##VIDEO ID:HXc8DIP5eYM## Council agenda t of ppy Troy Hills Township Council agenda meeting of October 8th 2024 introduction posting a notice adequate notice of this meeting has been provided in accordance with the retirement of the open public meetings law by following the notice in the office of the Township Clerk and by posting the meeting notice on the bulletin board at the municipal building on December 20th 2023 where it has remained posted since that date a legal notice appeared in the daily record of New York Star Ledger on December 26 202 3 now please ask everyone to stand for the flag salute alance flag roll call Mr Hernandez here here we I said Mr Hernandez I mean council president here um Mr McGrath here Mr muella here now Mr kifi here okay too oh Mr negle I'm sorry here uh also present are mayor James Barbaro business administrator uh Jamie cry Township attorney Michael Lavery and municipal clerk coed Madden council president we have a quorum may I begin yes please okay upcoming meetings uh 10:22 24 at 7:00 p.m. is the regular meeting 11 12:24 at 7:00 p.m. is the agenda meeting no ordinances at this time uh at this time I'd like to entertain a motion to open up the public session motion second motion made by Mr neglia seconded by Mr Hernandez roll call Mr Hernandez yes Mr McGrath Mr Mella Mr negri Mr K the floor is open to the public to speak on any matter you have five minutes to speak Bob [Music] I want a disappointment n yeah that would be a great disappointment [Music] Bob okay my name is Bob Vania and I'm from sipy um I feel so strongly against Pilots specifically residential Pilots that I just can't let certain pilot related statements go unchallenged at the last council meeting the mayor repeated a statement that he's often made that is Pilots do not create School aged children the mayor is correct that commercial pilots do not create schoolage children on the other hand resident IAL Pilots can and do add students to our school system here's how that happens suppose a developer such as 15 15 Route 10 presents plans before the council to build 500 Apartments some of which are affordable housing units if completed the development will probably send 75 to 100 children to our schools however without a pilot the developer claims that the project is not economically feasible simply stated no pilot equals no apartments and no students whereas the granting of a pilot will result in both so yes Pilots can and do generate school age children the typical argument that you hear from the other side is that because of affordable housing laws we're going to get development and students whether there is a pilot or not that may true but if the develop and development and the students are inevitable doesn't it make sense to set to collect say $3 million in conventional taxes rather than a million do in Pilot payments and some residential Pilots do add school children uh and and the course to educate them to the school system add on the cost for municipal services and mandated infrastructure improvements now includ including $6 million water wells and the result the result is that a residential pilot is a huge money loser for Pary and should never be granted thank you anyone else okay seeing no one I'd like to uh entertain a motion to close the public session motion second motion made by Mr neglia seconded by m Mr muella roll call Mr Hernandez yes Mr McGrath yes Mr muella yes Mr neglia Mr Ki yes okay at this time I'd like to have the council briefly review the consent agenda which will be voted on at the next council meeting of October 22nd do we have any questions with regards to the consent agenda okay uh seeing none we're going to go ahead and move on to presentations mayor thank you c um tonight I'll be presenting the um three U Norbert sasas senior citizen Awards and then I'll answer the questions about the pilots did that we didn't do that I don't think we've done it [Music] God bless you pretty good huh yeah I think Chinese four years in high school and I don't remember any of it remember the and thenes I know that one so I remember some stuff so first of all congratulations this is a proclamation from the um Town SRO Hills the saskowski senior citizen of the Year award was created by an endowment of Jean Sakowski who with a tireless volunteer dedicating her time to the mallak Hall Museum in mortown the Daughters of the American Revolution and other causes and whereas the sakasi senior citizen of the Year award recognizes a PRP residents of over 60 years of age who demonstrates the power of making a difference in the community Through volunteerism whereas in recognizing the need for ior citizens to better maintain their health and physical well-being Florence organized and conducts a weekly exercise class free of charge as well as outings to nearby parks and walking paths and whereas forence coordinated the annual Chinese new yearor performance who consistently drew a large attendance for over 10 years assist with the Mandarin translation at the senior set in Tai Chi classes and is the longtime president of the ping pong club and whereas Flor Khan has extended herself in a multitude of areas offering computer assistance translation services and General Life navigation of pan seniors as needed now therefore I James Al Barbara the mayor of the township P TR Hills to hereby present this Proclamation as a token of respect and admiration for Florence Khan and urge the