Council - Regular Meeting

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good evening please stand for the pledge of allegiance and please remain standing for the invocation by Reverend Deacon Ken Carpinelli I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, liberty and justice for all.

Good evening everyone.

Good evening. First of all, it's wonderful to be able to see everyone here for tonight. Uh, and just give thanks to everyone being here and to God for this beautiful day. So, let us pray. Holy Father, watch over the people of the town council, the people of Gloucester Township. Watch over the students in our schools, the teachers who provide them guidance. Help the families to continue to grow and be strong. And help us all to care for one another. For that is the witness of your love in how we care for each other. Give wisdom to those members here in charge to be able to do and make the right choices to listen with open hearts. Help us to also to listen to the needs of each of all of us. I thank you Lord for the opportunity to be here to see you in the faces of others. May we always remember to love one another as you love us. I ask this in your name. Amen. Amen. This regular meeting of the township council is being held in accordance with the schedule of the meetings of the township council which established and adopted designated the time and day and place of this meeting. Adequate public notice of this meeting has been provided pursuant to the provisions of the open public meetings act. We are using an electronic amplifying recording device in order to obtain a clear and audible record. And we request all those wishing to speak be recognized and state your name address directly to the microphone. The recording device to be solely utilized by the township clerk's office for the preparation amendments and shall

be the official record of the township council meeting. Madam clerk, may the roll call, please. Mr. Minion here. Mrs. Sbury Troxel here. Mrs. Grace Love here. Mr. Nash here. Mrs. Walters here. Mr. Castro here. Mr. Mcado present. Mr. Hutcherson present. Mr. Cartis here. Chief Manazi here. Mr. McIll here. Miss Weiss, we have a special presentation tonight. The Gloster Township Day Scholarship Committee will be uh presenting scholarships. I'll hand it over to Dr. Dick Hollings.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Marcato. Um, before I get started, um, does everybody out there have one of these sheets with numbers and and oops and names all over it? Um, you should find you should find your name and start channeling that number. Whatever you can do to hope that we pull your number out of the um, whatever that thing is called with all the ping pong balls. Um my name is uh is uh Dick Holland Head and I'm the assistant treasurer for Gloucester Township Bay Scholarship Committee. Um it's a small group of volunteers and we sponsor a number of events throughout the year. The purpose of those events is really twofold. One is to try to to foster uh community spirit. Gloucester Township is a huge geographical area and there's no real center of Glouester Township and so by having a variety of of events throughout the year including I don't know if I saw any of you at the 5K we had on Saturday uh but that's one of the events that we do and the and the reason we do this in addition to simply getting um more community spirit is that we raise money all the money that we raise goes right back to the community in the form of scholarships for students from Gloucester Township. Um, and that's why we're here tonight to choose the students from those who have qualified. Um, we're going to be giving out 40 scholarships in the amount of $1,000 each. Um, if you win, you're not walking out of here with a thousand bucks tonight. That'll come a little bit later. Um, but we send applications out to um the three high schools in uh Black Horse Pike Regional. That's Triton Highland and Timber Creek. But we also

send it out to all of the schools in the area where students from Gloucester Township are attending. That would be all uh private and parochial schools as well. In order to qualify for a scholarship, you have to meet four criteria. You have to be a resident of Gloucester Township. You have to be eventually accepted at a an accredited college or university. You have to score at least an 800 combined on your SAT or a composite score of at least 17 on the ACT. And you have to be either in the top 50% of your graduating class or have a 2.5 GPA. As you listen to those criteria, you can tell that what we are trying to do is to be as inclusive as possible. We raise money all over the township. And so we want to try to open this up to as many students, not just the kids at the very top of the class, but everybody who who is planning on going to college. Um, and this year I'm happy to report that we have applications from Highland, Triton, Timber Creek, also Camden County Technical School, Gloucester County Institute of Technology, Paul V 6th, Our Lady of Mercy Academy, Bish Bishop Eustace, Camden Catholic, and Gloucester Catholic. Um, of the applications that came in, we have a total of 386 successful applicants, but we're only giving out 40 scholarships. So, obviously, uh, those of you who are in AP calculus this year can do the arithmetic quickly, and you know that that means you've got a little better than a 10% chance of winning. Um, on the page that you have in front of you, we've arranged the students names alphabetically and each student has been assigned a number. 386 numbers. There's

