Borough Council - Regular Meeting

The following is the agenda for the regular borough council meeting in the borough of . The meeting will conclude at 7 PM on May 22nd, 2026 in the municipal building 251 and with the open public meetings at the meeting will be open for public comments until being recorded with terms and conditions of the borough municipal code of law. of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Please bless the Sumerian Council as they deliberate on the best of pomp and nice. In accordance with the open public meeting law, New Jersey SA 10-4-6, adequate notice of this regular meeting setting forth the time, date, location, and purpose of this meeting was provided by posting notice on the bulletin board of the municipal building by transmitting notice to all persons requested same and pursuant to PL 2025 and the application provision of Title 40 and 40A of the New Jersey statute governing legal notice and advertisement by electronic publications on this official website of the Borough of Palmton Lakes. Now, I've been reading this for 15 years. This is a new one, and I memorized the other one, so this is a problem.

I've got to blame the attorney.

It's always the attorney's fault. Okay, roll call, please.

Okay, thank you. I have a bunch of presentations I'd like to do, but I'd like to start with

The first one, recognizing our clerk. Our clerk, Liz, has been here for numerous years. How many? Do you want to tell or not tell? Twenty-five. Twenty-five years. She is my right-hand person when I do anything here and all the things I do. I know I can always rely on her to give me the right information squarely and fairly. And she's always there to help, always working the dedicated time. So this is a well-deserved award for her. And this is for the Borough of Palmton Lakes, the general code honor roll certification of recognition for Elizabeth Branson in celebration of her selection to the 2026 Municipal Kirk Honor Roll. This distinction is awarded following outstanding dedication to your community, recognizing your effects to go above and beyond your official duties, your steadfast dedication to public transparency and professional codification serves as a benchmark for the local government nationwide. And I can tell you everything I just read there is completely true about what Liz does. She really does support this panel 100%. You should be taking the pictures, but we're going to have somebody else, please.

Thank you. Come into the picture.

Thank you, everyone. And I'm very happy that I have the opportunity to serve my people.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Liz.

I think we'll go next to the Eagle Scout award project. Is Nicholas here? I'm sure he is, because he's the man in the uniform. So why don't you come up and tell us what you're looking to do.

Right here, fine. May I give you papers?

I don't know if some of you- Give it to the clerk and she'll hand it out for us. I think we have it. Yeah, we have this. We all have this.