residents of our community to follow good example of service to community dated this 8th day of October 2024 that's for you congratulations give yeah I mean at Le good evening mayor bario council president Paul kifi Jr and uh Michelle uh pic good uh and all my ping pong and taii and Grand dancing healthy bones friends they all here they all came here to support me to tonight I also want to thank you those who uh nominated and select me for the award obviously you're deserving of it I just play ping pong so yeah I okay I'll continue to be the president of the pingpong club and be nice be kind and be helpful thank you so much thank you Peg [Music] Smith first of all congratulations thank you proclamation of the township ofro Hills whereas the saki senior citizen of the Year World us gr upon an endowment by Jean sakasi who was a tus volunteer dedicating her time to the mull Hall usam in Morristown the Daughters of the American Revolution and other the causes and whereas the sakoski senior citizen of the Year award recognizes a paron resident of over 60 years of age who demonstrates the power of making a difference in the community Through volunteerism and where as Peggy Smith has been a volunteer with the friends of the ppan library since 2019 beginning at the little look an ongoing Friends book sale at the main library to becoming co-president along with marish shut of friends of the pan library in 2020 and whereas under Peggy's guidance fundraising efforts for the friends Grew From two $2 uh in 2021 to 15,000 in 2022 and astounding $27,700 in 2023 wow that's a lot yeah I think yeah I think so 2,000 I mean I could be two hours I mean so the bulk of which is used to fund the library program such as Summer and the winter readings the tiny art show Lake high the library Halloween party the valley at the Main Library community read and the purchase of the items of the library of things and whereas in addition to fundraising Peggy gives her time countless hours a week working at the Nook sorting book donations attending to administrative tasks and Friends of the library social media presence and whereas Peggy Smith has been described as passionate dedicated tenacious and extremely deserving of recognition now therefore I James Al barar the made of town for Senator H to hereby present this Proclamation as a token of respect and admiration for Peggy Smith and Ur the residents of our community to follow her example of service in community dated this 8th day of October 2024 that's for you thank you you raise our kind of money you can help us out with our budget you know um I'm very lucky at years to be able to do something that I enjoy so much I never did fundraising in all the volunteer work I've done much you know throughout my life in Paran um but I took on the library and um through the sale of books that the community has donated um it's like Christmas morning I always say on Monday morning when we go into the library and we see wonderful wonderful books that people in Paran have collected it I've lived here 40 years 45 years and I never would have known you know what was inside people's houses um I couldn't have done it without all our volunteers which um were a small group but very very dedicated and people work very hard for the library you do as well so yeah congratulations thank [Applause] you I didn't close I guess I didn't well good hold on all right I know dor for many years I'm not going to get yelled out tonight I guess everybody knows over here huh yeah exactly great friends yep great sister and you're a good person too so that that's what makes it easy so proclamation of the township detroy Hills now I'm going to read it all over again because it's worth it okay so the S whereas the sakes senior citizen of the Year award was created by the endowment by Jean Sakowski who was Tyler's volunteer dedicating her time to the McCulla h Museum in moristown the Daughters of the American Revolution and other causes and whereas the sakasi senior citizen of the Year award recognizes a70 resident of over 60 years of age who demonstrates the power of making a difference in the community Through volunteerism and whereas D sok is in her six years as president of the Golden Age Club of St Peter's Roman Catholic Church in pipany where she works tirelessly on behalf of senior citizens by helping them stay active creating a place to socialize and assisting them in navigating any issue that may they may encounter and whereas Doris is a devoted parisher of St peters's the Apostle Roman Catholic Church where she is Eucharist Minister as a dedicated member of the Rosary alar society and tirelessly volunteers with the homebound Ministry where she visits with people who are ill alone Homebound and unable to attend the mass whereas in addition Doris volunteers at the nursing home by helping where needed and by transporting residents to the chapel and setting up for mass and whereas dors walk believes that volunteering is a significant and vital part of life providing help to those in need as well as creating and fostering empathy and compassion for our fellow man now therefore I James R Barbaro of the township of barim Troy Hills to hereby present this Proclamation as a token of respect and admiration for dorso rock and urge the residents of our community to follow her example of service to community daed this 8th day of October [Music] 2024 I know you never been short for words so if you want to say