386 ping pong balls in there each with a number. And it's possible that we made a mistake typing your name in and you and it's possibly misspelled. That could change your order in this thing. and therefore change your number. But we have to say that whatever number is next to your name, that's the official number. Even if we misspelled your name, and if we did, we we apologize. Um, I'm going to say that it could have been my fault in typing it in, but it could also be your fault for your pemanship or lack of it. Uh, because some of it was very hard to read. Um, okay. So, we're going to draw the numbers. I should point out to you that in addition to the 40 winners, we're also going to pull 10 more numbers. We call them the alternates. If one of the students of those first 40 decides not to go to college, then alternate number one will get the scholarship and so on. If two people don't go, then alternates one and two get it. So, we have a couple of people up here recording everybody's number that that gets called. Um, so it will to pull a total of 50 ping pong balls. First the 40 winners, then the 10 alternates. This is our 41st year of doing this. Um, and with these $40,000 that we're giving out this year, it brings our total uh amount of money given out in scholarships over these 41 years to $1,465,200. That's fantastic.

Thank you. It's really only possible because the community does come out to various events and we're able to um you know to to use that money for the scholarships. Um if you are interested in knowing more about our committee in the upper leftand corner of the uh document that you have in front of you is our website. You can go there and kind of get a better feel for what we try to do. I also need to say before we start pulling the names or the numbers that it's very likely that I'm going to mispronounce some names. Um, so I'm going to issue a blanket apology upfront and I'm going to do the best I can with it. Uh, but if I do mispronounce your name, um, I'm I'm really sorry, but if I'm mispronouncing your name, it means that you're getting a scholarship. So maybe you can forgive me um, if if that happens. So, um, with no further ado, um, I'm going to ask, uh, I guess Mr. Marcato, do you want to come down and do the first 10?

Okay. Okay, the first one is number 80 and that is Kendall Cena from Highland. Oh, I should mention also that if your name does get called, it's perfectly okay to cheer. You know, we're not in school. You can make as much noise as you want.

312. Number 312. Number 312 is uh Kimora Richardson from Timber Creek.

271. Number 271. Uh two 271

271

108 number 108 and that is uh Sophia Donado from Highland. Number 48 is Xavier Banano from Highland.

56. Number 56 is Avery Brley from Timber Creek.

286. Number 286 is Am Patel from Timber Creek. Number 44 is uh Kaden Blake from Timber Creek. Oh, that wasn't done. Uh number 18, Brianna Escu from Timber Creek.

356. Number 356. Uh Anelise Tooffen from Highland.

Okay. Whatever you'd like. Yeah. 384. Number 384 is Aiden Ye from Timber Creek. 365. Number 365 is uh Khloe Walker from Timber Creek. 218. Number 218 is uh Leila Lynch from Highland. 284. Number 284 is Kingston Pandalfo from Highland. 234.

We're getting a lot in that category. 234 is uh Spragens McCary or that's the last name. I don't the first name didn't print on here from Triton. 265. Got to start digging deep. 265 is Sura Muhammad from Triton. 104 104 is Aaron Duti from Gloucester Catholic. 140 140 is uh Kalia Gay from Highland.

368. Number 368 is uh Deshawn Wetstone from Timber Creek. 118. 118 is Jamaiah Irvin from Highland. We have 26. Number 26 is Jackson Ballard from Timber Creek.

