Village Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening. This is the Ridgewood Village Council Public Workshop. The date is August 5th, 2026. The time is 7.30 p.m. Adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by posting on the bulletin board in Village Hall, by mail to the Ridgewood News, the record and by submission to all persons entitled the same as provided by law of a schedule, including the date and time of this meeting. And it was also posted on the Village of Ridgewood's legal notices page on its website. Roll call.

Council Member Mortimer.

Here.

Deputy Mayor Perrin. Here. Council Member Weitz. Here. Council Member Winograd. Here. And Mayor Vaggianos.

Here. Will you all please join us in a salute to our flag.

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

And let's go right to public comment.

Is this on?

Yes. Okay.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Anne Loving, Ridgewood resident. My grandson was in town the other day and a police officer gave him, he came home and said he got a ticket. But what he was given was a certificate for a free small slurpee drink because he was riding a pedal bike and wearing a helmet. And I thought that was just awesome. First of all, this e-bike law worked like that. I don't see any e-bikes around. It's just been fantastic. But the problem with this Operation Chill, as it's called, is that the certificates are redeemable at 7-Eleven, Speedway, and Stripes, none of which are really within pedal bike distance for a 13-year-old. So I was wondering, I think, Deputy Mayor, I believe, aren't you like the liaison to the Special Improvement, I don't know, maybe somebody could talk to some of the local businesses and suggest that they might come up with a coupon, even I guess the businesses would give them out. This was given out by a police officer, but that would be really swell, you know, a free bubble tea or whatever or ice cream at Dairy Queen, something that they could actually get to on their pedal bikes in Ridgewood. Thank you.

Thank you, Ann. Anybody else? Seeing no one, we'll go to Denise on hybrid access. Denise, you're up.

Hi, everybody. Denise Lima, Ridgewood resident. Good evening. Today I just want to talk a little bit about communications, specifically two-way conversations between residents and village leaders. hoping that we can generate a more valuable input into the village process, master plan and budget so that we can create joint relationships that help to build our community. I realize there's a tremendous amount of projects and resolutions going on as well as unexpected daily emergencies, but I'm getting concerned that we don't have frequent circular conversations. The village council meetings and public comments are one directional at best. Most times our questions are typically not answered. On social media, which appears to be the predominant means to the village to communicate, there's a growing and obvious recognition that residents questions on the village or the village manager's pages are not being responded to. I can provide you a list after the public comments, or you can search social media yourselves. The second problem with using social media is that residents are not hanging around and checking for updates to all the different pages. So important updates are going unnoticed. This is a particular concern for when we have natural disasters or emergencies. Most recently, a few residents asked if emergency news can be pushed to residents via text message, like most of our surrounding towns do, and those questions were not answered. So I just wanted to highlight that. I know we have a communications person. Again, that's kind of one way. I think the crux here is having a two-way conversation, and I'd like to understand what the council feels, how we can better go about achieving that. That's it. Thank you.

Thank you, Denise. Anybody else? Seeing no one, I'm going to close public comment, turn it over to the council.

If I could just maybe address Denise's point Denise, your point, we do council chat. I know I leave every quarter. We generally wind up not getting very many people there. Our emails are always open. I don't get that many emails from folks. Generally, when we do, I'm copying on something that goes to Keith. Keith is very, very good at responding very, very quickly. But most importantly, like I said, my email is certainly public. I'm happy to make myself available to you or any citizen at any time. I believe you, like me, have a day job, so I'll do weekends, I'll do nights. Haven't had any invitations from you or others but certainly I think, I speak on behalf of the entire council, we're an open book, and we're happy to speak with you whenever you like. I can't promise you we'll give you the answers you want, but we'll certainly speak with you and communicate with you if you reach out to us.

Yeah, and I echo Evan's comments. As most of you know, my cell phone number is open to everyone. I've said it from the dais here. It is online. My business card, I know several of members of the council have their cell phone numbers on their business card, which when we first introduced this idea to some of the staff, they said, we don't think that's a good idea. And we said, we're going to do it anyway. So we are incredibly accessible. We try and keep the meetings moving because long dialogues during the meeting don't always allow us to get to our work. And we do have to get that done. So by all means, reach out to us. We're happy to respond.

I also want to add. So everything that they've said, in addition to serving as a council member, we're liaisons to multiple committees where we can field more targeted questions. So I sit on six committees. And several of my committees not only meet in person but have hybrid access there. So an example would be access fields, which I know many people attend. they're all hybrid as well as stigma-free. We've done a lot to engage with the public. I want to take this as an opportunity to thank our communications chair who is here, and we recognize the difference between communicating back and forth and pushing notifications out. But four years ago, there wasn't a Village Instagram or and our Facebook postings were limited. Ridgewood Waters here and we've done a lot to enhance it and there's always room for more because Ridgewood is a smart thoughtful community and they have an appetite for real information and we are all wedded to providing that but you can find us anywhere and you know I've never been accused of missing out on a chitchat so let us know.

And it's not going to happen now. Anybody else? Good, let's move on. Heather, manager's report.

Okay, village manager Keith Casmark is out of the country on a pre-scheduled vacation. I'm providing an update on the soil remediation project at the Zabriskie-Shedler property. During the remediation work, nine-by-nine-inch floor tiles containing asbestos were discovered among buried construction debris in an area formerly known as the Schottmeyer property. Because the asbestos is sealed with the tile, the potential for airborne fibers to be released is low. A representative from the NJDEP was on site when the material was discovered, and immediate action was taken by the village's LSRP from Matrix New World Engineering. The village is required to conduct asbestos abatement, which is scheduled to begin on Thursday, August 6th, and the work is expected to take two to three days. The material will be removed by a licensed asbestos abatement contractor under the oversight of a certified asbestos project monitor from Matrix. Workers will wear the required protective equipment, and the tiles will be kept wet during removal and placed directly into a lined container for transport to an approved disposal facility. Matrix will also conduct perimeter air monitoring throughout the work to ensure the safety measures in place are effective. The impact to air quality outside the work zone is expected to be minimal. Once the material has been removed, Matrix will collect soil samples for laboratory testing to confirm that asbestos associated with the buried debris is not detected in the soil. The village will actively pursue available NJDEP funding to help cover the additional costs associated with the asbestos abatement. To notify the community, a letter was mailed to 140 property owners in the Zabriskie-Shedlar neighborhood. The same information was emailed to residents in the Zabriskie-Shedlar area who signed up for emergency notifications through Everbridge. The letter also was posted on the village website and emailed to the individuals and organizations listed in the public outreach plan prepared by Matrix and approved by the NJDEP in October 2024. The village will continue to keep residents informed as the project moves forward. Now I'm going on to other aspects of the manager's report. Excuse me. Bergen County has completed the paving of Maple Avenue from the Hohokas border to the Glenrock border. The project was complicated by thunderstorms that brought heavy rains to the area last week. We appreciate everyone's patience and flexibility as the areas they were able to pave change frequently due to the weather, but we are pleased to have the much needed project completed. Relative to those storms early last week, the Ridgewood Fire Department responded to 23 emergencies, and the Police Department responded to over 25. This includes a variety of calls, including multiple trees and wires down, numerous water conditions, and underground fire smoke from a manhole cover, and a lightning strike resulting in a working fire, the fire that grew to a second alarm, including assistance from five mutual aid towns. In our continued effort to address pedestrian safety in our downtown, the permanent crosswalk has been installed near Tate Bakery on East Ridgewood Avenue. The corner bump outs shorten the crosswalk area, causing pedestrians to be in the roadway for a shorter period of time. Thank you to our engineering division for their work in getting this done. The Ridgewood Fire Department recently took delivery of a new ambulance, which is now officially responding to calls. This rig replaces a unit that had reached the end of its service life. The ambulance was required as a pre-built vehicle, allowing the village to avoid multi-year manufacturing delays while purchasing the apparatus has a significantly reduced cost. Just a reminder that overnight parking requests can be submitted quickly and conveniently online. You don't need to make a phone call. Simply complete and submit the online form by 10.30 p.m. Requests are typically reviewed by the on-duty supervisor by 11 p.m. Please note that your request is not approved until you receive an email confirmation. The portal link is on the resident tab on the top of the Village homepage. In addition, the Ridgewood Recycling Center is accepting used mattresses and box springs. Both mattresses and box springs must be bagged and ID is required to confirm you are a Ridgewood resident. They may be dropped at the Recycling Center. As a reminder, the two-day-per-week irrigation schedule is in effect. Odd-numbered addresses for irrigation are Tuesday and Saturday, and even-numbered addresses for irrigation are Wednesday and Sunday. Ridgewood Senior Bus, new hours, 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., Tuesday through Thursday. If you have a medical appointment, need to go to the grocery store, or want to stroll around the mall, call Beth Spadato at 201-670-5500, extension 2203 to make a reservation. The bus will be going to the ShopRite in Wyckoff on Wednesdays. The Ridgewood Guild sponsors music in the night for the 15th season and will provide music in various locations on Friday nights through Labor Day. Graydon Pool is open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. These will be the hours through August 30th and then also on September 5th, 6th, and 7th. The Ridgewood Chamber of Commerce presents the 25th Annual Ridgewood Farmers Market on Sundays through November 1st. from 8.30 a.m. to 2 o'clock p.m. at the New Jersey train station parking lot on the west side. Enjoy fresh farm-to-table vegetables and fruits, baked goods, local honey, homemade mozzarella, and much more. Music in the park is taking place on Saturday evenings from 7.30 p.m. to 9.30 p.m. at Memorial Park at Van Ness Square. On August 15th is Sound of Fay. On August 22nd is Mary's Basement, and on August 29th, it's Acoustic Dudes. Come and shop, dine, and enjoy the entertainment this summer. The Ridgewood Guild is sponsoring free movies in the park. The next one is on August 19th from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. in Memorial Park at Van Ness Square, and it's going to be Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas. Those who are attending may wear a Halloween costume to this movie. The Richard Chamber of Commerce presents Super Sidewalk Sales Days on Thursday, August 6th through Saturday, August 8th, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., weather permitting. There will be arts and crafts, music, chalk, face painting, balloons, hula hoop contest, a Where's Waldo search, through participating businesses, which may result in a prize for those who find Waldo in all of the businesses. The map of participating businesses can be picked up at bookends on each day. Village Council upcoming meetings are broadcast live from the Village Hall courtroom on the Village website and Channel 34 on Fios. They are also available on Zoom or by phone or YouTube. Upcoming meetings, August 12th next week is our Village Council public meeting. September 2nd is the work session. September 9th is a public meeting, and September 23rd is a work session, and all meetings begin at 7.30 p.m. That's the end of my report.

Thanks, Heather. Let's go to council reports. Frank, kick it off.

Nothing. Evan. In light of the very large agenda, I too will waive my council report. Siobhan.

I feel bad, but I have several reports.

I never expected you to wait for us. There is something called peer pressure, Siobhan.

So I want to begin by thanking everybody who put together the Zabriskie open house where we had local community partners and all of us were in attendance. and got to see this very important premium house opened up. It featured local artwork from a local mother, and it never looked better, so thank you to our staff and our partners who made that happen. And I think everybody who was there felt how much possibility the house holds for all of us. With respect to access, I have two updates. I want to thank the Ridgewood Police Department, our community partners, Bridgewood High School and announced that we created a film with one of our student interns who wants to go to film school and this will be released during Access Week and it shows how a neurodivergent driver can respond differently to being pulled over by a police officer. We actually staged a simulation at Graydon parking lot at 6.45 in the morning because it's so busy over at Graydon. So thank you to the students who always share their skills and are police force and when we all left for the day, it's unique to have a student. And I said, do you think you know your community much better? And he said, I know it and I love it so much more today. So thank you to the Bridgewood Police. If you're unfamiliar with the Operation Blue Envelope program, please go down and check it out and thank you to our parks department. With respect to access, I want to announce that we're going to postpone access this year simply because the construction at the library and village hall will make it inaccessible and finding a location that can accommodate access will be a lot. We're going to put it out into the spring. We're meeting from the date. This is very exciting for us because everyone's into it and we're going to come back bigger and better in the spring. But the fashion show, all of that really can't occur without the library. So stay tuned for that. I had the fields committee meeting yesterday morning. It was incredibly well intended for August. Sadly, a lot of our fields have been closed because we've experienced such significant rain. The high school is asking to stay off Stevens and the stadium until the end of the month. We're in the process of cleaning up our fields. Our grass fields were open. The 12U girls softball won the state championships. And we received an outcry from like a nice reach out from a man who's reached out to us before regarding flooding and some ideas he has. And Frank and I are going to do a walkthrough with him to explore his ideas with the Board of Ed. And it was, in general, very positive meeting. And I'm grateful to everybody who is handling this incredibly wet weather so well. And two last things, I too just want to take a brief moment and thank the community for their patience with Maple Ave, thank the county and our local engineering. I live right off Maple Ave and I walked it and it was so impressive and so exciting and then just randomly I got stuck behind the paint truck and it was such an impressive feat and I know the whole community really, really endured a lot of detours and was incredibly patient. And there's been jokes about roller skating down Maple Avenue, and I'm not sure they're jokes anymore. And lastly, I wanted to give a preview because Shade Tree has been meeting about our door knocker program. So Shade Tree is very dedicated. They like to be boots on the ground. We have gaps in our area from the GIS, and we also have now gaps because there's been significant weather. So we'll be rolling more information on this on social. But if your house is missing a tree or had a tree come down, you're going to receive an engagement door knocker, which is so cute, student-generated, and this will be rolled out in the fall with more detail coming. Clearly, there'll be students involved in it, and it'll be by the area, but it's best to mention now before someone goes on social media and questions, are these door knockers real? They are. They were introduced here, and thank you again to all the people. I can say with Carol being here, I think this has 875 emails associated with it, so we're very proud of our product, and that's it.