All right, so thank you for having me. I know there is a lengthy chain of emails, and there is some confusion. I was really log-in gagging with getting this presentation over. So my equals service project proposal. The project is a construction of the kiosk at the Morris Canal Greenway Trail. And there will also be some nicening up of the trails. I noticed there was very much lack of gravel. You could see some of the weed prevention under the gravel. And I assume it would be great to have a beautiful trail. This is down by 14 Mass Ave. Great. Benefits, the Pompton Lakes Trail Committee will now have an additional place to post warnings, maps, and informational papers. I know that ticks can be problems for some people because there's Lyme disease or alpha-gal syndrome and that can cause lifelong effects and I'm sure there's other bugs that they would love to post about and make sure that people are safe from or maybe even snakes or other animals. Hikers, they will certainly be warned by the Pompton Lakes Trail Committee. And they'll have a more pleasant experience, as I said, with the gravel. It's a little bit lacking down by that trail. And then for myself and volunteers, I will be progressing myself in the Scouts. I will be running my Eagle Project. And other people will have volunteer hours that they can use towards their graduation. Maybe they can put them on the resume. The steps that could be completed right now is approval from the Council and then the Scout Council. I will send my Eagle Papers to them after I get approval from all of you. After that, I will start obtaining funds and materials. I write about the material cost and what we will need to fundraise later. Recruitment, I hope to get this done in June, latest July. It should take no more than two days. I'll send out flyers. I know many people who would love to jump at the opportunity for volunteer hours and I have many people from another troop who would love to come to the Eagle project. And then the final step would be execution. Fully assembling the kiosk and spreading the gravel. I included multiple slides and what the site looks like. There's some weeds so it might take a day to kill the weeds and then we could also spread some gravel. And I also attached a reference site of what a previous scout did. Workplace necessities. I'm sure that kids will have to go to the bathroom. There's a scout parent who is offered, they live nearby the trail, to offer a bathroom and with safe scout transportation, which means buddy system, make sure there's nothing, anything going wrong with adults. There's also ample room for the trucks and the materials to come over and we can assemble. There is also nearby fields should there be any problem with that. I'm not sure about what the title of the next page may say, but it's supposed to be medical overview. Many problems can happen down by the trail depending on whether it's cold or hot because with this New Jersey weather, it seems to be all over the place. There can be dehydration, heat exhaustion, hypothermia, or other heat-related injuries. Just make sure to send out notifications about what people should be wearing when they come to work. Allergy reactions, I'm sure people will be able to account for themselves with that. I have friends who are allergic to have pollen or other things that I'm sure they know how to take care of. Poison ivy, sunburn, and animal and bug bites. Sunscreen, bug spray, stay away from the plants that don't look like they're supposed to be touched. Work-related causes, cuts and abrasions, essentially bruises or scrapes, we will be using shovels. So I hope that they keep them away from swinging them like bats. Splinters, we will be working with wood to assemble the kiosk. That should be kept to a minimum since they're being assembled with screws and other things. Injury reduction, drink plenty of water. I'm sure that won't be a problem. Make sure everyone is well-closed for the weather, as I've said before. And be mindful of surroundings. I'm sure there will be many eyes and no one will have a problem with keeping up for animals. Supplies and tools needed. All of these tools that you see here will be provided by the scouts. We have a whole shed. And the supplies will be shown later. Bagels and drinks, this will happen probably around 9 in the morning. So in case people don't come with having eaten breakfast, that's what they'll be for them to eat. Drinks include water and Gatorade things to make sure that no one gets dehydrated. Electrolytes to make sure that you keep the hydration inside of you. There will also be pizza as a lunch, since this could very well last four, five, maybe even six hours. And then garbage bags to dispose of all that stuff. Supplies cost, I calculated for about 25 people. Bagels cost around $80. Pizza for 25 people, assuming everyone got two slices, is about $150. And then drinks, like two or three water bottles per person and two or three Gatorades is going to be around $70. which totals to about $230. Any questions so far?

Nope, we're good. Keep going. Doing a good job.

The materials cost, I've calculated this. I don't know how well you can see that, but that's a material list and their prices. Materials will cost up to $650. although this is without any discounts. Home Depot has been known to give generous discounts for Scout projects. And one of the last Scout projects actually got all of the materials for free. Supplies price, as I said before, is around $230. And then tools are provided for the... So, so far the total cost is about $880. Fundraising, I've fundraised for sports and through a method of just reaching out to friends digitally. I've raised over $1,500, which gave us lots of equipment for my fencing team. I'm sure there was a little bit of problems with that one. There was a minimum donation price, which is $25, which turned many people away. But I don't think there's going to be a minimum donation price for this one. And I'm sure many more people will love to donate. My mother works as a bartender, and my stepfather also works in the restaurant business. So they have received permission from their bosses to allow me to fundraise near their shop. And this has been a recurring thing where I fundraise at their work. That is all I have to present. Thank you.

First, congratulations on reaching Eagle Scout. I can talk from personal experience. It's a very hard thing to do. So congratulations on doing that. I think that I can help you with one of the things. I'm going to reach out to Councilman Vennen. He's a member of the Masonic Lodge. And I think they might offer to make some donation. Is that right? Yes, that's correct. Go ahead. You can speak about it.

Yes. We have some money that we'd like to be more involved in the community. And I'll connect you with the person that could help with that.

Thank you. I also have a question whether you would be able to help with trucks and delivery of gravel. That would surely significantly reduce cost of gravel. I don't know if there's any availability of that.

We have a connection to Tilcon. The issue is I don't know if they have this small gravel.

Do they?

I'll find out. Okay. Well, I'll ask. If they have this gravel, I'm sure they'll donate it.

We're planning on three-fourths gravel.

Okay. So let's see if we can find that out, and we'll get back to you on if we can get that down to you.

Thank you.

Any questions from the council? No.

I just have a comment. I worked with health-specific site and safety plans in my past life, you know, with the DEP. And this proposal that you put together with all the information of, you know, on-site injuries is spot on. Thank you. And I'm very proud. I was very amazed at the degree that you had actually put that together.