anything well thank you as I told Michelle when she came in and told me that I had won this I told her this is not what I do it for and she insisted so I'm good with that now it took me time but I'm good with it now but I do appreciate everybody that I did with in that Community Center they're fantastic people and they deserve to be helped and there's a lot of people out there that do need to be helped so that's what I'm here for and thank you so [Music] much I want to thank all the recip for all you do for the community of par Troy Hills and that's what makes Paran a great town those that volunteer their time to help others in Need This truly is appreciated um Doris I've known you for many years and I know your commitment to this community as well um Deb with the books that's phenomenal what you've done with the friends of the library and friend um I can't play pingpong because if I win I might jump over the net as a victory chant I want to see that no you but that being said thank you for you what you do for the community parity because in all reality it's each helping hand that keeps moving us forward so thank you and God bless you thank you thank you oh yeah I to say I'm over 60 years of AG yeah want to join the club2 get them my report real [Music] quick okay council president I'm going to be going probably all over the place I wrote some stuff down that I want to talk about in my report I'll just wait you guys are more than welcome to stay but you don't have to if you want if you guys want to leave now a minute mayor congratulations again congratulations [Music] everybody congratulations good night congrat congratulations to see you Thursday okay I'm going to start this off on a positive note and end on a positive note um I like that this um Saturday October 5th I had the honor of performing a wedding uh with uh two individuals that are in the audience tonight and that's Michael Smith and Jamie Smith now or Jamie Welsh and it's actually a very nice event and I appreciate and I really felt very honored that you asked me to do the wedding so thank you so very much than you I'm going to give an update on the baln road repairs update as you know um the the line has been fixed and we're looking at Milling of the road starting approximately on October 16th and I say approximately because sometimes when you give a day it's never that dat so and and Paving should uh proceed that on October 17th uh as for gov pilot uh the total concerns reported uh year to date is 632 number of Clos concerns are 601 which is 95% close number of concerns in progress is 26 which is 4% and number of open concerns is five and that's 1% and that's carried over from um the last uh the last meeting that we had um so I've been getting some um questions asked to me about um the Route 46 now I and I explained what was going on the rout 46 of the crossing by Baldwin Road and you know people um getting killed crossing the road and we did meet with the commissioner with regards to that so the pretty much the update is waiting on the state uh with regards to them they're going to be probably putting a fence up um we're going to see what kind of fence they're going to put up that's aesthetically uh appealing uh to the township um and there are concerns uh of the of individuals still crossing the roadways but there's only one way to prevent it um we can't have a police officer on every corner of every um crossup highway so um the fence might be the only Al alternative that the state has not the township so I'm going to get to North beverick Road now as you know right now we're doing the streetscape on North beverick Road and a lot of the residents have contacted the township wanting to know what it's going to be done and to be totally honest it's not going to be done for a while cuz this is only phase one phase one of the beautification of North beverick Road um so with that being said you you have to be very blunt and candid and honest um this is not going to be done by the end of October um you know there's a lot of things that happen uh when you are uh repairing uh a roadway water lines have to be you know amended and and that's what we're going through right now so in all reality I I don't see this thing being concluded into going into next year also I'd like to commend District 5 fire department for its um relief effort for those in North Carolina from Hurricane Helen which has caused damage of across the state of North Carolina and all the things that they're doing for the communities over there like bottled water non-perishable foods baby food formula and so I want to commend all the fire districts and I know some of them are going to be joining forces with them as well I also want to take this opportunity because as you know um and if if you don't know then you haven't been reading social media but I'm I'm really um ecstatic to announce the the relationship between myself and the Board of Education uh specifically Andy Chao um and um I'm going to be having meetings with them uh visiting their schools and highlighting areas that you know are potentially could be projected the town might be able to do and get come up with some sort of an agreement uh with regards to the pilots I also want to take this opportunity uh to recognize the par School District which received an impressive a ranking from Niche and this recognition highlights the D's commitment to academic Excellence dedicated faculty and supportive