Thanks, Siobhan. Pam?

I have a question for Siobhan. Isn't this a door hanger?

Yeah, sorry. We were calling it the door knocker program because they're going to hang and knock.

Okay, because we have another knocker program coming up later in this agenda.

Do you have a cute graphic?

Green Ridgewood Met on July 23rd and... We welcomed Clarissa Gubb as a new member of Green Ridgewood and a new student liaison, Devin Letcher, to Green Team. Various subcommittee heads reported on what they're up to, notably Skip the Stuff. One of our members went door to door to restaurants to make sure that they knew that the Skip the Stuff law is going into effect August 1st, and they are ready and understand it. We also talked about the New Jersey Resiliency Grant, which the county submitted with the help of several towns along the Saddle River. We also talked about the Community Energy Planning Grant, which we are working with with Carol Bielkowski, and that is a much smaller grant, and it is not due until I think it's August 15th. The planning board met last night, oh, and to go back to Green Ridgewood, our meetings in September through December, because of the construction in this building, are going to be at the stable downstairs for these next four months. The planning board met here last night to hold a courtesy review on a proposed shade structure that would be installed behind Willard Elementary School. and the planning board saw the drawings and we will be sending a letter, if it hasn't already gone, to say that this plan complies with the master plan, specifically the community facilities recommendation number six to prepare for resiliency in light of climate change. shade structure will, of course, make the seating area underneath it cooler and more usable. And that's all I have.

Thanks, Pam. I just want to take a moment to thank Siobhan You catch a lot of flack for a lot of things. But the neurodivergent community, and for those of you who are unfamiliar with that, people with autism and other related situations, they're a forgotten community. They're not forgotten by Siobhan. And she works with the Access Committee to set up all sorts of wonderful programs that we've talked about here. in council chambers, and I just want to thank you because if some member of my family was neurodivergent, I'd want to get some support from my community, and you provide that support, so thank you very much. And that's all I have. Let's go to our regular agenda. Rich, I believe you're kicking it off for us with Ridgewood Water.

Wait a minute.

Oh, did I miss something?

No.

Yeah, we moved. Oh, go ahead.

Item eight was to be a presentation by Steve Grillo on the amendments to the RBA ordinance. But since he's on vacation, I was going to cover it. By all means. Okay. And before I begin.

We have it later in policy. Pardon? We have it later. We moved it to policy.

It is.

Oh, okay.

Sorry.

You want to wait until then?

Fine. Yeah.

Okay.

Okay. Good. Rich, you getting your exercise? Up, down, back, front.

Hello, Richard. Good evening. Welcome.

Happy summer.

And to you, my friend.

Hope you're all enjoying it. Good news is we've gotten some rain. Good to see. So we just have four quick items for you tonight. The first item is the award of our annual purchase of water meters that go in customers' homes. On Thursday, June 25th, we received bids for cold water meters and accessories. There was a single bid received for the years 2026 to 27, the vendor being Rio Supply. The total bid amount, which is a calculation based on the meter prices to determine the low bidder, in this case the sole bidder, was $330,124.75 for the year 2026. The recommendation is for the balance of this year to award an amount not to exceed of $100,000 just for the purchase of the meters that we need to get through this year. And then there'll be a subsequent award at the beginning of 27 to cover that year based on the prices and the bid. And this is funded under the water utility budget.

Questions, anybody?

Yes, may I suggest, in light of the fact that later in the agenda there's a modification of a resolution to reflect the correct number of bids, so here in the resolution it says whereas bids were received, you might want to make that singular.

Okay.

Just to reflect that we only got the one.

Whereas bid was received.

Yeah. Thank you. A bid.

A bid.

Anybody else? All good?

Okay, next. Let's go. Next item, this is a continuation of a service we took advantage of in a prior year as well, whereas the Township of Wyckoff bids up on an annual basis for road paving within the Township. They received several bids this year. They're awarding to the low bidder D&L paving contractors, and Richard Waters recommending that we enter into that contract for all the paving that we need to do to restore the raw water main trenches that were dug up in the Township of Wyckoff. So this is a recommendation to award to D&L Paving an amount not to exceed $386,239.72 funded under the water capital budget. So we'll actually issue a purchase order to their contractor and pay them directly utilizing the prices in their bid.

Everybody good? Yeah. Let's go.

The third item, this is for a professional services contract for the second phase of Ridgewater's lead service line replacement program. This will be the design and the construction administration inspection for the second contract. We're near completion on the first contract. The recommendation this time is to a new firm, Arcadis, on the amount of $793,200. Arcadis is a local firm. We've worked with them before on several other projects, and this is also funded under the water capital budget.

Everybody good? How come we're changing vendors?

The prior consultant still needs to finish up the first contract. So we want them to focus on that and figure it was a good time to shift to someone else and give them a shot at the next contract.

Can I just say that because of The first one just went so smoothly, as I've said before. So I'm sure the second one will do as good, but it just was amazing how they're, like I said.

You had a very good experience. There's the good and the bad. But I'm glad you had a good experience.

But Rich, Arcadis isn't a new vendor. We have other contracts with them.

Correct.

Okay, good.

They've actually, the vendor that's designing three of the last four PFAS projects and overseeing the construction successfully so far.

And congratulations for getting a contract that's, what, $80,000 less expensive?

Yes, compared to last year. And to this point, I think we've replaced over 650 lead service lines. So we're making very good progress. So the last item that Deputy Mayor pointed out, this is a correction to a prior resolution that was awarded. There were two mistakes in that resolution. One was the reference in the amount of the bids, which the correction will be made on this new resolution. And secondly, that prior resolution also referenced that the project was being funded through New Jersey Infrastructure Bank, which was incorrect. It's being funded from the Ridgewood Water Capital budget. And this is for the replacement of the water main on West Glen Avenue. That's actually going to break ground in September.

Nice.

Questions? Nope. All good. Thank you, Rich. Thank you very much.

Okay, moving on to parking. The first is amending Chapter 190 for permitting shared parking arrangements for institutional uses. This was previously discussed in July. Mr. Rogers prepared the ordinance. This will actually immediately assist the teachers at George Washington Middle School who have been using the Westside Presbyterian Church's parking lot for decades. It will go to the site plan exemption committee for approval.

Questions? Nope. That's good.

Okay. Let's go.

The next one is no stopping or standing on South Pleasant Avenue at Somerville School. So during peak drop off and pickup hours, there's heavy northbound traffic on the school side of the roadway at Somerville School. Parents typically park in the designated cutout on the southbound side of the street. However, parking is currently allowed where the cutout ends, next to the tennis courts. This creates a bottleneck on South Fantine Avenue. In addition, the nearby traffic light at the intersection of South Pleasant and Spring Avenue exacerbates the issue, as vehicles queue southbound at the traffic light, potentially causing a standstill. They recommend regulating parking in the 120-foot area on the west side of South Pleasant Avenue next to the tennis courts during drop-off and pick-up hours, which would be from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 2.30 p.m. to 3.30 p.m., Monday through Friday from September 1st to June 30th, and it would be designated as no stopping or standing.

I just want to say that this is from the Traffic Safety Bureau that's led by Sergeant Ray Torino, who goes to an extensive amount of extra training specific on traffic. And so if he's recommending it'll be safer, then I absolutely think it's what we should do.

And I just want to also say that I was the safety chair at Orchard School for six years, not the most impressive role, but it is a nice time if you're a parent to think about starting a walk pool. October is National Walk to School Month. Orchard has a serious traffic problem because of the access, and it would be anything we can do to get these kids to get there on foot would improve the safety and the traffic as well. So thanks to the police department. And if you've never started a walk pool, this is the perfect time to do it.

Frank, did this come before CSAC?

No.

Oh, okay, because I don't understand how the situation creates a bottleneck at South Van Dien. That's a good three long blocks away. I just don't understand, but that's all right. I mean, the whole idea sounds good to me.

There's some serious traffic around our schools, like real traffic. Oh, yeah, definitely. I see it.

But I don't see that it affects Van Dien. the intersection of Vandene and Spring is dicey for other reasons, but yeah.

Okay.

The next item is amending the municipal court fines. I'll have our court administrator, Erica Miller, to come up and she'll be up here to answer any questions you may have. So if you go to the first page, The traffic scheduled amounts, everything that's highlighted, so make sure you have the highlighted one, which was given out tonight, goes to the progressive schedule. If you don't have that, you can also look at what the current progressive schedule is and what the proposed progressive schedule is. So, Erica, maybe you could just, I could just read them all. Is the time limit parking, deposit of coins, permit parking, overtime parking, increasing the parking time, paying more than three hours, and then also CBD employee parking. So those are the ones that are all progressive lines. So, Erica, you wanna go over what the progressive schedule is going, proposed?

Welcome, Erica. Hi. Hi. And you need to speak into the mic, so you need to, there you go.

Is the green light on?

Yeah, is the green light on?

There's a button, and then you have to hit that. It's on. Okay, good, thanks.

Okay, so I am just the custodian of keeping track of this. I don't have any, I just was data entry and provided some numbers that was requested of me by the village manager. But what has come to terms was that the current progressive schedule is going to be increased according to this chart we have. So currently, all of the progressives for the I'm sorry, I don't have a highlighted one. Overtime parking, increased parking, and CBD employee parking are currently first through fifth offense, $25. Time limit parking is $35, oh, I'm sorry, All of them currently are $25 for the first through fifth offense. Sixth through 10th offense are $50, 11th through 20th offense are $75, and 21st or more are $100. The proposal that they are looking to implement would remain $25 for the first through fifth offense for the overtime parking, increased parking, CBD employee parking. That is to acknowledge that people do make mistakes and sometimes it's just an oversight so we didn't want to penalize those for the first through fifth offense. It's a significant increase for the 6th through 10th offense and so on and so forth. This is mostly to deter people from parking in the train station lot specifically or using the three hour limit parking spots for commuter purposes.

And if you look at the following page, you can see how many tickets were issued for the various ones, such as time limit parking, permit parking, and overtime parking.

My question, though, is how many 21st or more offenses do we have?

That's a good question, because there are a lot. How many more than 21?

I don't know if I printed it, but I do have, I can...

Because I like the idea of holding the 25 for things, like you said, that made a mistake. But if you get over five, then that's kind of crazy.

I don't have the numbers exactly currently for how many people are over 20. But we're now in August, and I can tell you we have over 75 people that are over five to ten offenses.

Wow. That's really disturbing. And Erica, we've had this discussion in our ordinance working group meeting. Why don't you lay out for the council and for our residents why you're recommending these reductions and increases?

Well, I just want to say that I'm not really recommending anything. I'm just here to provide information and answer some questions. Right. She's not allowed to actually recommend. Yeah.

So, therefore, she is just suggesting because based on the behavior. So, go ahead.

Well, there's a significant increase in people taking advantage of our permit parking, our train station lot, and our parking. parking garage, I get several complaints very often of people that pay a significant amount of money for that permit can't find parking in the morning, even in the garage, and they're forced to walk a significant distance there for causing problems. I have so many people that violate it and are taking advantage of only having to pay $25, and it's kind of a deterrent if they're increased, being that tolls, parking in the city is obviously a significant amount, so people take the chance of only having to pay $25.

I also think added to that, because that's on my walking route, the fact that people are banking on only select days of commuting because they're not back to full-time work. You see more of that. You know what I mean? So we're having trouble selling the parking passes at full boat, and then they have these problems. and somebody who is going in two days a week sort of says I'm gonna roll the dice and so they'd rather pay the fine because they're not commuting across so many days anymore.

All I really wanted to get out was that people are gaming the system and that unless we make it not worth their while, they will continue to do this.

My question is, should we be more aggressive on above 10? I'm shocked that there's so many above 10.

The proposed schedule for the permit parking is... $75 for the first through fifth offense. That is a clear violation of the permit statute. And I believe they were gonna have someone monitor to make sure that there's proper signage everywhere to make sure that it's, I believe it is pretty clear. But so just double check that. So it'd be $75 for the first through fifth offense of the permit parking violation specifically. And then for the sixth through 10th, they're proposing to increase it to $150. and then 11th through 20th offense would be $200, and anything over 21 or more would be $250.

Yeah, I'm just saying, like, should we, like, starting with the 11th through 20th, is that enough? Like, if you have people, 75 people, you said, that are over 10 offenses?

So I have approximately 75 license plates that are in a progressive status, meaning that they have been issued five or more tickets for the same progressive violation, whether it be permit parking, increased parking, or overtime parking.

And on the second page, Frank, and everybody, there's a total calculation. It doesn't highlight the repeat users. You're just looking for the repeaters.

Yeah, that's what we're focused on. But the one through five, okay, I get that, that people make mistakes. I don't want to touch that and applaud that three of those stay the same. My question is, all right, so we'll make six to ten as kind of squishy zone since you get some there but over 10 that's that to me is purposeful um that they're doing it and knowing they're gonna have to pay for it so maybe the 11th to 20th and 21st or more we should raise those significantly as well i mean listen i

I'm in agreement with everything Frank's saying, and I agree with these numbers. I'm okay with, if we wanted to jack it up even further, I agree with you. Then again, $200 for a parking spot for the day is a lot, and I would hope that would be a pretty strong deterrent to people, especially if they're trying to game the system, because at that point, at $200, after a couple of them, they could have just gotten a permit. It'd be cheaper. I'd love to see us tow. I mean, because my concern are the people that are legitimately paying for these permits and can't find a spot and are now late to work. You know, they did the right thing, and the guy that decided to roll the dice is now taking the spot of somebody who paid for it. So I'm fine with these numbers. If you guys want to go higher, I'm down with that as well. I don't want it to be draconian, but it should be punitive. But I'd love to have us start looking at towing. And that's infuriating that people are gaming the system and taking spots. Again, I'm with Frank on this. One through five, it's a mistake. After that, it's clearly intentional.