Many of the Boy Scouts merit badges, they always go through what could happen while you're doing this. Yeah. Right? Orienteering, walking through the woods. preparing for emergencies. There's so much medical preparation.

So the only thing I would add is just that you put 9-1-1 and the hospital. That's the only addition I think you would add. It's a professionally done proposal. I'm very proud of you. Is this the group that does the flowers in the spring and the fall?

I do, yes.

Because I love those flowers. And I buy them every year. And it's a great shoe.

Thank you. It really helps with the Boy Scouts in affording camping trips.

So we have no issue with the project. You've been in contact with myself and Michael through email. You can continue doing that. Maybe Mike will get back to you if we find out anything about the gravel. And Councilman Venon will reach out to you personally to figure out how we can do some funding. So good luck. And if you need anything, please reach out. Thank you. OK. Thank you.

Please come see the PVA, too.

Okay, next, we have, it's our Arbor Day Festival, which is always a great event. You know, we have a very active shade tree commission that does a great job here in town. And part of that is identifying residents who do the, or children who do the Arbor Day essay contest. I also have a proclamation for Arbor Day, which I'm not going to read the whole thing. It's the same proclamation I give you guys every year. I'll give it to you again. But I'm going to ask Ann Castanelli to come up and say a couple words about it.

Can we turn this a little? Do you want me to turn the? Audience a little, but not my back to you. Wait, wait, the microphone.

Yeah. That's a brand new microphone.

I'm going to keep this here, though, so you come around. Just come around this way.

Good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining us. My name is Ann Tassinelli, and I'm the chairperson of the Pumpkin Lake Shade Tree Commission. We're here tonight to commemorate Arbor Day. This is our 11th annual Arbor Day contest, thanks to Madeline Denti, who organizes it. Each year, the fifth graders are asked to write a letter to their favorite tree, or a prompt that is suggested by the commission, which could change every year. The Commission then reads each of these essays and chooses one winner from each of the two fifth grade classes. These winners will receive the opportunity to read their essay tonight and will then receive a special gift from the Shade Tree Commission and a certificate from both the Shade Tree Commission and Town Council. So now, with that said, I have some people to thank and bring notice to before we move on to the readings. First, I'd like to thank our mayor and council for allowing the opportunity to hold this event here in the council chambers. A special thank you to Liz Brandness, Kathy Trost, and Barbara Sishon for their support and hard work when residents come into the municipal building with their concerns. Also, thanks to our borough administrator, Michael Corelli, for his support and assistance. i'd like to thank our co-chair pete or terry pete spends many hours throughout the town surveying trees and determining their safety or their need for pruning or removal he's the first to be called upon to investigate a complaint or concern from a resident he's our shade tree steward and offers a world of knowledge about trees. Pete is also our county liaison and our liaison to JCP&L and Verizon. He's also our treasurer. Pete will be putting up our 18th year tree city signs at the entrances to the town. Madeline Dente is our secretary and an absolute asset to our commission as well. she has organized for 11 years now this arbor day event and does so with great pleasure and expertise madeline also organizes for national night out to help keep pumpton lake shade tree commission in the forefront of the residents and visitors to the event Madeline replies to residents about their concerns that come through by email or on our website and by voicemail, right? Kaylin O'Connor, who's not here with us tonight, is with us for her second year now. She has proven to be an amazing asset to our commission as she is not only well-versed in tree identification, But for the second year, she's handling the task of our spring and fall planting list. She contacts the nursery to order the trees and determines the tree's best location. Kaylin also goes to check on tree complaints and reports back to the commission on her findings. Kaylin is a professor of ecology at Kean University and has a PhD in environmental science and has recently become an ISA certified arborist. We are extremely thankful to have her on the commission. I would also like to thank Ranuel Hinton, who was a past member of STC and had been part of many accomplishments. He is again offering his expertise and support to us as liaison to the council. Randy brings critical shade tree commission concerns and opinions to our council on our behalf. He provides mayor and council updates and information on enhancing and maintaining our community forestry programs. Thank you, Randy. Dan O'Rourke, our DPW superintendent, and Tin Duffy, our assistant superintendent, help out in any way they can, and when asking of one or both of them, they are always there to help out. This year, we received our 18th year Tree City USA award for following and performing all of the criteria to be considered for this award. Our plaque is displayed in the hallway of the municipal building and our signs are at the beginning of town, both on Hamburg Turnpike. I do also believe we should thank the teachers who allowed the students to take the time out of their busy day to support the students in writing these essays. A big thank you to all of the students who participated because they are really all winners. I hope I did not forget to thank anyone who may have taken part in our commission's work all year or in the planning of this evening's event. But if I have, we extend a blanket thank you to all. As you can see from this long reading, Pumpkin Lake Shade Tree Commission is an extremely complex volunteer commission. and requires many of us in order to remain on task in keeping our town full of beautiful and healthy trees. That ends my long-winded speech. I apologize for that, but it's difficult to graciously thank a phenomenal group of volunteers without a lot of words. Again, I thank you for joining us tonight, and let's move on to the fifth grade essays.