245. Number 245 is uh Joseph McLaclin from Triton. 291. 291 is Thomas Phillips from Highland. 259. Number 259 is Cecilia Manorto from Bishop Eustace. 219 219 is Jaden Lions from Timber Creek. 171 171 is uh Ammani Holmes from Highland. 333

33 is Julius Shields from Triton. 156 156 is uh Jacob Hacker from Timber Creek. 60. Number 60 is Gavin Brown from Timber Creek. What are we up to? That was 29. Okay. Yeah. One more.

Number 112 is Blair uh Duckri Ferbert from Timber Creek. Okay, we need another uh I don't know what we want to call the person who's doing this, but Hi, Ellen. You want to go next?

274. Number 274 is Uh um is is um Kash Kashiuku Oki Okachuku from from Timber Creek. I know I messed that up.

Number 238 is James McDonald from Highland. Number 113 is Eric Dwire from Triton. I know. Well, close. Close.

Number 177 is uh Jamal James from Highland. 299 is Abigail Perfield from Timber Creek. Number 89 is uh Casaya Casay Cook from Highland. Number 69 is uh Joselyn Carpo from Highland. Number 146 is Brian Goodman from Highland. Number 35 is uh Jaylen Bates from Timber Creek. What?

That was 40. This is the 40th. Okay. Get a good one. 381. Number 381 is um Savannah Win from Timber Creek. Okay. So, those are the 40 winners. Um I was hoping we'd have more winners from those of you who are here, but now we're going to pull the 10 alternates. And this past year, three of the alternates ended up getting full scholarships because uh three of the winners ended up not going to college. So Helen,

good. Good. Yeah, you turn that thing a little bit. Bob eight. Number eight is uh Miriam Alooi from Timber Creek. 42. Number 42 is um there's no first name on here. It didn't print. Uh but the last name is Blackford Watams from uh Timber Creek. 179. Number 179 is uh Nia Johnson from Timber Creek. 377.

Number 377 is uh Brian Woodall from Timber Creek. 283. 283 is Ryan Panost from Timber Creek. 340. Number 340 is Angelina Smith from Triton. 197 197 is Maya King from Camden County Technical School. Congratulations.

Congratulations. You did a good deed today. Uh number number 224 is uh Sarah uh Melanic from Highland. 280. Number 280 is uh Jia Overton from Triton. This is the last one. 110 number 110 is um Lily Dryden from Highland. Um before we wrap this

thank you for coming out. I know you're just off all fresh off your your spring break. Uh so I'm glad you were able to be here. Um if for the alternates um even if you don't win um once we know actually what that who you know whether the students who won are actually going to college um we will send you a check for $100 um simply to for some expenses. Um we wish we could give lots and lots of scholarships out. Uh it's getting harder and harder to raise money. So if you hear about any of our events and you'd like to come out uh next year, that would be certainly greatly appreciated because that's the only way in which we can continue to do this. So again, thank you very much. Uh Mr. Marcato, it's back to you.

Thank you, Dr. Holmes. We'll take a fiveminute recess.

every day dealing with problems. Low low sounds again. I can't do anything more than I can. Getting something right. You have the uh thing clicker. Sorry, I didn't put it out. Can I have the roll call again, please? Mr. Minion here. Mrs. Aubrey Troxel here. Mrs. Grace Love here. Mr. Nash here. Mrs. Walters here. Mr. Castro here. Mr. Marcato, present. Mr. Hutcherson, present. Mr. Cartis here. Chief Manazi here. Mr. McIll here.

Miss Weiss. Mrs. Eric here. We now go to our first public comment. This is for agenda items only. Anyone wishing to speak can address council for three minutes. They may speak one time and there's a total of 15 minutes allocated for this first public comment portion. Would anyone like to speak during this time? Seeing none, we'll close the first public comment. Weigh the reading except the minutes of the workshop March 9th, 2026 and the regular meeting March 9th, 2026 and March 23rd, 2026. I have a motion, please. I'll make that motion. Second on the question. Roll call, please. Mr. Minion, yes. Mrs. Alrexel, yes. Mrs. Grace Love, yes.