So should we increase C, the category, which is 20, or do you want to increase B as well?

I will tell you my personal opinion for, and I think this is for the... for the commuter lot that 150 for the 6th through 10th offenses is a lot. 200 for 11th to 20th is a lot. And 250 per offense for anything over 20 is a lot. In fact, in our discussion, New Orleans Working Group, we did increase it to that. It was not that high in the discussion. So we went harder. If you guys want to go higher, I'm good with where we are. I think to talk about towing, which is not a terrible idea, I don't know if we need to have the Kalesan here to discuss how that would work.

So with that, I'm fine with these numbers. I'm sympathetic to Frank's position. I agree $200 for a spot is a lot of money. I would like to maybe think about toning. Maybe that's something we talk about in the fall. Because if they're not getting the message by the 10th time, I think we have to protect our residents that are doing this the right way.

Here's another reason why I would like to try out these numbers first is because I've been getting complaints from a family of parkers who pay for the permit to park on the third floor, and when that's full, they go to the fourth floor. They've been told to go to the fourth floor, but now they're getting tickets because they have to go to the fourth floor, and that really would be adding insult to injury. So I'd like to go with these numbers first.

Okay, so is everyone okay with the proposed progressive schedule, which is on the left-hand side at the bottom?

Can we track after this goes into effect how many repeat offenders we have? Because I'm willing to go with these numbers if it acts as a deterrent. If it doesn't, then I think we revisit this.

Sure, we can do that. And we can revisit it as well.

Yeah.

So that. Right, you can, yeah.

Under our current ordinance, are we authorized to tow?

That I don't know. I'd have to check with the police department. I don't know.

Yeah, let's find out. I will, I will.

I don't think we have a contract with any towing service.

I know we don't have a contract. It's just whether the ordinance authorizes us because I do think that towing is the ultimate deterrent.

That would definitely have to be discussed with the police department and parking enforcement because parking enforcement does not have access to always know which vehicles are in violation when they issue the tickets.

Right, and we don't necessarily want to tow on the first couple of offenses, but when people get to 15, I would be interested in discussing that. Heather, could you set that up for a future meeting? Yes, I'll look into it, yes, absolutely. Thank you.

Okay. I have another question. Conversely to what we've just been talking about, on ordinance 265-32, the description is deposit of coins. Does that mean the person parking failed to put coins in the 15 minute meters?

So that ordinance was made, I believe, when there was actual parking meters where you were depositing coins into the meters to pay for parking prior to us going to Park Mobile and to the kiosks. The ordinance still stands, but it hasn't been used in quite some time. If you look at the numbers, I don't think it's been issued ever. But yes, it could still be used for the 15-minute parking violations if they chose to do that.

The reason I ask is because I hear from merchants that trucks and Uber Eats and the delivery people are parking in the 15 meter spots and it's not available when the shoppers and diners want to use them. And I would like to see that enforced.

Well, if they're not paying for the spot, I assure you they're getting tickets.

Okay, good. I suppose it would be under some other ordinance then.

If they don't pay for the spot, so if they're not depositing money into the meter, there is another ordinance that covers the violation of that 50-minute parking.

Okay, because here under 265-32, there were no... No tickets in 24 or 25.

Right, because that was made more so for the regular spots where when you were depositing coins, now that we have the three-hour parking limit and we have the ParkMobile, that they use more of the 26538 overtime parking, which has more specific wording in the ordinance about the kiosk and the...

I will say without naming names, you can't use ParkMobile in a 15-minute spot, and I have several friends, let's go with, who've parked there, paid for ParkMobile, but didn't use the coin, and they all got tickets, and then they, I said, well, you can't do that, and it's on the sign, but it's a lot of reading, so.

Yeah, if those individuals did pay, and they didn't exceed the 15 minutes, and they showed, they can contact the court, and the judge does review them on a case-by-case basis.

So I'm hearing that everyone's okay with the progressive fines, so we're going to track it, and then we're going to see if it reduces the numbers. We're going to look into towing as well.

Yeah, I think if we can get something in September, either towing or booting or something, I'd love to start that conversation.

Okay. Now, if you would just move on to the criminal, which is ACS at the top. So there were the ones that are highlighted again are the ones that we... in the ordinance working group decided to make a change. Failure to obtain a dog license, failure to obtain a cat license, dog license not worn, dog running at large, first offense, distribution of advertising material, and distribution distribution of advertising handbills. Those are the ones that are slated to be increased. On the next page, smoking prohibited, failure to remove snow and ice, failure to comply with water emergency regulations, and then also a second offense for failure to comply with water emergency regulations. So you can see that the payable amount is the current amount and then the recommended amount is the increase. They vary between $20 or $10 more. One that went up significantly was dog running at large due to the fact that this year, for some reason, we've had a tremendous amount of dog bites. And it's really become an issue. And it's not always a dog running at large that bites, but they also contribute to that. So if you could just take a look at those. If you have any questions, Erica's here. The others, also ANC, which is no change. So we did keep it the same for those others. So it's a minimal amount that we decided to change.

So the only question I have is for, because of access, is there any discussion of a sliding scale for failure to move snow and ice? We have a significant number of senior housing in local downtown. It's a big problem, especially for walkability. I mean, I don't know how much we get of that, but I live near Cher, I live near Cottage, and that is a serious thing for our walking population.

So what are you suggesting?

First offense, a sliding scale, like a one through four. Yeah. I mean, you guys have all heard this, right? I mean, it's a big issue if these properties, and outside of the access issue, it's also on safe routes to school, and so it's something, especially after the winter we had, we had multiple, multiple comments on it, and I think it's an important issue for all age levels, but particularly those who need greater access.

So we did increase it to $100. And so each individual offense, if another snowstorm comes, they would still, it would be another $100. Do you want it more? Is that what you're saying? Like a progressive.

So if your house is left unattended.

I mean, you can also, this is the payable scale. So this is just if somebody receives a ticket, these amounts allow them to just pay the ticket online and avoid having to make a court appearance. What you can also do is if, somebody gets a second offense if you had a different ordinance or if you added a letter to the end of that you could make that ordinance court appearance required and not make it payable and make them come to court to speak with the judge and then the judge can just have a range depending on which offense and that we would have to establish the range yeah right yeah and the reason why is like snow removal particularly after this winter is really really expensive so a hundred dollar find especially if you're a snowbird and out of district which there are you

you would rather pay the $100 fine and you know, not like people who don't think about this and it would make people think twice about walkability and the senior citizens in their neighborhood.

I don't have a problem with Erica's recommendation of establishing a range and after a second or third offense, having the court make a determination, there could be extenuating circumstances. And again, not that we want to have that happen, but I would leave that in the court's discretion. So if we amended to include that, than if we made it say, and I'm going to pick a number, not to exceed $500. Does that sound right? After a second offense.

Yeah.

So for a third offense, it would be not to exceed $500. Does that sound right? I'm okay with that. Good? Yeah.

So that would be then a court appearance required, correct? Oh, sure.

Yeah. So it just would not be included on this violations bureau schedule, which would then default it to being a court appearance required ticket.

They would have to contact the court and come to court. Okay. So that's what we can do. Is everyone in favor? Yes. Evan?

Yeah.

Okay. I just didn't see a yes or no. Thank you.

Great.

Okay, so I think we went over everything. Am I correct, Erica? I believe so, yes. Okay, so we will have an ordinance to introduce for next week.

And Erica, is there a way that you can, I'm thinking I have to amend the ordinance and I think it would be easiest if we just made an exhibit. with regard to all the different violations, the code chapters, that which ones are going to be increased. And we could attach that as an exhibit to the ordinance so that the code company, you know, the coding company that does the ordinances and has something to work off of that they can utilize, because I think if we gave them this sheet...

I have to formalize this. This was just a worksheet, essentially, for Mayor and Council. I will, once you guys approve this and finalize this that you want to request, then I will put it into a formal Local Violations Bureau schedule.

Okay, if you could do that now, I think, now that you've gotten everybody's yays on it. That way we can add it to the ordinance and we can introduce it next week.

Absolutely. So if you could just give that to Jennifer and myself by no later than Monday.

And me, though, too.

Well, yes. And Matt sooner. Don't leave me out. No problem. Okay. Erica, thank you very much. You're welcome. Thank you. Thank you, Erica. Thank you. Great. The next item is an update on the Warner Theatre and Mayor Vaggianos.

Yeah, I'm going to call up Tom DeVita and Albert Frucciarelli. If you'll join us here, they're members of the Board of Trustees of the Ridgewood Arts Foundation. Gentlemen, thank you so much for joining us tonight. We really appreciate it. And I'll give the general update, and then you can chime in. Um, so as, as many of you know, the village has an option to purchase the Warner theater for, I believe it's $2.6 million. We paid $250,000 for that option. That option expires on October 31st. And when the Cheryl administration came in, they kind of put a pause on everything, which. through our timeline out of whack. So we needed to extend that option. We entered into discussions and negotiations with Bowtie Cinema and we have agreed to extend that option at the same rate but for 18 months. So for 18 months it would be $375,000 for which the village will have to bond and and that 375 would be paid quarterly beginning November 1st. The monthly rate is about $20,800, so it would be about a $62,500 payment on November 1st and every quarter thereafter. The one caveat with that is, oh, and through all of this, We are entering into an assignment agreement with the Ridgewood Arts Foundation so that if they are applying for a $75 million grant and they are waiting for the window for the New Jersey Economic Development Authority to open to apply for that, their application is fully prepared and ready to go. If they get the grant, then the village will assign the option to the Ridgewood Arts Foundation, and the Ridgewood Arts Foundation would purchase the theater. The village will not be in the theater business, as I've said many, many times. And with our agreement, the Ridgewood Arts Foundation would then repay the village all of its out-of-pocket money, so the initial $250,000, plus whatever money we spend in this next option. And the way this thing is structured is that if we make a quarterly payment of $63,000 and the next day, or at some point during that quarter, the Ridgewood Arts Foundation purchases the theater, the village will get a refund of whatever balance it has paid out. It is not necessarily true that we will pay 375. If it goes 18 months, then we could. If it goes something less, it will go to that day. So that's where we are. Again, the goal here is ultimately that the village gets what we hope will be a game-changing performing arts center in the center of town. It will be run by the Ridgewood Arts Foundation and the village taxpayers, if we get the grant, will not be out of pocket and will not be funding this. Gentlemen, jump in.

Paul, thank you. That's an accurate rendition of my understanding of the facts, certainly. It's my privilege to speak about Ridgewood Arts Foundation. As Paul said, I'm Albert Fuggiarelli, co-founder, president emeritus, and currently a trustee of the Ridgewood Arts Foundation. With me to my right is Tom DeVita, who is our treasurer and also a trustee of the foundation. It is a nonprofit corporation with 501 status. It was founded 10 years ago with a grassroots mission celebrating and funding the arts. To that end, we organize four to six annual community events, including exhibits, gallery tours, in-house salons, and our annual honors event. We provide grants and scholarships to arts organizations and artists of all abilities in and around the world. We've given so far 300 grants and scholarships. As a small arts organization, Ridgewood Arts Foundation is not in a position independently to fund the option or the agreement to purchase the time to our theater. But as the mayor said, if we receive the NJEBA funding and the project moves forward, we will then be able, credibly, to raise additional funds and repay the village in full. We appreciate the opportunity to collaborate with the village in this exciting project that we believe will benefit the arts, the local economy, and our entire community.

Thank you, Albert. Tom? You're just here to look pretty. I get it. Council, anybody have questions?

So I don't have any questions, but I want to first thank both of you. This is tremendous work, and on behalf of a grateful community, thank you for all that you do. I would just like to remind folks that we are still collecting property taxes on this property. So we're collecting about $125,000 a year in taxes. Obviously, when and if you buy it, we will lose that. But currently, as part of the deal that we're paying for the option, we have not forgiven that tax. So while it's maybe a little rough and back in the napkin math, the $250,000, for instance, that we've spent for the first option is offset by the $125,000 that we collected from the current owner of the property. As anybody who's been a fan, or maybe not a fan, but anybody who's been in the audience knows I'm probably the stingiest person on this dais, and I wear that title proudly. So I do take some comfort that we are still collecting money that's offsetting our out-of-pocket expenses. I don't love the idea that we're continuing to pay into this, although, as Paul says, if we're successful in getting the grant, we'll be made whole. but I can't stomach the alternative. At the end of the day, I think we have an obligation to try to save this theater. I, again, thank the two of you for the tremendous work you're doing. Hopefully, the Sherrill administration moves quickly, because as Paul correctly states, and importantly states, we get a prorated amount of money back, so hopefully we can close this out sometime less than the 18 months, perhaps nine months. We'd obviously save ourselves a bunch of money in the interim, and say, well, save you a bunch of money, assuming it gets granted, but but ask that you guys move forward as deliberately as possible with the sharehold administration, do whatever we can to get that grant money, and again, thank you for all your efforts in saving what is really, I think, a gem of Ridgewood.

Anybody else?

I just, I don't want to be redundant with Evan, but I do want to wish you the best of luck. And if there's anything you need from us to make the application more grant worthy, we are here. Clearly the theater isn't an important building, but it's an artery in our town. And, you know, we just passed the fourth round of housing obligation and these large parcels of land are big time for our town. And I think this is such a great opportunity since Jamboree, think about Jamboree and the new theater. Tom used to be a producer. So this is gonna be great and anything you need from us and I just really think the whole community wishes you the best of luck and hopes Ridgewood is as grant worthy as possible in this application.

