was asked for by um uh Mr Robertson from Atul scrio has been completed I sent that to the township committee I think we're going to it was it was just today that I had sent to the committee so we'll allow the committee to adjust that report ask any questions that they may have um but um could also um um you know then let me know whether um you know where where you'd like to go with that report from there um can that be discussed in the next SE sure absolutely um and then just lastly that uh we have um uh we are in production of the signage for the 911 memorial as well as um some uh new signage at Brookside and old CH Hills Road and we are currently working on the copy for um some new signage at lot seven and lot three um again to you know clarify and avoid some confusion in those parking lots but I just want to provide an update on that thank you okay public comment but invited to speak to offer your comments please come to the Lector and clearly state your name and whether you are a Milbourne resident Endor property or business owner please do not provide your full address seeing our meetings are recorded and are readily available to the public for the convenience of our community there is a remote option if you called in and would like to speak like to comment press star six now if you are attending by a computer or electronic device please click the raise hand button and be sure your video is on when you comment all members of the public wishing to speak will be put into the queue to address the committee to help facilitate an orderly meeing and to permit all to be heard speakers shall limit their comments to one three minute session you will be prompted when there is 30 seconds remaining a reminder this is not a time for dialogue or to debate a matter and this is a time during our business meeting for the public to offer comments I will not open the public comment period good evening hello goodlooking TC members um I don't know what the OT tool scrio investigative report is I don't know are we allowed to know that if we are can you give some more clarity about what that involves um I like the idea of the flags and the lights for pedestrians crossing the street it's great we need you know pedestrian safety um but I really like the idea of the ticket Blitz that Frank had brought up recently and it sounds like that's happening as much as pedestrians need to make sure they're safe and cars are stopped before they cross the street it really should be on the drivers to slow down and I think the best way to do that is to really ticket people I know that the police don't love to do it to our residents but it it's really necessary at this point um I had asked for an update on Essex Street um the oneway situation I was just curious where that stands um I don't know what is what we're waiting on for that I'm just curious um I met somebody in the audience tonight and I told him I was going to embarrass him and just give him a shout out so we have a resident here named Jo G who's sitting in the back we were chatting before the um meeting and I asked him what he was doing here because I said it's always the same old people and he said he's taking a class to get his masters in social work and this was a a requirement a homework assignment so I thought we should all acknowledge Him and I encouraged him to come to more meetings and then um one last thing might not be that popular but um I do not know Carrie heler at all um I know he owns prop in town but he really had me intrigued when he got up here last time and spoke about town hall and whether we really should be proceeding with renovated this building or maybe um thinking about alternates um I haven't really followed this that much but he really had some Salient points also I was thinking if you want that Town Hall Plaza to be permanently closed because people seem to like it I thought it would be really great if there were more commercial activity Around Town Hall Plaza and if I don't know where this building would be moved to again I haven't followed it that much but I feel like many times decisions are made and then they have to be reversed like complete streets so I was just thinking maybe you want to slow that down a bit and make sure that the renovation is really the best way forward I trust you guys up there you always do your homework but just some food for thought thank you thank you uh Charles Bambara the 27e resident of Milbourne dry Hills I I I just want to make a public statement uh to the court of Judge Santa mioro uh hopefully she uh reads these or hears about them uh judge you ran a kangaroo court with a with a foregone conclusion you should I'm a private citizen I'm not a lawyer but my God your bias was blatant and for for everyone to see and if you can't do the right thing and recuse yourself there there's something seriously flawed in your logic and and and uh and your morals uh but uh I appeal to you to to consider our motion our Township motion it's well founded and as a private citizen and there's a lot of residents that share my concern this was a biased case you ran a kangaroo court step down and step aside thank you good evening Phil kers no resident I had a question about the website I was looking at the township website and I might have missed something but no longer shows the terms for Township committee members the way it does for advisory committees all the other committees and I think I think it may have been uh May been some updates on it looks a little bit different but I no longer see the terms I think that's really helpful information to have so if you could look into that I'd appreciate it thank you thanks Dave cosr resident um if I understood the motion to amend the um the agenda you knocked off the appointments of the uh fair share committee folks um that has been continually delayed the fair the Staffing I'll call it of the fair share committee it's getting to the point where it's a little silly it's getting to the point where you're going to affect the uh committee's ability to effectively act thank you thank you um good evening my name is Jeffrey Feld more than 32 resident of the poet section um as my custom I sent a heads up letter and comments to the council um one thing that would help us in the fair share housing litigation is the responses to the calendar year 2024 best practices inventory um questionnaire due October 25 um I sent you the questionnaire the first eight there's new eight questions regarding affordable housing and there's also a a question regarding the special improvement district and I think that would help us when we go to the court to show what our responses are because I think they want to show how we have reacted and rebutting the presumption that we've done nothing um I asked about the status of the amended paper mill Playhouse sale leaseback agreement um the last since the last meeting I discovered when I looked at the calendar year 2022 um audit there was a reference on approximately page 3233 regarding the restatement of the 2021 financial statement for about $1.4 million the world I come from that's a material um development usually requiring stickering and I'd like to know what caus a restatement of our financial statement because when I did find that and I caused a financial statement to be restated in Orange that usually raises a lot of red flags um talking about red flags going to your consent agenda the bill list um there's like three um checks I listed in my list one was the Casey and Keller heler and Linderman they're getting paid for work that they did last year why the delay and what are they doing for well so there's a a payment to Tool scrio were they ever retained by resolution or was there ever a um engagement letter signed and especially with this investigation I was never contacted I think I'm probably a primary back witness because I represented the defendant as to what happened and I find it pretty outrageous that I was not contacted going to the non-con agenda can we have a little explanation as to the Metropolitan Health Insurance Fund resolution I understand because the costs are but to give the community a feel of what the savings are and how premiums are got out through the roof and what when would it Go effective and what are anticipated statements I wish I had more time to talk about the Woodland um develop agreement I sent you today about some suggestions as to language has to be broaden elaborated on one is taxes during construction there should be a specific paragraph saying what is the amount that you believe the assessment is going to be and that we understand that the the property will be reassessed when a CEO is issued thank you this is too more serious I think I should have a little more opportunity to talk you have another opportunity no you'll have voted on something and before that hi which cyber Township resident thank you uh committeeman Ben dooler for explaining in detail so the way I understood it we should Milburn residents back stop a $50 million project pay legal fees to RPM in the fair share of housing have full liability for if somebody gets sick relocate our town dump so we and in exchange for that RPM will pay $1 and own this property forever and at the end of 30 years the affordable housing units can all become retail or full Market which of course he will sell the thing within the first day of it being built cash out for a lot of money and we'll be holding the bag looking like fools that we built the building we don't own any of it we can't put the people in we can't pick who lives there it's a pilot program so no money's going to the schools it's not a senior citizen building where there would be no children going to the schools old Short Hills Road which is clogged up every day right now with no construction vehicles seems so silly so I read today um the 12 demands that um RPM and fare housing I'm sure you also read the 12 demands in that thing and I hard to take myself and not be a resident of milber and say well maybe that's somebody El else's town and I read one after another and I was like I really cannot believe that somebody had the balls to to even ask those 12 things and to have a signature ready for the judge to sign it like my goodness I am not a lawyer I wish I was one for this case alone to go back to school help you on this one but I don't see how the judge could sign that I mean I just don't see it one more thing I went to Trader Joe's recently and I saw that there were some people um whatever asking for donations for food or whatever I guess they aren't living so good or whatever they have a little issue are there laws in the town that let you stand on corners and in front of businesses and I don't know I mean I don't want to be judged on that thank you