Mr. Nash, I abstain on the workshop on March 9th. And yes, Mrs. Walters, yes. Mr. Castro, abstain on the workshop and on the meeting. Mr. Mcado,

yes. Next is the ordinance, a second reading. There will be a public hearing. Ordinance 0-26-09, Ordinance authorizing the completion of various improvements and acquisition of equipment for the sewer utility system in and for the township of Gloucester County of Camden, New Jersey, appropriating the sum of $1,820,930. Therefore authorizing the issuance of general obligation bonds or bond anticipation notes of the township of Gloucester County of Camden, New Jersey in the aggregate principal amount of up to1,820,930 making certain determinations and covenants and authorizing certain related actions and connections with the foregoing. This is a uh bond uh for ordinance for the sewer utility, acquisition of various uh tele equipment, uh standby generators, rehab and improvements of our sewer utility system, upgrades to our pump station, uh purchase of IT equipment, and the purchase of various vehicles for the sewer utility system. We now open up the public hearing. Anyone wish to speak on this matter?

Seeing none, we'll close the public hearing. May I have a motion, please? I'll make that motion. Is there a second? Second. M uh on the question. Roll call, please. Mr. Minion, yes. Mrs. Albert Troxel, yes. Mrs. Grace Love, yes. Mr. Nash, yes. Mrs. Walters, yes. Mr. Castro, yes. Mr. Marcato, yes. Uh, next is our consent agenda. Any council member like to have any item removed from the consent agenda, please speak up. Hearing none, I entertain a motion to accept the consent agenda as presented. So move. Second. Is there on the question? Roll call, please. Mr. Minion, yes. Mrs. Albert Troxel, yes. Mrs. Grace Love, yes. Mr. Nash, yes. Mrs. Walters, yes. Mr. Castro, yes. Mr. Marcato,

yes. Resolution 146, resolution to cancel capital appropriation balances for completed projects. May I have a motion, please? I'll make that motion. Second. On the question, roll call, please. Mr. Minion, yes. Mrs. Aubry Troxel, yes. Mrs. Grace Love, yes. Mr. Nash, yes. Mrs. Walters, yes. Mr. Castro, yes. Mr. Mcado, yes. Resolution 147, resolution approving open space tax levy for 20126. May I have a motion? I'll make that motion. Second on the question. Roll call, please. Mr. yes. Mrs. Alrexell, yes. Mrs. Grace Love, yes. Mr. Nash, yes. Mrs. Walters, yes. Miss Mr. Castro, yes. Mr. Marcato,

yes. Resolution 148. Resolution extending a temporary budget for the tangible cluster temporary budget appropriation for 2026. May I have a motion? I'll make that motion. Second on the question. Roll call, please. Mr. Mo, yes. Mrs. Albridge, yes. Mr. Grace Love, yes. Mr. Nash, yes. Mrs. Walters, yes. Mr. Castro, yes. Mr. Marcato,

yes. Resolution 149, resolution of the township council of the township of Gloucester County of Camden, state of New Jersey governing body certification of compliance with the United States equal opportunity employment opportunity commission's enforcement guidance on the consideration of arrest and conviction records and employment decisions under title 7 of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. May I have a motion, please? I'll make that motion. Second on the question. Roll call, please. Mr. Minion, yes. Mrs. Alre Troxel, yes. Mrs. Grace Love, yes. Mr. Nash, yes. Mrs. Walters, yes. Mr. Castro, yes. Mr. Marcato, yes.

Resolution 150, resolution approving introduction and providing notice for public hearing and public inspection of the 2026 municipal budget. May I have a motion? Make that motion. Second. On the question, roll call, please. Mr. Minion. Yes. Mrs. Albury Troxel. Yes. Mrs. Grace Love. Yes. Mr. Nash, yes. Mrs. Walters, yes. Mr. Castro, yes. Mr. Marcato,

yes. Uh, as we move forward during the budget process, I'll reach out to some of the council members to see if they're interested in uh serving on a uh subcommittee uh to help review the budget. Uh the second reading of the budget will be at the May 11th meeting. Um so we have four weeks till that meeting. We did not receive any egov uh egov access emails. We'll now open up the second public comment portion. This is for anything that the public chooses to address. Uh each member of the public's entitled to five minutes. There's a total of 30 minutes for this public portion. Would anyone like to speak on any matter? Seeing none, we'll close the second public portion. Polling of directors.