learning environment with such a high ranking it's no wonder that families are choosing to come to paron for the children's education so I want to I want to commend them on that um I think out of 400 500 and something school schools uh POS ranks 35 I think that's what it was and sixth in the county y um so and that gives with an a with an a ranking so I want to thank you know faculty Teach as Administration um for their commitment to the community of parcion and it's children and and I'm a product of the school system U as Frank and Paul are we went graduated fromp Hills and so I want to commend them and but sh high is also good I have to say that okay just cover myself um so that that being said but now there was a comment made tonight and if I do miss anything here with regards to you know Mr you know Venia come up saying when somebody says something he you know he can't hold back back well I'm the same way and I can't hold back either not and I don't mean that in a negative way there's nothing wrong with disagreeing how the pilots do not create school age children that's a fallacy it's housing that does it's affordable housing it's any type of housing a pilot is just a mechanism of financing that's all a pilot is and that's why they call payment of L taxes so when you hear the word payment of L taxes it's still a form of a tax now you know when you when he mentions we lose $3 million conventionally or I think that was the number um I don't know exactly what you said number wise we lose either way because if if it's not built if the commercial properties aren't built what happens the burden falls on the residents and he's right not everything is going to be a pilot and that's a fact now when you look at Pilots when you look at housing you look at affordable housing some times what a pilot will do is it will reduce the number of affordable housing units because they don't need as many as much housing and it reduces the number because the C now they have a profit margin so that's just with that now he mentioned 1515 round 10 I did not negotiate 1515 round 10 I I wasn't part of that negotiation um and I will admit there's a lot of units over there for 1515 round 10 uh but that's not something I would have negotiated uh with regards to that and and Mr B you're passionate about it and I respect you for that and there's nothing wrong with us not agreeing um but you know the facts are the facts when it comes down to the mechanism of all that so also I want to um discuss and this is important because I'm still seeing it in town bike safety bike safety helmet safety measures um and I have to tell you I it's I don't see it happening I don't see the kids wearing the helmets when they're riding the bikes uh we do have a program that I I I pretty much go around if I see a child with a helmet I get out of my vehicle I give them a um a uh Dunkin Donuts gift card thanking them for wearing their helmets but we're we're going to have to really um enhance this program because God forbid we don't want to see anybody else um we have cracked down significantly on um speeding in parcion I don't know what the numbers are now but we've we've enhanced not enhanced because you don't want to do that we've enforced um our speeding uh any with that speeds you pretty much get a ticket there's no like way pretty much to get out of it now but we have to do this because one thing I will agree that we're not going to be able to stop certain things now we follow the lawsuit we're in with other 13 other towns um were suing the state with regards to the affordable housing now let me just explain something real quick and I and I'll end this because it's uh affordable housing is not a bad thing there are people that cannot afford housing it's the mechanism that they use it's the formula that they use they have no concern about baran's infrastructure and a perfect example will be the park project that was approved in 200 I think 20 and and that's no no administration's fault because you have to you have to adhere to the affordable housing rules they made the township build two new wells and those Wells are anywhere anywhere between three to $6 million each to build well who comes up with that money the township has to come up with it now our infrastructure are are takes a takes a hit takes a hit buty road I mean it's going to pretty much going to be congested and that's just one area you take 15 15 round 10 very similar so now we have to prepare ourselves um for a change in our infrastructure so I felt and I know the council felt the same way because they approved the resolution that we have to take a stand and we have to say to the state Hey listen they say PRP is affluent it is in certain areas but in certain areas it's not we have low income we have middle income I grew up in the apartments clone apartments that was pretty much low to Middle income um we have our share of individuals that need help um but the problem with the affordable housing regulations is it's not being built for p residents it's being built for the whole entire state so and that creates a problem for us because we want to house our our senior citizens who can't afford to live in their homes anymore we want to house our families here that cannot afford to live in homes or even buy a home um but we want to help them out so I want to make that clear that the township H has a responsibility we have no problem with the affordable housing