You guys calling or you want me to call? You guys? You want to call? No, no. Go for it.

Justice Pierre?

Come on up.

Come on up. Come right here. And make sure you speak nice and loud. Because even though there's a microphone, your young voice doesn't always count.

Dear tree in my backyard, I want to thank you so much for all that you do for us. Many people just look at you and think, oh, whatever, it's just a tree. But I don't see it like that. You give us oxygen to breathe and help us clean the air of pollution. You give us shade from the hot sun and look great in the winter and fall. Of course, you know, you are a pitch pine. But when your pine cones fall, they add a great flavor to my mud pies and mud soups. But why? Why are you so important? Because you trap dust and absorb pollutants from the air. You provide shade from solar radiation and reduce noise. You prevent flooding and erosion, which we need in this part of town. On Arbor Day, it's a day for us to remember all that you do. Without you, people wouldn't be able to breathe clean air and more floods would happen. Yet on Arbor Day, we add more of your friends. On Arbor Day, we come together and show our appreciation for you. I may be writing to you, a tree in my backyard, but what about the cherry blossoms and the apple trees and the maple trees with that yummy maple syrup? All trees are great and beautiful. Trees don't only give us human things, but also give animals things like a great home to live in and have a family with baby birds. You give little chipmunks and squirrels nets to eat. You're an amazing backscatcher for black and brown bears. You even give bugs a good place to hide from woodpeppers. Now, trees, you're just showing off. You do so much, and we just look past you. We do have Arbor Day to celebrate you, but we shouldn't just celebrate you on Arbor Day, but every day. When I heard we were making lettuce for you, I thought of a haiku. Trees, trees, we love you. Your lovely leaves give us shade. Pine, oak, maple, teak. I don't really speak for myself when I say this, but we thank you, trees. Sincerely, your tree-loving friend, Justice.

We're going to take a picture. Should I turn? Yeah.

First of all, very good job speaking. It's better than me. You did a good job talking. It's scary. So this is a little certificate for what you've done. You've done a great job with the speech.

You want to take a picture?

So we have to end, all of us.

That's what we usually do. So take a picture with this first, and then we'll come back. Nice job.

Thank you.

Dear Treece, I want to thank you so much for all that you do for us. People always want to cut you down, but you guys are the reason they are living. You provide us with oxygen, shade, clean air, and fruit. You are a shelter for so many different animals like birds and squirrels. You are a nice place to read a book or even have a picnic underneath. I want to help out trees by protecting the trees in my community. I want to do this for you because you do this for me every single day. You protect us just by living. You provide oxygen and that allows us to breathe. I love trees because they remind me of the time my class hung wishes on our school tree. I love sitting next to you while doing my homework. When you shake your branches, you create a calming and relaxing breeze. When you make sounds with the wind, it puts my mind at ease and puts me into a relaxing state of mind. We could never live without you. My whole yard is filled with beautiful and luscious trees. You make my yard look complete. No matter what kind of tree you are, you are all gorgeous. I love when you change colors throughout the seasons. One of my favorite seasons is spring because there's a beautiful tree in my front yard that grows pink flowers every spring. One of my favorite memories with trees is when my best friend and I went to a cherry blossom farm. Every tree I saw was beautiful from their luscious leaves to their stunning roots. They all had gorgeous light pink flowers that decorated their branches like ornaments on a Christmas tree. Cherry blossoms are one of my favorite kinds of trees because they are beautiful and only last about one to two weeks, which makes it even more special to see them in their peak. Another reason I think cherry blossoms are so great is because they do everything other trees do and look gorgeous while doing it. One of my favorite trees is the peephole tree. Because of its astonishing leaves, out of all the trees, peephole trees are in the top five trees for trees that produce the most oxygen. Overall, trees create such a great environment for people to live in, and that is just one of the many reasons why Arbor Day is such a great holiday. I enjoyed writing this essay because it taught me how important trees are to this world and how we should be extremely grateful for them. No matter what kind of tree you are, you will always have a place in my heart. Sincerely, your tree-loving friend, Alina. Thank you.