I just want to take a moment to personally thank Albert and Tom. When we discussed with them how we could possibly put this together, it was their idea to do this through the Ridgewood Arts Foundation that has a 501c3, that has the same mission that you need to renovate and run this theater. So without their input on this, we wouldn't be going anyplace. And I also want to thank Evan, In addition to correctly pointing out that this option actually costs us 125 a year and not 250, it was Evan's brainchild to do this by way of option so that at the end of the day, in the event that we don't get the grant, We are not stuck owning a theater that in addition to being taken off the tax rolls is now, well now what are we gonna do with this thing? So this was a lot of people collaborating to come up with a plan, a working plan to go forward. And I am truly grateful to all of you, to the board of the RAF, Jill Williams, the president, who has been so supportive of this. So thank you all. So we are good.

And also, for those of you who grew up in Ridgewood and may remember that vertical marquee that said Warner on it, that is part of the plans to recreate that that landmark marquee, because it was really beautiful.

Yeah, and to that end, I want to point out that

Westfield applied for a similar grant, a little smaller in amount, but pretty significant. And they submitted their application in June of 2025. And they were just approved for the full amount of their grant about two weeks ago. And so that pause seems, uh, which was again, we believe is part of the Cheryl administrations taking a look at, okay, where do we want to go with this? Let's get our arms around it. Um, and, and that is now would appear to be moving. So we anticipate that we, we are ready at just the right time. Um, and to that end, There was a very, very talented team of people that Westfield put together of architects and engineers and theater people to apply for that grant. What gives me great hope is that we stole that team lock, stock, and barrel, and every one of them put together our application. So they were successful the first time. They believe that this is at least as good an application. So, after that, keep your fingers crossed, keep your toes crossed, and let's see what happens. Good. Gentlemen, thank you so much.

Next, our financials, so I have Bob Rooney come up.

Mr. Rooney, welcome.

So I distributed to council the financial statements that I put together for the balance sheets for the various funds as of 12-31-25, as well as the revenue expenses for the various funds through June 30th, 2026. So I'll go through the highlights of each one. Please stop me if you have any questions. The first one on page one is the assets for the current fund. We have prepaid expenses for payroll, which is very unusual, but it developed because of the timing of our first pay in 2026. The delinquent property taxes are down. That's because of the Valley payment from last year. Special emergency authorizations, the 267114, I'm proud to say that that's going away. We hit our five years of the special emergency. The grant fund on page two, overall the change between years is flat. Page three, which is the liabilities for the current fund. The balance for appropriation reserves is higher, probably most likely due to the timing of payments. The liabilities under deferred school tax, the school tax is payable as a result of deferred school tax increase. And at the end of the year, the fund balance was up $1.3 million from 2024. Again, grant fund is flat. Liabilities, the fund balance utilized was $1.1 million less than it was for 2024. Delinquent tax balance is the result of values not payment in 2025. Total income is up about 5%, which is a slight increase over the prior year. Same for the excess of revenue. And again, the fund balance is up $1.3 million from 2024. Water utility fund, big change there is advances which is the inter-fund loans to other funds and the prepaid expense again for payroll that was early payroll in 2026. Page eight, significant increase there is the set aside of PFAS expenses. It's up to $9.2 million and fund balance is up $2.3 million from the prior year. Page 9 of the operations of the Water Utility Operating Fund. Fund balance utilized is flat to the prior year. Water rents are up about $2.4 million from the prior year. Miscellaneous revenue is up due to about $1 million in interest, and the overall income increase is 13% compared to the prior year. The fund balance, or I'm sorry, the expenditures for the operating fund The budget fund balance is the amount that gets paid over to current, so that's consistent with what we have done in the prior year. And again, on page 10, the fund balance is up $2.3 million from 24. Parking utility fund, pretty much flat to the prior year. Fund balance is down about $100,000 from what we had in 24.

So Bob, are we closer to pre-COVID? Are we getting there much closer? Do you think parking is going to be everybody going back to work and parking more?

So there's definitely an increase in usage, and we're seeing an increase in the revenues that are coming up. As I pass through every day, I always wish Fridays would be more crowded. But for the most part, there is definitely movement. And you can tell. the conversations earlier about the garage and the lot itself, it is working to capacity, so that's all good signs. I'm sorry. Page 13 is the fund balance down about $110,000 from the prior year. And that's the result of the anticipated 460,000 and only realizing 352. So that's the 108,000 for the reduction. Page 14 is the accumulation of the balance sheets for all the capital funds, general water and parking. So I'll just go down the changes in total. Cash is down from the prior year about $8 million and that's a result of capital project spending. The deferred charges to future taxation funded is up $9 million, and that is the result of the bond sale in early 2025. Fixed capital uncompleted is up about $12 million, and that is the result of the water spend for PFAS and other projects. Under the notes payable down to liabilities, it is down $12 million. and that's the result of the bonds payable being issued during the year. Loans payable is up about $7.5 million, and that's the iBank projects that we're working with for PFAS. Improvement authorizations are down about $38 million, and again, that's the spend on water. Page 15, the overall gross debt compared to last year. Water utility is up seven million, parking utility is up a million, and the general debt is up four million. The percent of net debt to equalize valuations is down to 1.86, and that's basically the result of the increase in the equalized valuations for 2025. Page 16, and I'll just go through the subtotals. Local revenues are about 45% of what's anticipated. On page 17, the other special items are about 93% of what's anticipated, and that's mostly from internal adjustments that are made by journal entries during the year. The state aid is zero. We start to get our distribution from the state starting in August and finishing up in October. Total general revenues through June 30th is about 44% of what we anticipated. In the appropriations for the current fund, if you go to page 19, total general government is about 47% of budget. Page 20, the total insurance is 61%, and that's the result of the timing of premiums. Our pension payments have to be made, not our pension payments, but our premiums have to be made up front through April. So that's the result of that being higher than anticipated. Page 21, public safety, we're about 52% of what we budget for the current year. Page 22, same thing for public works, about 53%. Health officer on page 23 is about 52%. And parks and recreation are at 38%, and that's primarily because of seasonal expenses. That would be much higher when we get into August. And on the last page, or I'm sorry, on page 24, the municipal court is at 53%. Landfill disposal costs are at 51%. Uniform construction code, the building department, at 46%. Total deferred charges and statutory expenditures on page 25 are at 85%. And again, that's the timing of payments. All pension payments have to be made through April, so that's 100% of what we budgeted. On page 26, the operations, other operations excluded from the cap are about 50% to local service agreements of 53 and operations excluded from the cap are 52. And grant total on page 27 is roughly 56% of the budget and that's primarily because of the timing of such large items as pension and insurance. Page 28, Water Utility Fund, the revenues, they're at 45%. About $1.1 million are due to be billed in the fourth quarter, so we understand what that is all about. On Water Utility Appropriations, on page 30, we're at about 39%. There are some encumbrances that are yet to be posted, so I would expect that to be more towards the 50%. Page 31, we have parking utility revenues, which is 52% of what we budgeted. And the expenses on page 33 are at 48%. Any questions?

Questions? I have a question. Sure. So I've been following you along with this. I'm a simple guy. But it sounds like we are spending at the right rate so that on December 31st we have enough money to pay our bills. Is that something that you're comfortable with and you agree with?

So yes, my cash flows show that we're satisfactory through the end of the year.

Good. That's why we do this quarterly. Right. Anybody else?

I just want to say thank you for the document, the extra large font, and all the detail.

You're welcome.

And I want to thank you for putting this in, stating this in a way that even I can understand it, so thank you very much.

Okay. Thanks, Bob.

The next item is awarding a contract for IT needs of the Shedler property and IT software and hardware. It's to be awarded under state contracts to SHI International Corporation of Somerset, New Jersey. in an amount not to exceed $150,000.

Questions?

The next one is a change order for professional services contract that we have for special counsel for the anticipated tax exemption matters relating to properties owned by the Valley Healthcare System in the Village of Ridgewood. The change order is not to exceed $40,000 for Martin Allen, and that would, oh, it's because of additional legal work necessary before the end of 2026.

Everybody good with this?

I can see that Marty is definitely earning his keep, but I don't understand this phrase in here that some of the work he is doing involves trials before the appellate state court. How do you have a trial in appellate court?

I think he was probably referring to the hearing that we went to, the one in Hackensack.

Usually I have hearings in front of them. Hearings in the appellate court. I think he just misworded it or whoever prepared it.

So it should be hearings before the appellate state court, is that what you're saying?

More than likely it's a hearing instead of a trial. It's a hearing, it's not a trial. It's a misstatement.

I was a little confused by that, but otherwise, yes.

Good.

The next one is authorizing execution of modification number three for the Safe Routes to School project. The NJDOT is actually giving us an additional $55,224.98 for NV5, who is the village's project design firm for the final design efforts. And so the resolution is to accept the grant and authorize village representatives to execute the agreement.

Great.

Everybody good? Let's go. Let's hope so.

The next one is authorizing a property tax refund for Block 2908, Lot 9, for a tax-exempt veteran in the amount of $7,089.68. Everybody good?

Let's go.

The next one is accepting donations from various sports groups for the Shedler property. So we have received... Various sports groups have contributed donations. They will each have their own resolution at next week's meeting so that we can accept the donations. And we also do have a few that may have not yet come forward. And as long as we get it prior to the public meeting, we will add that as well.

Good. That's great. Siobhan, did you want to add anything to that? Yeah.

I just want to say thank you to every one of our community partners and what we have on hand for the public is a commitment for $264,000 for the project, which is a significant amount. On top of that, our partners within the fields community have previously this year donated to the Citizens Improvement as well as a new scoreboard at Maple. So this has been an incredibly expensive project. As everyone knows, it's gone on for a very long time. And we're very grateful to everybody who gave us donations for all elements of the park. We've had furniture donations for the house, which we're very grateful for. We've had some trees donated through the Conservancy. And now we have our community partners. And that's just a nice big chunk of money to offset our tax dollars and allow this project to continue. So thank you to all of them. And some days it's really good to be the fields rep.

And I just want to say again, we needed to raise additional funds, and Siobhan worked very closely with our sports organizations as our community partners for our mutual goals. And kudos to Siobhan on this one. Thank you very much, Siobhan. Everybody good? Let's go.

The next item is accepting an additional donation for the Community Center Improvement from Ridgewood Senior Citizen Housing Corporation, which is the Ridgecrest Foundation and the Community Center of Ridgewood Foundation. I'm going to ask Gwen Houck and Nancy Biggos, and I guess Deanna is here as well, Deanna Shablick, to come up just in case there are any questions and maybe just a brief explanation. That would be great. And anyone else who I didn't mention who should come up at this time, please do so.

Ladies, welcome, and I just want to say thank you so much for the incredible work that you guys have done on this to turn a dream into a reality that will benefit generations of people in our village for decades to come, so thank you.

So good evening, Mayor and Council. I'm pleased to share with you this evening. Several weeks ago, I sent you a memo and a resolution outlining the details on this new renovation to the community center. I also shared with you in that memo its funding as outlined so that you are aware. The latest architecture figures came in at $586,209. We have additional funding, which I'm really happy to share with you, from the Ridgecrest Foundation. of $285,209, and the Community Center of Ridgewood is donating an additional $70,000 to this project. Just for the basics, right, so that you have an understanding of where we are with this project, I know Gwen would like to share some thoughts as the president of the Community Center of Ridgewood Foundation.

Well, I think it's exciting and also terrifying to think that we're doing such a large enhancement to this building and we're part of history and I'm just so thrilled that Ridgecrest wanted to double their donation and I think this is going to encourage more people to continue to donate. The foundation is an ongoing entity and we someday hope to build enough money in our endowment that we will be able to continue to boost the programming and by ongoing things as they're needed. But for now, we're good. And I'm hoping we can break ground in September, but maybe October. And it could be a three-month project. So if I might indulge in this, if this project ends up ending in December 2026, and programming begins in January, 2027, I wanted to look at the contract that we have with the village, which is your part of it, is to donate three years of programming expenses, staffing and programming. So, on our contract, I would like to change the years to say 2027, 28, and 29, instead of 26, 27, and 28 because we're not going to be rolling until 2027. It's a simple change.

Does anybody have a problem with that? I think before we get into that, Gwen and I discussed this just today. I think we have to talk to Keith about that because this was a... The agreement that Gwen is referring to is a grant agreement that exists between Ridgecrest and the community center of Ridgewood Foundation. So... I just wanna talk to Keith to get the okay. There was a promise and a consideration that with the funding coming through, we would dedicate services for three years to assist in the management and the operation of this. And I just wanna make sure that that's okay. So before we do anything, yes, but we'll have that by next week. So we can go ahead with whatever we need to do at the next week's meeting and take care of it then. That's great, let's get him on the phone.

Yeah, that's a budget thing. But yeah, so the grant agreement has been completed just with a couple, like I guess that last caveat.

Right.

And then we'll be ready.

And it's not the one that's sitting in your packet. It is a modified one that you'll get to see next week. but actually I think it's done now with the exception of that one issue.

And we have a pre-pre-construction meeting on Friday.

I'm not invited to that one, which is fine.

Thank you all.

This is the pre-break. Any questions?

I just want to say, like, this is a little, like, this is amazing. This is so amazing. This is so great. I mean, obviously, as a citizen, I had, like, the lovely opportunity to work with all of you for many years, both in Ridgecrest and Parks. I'm so proud of, you know, this is huge for the general community. This is going to be such an amenity for everybody, not just senior citizens, as Mrs. Blood said, a community center. It's going to be something that we will be so proud of it will thwart loneliness, it'll provide community, and I'm just so grateful for the generosity. Additionally, while we're undergoing construction, shameless plug to the next part of the presentation is that we're gonna be, similar to what I said before with the library being under construction downstairs, we are gonna need more additional space, and we're gonna be discussing some of the rates at the Shedler House, so I wanted to say that publicly that while one floor opens, we have some new amenities. And again, you're just looking very professional and serious. And with much gratitude, I'm so excited about this. It's such a generous gift to our community and just so well done. So thank you. Thank you.