but it's the amount the number they want to give us and the remedy that the developers get that what becomes the problem so I felt that it was necessary for the town update on uh I know Segway to this on cannabis we'll be we're working diligently on an ordinance and hopefully we will present this ordinance on um at the next council meeting and we get the whole cabis thing under control uh because I'll tell you um and I've said this a 100 times um right now we're just hoping to keep our revenues where it's at now we had a um meeting with our um rating agency and the meeting went very well um in fact they were ECA not ecstatic I shouldn't say that they were happy how we maintaining our financial stability here in pany um you're always concerned they're going to um downgrade you but they didn't they kept us where we're at saying pipany has improved pipany has bounced back and they commended us saying that we have Surplus and or fund balance and all our utilities and that was very important for them to um and they recognize that so I want to take this you know time to thank the administration and our CFO and everybody that worked very hard to to get us back on track we're back on track and and I'm I'm happy to say that um and there's so much more I could say but um I'll leave the rest with Jamie but thank you council president thank you Township Council any member yeah so the economic development team alongside mayor James raria will welcome the following new businesses par siany with ribbon cutting celebrations the salad house on Friday October 11th at 894 Route 46 West at 10:30 a.m. crafton's Farm Saturday October 26 at 2352 Route 10 West at 11:45 a.m. that one painter Friday October 25th at 8 campus at 11:00 a.m. in La pla restaurant Saturday November 2nd 44 North beverick Road at 10:00 a.m. public is invited uh the next meeting in the economic development committee I heard there were some uh Miss people on the last one they had changed the date this one is Wednesday November 13th at 6:30 at 90 East Hy Road Third Floor conference room public is invited please RSVP with chairman Frank Cahill 973-559-6787 15th at 6:00 here at Town Hall thank you thank you Mr McGrath any other member from Township Council okay seeing none moving along to the township attorney uh no report this evening council president and the business administrator thank you thank you council president just a a few quick announcements um as mayor stated we uh had a good meeting with Moody's uh they were very happy with our progress they did maintain our uh rating um and they basically uh uh you know they're impressed with our improved reserves that are set to hold in 2024 they specifically mentioned the Township's strong underlying credit quality um and uh they um like the diversity of uh projects that are coming into town to uh help the tax base um we discussed the warehouses we discussed some of the housing we discussed some of the uh uh uh good projects like lifetime Fitness and uh a data center that's coming in so they're really really impressed with that um wanted to talk about the uh so vter registration deadline uh for the November general election is October 15th the deadline for uh the last day to apply for vote by mails or absente ballots is Tuesday October 29th so those two are upcoming and early voting begins on October 26th uh and goes through November 3rd there's eight different around Morris County that you can uh uh vote early uh in person if you'd like um we have all the information uh in our clerk's office you can reach out to Clon and his team and they can let you know or the county um uh uh clerk's office as well the uh there's going to be the um uh TR trunk Retreat this uh Saturday or not this Saturday on Saturday October 26th from 1:00 to 4 at Smithfield the admission is one bag of candy that you have to bring per child so about 50 pieces um you can get more information at the rec by calling Rec or going out to the website and signing up uh there as well should be a great day um the other thing that uh we need to talk about is uh October 14th um is Columbus Day celebrated uh Town facilities will be closed um columus day honors uh uh the Italian Americans and there's a big Italian American influence uh in in parsipany that should be celebrated it's up here on this panel uh too uh you don't say and um it's uh it's actually uh also a Polish American uh uh month right yeah Hispanic hisan Hispanic American month indigenous people uh month it's uh and today is perogi day and anarie Ferrara day happy birthday that's all I have Mr cryan um can we get an update on a library I know I think you guys had met on that and yes because I know they've been asking and folks like to know yes thanks councilman uh mayor and I had a great meeting with uh the library and uh discussing some of the uh improvements that are needed there in Lake iata there's you know we've talked about it at this meeting and other uh venues as well they were given they're awarded $3 million uh as a matching Grant uh to redo to completely redo the lake Hawa the library so the township was going to put up 3 million and they were going to get 3 million from the state the cost of that project was somewhere between 9 and 12 million so it just was not feasible uh in that location so we tried to uh uh go through a couple of different uh plans uh Melissa the the librarian was you know she's very uh uh interested and Vigilant about trying to