thank you hi Jean Pastak resident I just want to recognize Charlie bber for all his really hard work on the flood uh mitigation effort we met him in the street three two years ago three years ago and he told us that he'd been working so hard trying to get his ideas through and it's just really nice to see that you're actually making a real different so thank you um the other thing I wanted to say is I support Jeff's um request for having inut into this investigation lastly I just want to read some of the uh myths about Milburn that someone submitted to uh the tap I think it was really good um this is regarding the the affordable housing project at se 75 units that Ben just spoke about and others as well myth number one many believe that getting out of the poorly negotiated plan to build a 75 unit 100% income segre housing project on the toxic DPW site will be too costly to Township taxpayers fact number one while the town is not at this point spent more than the town attorney's fee on this issue the cost of building the project would be many multiples more costly if the developer does not receive all the tax credits and grants they hope for the current estimate of this cost to Milbourne taxpayers could approach $50 million per the RPM plan that figure includes a $4.7 million developer fee quote which is basically a thank you payment to developer RPM for for taking on this project myth number two some people still believe that the Department of Public Works dumpsite is not toxic fact number two I'm sorry to burst your bubble folks but the DPW dump site is indeed toxic multiple borings by soil Engineers discovered excessive amounts of arsenic Mercury benzoin and other polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons that's pretty good myth number three okay so the dump is toxic we can just cover it up or haul the toxins away right fact number three whenever Milburn Township chooses to do to remediate the toxins while paying a multi-million dollar bill to do so our town not the developer will be responsible for any future adverse outcomes tied to the toxic contam it's on the site myth number four so this would be an incredibly costly undertaking with a huge potential future liability but murn must fulfill its affordable housing obligation fact number four because the fight to overturn the dump project has received the most attention many in town are unaware that five rental apartment buildings have recently been built or are in the works all with affordable housing allocation myth number five there are no alternatives to the DPW dump site fact number five the township committee has presented alternative plans that will provide the same number of affordable units with additional Workforce housing and lower per unit cost so um I guess oh I still have 30 seconds I just I want to say that um I completely support the statement that Ben made tonight the others here um I remember being in the courtroom when judge santaro said to us if you don't like what's going on vote them out this person that wrote this and these people in this this room that spoke and others in the community 65% of the voters last year uh made it clear they don't want this project our town has a right to have what we want in our town and to plan our future and I hope everybody will stay strong and fight this thank you anyone else before we go online carry 56 Byron Road um I've raised this a few times with Alex um more recently and I'm going to ask it if Council but maybe of legal counsel um if I owned a 100 apartments in town and say I had 100 children in that complex if I wanted to sell it to the town or if the town so decided to sell that property to me for some dollar amount and I was willing to compel by agreement to make this Housing Development this 100 units let's call it two bedrooms per unit I was willing to make that a fair share housing project is that a way or a means to accomplish this in the future now why would a owner of a property do that they don't only do that for an accommodation probably for real estate taxes perhaps even a Town Financing it at a lower interest rate there's all sorts of different ways and there may be one or two apartment complexes in the town where this can be done I don't think it solves our immediate problem but there's another round of the fair share housing coming so if that question could be answered and Alex I've raised this with you both in in person and writing I'm curious to why I haven't got no response thank you thank you good evening good evening Perry erso Short Hills um I didn't hear any reports I'm not sure if I'm perhaps I missed it from the attorney caner regarding the be properties litigation I will state that our attorney had filed a recusal motion where within hours of the same day judge Russo transferred the case to another judge our attorney has submitted a proposed consent order memorializing the judge's actions and deeming our recused motion to be now deemed moo today we yet have not heard back from the township regarding this as a reminder the Township's trial be brief and materials are due this coming Monday October 21st 2024 since our attorneys submitted our trial materials we have since received documents by way of Oprah from the state of New Jersey and the township of Milbourne supporting our arguments coincidentally today the Appel division issued a persuasive conflict of interest opinion supporting our case I would suggest that you may wish to consider the two best practices inventory special improvement district questions um that actually were uh provided in um attorney feld's um heads up email that I uh came across lastly we respectfully request that the TC reconsider our May 7th 2024 settlement proposal because it is much better when we all can work together thank you and have a nice evening thank you good evening can you guys hear me okay yes but we can't see I'm sorry there you go okay um I just want to thank Charlie bber for his work on the flood mitigation committee it's awesome thank you so much it's one of the number one things that needs to be fixed I also really really have to shout out to Ben and Frank um on the work on nine Main Street and then your analytics on the 12 mil versus 50 spot on it's all about being logical I also want to point out that no one's done a strategic plan um what we're going to do with all these new incoming people that are going to be going into the school system are we rebuilding a whole new high school are we going to put trailers out what's the plan and what are the finances that we need behind that that's something that's really important to understand and I don't think it's being addressed maybe it is but it's behind closed doors possibly I'm not sure I also want to talk about just development in general I actually went to the CH Center hearing um and will be attending the next one on November 6 and I wanted to ask what the policy is in terms of the planning board and maybe you guys can answer this for me when somebody is doing a commercial property which a house of worship is considered in real estate um and especially when it has a school attached to it um and they're doing it in clearly a aded with in an area with deed restrictions historically um if the planning board knows that there's deed restrictions on the property why would they be hearing a hearing of you know this is what we're going to do and this is what it's going to look like Etc like I wouldn't even waste my time listening to that because if it doesn't even meet those standards legally I just I would like to understand that more because I I find that odd and I also want to understand um when somebody's allowed to demolish a building do they have to have plans in place and approved by the planning board before they're allowed to demolish the building or are they just allowed to demolish the building because you know somebody has to be pretty sure that they're going to get their plans through if they're demolishing a million dollar building you know what I mean I mean I wouldn't de demolish a million dollar building if I didn't have my plans approve that seems not very Savvy strategically so I wanted to ask you about that um I think that's really really important um and then I wanted to talk to you just a little bit about 5G um not to get into it but I did notice there's a new 5G poll um close to the East Orange uh reservation um little brick building off of JFK Parkway and um I wanted to know like were people notified because I wasn't notified that it was going up really was sort of vaguely talked about and when you guys put up a new 5G Tower what type of notification do you give people because you know there are Ada violations involved if somebody is EMF sensitive and don't you think you should be giving them like a Year's notice so they can sell their house um and I wanted to understand that because that isn't happening and I also wanted you to look to Spring Lake New Jersey they've raised close okay thank you so much have a good one good evening we go sorry for the okay Tom hler longtime resident I have a couple of questions regarding the affordable housing and the report that we had tonight uh I think that's not what's not being fully appreciated is that the foot that is on our neck is a result of our signing the settlement agreement in August I think of 2021 and what's being done here is that agreement is being enforced and there were deadlines that could have certain things could have happened and we didn't do them and so forth my question is have we ever filed any kind of application motion to vacate that settlement or modify that settlement for example on the grounds of newly discovered evidence or something else we talk about the dump being toxic and so forth where we're in 2024 that wasn't known in 2021 2022 2023 uh is there been anything to do to get out from underneath the settlement uh that's one question with regard to Mr banish and his you know contradictions when he was uh touring the site did the uh Township ever ask for a hearing on that and I don't mean uh where the lawyers argue I'm talking about taking testimony from Mr banish there's obviously a a conflict of facts that has to be resolved by people testifying did we ever ask for that or did we uh content not to and thirdly I know we made attempts to appeal and it wasn't clear whether it was an interlocutory or temporary order or or changeable order or final order meaning finalist to all issues in all parties we lost on both it's not a final order it's not an interlocutory order so what can we do to appeal what has to be done before this can be a final appealable order of right that we have a right to go to the Appel Division and not have to have it what what's standing between now and then those are my questions