Borough Council - Regular Meeting

Okay. Okay.

Good evening, everyone. This is a record-breaking agenda of the government body of the Parliament. We're going to be out Tuesday, September 15, 2000, at 26 and 7 p.m. The board's meeting is in order, but I'll speak to the flag. Aye. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands,

One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Roll call.

Mayor D'Amato? Here. Councilman Runkert? Present. Councilman Catalano, maybe late. Councilman Graziano?

Here.

Councilwoman Hagan? Here. Councilwoman Schubert? Here. Councilman Yassi?

Here.

We also have our municipal clerk, Pam Smith, business administrator, Michael Sondermeyer, and verbal attorneys on summary.

This meeting is called to pursuant to provisions of the Open Public Meetings Law. Addict to notice of this meeting was advertised in the Herald News on January 9, 2026.

Office was provided to a local news media and posted continuously in the municipal building. A copy of this notice was available to the public and was filed in the Office of the Municipal Clerk.

There are two emergency exits in this council chambers. The main entrance would you enter through and the secondary exits to the left of where I am seated.

If there is an emergency, walk orderly to the exit and exit through the door, down the stairs, and out of the building. If there's any questions, please raise your hand.

Seeing none, we do not have any presentation tonight.

We do have an executive session with no action being So we've got a motion to open up for early public comment. Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Anyone wishing to come up?

No.

Okay. Okay. Since there is no one, the motion to close. Second. All in favor? Aye. Report to committees.

Mayor, on... Friday we had the 9-11 Memorial, which was nicely attended, even though the high school did have football games, so it was not as intense, but it was still beautiful. We have the 26th of September Celebration Day, and we have a lot of vendors and food trucks coming, and a lot of the the PTA will be there, the library, the Glen Wall Gardens will be there, there will be crafts, and Jen has a lot more information on that. For the EMTs, Triborough, year to date, they had 1,268 calls. For the month of August, they did 177 calls. Triborough took 66 calls, 76 duty calls, and had four canceled calls. On the report that Gail Dunlap sent to me, it says that they missed 25 calls and that the percentage for the month is 83%. The county took six calls and mutual aid to us was 25. So per town breakdown was 52 for Butler, 57 calls for Bloomingdale, 46 calls to Kinnelung. And they did mutual aid. They did 12 mutual aid calls to Bloomingdale, Compton Lakes, Wannakee, and Ringwood. Also, for the seniors are super busy. Their walking club is really big. They meet on Wednesdays at 9 a.m. They're in Wildwood. They left. They do a lot of stuff. They're in Wildwood. They'll be back on Thursday. Look at their calendars online for their chairmobics. And they have a trip to Langer Castle leaving on September 23rd. And they're going to start up the line dancing is back. The cost is $3 per class. And that's going to be on September 28th, October 6th, and October 20th at 1.30 PM at the Senior Center. Coming soon to the Senior Center, sign-ups are required for all special events on 10-6, 11 a.m., random presentation for lung and cancer screening, and on 10-20 at 11, the horse races lunch at the Berkshire. You definitely have to try the sign-ups. Plus, they have a trip to Bermuda lined up and Newport Cat Christmas. And all this is also on their Facebook page as well.

One reminder, on October 10th, we have our movie on Main Street in Columbus Park. We'll start getting there around 6, so at sundown, that's 6.30. We should have public focus, so it should be family-friendly. We'll be giving out free popcorn, confirming that. desserts and things like that. So I definitely encourage folks that are going to be having dinner to stop at a local takeout and break into the park to watch a movie. That's all. On Saturday, October 3rd, the environmental will be having some people gather at Oakwood Lake for some lightning and marking to clear some

right there, so it's the beginning of the ongoing project, but if there's anyone interested in volunteering, on a Saturday, October 3rd, from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. And they do have permission to do that currently, right? Yes, we have. That's it.