Mr. Hutcherson. Nothing. Mr. Cordis. Nothing at this time. Chief Manazi. Mr. McIll, thank you. Miss Weiss, Mrs. Eric,

Mr. Mone, congratulations tonight to the 50 recipients uh for the scholarship. It's a it's a great thing uh the township does that $1,000 will go to to 40 uh uh students. So, that's wonderful. Other than that, have a great night, great week. Mrs. is all by Troxel.

I'm a strong advocate for education at all levels and it was really nice that I got to select even if it was an alter alternate, she still got a shot at it. So that that did my heart good and I hope that helps her and I hope she gets it. Also, we went to the um bowl openings this weekend and they're loads of fun because you see these little kids come out with their families, their parents, their grandparents, and their siblings and they're running around and they're just having a great time and it does your heart good to see that because those little children are going to be our future and they're enjoying their life and it's nice because we provide that through Gloucester Township through our tax dollars. So, I want you to understand that your tax dollars are going to absolutely great programs in this township and uh and they they help all ages all ages get to uh to enjoy them. So, as far as I'm concerned, I wish I could play ball again, but I can't. So, congratulations to all the teams. Whether they won or they lost, it was how they played the game. And I saw that they were taught respect for each other, which is so important and and pride in what they did. Whether they won or they lost, it was okay. They still hugged each other and and it was okay. So, we got to learn that as adults, too. Thank you, Mrs. Grace Love.

Congratulations to all the recipients and everyone have a wonderful, wonderful week and a great night. Mr. Nash. Yes. So, um, you heard me mention this event many times, but we're finally here. The Colonial Reenactment at the Gabriel Davies Tavern is this weekend, April 18th and 19th. Um, Saturday 9 to5, Sunday 9 to 3, rain or shine. It's a free event. Bring the kids out. It's pretty cool. They have a bunch of colonial things. Hatchet throwing, flint lock, rifle shooting. Dan might live light off a cannon or something. Come on out. Thanks,

Mrs. Walters. Um, congratulations to all the recipients tonight and all those that um were qualified to for the drawing. Um, as well and good luck to all the teams throughout the um, township, all baseball, soccer, anything going up. Um, wish them well. Um, and let the kids just have fun and have a good weekend. Mr. Castra, congratulations to all the recipients and the alternates and everyone have a great weekend. Mr. Marcato, Mr. Mun forgot to add something that's happening on Saturday. Go ahead, Mr. Mun.

Yeah. So, uh, this Saturday at 10:00 at the TBAA fields in Valley Brook, we will be opening up our ninth season of the Glosser Township Field of Dreams. Those of you that don't know what that is, it's a it's a baseball organization for all ages, age groups uh, of uh, players with special needs. This year we have well over 40ome players that are playing between buddies coming to participate. This will go out to the second week in June. So, that will open up this Saturday at 10 am. Please come out. Be a great time. Great weather, too. So, looking forward to it.

Thank you. I want to thank uh well, congratulate all the recipients this evening. Thank everyone for coming out. Also, thank you to Gloss Township scholarship committee for continuing to provide these scholarships for our uh seniors that are attending college. Uh, also I want to thank the Gloss Township Police Department and uh, the recreation department for helping in our 5K race this past week, which is one of the major fundraisers that we have for the Glosser Township Scholarship Committee. Uh, and um, yes, Field of Dreams is this Saturday and we look forward to another year of that. So with that, I entertain a motion to adjourn. So move. There second. Second. Second. All those in favor? Hi. Hi. Have a great evening everyone.

Please stay by and sign. Council members, we have a form we have to fill. There's four of them.