thanks good ideas thank you that's all I will now close public comment Comm would you like to start yeah just most of it was statements and affordable housing of Mr caner I would like to answer one of Miss Miss best's questions in terms of demolition there is no such rule that um in order to demolish your house you have to have plans for what's rebuilt your taking I guess the risk that you'll never get your plants through the only restriction and it is a new one that we just passed this year is that if your house is on the is it historically designated on the master plan that before you're allowed to demolish it then they have to have the opportunity to write a report detailing what the historical significance is but that's new and that happened after 165 ult sh Hills Road which was on the master plan was already demolished so that's the way those committ M sure um all great points uh you know one thing I I didn't I didn't bring up earlier in in the beginning was I'm a business person I've been in business for 30 years the cost per unit that they're building is roughly 650 to $700,000 per unit when I went out with Frank and a team here and we found a developer we could do it for $350,000 per unit Sons uh rebates and such for Workforce housing Etc so you know I would never make an allegation but you know people would ask where's that $300,000 going vendor suppliers rebates $4.7 million developer fee you know people acquiring minds want to know why that amount is so different uh and you know we have not had an answer to that um I'm not going to impis merch RPM but I've seen their product we'll leave it at that U and then also too uh you know the new the new two Alternatives were full taxpayers uh versus the the pilot program so you know just I'm befuddled by the whole thing and and honestly it it makes me sick to my stomach but this is part of the reason that I ran with Frank to get up here we went in front of the Court as Milbourne concerned residents concerned Milbourne residents and we wanted a voice at the table and santaro said judge santaro said vote him out well we voted him out and now we want to say and we want able to push this forward uh Mr hner had a lot of good questions um I could probably answer them but answer all of them but I'll defer to our Council to do that um you I don't even want to go down that rabbit hole right now not being lawyer um and then um uh solicitation in front of our units at Trader Joe's uh yeah I think that's something we got to look at and such as well and then uh Mr hel heler the 100 units 100 Kids existing Township being I'll defer to council I believe there is an Avenue to swap those out but I think it's much more costly than we would think but I'll defer that sure uh Miss Cruz um you mentioned that um you supported car's teller's comments last meeting um and you know we asking why uh renovation as opposed to building a new building so we actually looked at a few different scenarios and one of them was building a new town hall and it would have also um had some additional space for the police um what we found is the cost was higher it would have required utilizing uh a different site we don't have an abundance of available sites in our downtown area and one of those sites were that you know we could have used were still trying to use for the alternative for the affordable housing so there wasn't really um you know a good opportunity to build new it was going to be more expensive and quite honestly the renovated version of this building is going to meet all of our needs and it's going to have additional space for the municipal court so that will free up space at the police department so you know we what we don't want to do is let perfect be the enemy of good and I think our town has waited far too long to um do this renovation and costs have gone up considerably you know that's how it works um so it's time that we we do something we can't just sit there and wait for you know uh perfect project to fall on our lap so that's uh that's why we're going with renovation um or at least why I voted for it um Mr Vana thank you for your comments I doubt the judge was listening but uh I maybe you want to send her a letter or do pop or something that's your prerogative um Mr kers I assure you we are not doing away with term limits um yeah we're we're not Russia or China that's that's not how we operate um Mr crove uh so the appointments were taken off the list because one of the appointments was not have had enough votes to pass and so um they wanted to wait until it had enough votes uh I agree with you that uh we need to get moving on this committee and I'm going to be working on scheduling uh the first meeting for all of the members that are already on the committee uh and I think we probably can maybe invite uh the members that we know are going to be confirmed I'll check into that and if we can then you know we'll do that I think since it's a public meeting we can do that um Mr Feld [Music] um I understand you were never contacted about the scribo investigation we just found out about that um shortly before this meeting so that's something we'll have to discuss in the blow session we also have to read the report to digest it so um can't really comment on that um um let's see uh Mr Sebert uh with regards to the panhandling I do think uh that is something we should look into uh before it's a situation that gets worse so Alex maybe we can um look into whether there's any laws there uh or if they're you know harassing or intimidating people in any way then we should obviously not allow that to happen um let's see um Mr heler um there are um options with the affordable housing uh laws to do rehab of existing units and I think there's actually special credits that one can get there now um traditionally uh there hasn't been a whole lot of interest in uh Property Owners coming forward working something out but you you are a property owner so if you have property Point you're stting things incorrectly if you if you have property that you would like to talk to the township about making into affordable housing then we should certainly have those excuse me excuse me excuse me Mr please so um the other thing that I think we need to do is do an inventory of all the existing apartment uh apartments in town figure out if there's any units there that are affordable uh but weren't counted um and you know we can look at to whether there's an opportunity for um let's see Miss best uh with regards to a strategic plan for students that's a question for the Boe it's my understanding uh that before you know a new school can get built they have to actually have the students you know in the chairs um so that's why you tend to see trailers and um you know municipalities have to be reactive not proactive in that case but it's definitely something talked about with the bo um Mr hilner Fantastic questions um as far as I know I don't think that we've ever filed a motion to vacate um that's certainly something that uh it'd be great you know if it was an option may we we should certainly consider it but uh I'll let Council speak to that um as far as compelling banish testify I would love to know the answer to that so I will defer to our attorney on that um and I too would like to know what you know constitutes a final appealable order um I I feel like you know sometimes they move the goalpost on that but uh again if our attorney could address that that would be helpful thanks I just want to add one just one thing that said I I don't think it's I I do support doing an inventory of all the rental units I think that would be good information we even talked about it when we considered um putting forth a rent Control Ordinance which we subsequently found out as prohibited by New Jersey another great decision um I think that information would be useful I don't think it's it's likely that we missed any because in order to be candid is Affordable they would need to be deed restricted and we would certainly know that and and and to get them to be deed restricted would require the agreement of the current owner so but I do think having that knowledge of what the existing apartment are in town would be would be a benefit to all of us Mr CER thank you mayor um I guess I'll address Mr hel first um sorry I'll address Mr hel first the deputy mayor is correct um it's right in uck um there is um converting market rate to Affordable uh is a possibility and you do get bonus Credit One for one bonus credit that was third round and fourth round legisl maybe I misunderstood your question but I think that was your question that is that is the answer okay then you come back up at the end and ask again try to um as far as be property goes it's ongoing litigation I think it's kind of inappropriate to discuss ongoing uh litigation um you know to the points raised and I shouldn't be talking directly to the party but she's here and her council's here I know we had a mediation I'm unaware of any settlement offer made at that mediation that she was referring to so I'm not really clear as to what settlement offer were we going Mr McDonald also attended that um I'm unaware of any consent order that was offered to the township I just rechecked my email I didn't see it um and as to the motion to recuse the township didn't oppose it we just aren't in a position to make that decision for Mr Feld whether or not he has he believes that judge had a had had a reason to recuse himself the judge believed he had a reason to accuse himself that Mr Fel put papers in and the court made that decision Township doesn't know Mr F's history in Orange and his history with the judge and that some judge winked at him in some courtroom and all these things that he put in his papers about the FBI the township has no knowledge of that the township doesn't care if the judges recused so Township took no position we were going to review Mr feld's Papers and take position as rightfully stated when the when the judge got you know these papers the judge transferred it's unclear if it was transferred for purposes of deciding this motion or the case but the township didn't oppose or join in the to Simply was waiting to understand the position of Mr Fel to has no knowledge of Mr feld's uh legal history in Orange so we took no position so I it's not it's not it wasn't like a we got you you said you the judge shouldn't be recused and was recused the township was unaware of all these facts that no position so um I just want to clear that up um and I and I also will say one thing and I said it last night I'll say again um I'm here as a professional representing the township and what's clear to me is and in this case especially and it's an old saying in law when you're when you're weak on the law