Yeah, we can go out all night. This is fantastic. The amount of work you guys have put into this and the amount of good this will do is just exceptional. And I can't help but comment, seeing you, Gwen, seeing Albert here, folks who have given so much to this community, coming back and just giving more and more. Certainly all the folks that are donating money to our fields. We're always thankful for people who have great ideas for how our village should be run. But we're also really grateful to people that actually get in there and do the work. And thank you guys. And obviously, thank you, Nancy. Thank you, Deanna, for the tremendous job that you do. I've seen how you guys work with some of our senior citizens. And to be able to give you this great space to continue expanding that work is really just an honor sitting up here on the dais.

Anybody else? Just one last word of recognition for Rich Barkley and the board of Ridgecrest. Of course. So that needed to be the thing.

Believe me, I was going to finish with that. I didn't mean to steal your thunder. No, it's okay. You can have my thunder. I mean, Rich Barkley and the Ridgecrest Foundation, who initially agreed to fund this at half the price, when it came back at twice the price, said, Yeah, we're in, and I'm getting chills. Really, Rich Barkley and your whole board, and I would name them all, I just don't know them all. This is just an incredibly generous gift, and I promise that the village will live up to its end, that once this thing is established, that we're going to run this thing and make it great. And I know leading the charge is going to be Deanna, who, just for those of you who don't know, Deanna refers to the seniors as her seniors, because this is a very personal mission for her. So thank you all. Thanks, Ridgecrest Foundation, because like I said, these things don't just happen. This took a lot of work and a lot of commitment by a lot of people, again, like the Warner Theater Project, which, again, we're keeping our fingers crossed on. But this one is further along. So we're almost done. Great. Thank you all. Thank you, guys. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Thank you, Matt, for your legal advice.

Always great to work with you, Glenn.

All right, the next item is a change order for the professional services contract that we have for Shedler Environmental Services. This is for Matrix. It's for increased time for the field oversight, expanded lab analytical requirements, additional NJDEP-directed sampling, unforeseen site conditions encountered, and it's a change order in the amount not to exceed $147,600, and it will be funded through the capital account.

Questions, anybody?

Okay, I'll have Mr. Rooney come up again because we finally are going, we got our budget approved and he's gonna explain what the concerns were and what our resolution is.

I'm back. So back in May, we adopted the budget after getting approval from the state We moved on as if we had no issues whatsoever. After the state budget was adopted as of June 30th, we anticipated that we would get recognition from the county to move forward with our tax rate. So as we waited and waited and waited and kept asking the county where we are, the county kept saying, the state's holding it up, the state's holding it up. So after talking to a few colleagues, found out that there was another municipality in New Jersey, up in Florham Park, whose budget also was not adopted, and the reason it was, the reason for that was that they had the incorrect municipal library tax. So I had reached out to Lori, and I said, Lori, where'd you get your calculations? She told me, I said, that's exactly what the statute requires, and that's the minimum that they wanted. So the library spoke with the executive board, They all agreed they'll take the lower amount. So now when I reached out to the state, who, by the way, never contacted the village, they said, well, you have the wrong number. You should have had a higher number by $4,644. So I said, you're going to tell me you're going to hold this up, my tax rate up for $4,600? I said, I'll find a way to pay that. No, no, you're going to have to have it approved by local government. So they finally, make a long story short, they told me I had to amend the budget. That's what the original resolution was that I gave you. Now they came up with another way to do this and that's by what is called a 159. Just like when you have a grant, we have a revenue and appropriation, that's what this resolution calls for. They said that they would go to the county and let the budget be certified, the tax rate certified, if I promised them that you, council, would pass this next week. So I went out on a limb and I anticipated that you would allow this, okay, for the 46-44.

Just out of curiosity, we don't pay it, do you pay this? Like out of your, never mind.

I hear what you're saying.

This is 4,600 bucks out of a $60 million budget.

That's correct.

65. Oh, 65 million.

Yes, so, and here's what the dilemma was. Evidently, there's some libraries that challenged the calculation back in October, and they reached out to the Attorney General for an opinion. And the Attorney General said, oh, no, you don't calculate it that way. You take one-third of a mil to get the minimum, not 15% of your prior year, when statutes all say 15% of the prior year. So local government went by the Attorney General's opinion and that created chaos. So we now have a certified tax rate, the county certified it this afternoon, and my colleagues and our auditors will be taking a visit to local government to discuss this dilemma and how it's not gonna happen again.

And can we now pay our property taxes to fix that problem too?

You can pay your property taxes anytime.

Well, no, third quarter, you can't on mine.

No, but you have to come in to pay if you want to.

Right, but I'm saying, but will this open the online payment option now that this is done, or is there some more?

Yes, no, the online option will be open.

All right, so this is what we're waiting for. Okay, because I'm concerned that somebody was going to say I was late on paying my property taxes, so I wanted to make sure that I tried to pay on time, and so I couldn't, so now I can.

No, there will be an extended period of time once the tax bills go out, but no one will be assessed an interest for it.

And I gather, Bob, from what you just relayed to us, that this was not a Bridgewood problem, but a widespread problem.

So there were other municipalities. The only one that I was familiar with was Florham Park because they're also audited by our auditors. So that was the connection. But there were others in New Jersey.

Good. Anybody have any questions about this? No. All good. Thank you so much, Bob.

I just want to reiterate what Mr. Rooney said. Those of you who cannot pay online yet or do not have your tax bills yet, it will be an extended grace period. So usually it's August 10th. That's the deadline. It'll now be extended probably almost till September, right?

Yes.

So it'll be quite a while before you have to pay it. It's not like it'll be you get your tax bill and you have to pay it tomorrow and there will be no interest assessed.

And you will see today, the question is the auto-enroll will also have a delay. So I got that question. If you're in auto-enroll and this has gone beyond it, you'll be okay.

So we'll post something on the website that gives clarification on how to proceed. But just the fact that we got a tax rate is positive.

Good. Great. Bob, thank you so much.

Thank you.

Just one second. I just wanted to ask, Pam, do you need Bob here for the Special Improvement District discussion or no?

Some of it is pretty technical, and I don't know what questions people will have.

Okay, so why don't we go to that next, because this is the last item for Bob.

Sure. Okay. Before I run through...

So that's 98.

Yeah. Before I run through the amendments, for the public that's listening, I want to outline... the types of classifications we have for properties that are in the Special Improvement District. The first category is the Class IV-A properties, which are traditional retail storefronts, and standalone commercial buildings. We have 320 properties as forays. It's about $575,000 of our $760,550 budget for 2026. So that's about 75% of the businesses in the SIDS. properties in the SID, and that's going to remain unchanged with our amendments that we're talking about tonight. The second category is 4C properties. These are multifamily apartment buildings with five or more units, and they are 29 properties. The proposed amendments recommend removing a portion of these properties from the SID. And then as to the Special Improvement District Class 15F properties, those are charitable properties. We are making them exempt. And these are nonprofit organizations, and there are only four of them. So the proposed amendments recommend removing all of these 15F properties from the Special Improvement District. That would account for the loss of $14,000 in the annual assessment. And then we will also talk about the effective date of the ordinance. So if you turn in your packet to section three of the ordinance, in section in paragraph B that now includes a minor revision so that it says these are the included properties and that is with the exception of those properties that are in subsection C. We just wanted to refer to subsection C because that's where the exempt properties are explained. and the first subparagraph one is for properties used solely for residential purposes and occupied by the owner or the owner's family provided such properties are not classified as class 4A or 4C. This includes, without limitation, multi-family dwellings of four or fewer It also includes residential condominium units and cooperative dwelling units. Subparagraph two is properties classified as 4C that have, so multi-family housing, that has no commercial use. So no retail on the bottom, that sort of thing. In this paragraph, as it's written in red, it goes on to say the exception is properties on these streets, and there are a series of streets, most of which are close to or in the Central Business District. And what I would propose is, since this is an exception within the exemption, It's a little hard to read because it's a double negative and I've spoken to Matt about this. These are streets that are within the SID. So the buildings listed on those streets that are commercial will, that have some commercial aspect will go into paragraph B above. So that's just a placement. within the section. In section four, assessments, there is the red language, the redlined text, I found very hard to read, and instead of that, what I suggest, and I have run this by Heather and Matt, it would read, each year, I'm sorry, to go back. I would like a little more transparency here about how we calculate the assessments for the special assessments. So the sentence I would like to add is, each year the village tax assessor in consultation with the village tax collector will calculate the special assessment rate needed to fund the RBA budget, which the Village Council has approved. And so I talked with Bob Rooney about the timing here, and we made sure that the Village Council has to approve the RBA budget once it's presented first, before the finance department calculates the special assessments. for each property. And then, we have another redlined minor addition under section, what are we up to? Five. A, at the end of 17, It says recommendations made under section 5A1 through 17 shall be in writing. And here we also deleted language that kind of made no sense. And that was because it refers to a timeline that doesn't exist, so it would be unenforceable. And that's the cross out section you see. And then further on in section seven, this refers to the fiscal year and annual budget. What the law says at the moment is under subparagraph 7B, the DMC, that's the District Management Corporation, that's the Ridgewood Business Alliance in our situation, shall submit to the Village of Ridgewood a detailed annual budget for each upcoming fiscal year no later than December 31st. And I thought, whoa, that's way too late. Because the finance department can't can't pull the numbers together quick enough. So I spoke to Steve Grillo, the director of the Special Improvement District, and we agreed that October 31st would be the date, not December 31st. I also spoke with Heather about this, because we have to time it according to the Village Council meetings as well. And then, section eight, we have a minor addition to the language in subparagraph C, that the DMC shall cause an annual audit of its books, accounts, and financial transactions to be made and filed with the village council. We are adding that it will also be submitted to the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs. It's not absolutely required, but it's good practice. The state is supposed to be tracking what all the SIDS are doing. They're actually not, but we should prompt them a little bit. So that's one minor addition. And then, section 13, the effective date. Here, what we have in the existing ordinance makes it effective in the ordinary course. So that would be 20 days after the village council adopts it. However, here, because the assessments have already gone out for all four quarters of 2026, it's very hard to change that now. So I would suggest that we change the effective date to be January 1st, 2027. Also, in light of the reassessment that's happening town-wide and the fact that we have denied objections after public hearing, people are really relying on the amounts of assessments that we have told them will be levied in 2026. So to change it now would be very confusing and chaotic. But Frank brings up a good point.

Yeah, I'm going to bring up my points.

Yeah, okay. All right, so what do you have to say, Frank?

Yeah, so thanks, Pam, for putting this all together, and Matt for getting it so quickly to us. So I'm going to go through my points now. So when we have the list of the 15 Fs, the four of them, I just want to make sure that we're accommodating future ones. For example, the Cope Foundation is working on getting their nonprofit status from the IRS. So my question is, how do they get added once they have that?

I'm not quite sure. If their classification changes automatically through the tax assessor.

That's the key, the tax assessor.

Right.

So they will just automatically be listed once that they get that.

Yes.

Okay, good. Frank and I talked about that. We just want to make sure that the wording in the ordinance is going to permit that. So we're just looking for some language that deals with prospective changes in categories. Okay.

My second thing is I don't know if it goes under 3.1 or 3.2, but this is the instance of when if you have someone that's their residence and a portion of their property is used for commercial purposes, that only the commercial portion is assessed. Therefore, their entire property wouldn't be assessed, just what's used for commercial properties. I think that that needs to be spelled out.

I did ask that question of the RBA council. One of them is on vacation, so I haven't heard from him, and he's the specialist on taxes on SIDS. But it looks like other towns do do that. The next question is, how do you calculate it? Is it on square footage? Is it by floor?

And I would say square footage because I believe that that's how the IRS does it when you claim it in home office.

That's true.

I'm not so sure about that. And I'm just thinking about this out loud because in the Central Business District, if you have a commercial space on the first floor and you have... say a second floor with apartments, odds are that the commercial space, and I'm just going to pick a number, if the building is worth $100, the commercial space is probably worth $70, even though it's the same square footage.

But this is pertaining specifically to property that the resident or their family lives in. I'm with you. So therefore, it's more like if a lawyer has an office in his house, his entire house isn't assessed, just his office space.

Right. But this is commercial property. And so let's just say that the annual taxes are $10,000 a year. And those taxes are attributable directly to the amount of rent received. That's what the value of the property is. So if the If the rent on the first floor is $5,000 a month and the rent on the second floor is $2,000 a month for the same square footage, we're going by the assessed value of the building It should go by, in my opinion, the rent rolls and how that breaks out in terms of the total value of the building.

If it's my house, I'm going to use an example, and in my house that I live in with my family, I have one room dedicated to my law office. There's no rent. It's my office.

Right, but your house, we're not talking about houses. We're talking about commercial properties.

I'm talking specifically about a residence that has a portion of their house. If I may, Pam has done a significant amount of work on this.

And just at the end of the day today, in exchange of communication, brought up what two other towns have done in the way that they've designated this. And from what I understand, this also has to go through and be approved by DCA, if I'm not mistaken. So if that's been approved and that's the way that they've utilized, I think we can possibly learn from them with regard to the way that apportionment should be made. And so if we can learn from that and put that in here, we'd like to get this in and keep the ball rolling on this thing so that we can get to it and maybe at least introduce it next week. And I think we can learn from that what other towns have done. I think that was Westfield and... I forget, Westfield and another town.

Exactly where I was going. I think we all agree there should be some equitable distribution if you live in the commercial property, just how you break it up. I would be willing to defer to what Steve Grillo opines as well as what other places have done because I think Frank and Paul, I think reasonable people here could disagree and precisely how to do it, but we all agree on the general solution of there should be some equitable division.

Mind you, it's not exactly like The special assessments are not exactly like property taxes. Bill Palumbo has told me that for property tax purposes, they cannot split the property. But for special assessments, It's possible. Also, I think Steve Grillo needs to look at how many properties are we talking about?

Probably not that many, but it could be in the future. There's a bunch. Either way, let's just figure out what other folks have done and just use that as precedent.