Another great job speaking. Very nice, nice job. And Alina happens to be my neighbor, and I know she loves treats so much, she can always come over and rake my leaves at any time. Go for it. So here's a nice little certificate for you.

Thank you.

All right, so why don't we get a group picture? Come on up. I'm going to catch my slide over here a little bit. Thank you guys. Thank you so much.

Can I get back? You're a little tall. Can we get back? Randy, you're the lazy one.

You're the lazy yawn. Go on down.

Lazy. Lazy yawn. Lazy liaison. He's not lazy. He's got .

And thank you, Shade Church Commission, for doing what you're doing. Now's your chance to get out of the meeting, unless you'd like to stay for the whole meeting. You're more than welcome to stay, but if you'd like to leave, now's a good time. Thank you. Okay, can I have a motion to open the meeting for public comments?

Motion.

Councilman Hinton?

Second.

Councilman Bennett, all in favor? Aye. Against? Anyone from the public like to address? Step up.

Thank you, guys. See you. Good night. Good night.

Helene Zablocki. Congratulations are in order for Lieutenant Mike Papacki, who earned the highest score on the police captain's test, again. He is, in addition to being a smarty pants, he is also a really fine human being, and a man of integrity, and a sterling example of what the Pompton Lakes Police Department is.

Thank you. Anyone else from the public? Please step up.

Good evening. Before I begin, for the record, I would like to state that I'm speaking in my personal capacity, not as an Arlington County Commissioner, nor as a representative of the American Psychological Association.

Can I get a name, that's all?

Oh, Andrew Frayer. Residents of Hemlock Road are increasingly concerned regarding the condition and placement of the two fire hydrants located on our street. The hydrants are located roughly 100 feet apart, which appears inconsistent with standard fire protection practices intended to distribute coverage throughout a neighborhood. Under NJAC 521 and 5-4, hydrants are supposed to provide adequate fire protection coverage and dwellings generally should not be more than 400 feet from a hydrant. The concern is whether concentrating the two hydrants so closely together provide the best protection on the rest of the street. More troubling, to the best of our knowledge, one of the hydrants is currently inoperable. Residents have not been informed whether it has been inspected, flow tested, repaired, or officially designated out of service. Following the December 2025 fire on our street, many residents witnessed confusion and scrambling regarding hydrant access and water supply during a critical emergency response. No firefighter should have to question whether nearby infrastructure is functional during an active fire. So tonight we respectfully ask, have the hydrants been inspected and flow tested in accordance with New Jersey state standards? Is one of the hydrants still currently out of service, and if so, for how long? Has the borough conducted any review following the fire response on Hemlock Road? And what actions have been taken to ensure that the town is fully prepared for an event of another fire in Hemlock Road? Thank you so much for this evening. Thank you.

Anyone else from the public? I'll answer at the end. Anybody else from the public would like to address? Seeing no one, can I have a motion to close the public session? Motion. Second. Councilman Venon, Councilman Vague, all in favor? Aye. Against? Mr. Rocky, thank you for your comments. Andrew, yes, I was at that fire. I was there. There was a little bit of confusion, but unfortunately, I don't have much information to offer you. I'm going to have Michael and our, who's our fire? I don't even know. All right, so between, and Michael will reach out to the fire department. I understand them with the confusion about the hydrant, so I really don't have enough information to go on that. And I know they had to run a long line at one point to get up the hill, and there was a problem with the hill and all those things. So, Michael, could you look into that and maybe get the answers to some of those? Or maybe you know. I don't know.