and you're strong on the fact you count the facts and when you're weak on facts you're strong the law you count the law and when you're weak on both you just attack the other attorney so that's that's exactly what's going on here so um weak law weak facts um I think it's I think it's obnoxious that personal attacks are coming my way um as as to the affordable housing um so what the P division found and this is we're trying to create a unique argument you need a final Judgment of repose um from the court which is which is the end result of of your fure housing litigation we were taking the position given the judge's order that we had to build nine Main Street and that was the last um that was the last item that we were never going to get there and that basically ended the case because there was nothing left to litigate there was nothing left to the side courts appell that you have to continue to um you have to continue to operate Through Your settlement agreement but you could do things under protest and then peal them so I presume that the last two items that we had to accomplish were our Redevelopment agreement and our pilot agreement the Redevelopment agreement was deemed approved the pilot agreement we sell some time under the court order to approve which you know I I understand probably where we're going with that but you know that and that's discussion for close closed I presume after those two items are completed we can ask the court then for another hearing um the court stripped the township of of its immunity which we again thought would lead towards a final judgment um we did not get a written opinion from the Appel division so it's unclear to us as to why they found it to be in delator but we assume they found to be in delator because we didn't have a final judgment um of repose um from it which is typically the ending of a fair share housing litigation but again we don't think we could ever get there given the judges order so we took that this was the final order we also believe it was proper for interlocutory order given the $50 million price tag on the project and the amount of monies that are be expended um as to the settlement agreement a few things um there was a fairness hearing this is a different context than a typical contract case there was a fairness hearing that the Court held the settlement agreement was deemed to be fair um as far as these change in circumstances I presume he's refering ref ing to contract defense law um there is two contract defenses that um I think he was referring to which is impossibility or frustration of purpose which is when circumstances change in a contract that the parties were unaware of at the time the issue is the parties were aware of the tation the time they enter to settlement agreement in fact the settlement I don't want to make the argument on the other half but the the settlement agreement has in there that parties are to look at if it if it's not feasible there were dates in which the township has determined if it was feasible or not and dates have passed um so all parties were aware of the comination comand settlement agreement it wasn't an unknown um unknown factor so I don't think those two defenses would come into play um I don't know what else there is um as far as the testimony of of of the special master um special master was present at the hearing um the court had every opportunity to swear him in and take testimony and decided not to it's actually part of our motion to recuse um it's one of the main factors we don't understand why that testimony wasn't taken we think that testimony would have been beneficial to the township um we think there's an appearance of impropriety that it wasn't asked um you know I don't want to give away every argue but you know it again as everybody sitting here it makes me as an attorney been doing this for a long time when one side says he said X the other side said he said y and the person's sitting there and his job is to get up and tell the court what happened I don't understand why the judge didn't ask him just get up and say what happened and again it's part of our motion um to recuse fair share housing wrote a letter that said it was a got you moment that we were reciting with Frank banish said Frank banish wasn't out with his family in Milburn having dinner and we overheard a conversation he was walking the sites as part of his duty we paid him I think right out build us to walk those sites he was there as an officer of the Court as an appointed officer everything he said should have been admissible that was why he was there um and for the court to Simply say that oh was a gotcha he was just talking he wasn't just talking that was his job that's what he was there for that's what he's being paid to do it it made no sense it's all part of our motion to recuse um I don't know if I hit all the questions if anybody has any additional questions I'm happy to answer them um but that's you know I think these are all right arguments and I wish there was a magic wand to make the settlement agree go away um but you know I think we we're going down as as far legal path as we can go thank sorry the fairness opinion uh that was really the predecessor to vacate the settlement agreement I just want to make sure we understand that so so so at the fairness hearing beer housing Corporation and the township are on the same side they're arguing they've come to an agreement and fair and it's fair to low and moderate income housing given our unmet need and what the settlement agreement fulfill so at that point we were pushing for the township was there in a legal position that the agreement should be approved by the court and are any of those people still in town to your knowledge which people I'm sorry the township committee that was that was on that team as well as the manager the planning some are I think I think at least one I think I mean I don't know the all the committee members I know I know the planner has changed here okay the the professionals that were involved with that are no longer Prof in any capacity by this Township said two things ago before you get to Alex one is uh uh Carrie I'm still happy to walk the property so it's just been BL lasted at work and on a committee some being pulled in every direction happy to walk out I could do it this weekend um and Mr H any insinuation of removing term limits after being here for nine months cannot be further from oh I don't see the we're gonna look at the website no we'll check out the website we'll check the website that's it um just a just a few things uh one Mr kers will check that out right away and if they aren't there it was obviously an oversight and we'll make sure that they're put up uh much like the other committees um Miss Cruz asked what the UL scrio report was um uh simply this was uh we were asked to investigate how the Milbourne Township Municipal Court handled a citizen complaint by a city mayor at the time and whether they had done so properly um the uh Mr Feld asked about the hiff and I'm happy to to provide some insight into that um the currently the Township's employees um are um their benefits are through the state health benefits program uh the state health benefits program is looking at a 16.2% in increase in premiums for the year 2025 um the they are also projecting a 10% plus uh for 2026 uh the township is making the decision to move to a health insurance fund runs much like a joint Insurance Fund um that will help while maybe not initially provide um substantial savings although there will be savings uh our entry percentage uh increase uh to that Health Insurance Fund is 14% as compared to 16.2% it's about a $230,000 savings um and however what we are entering the health insurance fund for is rate stability more control more transparency for us um as it relates to the administration of those benefits um and so that is the reason for this change um and as far as our um collective bargaining units we are obligated to provide a plan that is um same or substantially similar uh to the plans that they are currently in without having to negotiate uh that change so that is where we are with that and that is why it is on the agenda we have to provide a 60-day notice to the state health benefits program of our um leaving uh their program um uh just so happens tonight that we have our Chief Financial Officer Matt larcy um and if you just don't mind answering the question that Mr fell asked about the restatement of the $1.4 million so nobody thinks that there's hopefully something nefarious going on no so that was um uh the 2021 audit did not and prior year audits did not include the payroll agency account on our official book so that's kind of like an In-N-Out payroll account right we funded each payroll the money's dispersed to the employees and the money's dispersed for taxes deductions Health deductions retirement plans Etc it's an In-N-Out account um I felt it should be included in our audited financials our new Auditors that year agreed um so that was why the restatement occurred right that was changing the auditing firm as well correct correct that coincided with the change the audit firm also me arriving late 2021 yes so the previous one was restated for comparability is that is that correct yeah because our audits show two years to compare right so it was it was included so that you compare the two years Y and for the record to uh the finance committee we went through the hiff uh analysis and being an employer many employees and such the insurance premiums are literally out of control you know across the country and anything we can do to stabilize and or cap those as a Township we need to be on board to do I only wish that we there were some of these available to private employers um and I think just to go back to Mr hel's question um although I think he was asking it a bit rhetorically um that I think this is a great sort of opportunity for the citizen advisory committee on affordable housing to take a look at those apartment buildings much to Deputy Mayor secondy Point um that may be at a point in their useful life that they could require rehab or that you could incentivize them through a larger transaction that whether it's in tax rebates or in other other other types of uh creative Avenues to encourage them to have more some of their property deed restricted all of their property deed restricted whatever it may be um but again it's a it's a it's a um it's an opportunity for that committee to look at creative ways of how we you know go forward with our affordable housing obligation um so I'm sure that's something that will be brought up in in future meetings as well um uh committee men uh Cohen did a nice job of answering the question about having to have a plan