Just so everybody knows, Steve was the one who prepared this ordinance and put this together. I think with looking at this from the standpoint of what a couple other towns have done on that special assessment for their SIDS, I think we can interject that without too much trouble. We should be able to get it back here by next week.

So I'm going to say, can I make two points? On a very positive note, because the public's probably like, wow, that's a lot of ordinance talk. I want to just start with the general.

I have two more points just for the record.

Okay. Do you want my stop and you go?

Go ahead.

Okay. So my most favorite change It's basically four words and a couple of letters with all properties classified as 15F are exempt now. And I want to thank this council. And when we first came out and we had the public hearing, there was a fair amount of blowback to us on those categories. So this year, the exemptions will be denied. And moving forward, we just felt like we heard too many situations where charities were feeling that they should spend their money on other things. So I want to thank Everybody, we can't all meet, five of us. There's been a lot of chats and figuring out how to do this. So that, to me, is the most beautiful thing. I also want to say that we've templated Princeton's. We looked into that. And I want to thank Matt for taking especially a non-lawyer's view on changing an ordinance. But I think what we should do next is make all of Pam's proposed changes and then just make sure before... Well, I have some comments on her. For both, but then I want to make sure we discuss how that's going to come to us to read because the red line here is great.

We do it at the end.

Okay. I just want to make sure we don't exhaust each other and then we end up in a poor... Because we can't all meet again, so... I want to make sure there's one red liner, because we have a lot of lawyers up here, insert lawyer joke, that we get that on Friday so we can have the read.

I agree. Ham's addition to assessments and to Section 4, I think that's good. There's only one piece of it that I think that we should add to your sentence, and that we need some sort of cap, meaning that when it calculates the tax rate, it has to be the agreed-upon percentages of 4% for the... the 1% and 2% for the other. My reason for a cap is I think that we got into, as Siobhan said, a lot of blowback on the 15Fs because it was kind of ambiguously told to us that it could be handled downstream. And so I believe that if we don't have a cap, I can think of scenarios where that could be misused. And so I don't want to just leave it up to, well, the council set our budget, so now we're going to have to increase taxes for the businesses. to meet that budget. So just working a cap to that sentence, and I'm great with it. But a cap based upon what, though, Frank? The existing tax rate that's in here for the businesses. Like, so it's like...

The 4% and 2%? Yeah.

I mean, doesn't it kind of say that already? Well, what Pam said was that essentially the council, and tell me if I'm wrong, Pam, that the council will approve a budget And then it goes to Bob's team that figures out how much to assess all the different businesses to achieve that budget. And so all I'm saying is that that could be a scary scenario that a budget's approved that would require the increase of the percentages given to the businesses. And I just want to prevent that from the start.

Well, wouldn't that be part of the discussion about the approval of that budget that you do as a council?

I want it in here because I don't want any ambiguity. That's how we got into it with the 15F.

I'm just trying to figure out how to word it and interject it because if the council is going to decide on the budget and the assessment is going to be based off of that budget, I mean, we can be clear about saying that it's going to be based off of that budget, but the real key is the cap on the budget. not on the assessment.

Well, the percentage that businesses are assessed, that's what the cap should be. So at no time would a business be assessed more than 4% for the Tier 1s. That's all I'm trying to say. Bob?

So the process, the way I understand it, is the SID is going to come to you with a number that they want in their budget. So let's say it's $700,000. you look at everything that's in that budget, you agree to $700,000. We then take the properties that are in these two groups and we calculate each property's share to get to the payment of that total number. So the 4% will stay for the one group, the 2% will stay for the other, but the total, depending on how many properties you have, will be used to calculate what each property pays.

But to your point, then what if the budget that they come to us with and says 700,000 is a full million, and it gets approved, and the only way to hit a million is if you increase it from 4% to 6%.

No, because the 4% and 2% is going to, you're not going to increase that. Right. Okay, you're just going to increase each property's proportionate share. So the 4% and 2% stay no matter what.

I don't like it because it just seems it's too ambiguous. Like why, if now currently, if a business is gonna get a 4% assessment, then you're saying that you could change that.

So 4% is used based upon the assessed value. So you're taking 4% of the assessed value. Then you have to calculate the tax rate. So you multiply that by the tax rate. And that's how you get to the number. So what may help you is if I give you the spreadsheet that I did. I don't know if you shared it.

I don't understand what the point of that added sentence is then because to me it's putting the cart before the horse. It's saying that the budget will get approved and then the assessment for the properties will happen second. And it should be the other way around. You assess the properties and this is what builds your budget.

I can't agree to that unless we first research whether other towns have had a cap and whether the RBA lawyers have any experience with this. We can bring it to them and see what they say, but I can't agree with it tonight.

I do think, if I could, I think if you could highlight a property and send it to us, I think there's an interpretation of the assessed value. I also think that the budget has to come from them and we can't really bind a future forward council. So if you do the... The budget's going to come from the RBA, and we're just the approver, and then the calculation is predetermined. So the only possibility that could go crazy is if RBA decided to ask us for $4 million. But then the council has the right...

What if the council says yes?

Well, then things have gone off.

I mean, then we're in big trouble.

That's our responsibility.

That's why we're here. Frank, can I just finish? So I think the idea in this scenario is that we are the financial guardians of an outrageous budget, and that's why they're two separate entities.

Well, then what's the purpose of the last sentence? I don't see the benefit of it. I mean, I don't know.

And again, we're going to lose ourselves in lawyery. It's no offense to lawyers in general. Like, maybe we should move.

Is that your second or third comment, Senator? Maybe we should make the modification. What's the benefit of that sentence you want to add that you see?

It tells you who's doing what. Right. That the village tax assessor is involved, plus with the tax collector, and that this is only after the village council has already approved the budget. Right.

Is there a better way that we can add a sentence that spells out everyone's job? Like if that's what you're saying. That's what it says.

But I do think the statute, the state statute, clearly delineates the process for the SIDS budget. So I think that I understand the rogue thing. I totally understand. But you'd have to have the whole RBA go rogue and then the whole council sanction it. and then you'd actually have people to have to have the money to pay for the rogueness. I don't think that would happen, because we're the backstop.

But the sentence that Pam is suggesting, she said, is a benefit because it spells out the roles that everyone plays.

Right.

So then why don't we just spell that out differently so it's not in an order process, because that's what my concern is.

Well, I mean, there is a process designed by the statute. The state. And off the top of my head, I don't, I don't know what the wording is in there, but I do understand that the budget gets proposed, it gets reviewed by the council. The first question you're going to ask as a council member when you see that said budget is what is this going to mean to the assessments on these people? How is it going to get paid?

Do we have examples of other SIDs using a similar sentence to what Pam's proposing? I don't know.

But I think it's only, I think what Pam is only, I think, and I understand what you're trying to protect, and that's certainly the viable aspect of this, but I think what Pam wants to do is just put in what the statute allows. I think she wants to just say it so that it's clear to everybody and be transparent that the statute's process calls for this to happen. So I think it doesn't warrant any arbitrary or capricious process that's different than what's permitted.

I think the sentence needs work then. So why don't we... Does it reflect the process? It should reflect the players, the actors that will make it happen.

Why don't we have Paul step off this ordinance and have you and Pam work on the red line ones, the final last sentence, and that will be it. Because we have to, when you do the clerk calendar backwards, reintroduce that.

And I don't have a problem doing it. I think it's fine to spend the time on it. It just won't get introduced next week.

That's right.

Why do we have to have that sentence in here then? I mean, I'm saying this is great, so if I have a problem with the sentence, let's just move forward without the sentence and maybe add it later.

You want to leave the section as it is?

You want to leave the red line the way it is? The red line as it is.

I think it's very confusing.

Yeah. I think that maybe we could add, I don't have the state statute in front of me, but that may be the modification that clarifies. I'm fine with the sentence, to be honest, but if you want.

I'm also fine with the sentence. I'm agnostic on this.

So there you have it.

I mean, I just, again, we're here because it was ambiguous with the 15F, and so that's why I'm trying to nail this down, so there's not ambiguity.

But Frank, on C3... It very clearly, that's my favorite line. All property is classified as 15M. They're exempt. There's no ambiguity regarding it.

It's an example, though. I know, but... That's clear now, and I'm just finding...

I actually, I mean, I still think the two of you have time before Friday. I will say, because I'm a reader of Pam's, it's a statement that she's, this is just Pam's attempt to be more transparent to the state statute process.

I mean, Frank, if you take the pen on this, I'm certainly willing to suggest or consider anything that you said to us via email before next Wednesday.

Okay, yeah, I think we can do it. Agreed.

And again, I'm fine with the way it is. If you think there's a better way to build this mousetrap, we absolutely want to look at it. So why don't you put something in writing to all of us? And we can take a look at it. He can't do that.

Give it to the clerk. He can't do that. To circulate. Yes.

Well, okay. And having something in writing would have helped this conversation. So that will be good to work on. Sure.

And then let's talk about that.

So these are lots of changes. I have one more. What's your other point? So on your effective date, I agree with you that it'd be cray-cray to impact 2026. However, I just want to make sure that, again, that is there a way that we say that these changes will go in effect for the fiscal year 27 and beyond, so therefore it doesn't impact 26, but we can still adopt it right away? Because my concern is if we wait, if he's building his budget per the change of October 31st, At that point, these changes haven't been made to reflect it. So then comes in January, then what happens to the changes? So 15F is still on the books. If he builds his budget in October, then come January, they're gone. So why can't we just have that say, which I agree with, so it impacts 26, but to be very clear that these changes will impact the calendar fiscal year 2027 and beyond.

after the second reading, Frank, in the 20 days, it's law, right?

But then, but Pam, go ahead.

No, if it were effective just within 20 days, it would take effect in the middle of October.

But didn't you say, didn't you put something in here that this takes effect January 27th? January 1st. Correct.

Well, what you have in front of you says it takes effect in the ordinary course as required by law.

But that's one of the changes you wanted to make.

It's one of the changes I want to make. And I'm asking to tweak her change so therefore we can confirm that the changes we're making will actually be impacted in 2027. Because my concern is that if we're saying they'll be pulled off the books on January 1st, but they build their budget in October before that, then that means they're still on the books.

I think I'll agree that this is the way it's supposed to be, that this will be going forward. If there's a way just to say explicitly I agree with Frank, I don't think it's a big change, it's just memorializing what we all

I think, Pam, was that your change? That was your change that you wanted, right?

Yeah, effective January 1. Effective January 1. But remember, Steve Grillo wrote this draft, and he's the one who will be drafting the budget for 2027. He intended it to be effective.

Why don't you just say it will be effective with the 2027 budget?

Yeah, that's what she wanted. Okay. I thought that that's what Pam had suggested.

Yeah, but I understand what Frank, it's semantics, but I understand, and as long as it affects the 2027 budget, I think that'll settle it. Yep.

Good. Say that dog will hunt. There you go. All right. All right, Siobhan.

Yeah, so who's getting, obviously, who's getting all the edits and the changes to Heather? Are they going to be to Matt, then to Heather?

And then can we, because we vote,

can we get this ordinance prior to? Yes, you can.

As long as you don't respond and discuss it. And you know, if when I send it out, I usually say, please do not hit reply all. If you've got any questions, I'm going to do it this time.

I'm just kidding. And also for anybody listening in the public with these amendments, the 15 F properties have to pay the still have to pay the 2026 special assessments.

So when is the draft coming?

I can't tell you right now, but probably by 3 o'clock on Friday.

That is awesome.

And we need input from the RBA's lawyers and Steve Grillo, so... You've got to push it.

I just have a request. When you do the red line changes, give me a copy because I'm interested in the assessment piece here. I just want to make sure that we're all on the same page.

Good, we'll put you on the list. All right, great. Thank you. All set? Thank you. Thanks, Bob. Thanks, Bob.

Okay, the next one, policy, establish ordinance for all-terrain vehicles. This is adoption of an ordinance prohibiting the operation of ATVs and motorized sports bikes on any public highway, street, or right-of-way within the village. They cannot be legally registered for on-road use with the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission. And they are a threat, obviously, to public health, safety and welfare. So what they are saying that the violation of this ordinance would be deemed contraband and subject to forfeiture. So as long as you're in favor of this.

I assume this doesn't apply to Ridgway vehicles or. No, no. The July parade. No. They can just steal.

Exactly.

I have a question as to whether members of the public are going to see the language that says can't use these vehicles on any public street, highway, right-of-way, will they, for those three, will they know that that includes sidewalks? We can delineate it as sidewalks if you wish. We could put that in there. Yeah, I'd like that in there.

Public right-of-way would include that, but I... We could put sidewalks specifically. Can we make it a little clearer or even redundant, but... Right-of-way including sidewalks, you can put the same. Yeah.

And then, similarly, when we refer to municipally owned property, do people know that that includes public parks?

You would think so. But it's up to you.

I'm just asking.

If you want to state it specifically, it's fine.

We can put it in there. Such as parks. Including parks.

Good. All right. Well, good. Let's go.

Okay, the next one is another traffic issue that occurs at Benjamin Franklin Middle School, where people are coming from East Glen, making the right, and then trying to make the left into the cutout. And it backs up onto East Glen, and it also makes it difficult for the people coming down Van Dien to be able to make the right-hand turn into it. So what they want to stop is the left-hand turns. This way the queue won't build up and it'll have the traffic move smoothly. So it will also enhance safety for pedestrians and students because as it backs up it blocks the crosswalk and so the crossing guard is trying to cross children who are walking and then there's cars in the middle of that whole intersection. of Glen and Van Dien. So they have worked out Ray Torino along with the principal and I know Christine Corliss was also involved I was told. They worked out that those coming from East Glen, and actually if they wanted to be from Van Dien as well, they're going to create a drop off at the back of BF in the parking lot. So they can go in the back. Those who want to go to the cutout can go to the cutout, but they can only make a right into the cutout. It's not really a right. It's kind of like a jug handle. Those who wanted to make the left at the cutout cannot do so anymore. They'll have to go down to the parking lot and they'll have a drop off set up. It'll be like, you know, just a line, but it'll be a quick drop off, you know, just. Sounds great. Okay, so we'll do that.