No. We're going to follow up with both the fire department and the Pompton Lakes Municipal Utilities Authority, which is the authority that manages the hydrants. Not the borrower. So we'll follow up with that.

And then the question, again, the inspections, can we find out if they were inspected? I don't know that. And I'm pretty certain one of them is out of service. So we'll just verify that. And there was a discussion. So usually when there's a fire that happens like that, there's a discussion within the fire department of how they handle it. It doesn't usually come to us, the council, unless they have a concern or a problem. Then they would bring it to us. But we didn't hear anything, so there's not much more information I could add. But I will reach out to the chief and see if he has any additional information for that. OK? OK. Motion to approve the following minutes. Special council meeting minutes, May 11th, 2026. Closed session meeting minutes, May 11th, 2026. Regular meeting minutes, May 13th, 2026. Closed session meetings, May 13th, 2026. Can I have a motion? Motion. Second. Councilman Sanchez, Council President Kent, all in favor?

Aye. Against? Mayor, I'm abstaining from the 13th because I wasn't here for the regular council meeting.

Okay, an abstention on just the 13th? Yes. Council, okay. Authorizing payment of bills and wires in the amount of $8,884,405. Motion to approve the following bill list as stated below. Motion.

Thank you.

Councilman Hinton, all in favor? Aye. Against? Anybody have anything they'd like removed from the consent agenda? Seeing none, go ahead please.

Whereas the Mayor and Borough Council of the Borough of Coffin Lake . And Borough Council of the Borough of Coffin Lake does not desire to move resolutions for individual action from that agenda. Now, therefore, it be resolved that the following resolutions on the consent agenda are hereby approved. 26-219 through 26-245.

Motion to approve the resolutions. Motion. Second. Councilman Bennett. Councilman Sanders. All in favor? Aye. Against? Ordinances for first reading.

Ordinance 2683, bond ordinance appropriating $3,438,726 and authorizing issuance of $1,667,350. taken by the borough, council members, and the county this day.

Motion to approve ordinance 2618 for introduction. Motion. Councilman Hinton. Who was the second one? Councilman Begg. Any discussion on this? Nope. OK. Roll call, please.

Councilman Begg.

Yes.

Councilman Hinton. Yes. Council President Zantos. Yes. Councilman Zantos. Yes. Councilman Begg.

Yes.

ORDINANCE 26-19, AN ORDINANCE AMENDING CHAPTER 5, LESSONS, PERMITS, AND BUSINESS, REGULATIONS, SECTION 21, SOLICITING CHARITIES, SUBSECTION 21.4, TIME OF ABOLITION OF THE BUREAU CODE OF THE BUREAU COMPANY.

MOTION TO APPROVE ORDINANCE 26-19 FOR INTRODUCTION. MOTION. COUNCIL PRESIDENT KENT. SECOND. COUNCILMAN SANTERS. ANY DISCUSSION? ROLL CALL, PLEASE.

COUNCILMAN KENT.

YES.

Councilman Hinton? Yes. Council President Pence?

Yes.

Councilman Sanders?

Yes.

Council President Pence? Yes. Motion to approve ordinance 26-20 for introduction. Motion. Councilman Hinton? Second. Councilman Sanders, any discussion? Roll call, please.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Motion to open the meeting for public comments on Ordinance 26-16.

Motion. Councilman Sanders? Second. Councilman Hinton? All in favor? Aye. Against? Anyone like to address just this ordinance? Seeing no one, motion to close the meeting for public comments on Ordinance 26-16. Motion. Councilman Bennett? Councilman Hinton? All in favor? Aye. Against? Motion to approve Ordinance 26-16 for final adoption. Motion. Councilman Bennett? Second. Councilman Hinton? Roll call, please.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Motion to open the meeting for public comments on Ordinance 26-17. Motion. Councilman Sanchez.

Second. Councilman Bennett, all in favor? Aye. Against? Anyone like to address just this ordinance? Seeing no one, motion to close the meeting for public comments on ordinance 26-17. Motion. Councilman Hinton? Second. Councilman Bennett, roll call please.