in before going to the planning board and being approved before you demolish your house um if you think about it if you bought the house next to you and you demolished that house and you just want it to be a vacant lot so that you could you know have enjoyable you know property uh you wouldn't be required to have a planning board application approved prior to demolishing that house and so there is no requirement to do so um in fact um some people tear down properties before they have a plan so that they don't have to pay taxes on the uh full full Freight so to speak so um and as far as the the deed restriction question um I think that's more of a question for the planning board attorney um and that is all I have and I will I will look into the concerns over over Trader Joe's although I think also it is uh incumbent upon the property owner to also um make us aware of a concern of the situation do we have any laws on the books we have we have soliciting panhandling yeah yeah it's all it's all Hawkers pedlers typ type of things yeah I should jumped in but but the Supreme cour rules it's very hard hand handling and telling they have a First Amendment right to ask for money um there's been very few Wares if any that have been upheld um by the Supreme Court um obviously there's like Deering and things of that nature but it's almost impossible stop people from I mean it goes to the same sort of uh mindset of we've had you know our own concerns over soliciting door too and we've made uh hopefully what appropriate changes to that ordinance that will help help with that but it will never uh eliminate the the ability to or the uh concern you know some of the concerns over door to-door solicitations but you know as a as a parent I'm only went up here with a 13-year-old daughter you know too we have to monitor what's going on and it's lering or what you know just making sure that the town is safe yeah no agreed and again and maybe that's a a great conversation for the community policing you to have with Trader Joe's see how things are going whether this is becoming a problem what you know may when they should be contacting them or or what it might be just to just to uh not make it a more contentious issue that it needs to be on ESS Street one do you anything uh no So currently we've received well we received our traffic studies back um the uh Christine bugle is and so I think there's a sort of um an interplay with that um the two-way circulation um but uh we're she's reviewing those um those responses and then I hope to discuss that with the township committee um at some point uh regarding those responses and what direction we want to go as far as uh you know traffic concerns the traffic study whatever it might be but um just just waiting for her analysis of that response thank you okay the township committee will now consider consent agenda resolutions are there any comments from the committee in regard to any items listed on the consent agenda I have a motion to approve resolution 24231 through resolution 24- 243 which are listed on the consent agenda may I have a second roll repeat who first second Mr Cohen yes Mr Stoler for Deputy Mayor Sandy yes mayor Romano yes thank you are there any comments from the committee in regard to resolution 24- 237 as revised may have motion to approve resolution 24- 237 motion may I have a second second roll call vote Please Mr Cohen yes Deputy Mayor second Mandy yes Mr Stoler mayor Romano yes thank you are there any comments from the committee in regard to resolution 24-2 38 as revised may have a motion to approve resolution 24- 238 may have a second second roll call vote Please Mr Cohen yes Deputy Mayor second Mandy yes Mr Stoler May Rano yes are there any comments from the committee in regard to resolution 24242 as revised just ask Mr to explain uh a developers agreement is here to protect the township uh it's agreement between the township and developer um to um those conditions um and what was agreed to at the planning board and plard resolution memorializes um and gives remedies to the town if the developer doesn't um do what they're obligated to do pursuant to the the planning board um so this property had already gotten cyan approval it's already gotten all approvals the last time thank you may I have a motion to approve resolution 24242 may have a second second roll call please Mr Colin yes Deputy Mayor second yes M affirmative mayor Romano yes thank you okay ordinance 2691-22 six9 1-24 ordinance of the township of Milbourne County of Essex authorizing the township of Milbourne to execute an eement agreement granting an easement and right of way on property located at 521 milour Avenue nor New Jersey uh so brief explanation so there's a property that's in bad shape um the owners of the property want to uh do something with that property uh obviously there'll be an improvement over what's there uh but in order to do so they need uh a small easement uh so that they can have cars park um so it's a it's a very small piece of road they need an easen on um and that's the purpose of this ordinance I move this ordinance be taken up and cast on first reading and that the Township Clerk be authorized to have the ordinance published in accordance with law and the item and for hearing and final passage on Tuesday November 12th 2024 can I just interject um that there should just when it is published if it is approved that Milburn should be changed to Short Hills because that is in sh Hills New Jersey 07078 title good may I have a second second roll call vote Please Mr Cohen yes Deputy Mayor second Mandy yes Mr Stoler affirmative mayor Romano yes thank you committee m co and you are scheduled to sponsor ordinance 2690 d24 yes uh I present for consideration an ordinance entitled ordinance number 26924 Bond ordinance to authorize the town hall renovation and addition project in by and for the township of Milburn in the county of Essex state of New Jersey to appropriate the sum of 14 4,500,000 to pay the cost thereof to make a down payment to authorize the issuance of bonds to finance such appropriation and to provide for the issuance of bond anticipation notes in anticipation of the issuance of such bonds tonight is the time set for public hearing and final passage as in accordance with law I declare the hearing open Carrie H 56 Baron um just for the public edification this is authorization it's not funding it's not the ordinance or the creation of the construction of the building but 200 maybe off a year Alex you can somebody correct me 20156 complete streets did a similar sort of thing and we rushed through a project we authorized I believe it was $8.2 million of which about 7 million dollars was spent after once you authorize something it sort of becomes a self-fulfilled prophecy once it goes out there it it's out there and we continue to act upon it whether it's this 14.5 or whether it's just a new building I would hesitate to do this tonight I think it's too early it's too soon it's not necessary right now and to follow the complete streets model we rushed through something a certain council member two members without you can call it Frank you're due diligence they said they did due diligence they had meetings you weren't here we begged several of us we begged Alex was around certainly the time we begged don't do this and they rushed it through they got it done during the summer destroyed Main Street eliminated the left-hand turn circulation left us with a boondoggle on East mman Avenue which still all those years later has not been fixed you know I or the new Council coming it or combination of both stopped the continuation of that project that 8.2 was going to lead to another 10 to20 million to be spent because it needed to go up Milbourne Avenue up and around and all the way come back down essic street we don't have hard enough costs and I'll speak a little bit later as to again Frank you're you're addressing the micro issues of this building renovated versus what you think you've done you've been here for a few years there are all sorts of other locations and possibilities we're carrying another property right now down on uh you Main Street off Main Street there are other possibilities and other considerations I wasn't consulted I'm not the know at all with this but there are other people that even know more than I do renovating this building is an open sore to be exposed and I can tell you that from Charlie Browns or any of the number of buildings that I've renovated it's not the perfect thing to do here it's not necessarily the right location it doesn't have to be perfect as you referenced don't believe in perfect it has to be best possible there's time to still look at that when I say financially I have no financial interest in it actually I do because the architect is my tenant in Maplewood coincidentally have nothing to do with I may lose a tenant as a result of this project not being done right now just for for what he's doing my incentive in this is to see that Alex and his staff get a good good building in the best possible location and we the downtown get the best thing thank you thank you good evening Jerry Kung Short Hills resident um um thanks uh thank you Mr heler for speaking out I I just have one question what is the harm in say delaying this by a month um because I know you know earlier this year we had the paper mill ordinance which I my personal opinion passed way too quickly and then you know people came out after they heard about it passing and then you know people didn't realize and then it's and then the excuse was made well you know maybe it's not the greatest idea but it's already done so I just wanted to you know vent us from getting into that situation again um so just a pretty simple question you know I I certainly don't know as much about potential opportunities for Town Hall but you know if someone's standing here saying hey you know put a pause on this give it 30 days see what we can come up with um you know I I certainly don't see the harm in that thank you thank you anyone else one okay there's one uh Tom Hilder I just have some followup I thank Mr caner for uh answers that he gave to the questions I raised but this is only I'm sorry but this is only for the um the bond that we're doing right now oh all right my mistake call back later yeah thank you all right thank you so I move that the public hearing be closed and the ordinance be adopted on Final reading and that the township cler be directed to publish the ordinance by title as passed on Final reading in accordance with law so just so the public is whereare we have had a number of info sessions on this um this this is not this project is not a new project it's something that has been talked about for quite some time um