Board of Health? that we met last night. They're doing a breast cancer strike swing. So it's going to be a golf outing along with a walk. It's going to be . So until the 3rd, the walk is 9 AM. Recommendation is $10 of donation. And then the golf outing portion will be $100 per person. This is the first time that they're doing this, so they're very excited and hoping to get a little bit of turnout for it. As usual, we have our health, the Board of Health has their health screening the second Tuesday, which we perform here in Patrick Chambers. The Children's Monthly Wellness Clinic for those who are uninsured, major new family. Also, the buyers on the website to make scheduled appointments depending on your location. And also, the free and hearing for uninsured or without insurance can the equipment's getting made at a total location and we're going to be starting the seasonal clinics and library nothing to report there i'm sorry the literacy not there and then on the 26th we do have our vendors i sent both the final

Follow-ups to our trucks on the flyer.

And I had a couple reach-outs tonight for additional vendors, so I'll be reaching out to them.

That's a fire alarm.

We've received a grant

I'm not sure if everybody was aware or not, but $10,000 from State Farm for turnout gear for the fire department. We bought some gear with that money. Projects right now are still underway. Chestnut is still going, as well as Ann and Ellen.

The $10,000 in grants for gear only covers three sets of gear. It's super

Just something simple for me.

The celebration day is the La Casca 5K along with the Parks and Parkers. Right now we have 122 participants with this. So the community is coming out. Sign-ups are ongoing until the race kicks off. So we urge people to sign up online if they choose to participate. Or you can just go online and make a donation. We would appreciate it. Do you want to talk about the school? What's going on? Does anybody have any questions?

Yeah.

With the construction of the school and the drainage, you've seen the pits that they put in for that project. It ran right over our lines for our electric for the musky lighting at Waltie Bergen. So we had to get an electrician up there to disconnect the wires, time being, while they did their pits.

The construction is pretty complete on that side of it. They just want to confirm with their plant that there's nothing else that has to happen in that area.

And then they will dig a new trench, and the electrician will come in and run a new conduit and put those lights back together right now. The lights, there's dim lighting around the entire field.

The small soft fuel does not have, it's not able to play games. the large baseball field and slash softball field does have full lights, so they can use that.

And the walk track is available. And the walk track is available, and they're looking within the next week and a half, two weeks, to have that wrapped up and have the problem resolved.

Good.

Okay. That's all I have.

Go to item number 9, resolution 2026.9.8, consent agenda.

Do I have a motion to accept the consent agenda? So moved. Second.

Just before we do roll call on this, item E is a contract with jobs for blue. This is simply the contractor needs a police officer to contact them. Instead of calling into their desk and asking for an officer, they can go online now, and they can request an officer for wherever that job is taking place. This is no cost. This is just to make life a little bit easier on our P's for scheduling and on the contractor's schedule. So we're just going into a contract agreement with them, so it just makes it a little bit easier for both sides. Okay. Any other questions regarding the consent agenda? Steve, not at all.

Cronkert?

Yes.

Graziano?

Yes.

Kagan? Yes. Schubert? Yes. Yassi? Yes.

Okay. New business. Boxer Resolution Number 2026.9.15. Payment of the Bills. A motion to pay the bills. Second. Any questions? Roll call.

Graziano?

Yes.

Pagan? Yes. Schubert? Yes. Jassy?

Yes.

Bronker?

Yes.

Okay.

So, we have a motion to call the count. So moved. All in favor?

Aye. All right.

Anyone want to come up?

I just want to address what I was talking about last week with the trucks that we purchased.

And there seemed to be two meetings. And the issue was that they were already bought. From what I understand, they were purchased before the meeting. We did a B.L. for it, and then the CASA sold out and accepted B.O. So that's what happened.

So they were already purchased.

I mean, the discussion was kind of moot. So I don't know why someone should say they're over the purchase of the domain. I do know the council school has to approve it just because we have a purchase on our hands ready to go to the dealership. If the council says no, then it's up to Mike to contact the dealer that we're not going for.

But it was approved previously at the previous meeting, which, of course, the recording didn't work. That wasn't approved at the meeting before that. It was talked about in Mike's report that the next meeting will be

Yes.

So we spoke about it in the report, but we didn't approve it at that meeting. We approved it at the meeting you were at for the day. It was really more of a discussion, but it shouldn't have happened then. Well, we just wanted to have a discussion. We did have a councilman that really voted against it because he didn't agree with it. So we had a discussion. Everybody put their input in, and we still don't vote. We had one that voted no. So let's follow the process.