I just had a question. Okay. Does this, it's minimum and maximum salary, does it include stipends? Or is that just the salaries?

No, this is for base salaries.

This is just base salaries?

Yes.

Okay, thank you. Okay, roll call please.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Okay, thank you. Before we start, I know there's been a lot of talk on social media. about the naming of a bridge for a past council person. I received an email from the family, and Council President Kent is going to address it a little bit more, from the family that they would accept the idea of naming the bridge at Herschel Park in the bag for our friend Bill Begg named in that. So it's something we'll talk about and discuss a little later, but the request did come from the family to do that. So we, just so the public and everybody understands, we now own that bridge. so we don't have to go to the county for any uh approvals for that it's our bridge to take what we're going to do there is going to be a ribbon cutting uh i think it's the 15th for the bridge if we decide now to do that then i don't think we'll have a plaque in place but at least we could call it that for the ribbon cutting so i'm gonna does anybody have any concerns or comments about maybe you want to add some more no i i think i think it's appropriate and uh anybody who knew bill bank well i know it was 30 years

worked with PAL, worked with the county folks, the Boy Scouts. He worked with the county. So it seems appropriate, and I think the family would appreciate that. And a number of people reached out to me. Once it got started, it just kind of snowballed, and people are very much in support of this.

So I would like to, I don't know if they have to make a motion.

Well, yeah, you can make a motion. Let's do it that way.

OK. So I make a motion that the Hirschfield Park footbridge be dedicated in memory of William Begg.

I'm just going to stop for one second. Is that what you'd want, what the family would want, the wording?

Yeah, I think William Begg would be. William or Bill?

You always change. You don't make a decision.

We can talk about it. Thank you, Bill.

And I really appreciate everybody's support with it. I second. Okay, Councilman Hinton, Councilman Santers, all in favor? Aye. And for people who don't know Councilman Begg, he was a long-time councilman, a long-time board member. I'm sorry.

I made the motion.

Oh, I'm sorry. Then it would be Councilman Hinton as the second.

I'll make the second.