there's been multiple opportunities for public input and you know whenever you have a large infrastructure project like this there's always going to be some in town that want to delay it for one reason or another and say well let's let's go back to the drawing board let's rethink things at a certain point we have to make a decision and this building right now is literally in some places falling apart um so we cannot afford to wait because if we continue to wait we're going to have to address the issues with this building and it's going to be throwing good money after bad so uh I'm going to disagree with you Dr Kung I think we should move forward with this I think we've talked about it we've had a lot of public input uh and this is just a project that we have to do with infrastructure Pro projects sometimes you have to make a decision so that's why it's up for a vote tonight yeah I'd also like to make the point you know making this analist to the complete streets is a false equivalence in my mind it's completely different projects uh with different underlying circumstances Etc um I don't know if a lot of people know what part of this building is historical uh and the historical committee was involved in this decision the first question question I asked was the cost benefit Anis of building a new building of putting it here putting it somewhere else understanding the different gives and takes of what it looked like it's significally more expensive to build a new building especially with this part being part of it being historical um going through the analysis you know through many many hours with the team here and with the the planner and with the public information uh that was made available as you most rightly put it Mr heler is this is the authorization of the bond etc etc so keeping the Train on the tracks as I say I think is a good thing and to make sure that we're moving it Forward because you know right now this is squalor you look at the surrounding towns of what mil of Livingston Summit Maplewood everyone's increased enhanced rebuilt their infrastructure for the town halls uh we are severely behind that timeline thank you may I have a second second call V please Mr Cohen yes Deputy Mayor Sandy yes Mr Stoler affirmative mayor Romano yes okay so we have nothing for new business uh I mean old business new business um Mr M um yes uh just bringing to the township committee's attention I mean they're all kind of in the same vein um whether it's proposed zoning ordinance for definitions as well as um the um uh proposed fee ordinance and traffic ordinance uh as is customary just making sure that it is under new business for some brief discussion uh the committee was provided a a memorandum uh by the um by the planner regarding the uh proposed ordinance Amendment for front yard setbacks as you may recall uh last year we had made a change change to the way that uh prevailing front yard setback would be uh calculated um after a year of sort of going through this and having um some practical uh application of it uh it has been determined by the zoning subcommittee to uh put that back uh to the way it was um and so again you have the uh the explanation uh from Mr pedo uh in his memorandum about um changing that back to uh reduce confusion and some unintended consequences from that from that change last year uh it is still uh an item of discussion um but I think um you know look uh we can all say lesson Lessons Learned um I think that going forward uh we are going to run parallel to a for things like this run parallel um when we look to make an a change to a calculation or to implement something run that parallel uh in in that we're doing that for a while before we make an introduction but again that that that will that first reading will be on for November 12th to put this uh put that prevailing front yard set back back um just moving on to the fee ordinance and the traffic ordinance um we have unlike uh other communities um all our fees for different things Recreation parking uniform construction code zoning all all those things are spread all throughout our our general code um many communities will have a dedicated fee ordinance that sort of shows all of those things in one place it makes for one a lot less confusion for those people that are using those types of uh services and need to understand the fees um but also uh makes the ability to change those fees and those and and those fee structures a lot easier for the township committee um so we are uh we have uh pretty close to completion a fee ordinance that would put all of our fees that are spread throughout the code uh into one fee Ordinance one central location um there is no proposed fee changes um again parking fees are going to stay the same uh but there are a few there are a few within the UCC codes um based on um practicality of of in having discussions with the construction Department uh that they would like to see uh amended um so those will be noted in in the uh in the ordinance and and the memorandum to the township committee on um as far as traffic uh chapter seven which governs basically anything related to Traffic related to parking within the township of Melbourne uh generally each year uh require some sort of uh revision and so uh we we we hold it for the end of the year um and so that we can gather all of those changes all at once um some of those changes include uh the implementation of of uh making sure that crosswalks are designated within the code uh changing uh some parking that has been problematic um or needs to be updated or wasn't updated in at previous times and gets discovered uh as you receive complaints about it um so that will be a pretty lengthy change to that ordinance uh so it does take some time to compile uh but I'll have that for the township committee uh in in in short order prior to the November 12th meeting and so that uh but that's that's generally what those things are and if there are any questions I'm happy to answer them anyone have any questions so they'll be on for first reading at the uh November 12th meeting um and um but out to the township committee uh prior enough that you can ask questions of any of the changes that are being made okay awesome thank you okay uh public comment this public comment perod is to allow for final comments from the community when invited to speak to off your comments please come to the Lector and clearly state your name and whether you're a milir resident and or property or business owner do not provide your full address seeing our M our meetings are recorded and readily available to the public a reminder that in order to help facilitate an orderly meeting and to permit all to be heard speakers shall limit their comments to one three minute session I will now open my name is Jeffrey Feld I've live in the poet section for more than 32 years we live in an alternative Universe here why would I get a letter from Mr caner dated May 13th rejecting a settlement if he said there was no settlement proposal I don't know that's a piece of evidence that's in the court sometimes veracity it's always I have no veracity I have no Integrity I'm incompetent I think you need to look at yourselves as to fair share housing I still do not understand why the township has not obtained and posted all hearing transcripts beginning with September 17 2021 the fairer hearing the motion where the town objected to the intervention by concern M residence in a declaratory judgment action where by Statute we're all interested parties and why they did not get the um conditional compliance hearing the fairness hearing is very important for people to listen to was virtual judge Garner denied myself this gentleman over here David Cosgrove an opportunity to question the expert that being our planner and Mr banish if you look at the statute about declaratory judgments I had the same standing as fair share housing center why wasn't I ever able to answer questions in my motion to determine my interested party status I listed 18 questions that have never been answered I just wanted the court to say let Mr banish and let our planners answer one of these questions because one of the things we're talking about is when we talk about contracts formation this is not a a contract between private parties involves public parties this is the public they were not notified of the terms of the settlement till after it was approved there are cases out there I have a case that's going up to the P division that in 20201 when Mrs puus Miss puus was our mayor our rights were suppressed I had a sue to get the right to speak again for all these people in this room room and now I'm told I'm incompetent I have no Integrity question is if one thing I suggest everyone you want the judge to recused you have the right if you own property to write the court because you're an interested party in a declaratory judgment action in a declaratory judgment action the court cannot issue coercive remedies we have not yet made that argue thank you Charles benar 27 year resident of mil burro Hills um there is a potential for new information about the site uh I'm not going to disclose that publicly but I will write a letter to the township committee and I'd be happy to beat with you privately I'm a chemical engineer with 52 years of experience and there's an opportunity to have new information to vacate that agreement and uh I'd like to offer my assistance in in helping you thank you thank you hi J Morel resident uh first want to thank uh all the TC members for their service to the community um thank you uh three points real quick number one is um I fully support moving forward with the renovation of this building um as I've said before I've been to many municipal buildings across uh the state um ours is definitely a lower till tier building and it's time something be done uh kicking the can down the road is not going to solve any problems so please move ahead Full Steam uh number two uh regarding the setback ordinance for front yards I raised concerns about that a year ago when it was brought forward I'm glad it's being reconsidered um uh and I hope it uh I hope it gets uh uh returned back to its previous state um finally um uh regarding Mr kersh's comments that the website no longer includes the term expir dates um thank you for bringing that up uh I'm assuming it's just an oversight and I don't know how anybody could interpret his comments to mean that the terms have been eliminated so um thank you Mr kers thank you Dean Pastor one last comment I I'm I've been so impressed this year with all of you working together and I'm a little disappointed and I do support Dave cost's call to get this committee going on affordable housing we have a lot of to do this is huge there's so much