Matt, what will the penalty be for making that left turn that we're going to now make illegal?

I would note this. I haven't dealt with this one yet. This is a suit from the police. I don't know whether they want to increase it from what it is right now, but I'd have to check to see what that penalty would be. Okay.

Okay. So the next one is land use development, recreational facilities, and residential zones. This was discussed by the ordinance working group. And what it pertains to is batting cages, tennis courts, basketball courts on residential properties. And there was a moratorium put into effect during COVID to stop basically the batting cages on residential properties. So the new regulations are, these are for accessory uses for single family and two family residents. The proposed amendments include specifically referencing batting cages and pickleball courts among the list of regulated facilities and incorporating permitted use hours of 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., There are other requirements that are already in the ordinance, and those will remain in place, such as setbacks of property lines to neighboring residential structures, fencing, landscape screening, prohibiting artificial illumination, and that the facilities must be in the rear yard, and also limiting the area of the rear yard coverage. Those will all remain, so it's basically making sure that there are time limits, as well as adding batting cages and pickleball courts to the requirements.

I really like how this is written and that it calls out that a basketball net on your driveway is not included. Correct. I thought it was very clear, and I think this is great for making it available that people can do it, just follow the regulations when you build it.

And I spoke with, I just want to let you all know, I spoke with John Barry, the village planner, because I wanted to know, does the homeowner have to apply for a permit? And he said they have to get the zoning officials review and approval. But depending on the size of the property and what's being proposed, the construction official in the building department will or should know based on those variables, whether that triggers the need for a permit application. So I just wanted you all to know that.

Okay. We have several parks and recreation areas and recreational facilities, so I'm going to ask Nancy Biggos and David Wild to come up.

And because David made this presentation to the PRC board, I just want to commend him that he put so much work and research into this, as you'll see, and that's including our packet that makes it very clear. So, David, again, thank you for all your work that you did.

So I just wanna begin this evening.

Welcome and welcome back.

Thank you. By just sharing with you, since 1982, the Parks and Recreation Department has been administering our municipal buildings, facilities, parks, and fields. So this research that David has done is really just a bit of housekeeping since we've come a very long way since 1982 when we began with just the stable. Now we incorporate the community center, the gatehouse, all of our parks, and all of our municipal fields. So, David, thank you.

Thank you. Good evening, everybody. Good evening. I'm just going to summarize this more or less as

Could I just have you speak into the microphone? Thanks.

Good evening everybody. I'm going to just go over this in a summary fashion just so you have this presentation that contains all the details for reference. So the reason we're doing this is the current fees for the facilities we have today that we rent out were set in 2017 and 18 respectively. Good time to revisit that. also due to the renovation that's going to be taking place in Village Hall, as well as adding the Shedler properties. And we do have an older resolution on the books from the COVID era, so we're looking to rescind that as well. Okay, on slide three, it just gives you a map. It's basically a lot of cleanup we're doing. There's a lot of different disparate sections. We're gonna clean those up and we're gonna consolidate into a simple fee section. So we're doing that cleanup. So this is just for reference. We did the same with the outdoor fields recently, working with the fields committee, as Siobhan mentioned. We got that all straightened out and we did take the fees out of the policy guide. They're now in the code book under their own section. So that was done already.

Which has been great.

Very good. So approach real quick. We had a bunch of steps we did. Basically we categorized each of our spaces. We applied the fee to the given size of the space. We then categorized the fees to the associated spaces. We updated our staffing fees, because, again, there were a lot of inconsistencies across the board. And then we drafted a resolution, as I spoke about before, to rescind the COVID error resolutions that applied to facility fees. And then we also drafted the ordinance as well.

And I think it's important, too, that you base the fee by doing research in other towns that were compatible and how we fit compared to them.

Yes, Frank, exactly. So I'll cover that. I have a slide that details that, but I'll just touch on that point as well. Thank you. So a timeline we were following. We're here tonight at the council work session. As Frank mentioned, we went through the PRC, started out with Nancy first, went through each iteration, met with Keith, went through the working committee, the ordinance working session, and then we're here tonight for this village council work session. And we're hoping to adhere to the timeline that follows.

Okay.

Just so everybody knows, I think I revised that ordinance. Yes. I think I revised that ordinance that you had prepared. You split that to maybe... And that gave me everything I needed, which was great.

Yes, Jennifer. Yep. Thanks. So on slide six, these are the categories based on size, small through extra large. There's a bunch of sites out there. One site I quoted here is Archie. It just sets up how many people per room and square footage. That gives us an idea how to size our rooms accordingly. And in the middle, you see how we did that. We measured each room. We got the square footage. And then based on that categorization, it's just simply applying small, medium, large, and extra large. And then for the kitchens, we have three types of kitchens. We have a kitchen area, we have a catering kitchen, and then 2B in the community center is gonna be a kitchen with seating, so that's the larger one. So that's how we categorized everything. Then the next step was to apply the fees to the space sizes. Again, as Frank mentioned, we looked out across other municipalities. At the bottom there, I state what we researched. There's also a bunch of private sector sources that kind of broker room spaces. So they're all about the same. I actually looked at New York City as well. Of course, that's going to be higher, so that's kind of an outlier. But the ones from northern Jersey, they all are kind of in line with this, which I'll show in the next couple of slides. One thing we did, too... The way it's written right now, it's a two-hour minimum. We kept that because that makes sense. But the old calculation for each additional hour, it wasn't linear. It was kind of all over. So what we just did simply was take the rate of the two-hour. That becomes your hourly rate. So it's very easy to calculate. So we cleaned that up as well. And for the kitchen areas, they're a flat fee. That's for the entire event. So we listed those fees there as well. Slide eight is really what went into the ordinance. That's our fee schedule. So as you can see there, we applied it to the rooms based on size and classes. So we do maintain A through E, similar as we do with the fields policy. A and B are exempt, because that's your municipalities, committees, recognized sports. And then there is an explanation for all the classes on slide number... 14 just as a reference it's the same as what we use for the field committee for outdoor spaces so that that's the heart of what went into the ordinances And then as Frank mentioned before, some of the research we did, and also just taking a look at what inflation, what it did to these numbers as well, because it's from 17 and 18. So the yellow is what the current charge is. You'll notice that Class E is blank. That was one of the inconsistencies. We didn't have a Class E for the stable, but we had it for the community center, and we had it for the fields. So we're gonna fix all that. The red band is what it would cost today, based on the CPI from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. And blue is what we're proposing, which matches what I have in slide eight. So that just gives you kind of a reference point. And the next one is for the community center, same deal. And then for Shedler, we don't have any history there, so these are just the proposed rates. And at the bottom of this slide, I put up this, you can see the public and private entities, what they charge per hour, that's the average. So you have high and low in there. And you see what our average rates are for the class C, D and E. So we're right in there. And then I mentioned before our staffing fees, this is a much cleaner approach. We had so many caveats in there, but now this will be easier to follow. And this is the other part of the ordinance. And amenity fees, we're going to handle parks and recreation. We're going to handle that because that may apply to a bunch of different things, things I listed there. And those things come in and out. Other things get added. So we'll just manage that through the parks and recreation department. And that was the class reference. And that's the content I had. Any questions?

Questions? I appreciate you setting this up and instead of going like, you know, number by number, just go and go with the approach, which to me showed the level of detail and thought you went into this. I looked at this, I spent a lot of time on the pre-reading on this and, you know, I was trying to initially look at each factor and then I realized, you know what, these are all reasonable and it's all supported by the work you did. So I very much agree with this and appreciate the diligence that you put into this.

Thank you.

I mean, I just want to say several things. First of all, this is awesome. And when I first took my seat, there was no inventory of our physical park space, which was one of our first things that we worked on with Cole and then David. Um, this is amazing not only because it, for the financial aspect, but it's an opportunity for us to actually promote our spaces more widely in the village. Um, so as some people know, I take many of my committees to other spaces and this will help us, especially with what's going to go on downstairs. And I want to say that again and again, for example, the League of Women Voters, which many of us are members, they love a kitchen, right? And so the kitchen will be a viable aspect. and then comes Shedler. Now that Shedler would be reserved through Master Library, we could service that longstanding organization, that's very important, and we could provide a kitchen access and promote our newest space. So I think this is wonderful for all those reasons, and I just want to say to David, you're so detail-oriented, it's a pleasure to work with you, and this was like the most palatable thing in my packet, I loved it.

Thank you very much. So one thing I want to bring up to the fellow council is that one of the things that came up at the PRC board was that for the fees for Shedler that we should write into the ordinance that for the first 12 months that those are discounted by 50%. So that way we can encourage people to use Shedler and it can maximize that and get people exposed to it. Correct. So I am going to propose that we do add to the ordinance for the first 12 months after it goes into effect to shed their fees are 50% less than what's stated.

I like that idea because people won't otherwise go there.

Right.

So once they go there, if they like it, then they'll come back.

Yeah. I mean, especially after we saw how it was decorated when we went. It's beautiful. So let's pack it every day is what I said.

Does everyone agree with that? Yeah, totally. Okay.

Good. And David, great report. I mean, really great report. I mean, this is one of those things that to the public goes unnoticed, but it's almost 10 years since we updated our fees. And, you know, I think we're, you know, I speak for everybody. We're going through this going, yeah, that's good. That's good. And you did just a fabulous job on this. And obviously, you put a lot of time and effort into this, so we all really appreciate it.

Thank you.

And this helps the revenues of the village tremendously.

I just have a question. Were all of the groups, did they all remain the same as they were originally, or were they added to? Sure.

The classifications of groups?

Yes.

Yeah, they're the same. And then we added E for the stable, which would be non-residents to cover that because we didn't really have that consistently across the board.

And then on the last page of the ordinance, I guess that Matt wrote, it says the village indoor facilities includes rooms at the Village Hall Community Center, the stable... And I think it should be the Zabriskie-Shedler house at the Shedler property. Right now it just says Shedler. So I think probably that's what it should be. Okay. Maybe the John A. Al, since there's so many Zabriskis and so many Shedlers.

Yeah.

Okay. Then the other part was the COVID error resolution, so...

Yes, and those apply to the fees for indoor and outdoor spaces for COVID. So we'd like to rescind those.

So basically, during COVID, we permitted Ridgewood-based nonprofit service groups, organizations, or businesses which perform services for the village or other organizations within Ridgewood. They did not have to... they were not charged a fee to use outdoor facilities because they wanted to gather and they weren't able to do so inside. So there were two resolutions during that timeframe. And so both of these will be rescinded because obviously the COVID era is over, thank goodness. But also because of the fact that people don't need to be outside necessarily. They can be, but they don't need to be.

Good. Move on.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you. Thank you, everybody. Good night.

Before you go, Nancy, community forestry. We'll do that now. Okay. Great. So that's E1.

So I believe in your packet sometime back you received a copy of the community forestry and it's management plan, not master plan. Heather, just so that you have that. Thank you. And that is a five year strategic document that was prepared and written for us by an LTE who is a licensed tree expert. with the state of New Jersey. And the Shaytree and the Department of Parks and Recreation worked together on this document, which was prepared by Liz Stewart from Hohokas. So this document is an a strategic document approved by the New Jersey State Forester, which guides local governments in a proactive tree care plan. It also helps us with our risk reduction, our liability protection, and canopy resilience. So through the New Jersey Urban and Community Forestry Program, which we actively participate in through our Shea Tree Commission, It requires members have training. We keep up on our CEUs. We do reports annually. And I just wanted you to know that this document was prepared and sent to this state, Forrester, for their approval.

Thank you so much, Nancy, for your work on this. Questions, anybody?

I just have to say a couple things. So first of all, thank you to Nancy. Thank you to Liz, whose husband, by the way, is a Ridgewood School teacher. everybody on shade tree. This shows many of our accomplishments, including things that we did with like big tree, the Liberty trees, those initiatives, which are great. And, um, it, we're in the tree space, particularly in Shade Tree, we're not as grant-worthy because we're so over-served, meaning we spend so much money so we don't get as many grants because they know we're going to spend the money. It will be helpful with stormwater. Having this plan updated will make us much more grant-worthy and should be referenced in flood mitigation and those things because we're really unlucky in tree grants, like I said, because we spend tenfold to what other people do. And the underserved districts deserve it more. So just keep this as a tool. And it was a very fun experience. It was great to work with Liz, the students, and Shadetree. And thank you, because Heather made copies for everybody on Shadetree as well. So that was a lot of paper and a lot of collating. So thank you.

I'm sorry to be so literal. You say this was sent to the state. Did the state respond that they accept this?

We haven't heard back.

Okay.

We're awaiting the state foresters approval.

And Paul has to sign it as well. So we need two signatures. But the state forester was just here, and we have, I'm going to tell you, the largest London plane in the state of New Jersey on Colonial. True story. I'm going to introduce its report card next month.

All good, everybody good? The Royd Grant.

Thank you.

Thank you, Nancy.

Royd.

Oh, okay, thank you. The Royd Grant, yes.

So this year, you know, I believe for the last five years, the Village of Ridgewood has typically applied to the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs for its approval and participation in the recreational opportunities for individuals with disability grant. We have won this grant. successfully for the last five years. This year in working cooperatively with the access committee rather than it have being individual age groups and we have we have really encompassed preschoolers, elementary school, we worked for several years with middle school and high school students. We this year under Katie Fry's recreation supervisors guidance want to work on community, community involvement, community engagement, pretty much what we are doing within our village already in regards to access and sensory awareness and inclusion. So that will be the focus of our grant this year.