I think it would have been clearer if you didn't state what was going on. It wasn't just that we're going to start looking for something now. It was just a letter of intent from me to that we're going to purchase it based on a resolution that will be approved. The letter of intent to me was beyond that.

So I'm just thinking it should be addressed. It would have been voted now and Mike would have pulled back It was in motion to buy, right? Because of the process that we always follow, and we have to do a resolution to make the purchase, which we did in that meeting.

So if you follow the process, if that meeting, if that failed, obviously, those trucks would have been bought. So if it did not fail, the council approved it, and it was done. I do the same thing with employees that are leaving the DPW. I'll ask if we can replace an employee that left prior to the next meeting to adopt the hiring of it.

Yes, you can go ahead and give them a letter of intent to yes, and it'll be approved at the next meeting. But I get a green light from the council. Correct. We just don't do it without everybody's final vote. Anyone else?

So I had a general question, and I know a while back when you've been here, we had asked about policies in the town about wildlife, like painting deer specifically. And I know we have an ordinance, there's an ordinance on the books against that. So I'm kind of wondering.

I think there is. There is, yeah. There is, but it's not, and I didn't pull it up here. The ordinance review really needs to look at it, because it states shall be unlawful to feed or to bait bears and their undomesticated animals in any manner.

For purposes of this ordinance, undomesticated animals shall be defined as any four-legged mammal which lives in the wild or has not been trained to live in a human environment which has the potential for attacking humans.

You don't know. They could be in a rut.

You don't know where they're going to go.

They could be running across a road and hit somebody. I mean, we can get into it a little bit deeper if that's what we need to do. That's fine.

But we do have something on the books that you should not be feeding. Yeah, absolutely. And I do know that earlier, six months ago, eight months ago, I remember that you had also posted something on a reminder on the Facebook page. but the question I specifically have is I've witnessed a neighbor, this isn't hearsay, I've directly witnessed a neighbor feeding deer in their backyard, and it certainly contributes to the growing problem that we have, right? So what I'm wondering, and I sent an email to the administrator about this, I'm wondering what the enforcement mechanism is for that ordinance. I don't want to... high tail on the neighbors, but they're contributing to the problem by eating deer in their backyard in the corn.

This is my opinion, and then we'd have to talk to chemical control. If we have an issue, forget about the deer for a second, that a neighbor's yard is on the corn. We do a polite door knock with our maintenance officer and says, you know, you need to cut as long as your lawn size, whatever it is. And that's just, you know, we

So I would think we'd have to have a conversation with...

So that's what we would have to get in touch with, and then they can just take it from there. My opinion, we're not going to do this, we're having problems, and we're trying to avoid any more. Explain why. Yes, the answer is yes.

Okay, and so... I can share some additional information with you about that. It's sort of related to that. I know that a survey is going to be conducted, I think, in November time. Do we have a date? So it depends upon who wants to leave small.

They need to have a clear line of sight for the drones. So we have been in touch with the group that's going to be doing that, and they'll be following up with us in October. We should get it.

It's not the contract. We're on their books. And the date will be shared on the Facebook page or something, I guess. It'll be announced so that PD's not getting phone calls about drones flying overhead. But beyond that, I don't think we're going to directly inform people. But there will be an announcement made to the general public that there will be a plan. We have two nights to whatever.

We probably should, when we do that, explain sort of what it is. We've been watching that.

When I'm doing that, we're trying to get a tracking mechanism to see what your population is. Keep an eye on the Facebook page for when that gets shared. Thank you.

You're welcome. Anyone else?

This is their process is going through the DEP.

And this is what they do to professionals, and this is what they tell us, and when it should be done. So we're just going to follow their lead of following their process.

I saw that with you yesterday.

You did?

Yeah. That's awesome. One week through my garden there, my bare feet, I stepped in a pile of deer sheds.

Oh, that's great.

I remember you talking about that, you know, that you love the deer. And I'm like, oh, I love to go to the deer as much as you do in my yard. My yard's best fit.

Yes.

All right, that's good. If I need it, I'll come up here. Come on, come on up, come on up. All right, anyone else? Seeing none, I want a motion to close.

So moved.

All in favor? Aye.

Motion to go to executive.

So moved.

Thank you. All right.