to learn and to deal with so I just um I I just don't understand why this didn't go forward it's not like what you've done before this year so it's a little puzzling thank you thank you evening Jerry Kung just a minor thought um and thank you mayor for bringing up the pedestrian advisory uh pedestrian safety Advisory Board peace out um I I think this has been brought up before but just wanted to follow up again um is there any sort of restrictions on the electric scooters that kids are you know riding around on in town um I I just today I was waiting to make a left turn onto Milburn a from Short Hills AV um busiest like one of the busier intersections in town at five o'clock trying to get to my haircut on time um I and I did wait like probably six stop lights before I could make that left turn while I was waiting there and the I didn't have a left turn signal but it it's green and then you get a or I think it starts that you get a left turn signal and then it turns green so opposing traffic was coming north on Short Hills AV um and they can make a right turn and so in that sort of crosswalk um between you're on the high school side of Milburn AV and you're Crossing Milburn AV to get you're Crossing up in the direction of sh Hills AV um you have a do not walk sign when it's green um and I saw a kid riding a scooter on the sidewalk up to that intersection saw the do not walk sign and then he sped through the crosswalk and I was thinking you know those things go pretty fast um people making a right turn pretty quickly um he could have been hit so I don't know if that's part of pedestrian safety in terms of you know educating the children in the community that you you have to you know you have to follow the street signs when it says do not walk do not walk um so I don't know if that can be incorporated because you know God for bid something terrible happens um you know also I was making a left turn so sometimes you know you try to make that left turn you so uh just something that came to mind um you know streets are getting busier I know everyone's concerned about that so just let's try to be ahead of the aall on this thanks thank you Janet pisar Main Street um mayor Rano earlier today you made a report about studies that were done for speed limit compliance on certain specific streets and I would like to request that such a study be done on Main Street um it's not so much Northern Main Street that I'm concerned with because there are two lights uh Rector in Maine and Nobert Avenue in Maine that control some of the flow I don't know exactly how those lights are timed but it seems the traffic is forced to slow down and not make both those lights um at the same time however Southern Main Street from coming over the bridge on Springfield um I have to say I've seen Speeders that look like they might be going 50 miles an hour in a 25 mile an hour Zone and I think that's very concerning I have to say um last week for the first time I saw a police officer issue a speeding ticket on Main Street and that pleased me very very much I think there needs to be much more enforcement um the other thing is I just want to mention that for several years now there has been panhandling in the Box Hall parking lot where Staples is locating that's been going on for a while um in the parking lot not so much outside the doors and um I also just want to say that yesterday I saw my second homeless person in melburn I don't know if that's a common sighting um or if this is something new but it was just yesterday I saw my second person thank you thank you uh Debbie Frank um Milbourne Avenue just about the um pan handling I don't live that far from Trader Joe so I I've been there couple times a week I would say and and I did see one small family I just wanted to let you know I don't know that even Traders or even Petco would necessarily be aware of it it was not in front of the doors it was on the edge of the parking lot right by Walnut Street and they were not they were just sitting there with a sign so I don't know if that's the same family or if that's the same location but it's very possible they're not even aware that it's happening uh Carrie Herer um Michael I think you were you w answering my question directly the first time I spoke but with regard to the apartments Alex I think you explained it a little bit better and and and Jared you're certainly familiar in other towns where towns have established their own housing authorities and built their own units if we by example to to simplify for your micro examples versus my macro if we bought an apartment complex and over a period of years with deed restriction everybody's sort of touched on this but again limited amount of time it's hard for me to expand so anytime anyone wants to learn a little bit more I think you all have the Avenues to learn more it it is a possible thing for us to do and it's not just for the renovation it's to basically deed restrict in essence we could buy a complex at 2 3% demolish it and build something bigger and we control it it's a lot less cost as you referred to $350,000 instead of 600 end of that point um I hear a lot of conversation everybody thinks they know everything because I'm around a long time doesn't mean I know everything but regarding traffic does anybody know anywhere in town on a local kind of road where there's a passing zone double two different locations on the same street we all go by unless you've had it happen to you and one of them is the most crazy places of all to happen on White Oak rdge Road you're certainly on White Oak Bridge Road J on white oakd a lot of us are there are two passings they' been there forever until you've been out I'm out at 91 11 o'clock at night coming back for meetings until you've been passed by someone the kids cross there it's a disaster for years it's been there for years but that whether it's train drop off whether it's double driveways on the chadam road parking lot we're putting two new double driveways on the new chadam development which shouldn't be there there are so many different things to be done and you got your committees but go out to Residents you know Diane you know talks about trees lots of people have lots of thoughts and some people are crazy some are Ecentric some just have ideas but to get out of the Committees right miss the Committees and participation but I participated on town for a lot of years you know long before this it's a sunk decision not yet there's still time somebody has the cure for cancer let's take it you haven't expressed an interest in knowing I think I have a better place to put it Alex has reasons and good reasons why it should be done now your reasons are good but to go and do it because oh my God if we don't do it now we're not going to do it is not a good enough reason um we spent a lot of money on a lot of different things including the two-way traffic and I think most people and I'm up here most of you won't talk to me I mean that that that's not why I stand up here to talk it's it's to get it onto the record for the public mbour Avenue and tic Street were two-way streets Once Upon a Time have the photograph of it it's it's there it should go back to it it if it should go back to it but the studies need to be done to determine whether it works it goes for the left inters or anything else I'm happy to talk to anyone and share any of my experiences and knowledge thank you and then I won't overate good evening hi um Tom Hiller uh just a couple of points uh in in response to the affordable housing and the discussion by Mr caner seems to me we have two things uh that are major problems for us one is the settlement one is the banish report let's take the banish report for a second I we learned that Mr banish has was given an opportunity to weigh in on the Alternatives of nine main street or other properties we later um suggested and that on the hearing he was in court and my question was when he was in court and since we take the position that uh he contradicted himself that his opinion's unreliable for any number of reasons perhaps um was he did we ask for him to be called he was sitting right there did we say say judge put Mr banish on the stand I would like to cross-examine him did but what we've done is because the judge didn't do that the judge didn't say I'll call Mr banish that that's bias on her part even though we didn't perhaps ask her to the second question is does that really make a difference is there not an argument that she was obligated to call him to justify any decision whether we asked for or not because there was a dispute of fact and there's an answer to that that I don't have off the top of my head the second one is the is the settlement agreement what we know now is we signed the settlement agreement we went to court and asked the court to accept the settlement agreement to approve the settlement agreement so what's what are our answers then is is the settle are the orders inconsistent with the settlement agreement in other words you're enforcing a settlement agreement but doesn't provide to the orders you are are we arguing that we don't seem to yet be arguing that it should be modified or vacated for some some reason or was suggestion that maybe change circumstances have changed at the site one of the gentlemen just brought that up and another question is even if we got a recusal of the judge if they're enforcing the settlement agreement and we can't get out from underneath it what difference is that going to make some judg is going to do something different so these are questions that I think we have to face up to because we need to know where we're going in this case and what the chances of success are and we can rail against the judge but if she's enforcing the settlement that we ask her to ENT to enter and we don't have a way to get around that and perhaps well we do then where are we left thank you thank you hey okay I was just gonna finish earlier so thank you so much for the extra opportunity um I wanted to just shout out to Dave Cosgrove on pushing for that affordable housing committee to go ahead I think he's very smart about that and I hope you listen to him um Alex thank you so much for explaining on teardowns um there was some information that was extremely helpful for me that I didn't really think about so thank you um I do think though that there should be code built around teardowns because a lot of times Builders go in and they trash the place and leave it like sitting in a total state of chaos with you know fence around it for three years and imagine if you're living in you know your home and you have to deal with that so I I do think that I I hope the township committee and the planning board might look at visiting that but thank you again for