And again, this has been huge for us. Access takes on a lot, and we always use the phrase, there's no one brush that paints the disability. landscape. However, we have an age issue. If we focus on the young school-aged kids, there's criticism or an opportunity from the older adults. So this previous Royd grant, we've done two movies, one which is this Saturday, The Minions, $5, soda, free movie, which is great, and bowling. We've also gone out to, with Pullover Properly, SpecWire, potentially a cooking class for young adults who need socialization. If you are a member of the disability community, particularly somebody living in housing or at home, Two things that you crave are relationships and employment, and the odds are that most likely you really want the employment for the relationship. So these grants are incredibly essential. I'm hoping if we get this, there'll be an additional $20,000 available. We're in for four, meaning you guys and me, and that's great. It's great money. If you've never been to one of these events, they're a bargain, they're wonderful, and they're available to everybody. So fingers crossed we get it.

Agreed. Thank you. Okay, thank you.

Okay, our next item is a no-knock registry. So we have had concerned residents calling regarding commercial solicitors door-to-door. And so several other municipalities in New Jersey and in the local area actually have no-knock registries. So this would allow residents to sign up on a no-knock registry which means solicitors for businesses, commercial businesses, are not allowed to solicit at these residences. This will not apply to any individual who is a first responder or if a utility person comes to your door or a municipal employee who comes to your door who has to possibly do some kind of service call. The other, it doesn't cover commercial, religious, charitable, political, or civic speech. or publicly advertised open houses for realtors on behalf of the resident. The violations are recommended to be $250 for the first offense, $350 for the second offense, and $500 for the third offense and every offense after that. And each approach to a registered property who's on the no-knock registry would be a separate offense. So...

So if you knock on 10 doors, it's 10 times that amount. Correct.

All right, I'm going to channel my inner Pam a little bit. So the only one that I really cared mostly about here was F3, which is the one you just talked about, which exempts non-commercial, religious, charitable, political, or civic speech, because I think it's First Amendment stuff. What I don't understand is, so it says that if and to the extent such exemption is permitted by law, which is great, I understand that. But then after that, I lose it. And as otherwise provided in this chapter. So what does and as otherwise provided in this chapter mean? Because there's nothing else I think in this chapter that would apply to that speech because that speech is explicitly exempted.

And my question is, clearly this exempts the band, right? Because I love when they're charitable.

It's only for business and commercial purposes.

But I'm just saying, and as otherwise provided in this chapter. I don't know what that means.

This is only part of the chapter. So this is not the entire chapter of Peddlers and Solicitors.

This is just being added to the existing ordinance.

But what would apply, so what restrictions, or what would?

We're going to go back through the other ordinance that's not being changed. And just to think of what it does is refer to part of the ordinance that's not being changed. This just is amending the ordinance

Right, but I'm just saying what other section of the ordinance that apply to this act, you know not commercial I'm fine again. I don't want to slow this down. We should vote Yes, this makes sense and I'm gonna go find a straight hyphen so I could really really I had one change on f1 and

where it says municipal employees, can we do municipal employees and volunteers? Because our commissions, you know, Green Ridgewood does knocking, you know, Shade Tree will do, you know, if you go skip the stuff or anything like that, the rollout.

Yeah.

This beautiful door hanger. Are you sure? Because that's why I want the volunteer aspect added.

It's not commercial activity. It should fall under the same exemption I was just speaking of.

All right. I think we're all agreed. So I have a question to Matt and Heather. Can something like this also be applied to get a list of people that don't want those freebie newspapers in their driveway?

That's separate.

That's separate than this. And this is talking about when people go

Understand it's different. I'm saying in the vein of this. Can we do something of people?

I agree with that. Let's talk about that in the fall. I suppose something different.

I think it's great It's terrible for the environment winds up shredding out all over my side all over my driveway And then I got out of town and it shows you I agree I I not only hate them, but I hate them even more when I'm snow blowing my driveway and they are they are under the snow and and they lacerate my snowblower, so it's,

And I've received complaints about that too.

So let's keep it separate, but I agree, we should tackle that one too.

I will say, years and years ago when I was an observer, it was introduced unsuccessfully. So chances are, back then it was when print had coupons and there were local merchants, a lot of things that had been phased out. So Frank called me and said, I remember sitting in a meeting and it got quite contentious with the paper crowd, the people who loved it. People still get those. Yeah. That's why if it's a list that you can get on, you can call a number and opt out yourself. But last time this was introduced, it was quite an argument at Ridgeway.

Let's criminalize it. I like that. Pardon? Let's criminalize it. I like it. The former prosecutor wants to put people in prison for this. 100%. That and the people that park in the spots by the fifth or sixth time by the train station.

Where do the Girl Scouts fit in?

Charitable? Charitable. They're 501c3. Are you sure? Yeah.

I think you should. I think it's covered under 501c3.

And where you'd also say high school, high school boosters and things like that. High school students.

We can start making a list first.

Only because, you know, some people don't know.

Including but not limited to.

Just shows Pam's commitment to cookies, which is totally respectable.

We're pro Girl Scout cookies on this panel. So you don't want to put them in prison? Oh, no, they're good. The Girl Scouts are good by me. Unless they're parked illegally by their moms five or more times, in which case all bets are off. I got you.

I'm with you. I'm with you. Let's go.

Okay, so the next one is the amendment to the renewal date of Maple Avenue Liquors liquor license. I just want to give you a background, and then I just need you to make a decision. So Maple Avenue Liquors is a distribution liquor license. This means it's a liquor store. It has been a pocket license, meaning that it has not been cited at a location. Governor Murphy signed legislation that required pocket liquor license... both consumption, which are bars, and also distribution, which are liquor stores, to either be cited or be transferred prior to a certain date. For distribution liquor licenses, the date was June 30th, 2025. There was also a one-year extension to this date, which the Village Council granted to Maple Avenue Liquors. and so therefore their expiration date was June 30th, 2026. In June 2026, the village council, knowing that the owner of Maple Avenue Liquors was diligently trying to either cite or transfer his liquor license, allowed the licensee to have until September 30, 2026, to do so. This was in the resolution of renewal adopted by the Village Council as a June public meeting. On July 23, just a couple weeks ago, Governor Sherrill signed S-4404, and one of the provisions of that removed the requirement for a pocket distribution liquor license to be cited or transferred. leaves it up to the governing body to determine how long they wish to allow the distribution liquor license to remain as a pocket liquor license. In other words, the pocket liquor license can be renewed annually for as long as the village council wishes to do so. Therefore, We'll amend our resolution, which was adopted in June, because that sets the date of September 30th. And you need to indicate what date you wish to extend the pocket liquor license. As a reminder, they're all renewed annually, and the term is from July 1st to June 30th. So you can decide to extend the liquor license term for this particular license to June 30th, 2027, or any other date before it. If you wish to extend it to June 30th, 2027, sometime prior to that date, a discussion should probably be held if you want to extend it for the 2027 to 2028 year. The owner is still pursuing either citing or transferring the slicker license, and it may occur prior to June 30th, 2027. In that case, a place-to-place transfer application Police investigation and resolution will have to be adopted at that time to do so, once there's a complete application. So I just need you to let me know what date you wish to extend it to at this point.

Is June 30th the date that all the other licenses. It seems to me that that would be, if you put it in the same cycle as everything else, that that is the time to do it. Everybody good?

Yeah, and if it's not sold at that point, we can extend it again and break the circle.

Okay. The next one is declaring various IT property surplus. It's to dispose of equipment that has either been rendered unusable, is past its useful life, or has become obsolete. All devices capable of storing data have had their hard drives and memory removed to be destroyed separately. And IT will work with the recycling department to facilitate disposal.

All good.

Okay. The next one is the 2027 Village Council meeting dates. I just want to point out a couple of dates. Our reorganization meeting in January will be January 4th because it has to be held within the first seven days. And then we'll have a public work session a couple days later on the 6th. We did try to combine it one year, and it was much too long and a little chaotic. So the other dates I want you to look at are September. It's very Wednesday the 1st or Wednesday the 8th.

I vote 8th.

Because it's either before or after Labor Day.

After.

After Labor Day. Does everyone agree?

Yes.

Okay, so that's good. The other thing I wanted to say is I would like to set the council chat dates for March 20th, May 8th, and October 16th, and then coffee with the council for September 11th, which is the usual day, which is the Saturday after Labor Day. Are we okay with that?

Good. September 11th. If you want, we can move it to the 18th if you wish.

Would you prefer the 18th? We just need to check that the 18th doesn't. Yeah, I know.

It's in Rush, Sean. Yeah, I will check that. Okay, so you prefer to move it. Okay. That's all I have.

Great. Then let's go back to public comment.

I remind you, public comment is limited to three minutes. Please be mindful of the timer in the courtroom and wrap up your comments as you approach the three-minute mark.

Good evening, Michael Ngo, Ridgewood resident. I wanted to ask about the Ridgewood Movie Theater. I remember going there quite a bit when I was very young, and two things I remember about it is, one, is that it was very ornate as a historical building, but two, it was very old, and that was quite a while ago, so I'm sure it's quite a bit older right now. So my... question is, is that I heard several different estimates. The first one started out at $50 million for remodeling costs. Second one was $90 million. Now it's $75 million. So I'm not an engineer, architect, builder, any of those things. But I guess my question is, has anyone explored the option of just building a brand new building exactly the way you want it, rather than trying to shoehorn whatever you want into the existing building that's already there. Has anybody thought about that? My second question was about Ridgewood Water, and I was just curious, the money that they collect from the monthly fees or the quarterly fees for actual use from the several towns, Does that cover the actual expenses of Ridgewood Water, excluding the PFAS? I know PFAS is a lot, but I'm just wondering, is Ridgewood Water a profitable operation? Thank you.

Thank you, Michael.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Boyd A. Loving, Ridgewood resident. There was some discussion this evening in D policy number one about establishing an ordinance for all-terrain vehicles, and the acting manager indicated that the ordinance would apply to public right-of-ways, among other things. My concern is that most of the right-of-ways in the village of Ridgewood that an all-terrain vehicle would be operating on are privately owned by Public Service Electric and Gas, and I'm wondering if this ordinance would also apply to private property private property as well as public property. If you know the public service electric and gas right-of-way, particularly between Grove Street and Spring Avenue, it is quite an open space and I have seen all-terrain vehicles riding on it. I don't know if the operation of all-terrain vehicles or any vehicle for that matter is prohibited by another ordinance, but if it is not, certainly I do think that private property to that extent, to a right-of-way extent, should be included. Obviously, if somebody wants to operate one of these devices in their backyard, there's nothing you could do about it. But on a property similar in size to public services properties within the village, I do think it should apply to that. The other thing I did not hear mentioned was, although the village of Ridgewood doesn't own the property, school grounds. I could see some of these dirt bikes, ATVs, riding across some of the fields that are owned by the Board of Education. If you could also make sure that the ordinance would apply to prohibiting them to write in those areas too, that would be great. As Mr. Noe had a question about the Warner Theater, I too have a question. Given the rather surprise announcement tonight that there will be another $375,000 added to the option, my question is this. Even with 375 being added, you are still buying or you have an option to buy the property well under what the current assessed value is according to the tax records I just looked at. My question is, does the option limit you to purchasing the property only for purposes of having a performing arts center or in the unfortunate event, hopefully it doesn't happen, that you don't get the grant, Can you purchase the property for the price that you were promised that you could purchase the property for and then flip it and sell it to a developer? Or are you, so you don't lose the 250 plus the 375, or are you bound to purchasing the property only for use as a performing arts center? Thank you. Thank you, Boyd.

Anybody else? Seeing no one, we'll go to hybrid access. Denise, kick it off.

Hi, Denise Lima, Ridgewood resident. Few things, so my earlier questions were about conversations and social media, but it appears that everybody is looking for emails, which is fine, I'll send you a recap of the items in question. Hybrid access, while a little bit flexible, continues to be difficult because we don't have sunshine binders or access to any of the presentations, budget packaging information, so it's kind of hard to follow. On the theater aspect, I think it's still confusing on whether the foundation is going to be owning the theater or Ridgewood and how that's gonna be flipped and not flipped. I think just curtailing onto the questions that were asked earlier and the assignment of the funding that we're providing, are we charging the foundation for interest for that loan, for that assignment? What are we getting out of lending that money to them? The budget presentation, again, you know, hard to follow. Sometimes Bob was saying, comparing it to 2024, sometimes 2025, sometimes the numbers looked at, you know, looks like we're underachieving, but at the end he said, you know, everything's fine. It would be good to see a little more on the forecasting so we can kind of see where we're gonna end up for the end of the year. Tax communications, I think the only thing left on that is communications, so I'm guessing Heather, if Keith's not here, if you can update the social media pages. Definitely agree that in the resolution for bikes, we need to add sidewalks. I don't think people think of sidewalks when they see the term right-of-way. SID and RBA. So... we're gonna be providing a service to the RBA SID on the tax assessments. And again, my question is what fee are we getting out of doing that? That's a service that we're providing. And are we giving that away for free all of our time and money in legal as we're doing that? And I absolutely agree with Frank about the cap. So let's just hypothetical. We have 100 businesses, you know, for a million dollars today. Next year, it's a million dollars, but 20 businesses leave. Are we dividing the million dollar budget by 75? or is it assessment no more than 4%, even though it's a million, but 20 less businesses? I do think that really needs to be clarified. And nobody thinks anything rogue is going to happen, but we have a president of the United States that's rogue, right? So we're all gonna be gone, we're all gonna be retired, and somebody's gonna do something radical. So I think that the cap needs to be in there. I also think for Parks and Rec's, the fees presentation, I agree, Absolutely great. I'm wondering if we could tear the fee to be one fee for Ridgewood residents who want an event versus out of towners that maybe we charge more or an event for seniors that maybe are discounted.

Thank you. Have a great night. Thank you, Denise. Cynthia, you're up.