get the best for that facility um what was discussed was maybe having the township keep the $3 million uh commitment to fix up that Branch over there Mar and I toured it yesterday with uh uh our building maintenance uh uh supervisor and it's going to cost much more than $3 million to fix all that stuff to get that Library up and going so it's a a big issue is that just for the repairs to just to get it back up and you know like the current cost yeah do you expect we don't we don't have an exact quote on it um so one of the things that we're going to do is is contract with an architect to go in and and try to cost some of this stuff out but what Meritt suggested and uh talked about is finding a different um uh uh location for that branch that is very convenient for Lake hawaa folks uh but also um cost effective cost effective uh because you see some of the new libraries that are going up around the state they're going up in brand new locations and that's how you're able to get a better uh uh bank for your buck and a better building um so we're looking at that I don't know if mayor wants to to yeah so when we're in there we're touring and all the repairs that need to be done I actually felt we're going to put money into something that we never going to get uh we're going to we're going to be putting money into a project into a library that is not going to even be up to date and Par I mean just the hva system alone will probably cost a million dollars in that area there um and whatever we we fix doesn't even fix the problem nowhere near it you still have to put in new computer just look at do all these things the bathrooms are outdated uh you the smell downstairs the must I don't know how you even get rid of that the walls the ceilings um there's only in my opinion and that's why we got an architect two options we find another location or we demolish the one there and sell it um because um we're going to put money we're going to put $3 million into something that's not even 25% um done it's only 25% done which means you got 75% more to do and there's no way I don't think the state will even consider giving us any more money realizing that we put money into a bad project so we have some options and you know I don't know if we can do them I don't know if I should I can discuss it I guess but we have the CET property that we just purchased which is uh 11 acres of land and if we were to put a library there it's really pretty much in a heart of Lake kwat next to oldwood school and further down as Lake kwat School um and I think that would be more cost effective than this building here it was built in 1948 um it's outdated and you the ceilings are are not the right height um it's not Ada accessible uh so there's a lot we're going to have to do and we're going to spend $3 million I even put a little crack in it so you know we we're going to get the cost estimate we'll send it to the council and we're going to have to decide what we want to do in the future with it of course we talked about our fundraising you know they about some way to do a a foundation cuz uh but you know those can take years to to get the amount of money but uh or there's a mechanism where we can still get the foundation and whatever we bond that we would receive that money back to the foundation money so there's a lot of things we're going to have to decide we want to do with that but I think to move out of Lake kwaa it's no more Long Lake Kat um library but it's it's bad it's in bad shape and I I don't I don't feel it's it's in the best interest of us to use money and put it into a bad project so if you ever want to take a tour of it you know I would recommend every council member to take a tour and then you're going to realize I mean foundation's cracked all the entryways are cracked um and water is getting in through almost every area every doorway every this the roof and I I don't know how there's no mold in there but they said there isn't any but it's a it's it's in bad shape so and I'm not a building a maintenance person but I can tell you this much I walked in I said this building is in bad shape and and so and we can only repair so much we have our building of Maintenance uh superintendent he's fixing peace fixing mealing fixing stuff and he even said eight now the the boil system itself is is like from probably 1970 um it's going to have to be converted to gas a whole new system on right there in my opinion the two things are $2 million just to heat the place and to um air condition it so we'll have to make a decision so we we're going to hire an architect and we're going to get AC cost um estimate thank you mayor thank you any else okay I have no report moving along approval of payroll and bills list CFO Leonard ho recommends authorization for payment number one authorizes payment of the October 11th 2024 regular miscellaneous payroll estimated at $1,650,000 and number two payment of bills from voucher list of 10124 through 10324 which is 3,520 786 93 may I have a motion to approve the authorization for payment motion second motion made by Mr neglia second by Mr Mella roll call Mr herandez yes Mr McGrath yes Mr Mel yes Mr neglia yes Mr kifi yes motion passes can I please have a motion to adjourn make a motion second motion made by Mr Mella seconded by Mr negli a roll call Mr Hernandez yes Mr McGrath yes Mr Mella Mr neglia Mr Ki yes we're adjourned have a good night everyone good night everyone good night