educating me I really appreciate it I want to talk about 5G um really quickly so in Spring Lake I know quite a a bunch of people down there because I'm an Avid surfer and I spent a lot of time on the beaches there and they have thwart Ed um putting in 5G antennas on every single block on the boardwalk I mean can you imagine they're hideous looking besides the fact that they're ugly can you imagine you're trying to like be calm and you have EMF frequencies actually raining down on you while you're trying to be on the beach and they already have good sales service there so I don't really know why they're doing that but I want to point out to you because no one tells me about the 5G stuff and our Town's like oh we can't do anything about it but rep Chris Smith I know he's a republican but he's putting legislation through to give more control to towns and also individuals have control so what Spring Lake is doing they're using their 150 citizens that have complained about it that's a lot of people to actually uh work with RFK Junior's attorneys um they've actually come in now along with the town of belmare to fight Verizon and they've also put in ordinances not allowing 5G antennas in certain locations so you do have control um and our Town's choosing not to have control and not being transparent and I want to remind you that some people have serious EMF frequency issues and there's going to be Ada violations for for people that are educated enough to know that and you need to have cell towers 1,500 feet away from living residences so really think about that because everybody's blowing this issue off and it's really going to come to a head and there's lots of towns getting on board with it so I just want to throw back that to you and then I also wanted to ask going back to the triai center application that's going to be coming back up on November 6 one of the things I wanted to talk to you about was in that meeting after the meeting there was a lot of intimidating of witnesses by the applicant and there's multiple people that felt that way including myself and um that was concerning to me and I also want to talk to you um you know about um the deed restrictions again because it's very clear that this is a class to I read the deed actually there's nowhere in the deed that it says oh we banish the deed re thank you Miss best thank you thank you have a nice night thanks Anette good evening Perry erso hey I'm right side up like to say um thank you all of you on that di tonight um I'm Sorry Miss trus isn't here but I it's just very nice and refreshing to see that this entire body is working in a nonpartisan way so and you're looking out the best of the Town Mr stuller I appreciate all your efforts joined by Mr sacen and um hopefully that it'll go forward with your efforts um all due respect to Mr caner I don't think anybody is discredit crediting or trying to um any way um but I am pretty and I'm sure you all are because there's about 67 recipients on most of attorney feld's emails so if you haven't had a chance I would respectfully ask that you take the moment to look through o I believe it was October 10th or October 11th email sent from attorney Feld regarding the bare property management and exactly what happened and what transpired with the request of recusal and going back to October 1st uh Deputy Mayor sac's comments regarding um who's making these decisions and if they're brought to the TC so if you could answer the question is does the attorney have the full authority to respond on behalf of the TC or does the TC have to be consulted prior to any because you take a moment and look at a certification not only filed and signed by attorney Feld but also I'll hold up by myself that I am subject and I signed this I'm subject to punishment that in this certification states that I was aware and I was instructed and um the recusal was refused immediately so I think if we could have some type of clarification what the process is with this I think that you know it would L you know um shine some light on some any type of confusion and um I'm happy to forward this uh email to the entire TC and Mr caner just in case you did miss it but I know sometimes people think that you know Mr Feld is um overwhelming us with emails but however if you take the time some of that information should not be um discredited and taken mildly and truthfully I would if I were a Township member consider taking up this fine gentleman's offer thank you so much and have a wonderful evening thank you close public comment do you want to start Mr I have a few few um to Mr Fel I don't think anyone's called you incompetent and that you lack Integrity uh and I read everything you send through and I do appreciate that um for Mr hner and and and and a couple other folks Let's Not Be unburned by what has been fresh perspectives times have changed um you know Township when we're appointed to Township committee uh we have a responsib ability to do what's best for the town under the constitution of New Jersey that we swore and oath to as well as United States of America so uh as we look as we work forward uh I just know that we can't afford not to fight this fight because it's the right fight uh and I appreciate everybody's efforts in coming out and spending a few hours with us thank you thank you I just want to just um the affordable housing appointments like um Deputy Mayor said earlier we um did not have consensus on all the appointments so we are going to take care of it at the next meeting but the meetings are open to the public so whenever they begin I'm sure the deputy mayor will let everyone know and you're welcome to be there um and the electric scooters do they follow the same rules as bicycles depends uh depends the speed of the vehicle so that's something we could talk to the schools about yeah and I I forgot to bring that up yeah we could talk to the schools about that and also the chief with the uh speed study on Main Street I'll mention it sure um so Mr Feld and Miss persono I do recall there being some sort of whether it was technically a settlement offer or some sort of profer I do know we were presented with uh a proposal uh from your side it was discussed in closed session and there was not consensus to uh you know adopt that the uh the majority decided to continue on with the case um so I just wanted to put that out there you know I don't know if this K spoke or or if settlement agreement is not the right um term but that was brought to us it wasn't you know that Mr T was making a unilateral decision it's something that we discussed um let's see um Miss best uh I think you raised some interesting questions about the deed restrictions uh I think that's definitely something you should bring to the planning board as that's the appropriate body uh to be looking at that or handling that um I I I know that in the past when there's been stuff going on in that area uh deed restrictions came into play so there's some history there um so definitely bring that the attention to the planning board before you go on I would also add to bring to the planning board the intimidation that you felt I think that's abely also signicant but that is the place to bring that not not here but you know tomorrow the planning board will be ex correct um with regards to the electric scooters um you know perhaps that's something that we can um have the experts weigh in on when we do the townwide traffic study um it's my understanding that uh right now the proposals have gone to the DPW or thisp thisp okay do we have uh estimation of when that review will be done uh it should be very shortly um and again I'd like to sort of discuss the the path forward with yourself and and and maybe the other committee members um given given their responses and her and her analysis um because you know maybe maybe the time to address some of these pedestrian safety things if we're doing if we decide to go forward with it which I hope we would um see oh I think mayor Rano addressed the issue of the committee appointments um I will try and get that scheduled um we're going to be meeting via Zoom so that makes it very easy for all to to watch um and uh I guess I'll I'll let Mr McDonald know and maybe that get posted to the website so for those of you that are interested to watch the meeting you'll be able to do [Music] so think that's all I have thanks yeah just real quick um as far as the electric scooter goes and Dr kung's comments about that intersection I think one is there there are state law WS pasted in terms of uh how you're allowed to operate th those types of vehicles a lot of it depends on the speed of the vehicle electric bikes electric scooters um and one of the difficult parts of that is obviously when the when our kids are riding those um Scooters or bikes you know the enforcement of that can get very tricky um one in particular are they wear wearing a helmet I'm I'm not sure in your case whether they were AR good um but uh but but certainly it's something that we can continue to discuss with the schools and the police department um and again I hate to keep throwing stuff on the community policing unit but this is also a really good opportunity for them to uh educate uh the kids about the operation of those and to your other point about the left-hand turn signal this is a condition that happens not only in Melbourne in quite a few places but everywhere else is that when there is a dedicated left-hand turn um that that hand will stay raised and tell people not to walk people only go based on the flow of traffic and they say oh well the traffic is Flowing therefore I'm allowed to cross and that is not necessarily the case so that is another education point and so I agree with you there um and probably something that you know whether we have specific uh information put out um you know from from on our channels and different things like that in the schools I think that's important um and then just to Mr hel's point about the um the passing zones on white o Road you know at times I don't know whether um the county even realizes that they still have those um or whether they find them necessary anymore um and so maybe it's just a quick conversation or or a quick heads up to them about it and the concerns over it uh because a lot of times when roads are repaved and restriped they just go with what was therei previously and they restripe it accordingly so um that's all I had to add to that Alex uh for the community Ser I was on the scooter issue three kids on the scooter One Scooter going like a bat out of hell down the sidewalk so I think for the community policeing two and the schools maybe one Rider per scooter as well that's always advisable yeah uh do you have a motion to adjourn good night thank you