For people who didn't know Councilman Begg, he was a long-time Councilman, but a very long-time Board of Ed member, also a captain in our police department for many years, retired from our police department. He was very involved in the town. He's a true Pompton person from beginning to end. You know, if he needed something, you could always go to him, and if it was for Pompton Lakes, he was involved, besides all the other things he could do. And even into his advanced age, he didn't slow down and drop them. He was always right next to me doing whatever I was doing right there all the time. So, you know, he is missed, and I'm glad to see his family following up on his switch steps, which is a very nice thing to see. So I'm glad we're doing that, and we'll move that forward. Mike, you'll take care of that with the county, and we'll talk about that. Okay. Under my report, I attended the Memorial Day Parade. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate. But if you had been driven down Colfax Avenue, I think the DPW did a great job in the flags and the 250-year flags that are up. The street looked very nice. Too bad we couldn't have the parade. And believe me, we don't cancel this parade easily. This is only the second time we've canceled it in a very long time. But I have to thank the public. The public did come out for the event that we had. at the VFW inside. We had over 100 people there for the event, which was, that's amazing that the public still wants to recognize and support our veterans. So I got to thank Bob McGrady, who's been doing this for 35 years. His father did it for 50 years before that. So between the two of them, they've been doing it for 85 years, running this parade. Bob McGrady and our post, our VFW post, put a lot of time and energy into making it work. So I thank the public. I thank the post. It was a very nice ceremony. And I almost... enjoyed the ceremony more inside than outside because it's more contained and you can hear what everybody's saying. So it was a very nice ceremony. I had a meeting with the coalition with Councilman Begg. Unfortunately, the grant that we applied for is already 10 years that we applied for for the Municipal Alliance Grant that we got a million dollars for over 10 years. It's running out. We actually are in an extension year right now. And after this extension year, unfortunately, the grant does go away. So we had a meeting to discuss how we're going to move forward with that. You know, I go back, you know, that was one of the things we did years ago. When we applied for that grant, There was only large towns that were getting it, you know, Newark or Wildwood. You know, that Pompton Lakes was picked as one of the towns was an impressive thing at the time. I don't even know if they still offer the federal grant for this, but we did try to get some more funding, and unfortunately, we were turned down. There is still state funding that comes in from Passaic County to run our alliance, municipal alliance. It's a much, much smaller amount, so that's what the meeting was about. We'll decide how we're going to move forward with the alliance moving forward. I attended the open space meeting. I'm sure the council president will speak about that. It was great having one of the commissioners who Mike Romaglia attended the meeting and the nice part about him is he's a Pompton Lakes resident. So that's nice to have a county commissioner who lives in town and cares about what we're doing here in town. It was very nice of him to come and explain what he has, and I'm sure a council president can't speak more. But when you have a home field to somebody at the county level, that's always a good thing. I attended the Walk for Hope that was run by the coalition. It was a great turnout, great speakers. I loved seeing the kids come out and support their own there. Ryan did a great job putting that together. There was great supplies and food and everything else, so congratulations to everybody with that. We had our first mini-bid stroll. The weather, again, did not cooperate. So what I've heard is from a lot of residents, they didn't know the event was going on. And if you're not on social media, you might miss it. Once a month, usually around the third Thursday, we'll be having where we close down. the side of the street on Wanakew Avenue about halfway down, filling it with food vendors and vendors and the restaurants will bring tables out into the street where you can sit and eat and chat and talk and there'll be bands playing and music playing. This is the first one we did. It was pretty well attended for a rainy, cold day. And it's only going to grow from there. And I had a lot of people saying, why was the road closed? There was a reason the road was closed. And it was a nice event that we had put on. I noticed, and I spoke to the administrator today, there are no parking signs down in Wanaque, if you notice right now. Part of the building of Meridian, the new building that's being built, they're going to repave Wanaque Avenue kind of in front of where Meridian is, and that's why there's no parking there. I will tell you, we had our first meeting with Historic in the new Civic Center. In the back, it's a beautiful building. It was a nice setup. You know, that was all paid for by Meridian. There were no costs to the taxpayers to redo that whole building. We've gotten women's locker room showers and locker rooms for our women police officers, new offices for our police department, and the most important thing is some real needed storage upstairs. They built a second floor for storage. So if you had to have a chance, we're also having a grand opening, I think, for that, right? I don't know the actual date on that.

The second.

The second, right, okay. You know, I sent out a letter to Congresswoman Poe today to thank her for taking, trying to get some appropriations for us for our new DPW building. She did get us some money and it's some real money. And if it goes through, this will go a long way in supporting what we need to do at our DPW, which is a big deal. This is a big deal about our DPW garage. You know, I've understood that we were one of the bigger grants for the appropriations that she gave out, which is nice to see that we're not forgotten as a small town. And again, forget what party you're in, forget what side you're on on the aisle. At the end of the day, we're here to make our town better and the state better, and I appreciate the effort that people put in when those things do happen. And that is my report. Council President Kent.

Thank you, Mayor.

Just real quick, it's June 8th is the Civic Center.

June 8th, okay, thank you.

Thank you, Mayor. I want to congratulate Liz on 25 years of putting up with council people. I can imagine what that's about. You did a great job and you are a wealth of knowledge. And thank you for, no matter what we ask, you provided, so thank you very much. I also want to give a shout-out to the Eagle Scout, Nicholas. He did a wonderful proposal. We, you know, for many, many years, we've created trails, and the Eagle Scouts come up with the projects that help us even make our trails even better, and this one looks like it's going to be actually beautiful, and I hope to be down there. If not, I'm going to buy them a pizza, because that seems to be a big thing, pizza and bagels, so let's get the kids fed. for all the work that they're going to do. I want to thank the Shade Tree Commission. The Arbor Day essay is always beautiful. I love trees. I've always been involved with the environment for pretty much my whole life. And it's lovely to see the fifth graders come here. They did a great job. And it's something they'll remember. So I want to thank all of the Shade Tree Commission, especially Ann Tassinelli, the chairwoman. She does an amazing job I also walked with the Walk for Hope. It's a mental health awareness day for Sunday. Ryan Gossinger and the staff did a great job. The T-shirts were amazing. They were beautiful. And the vendors and the refreshments that they had there were wonderful. But most important was the information on the mental health. and how important that is to understand if you have a problem, there are places to go. Sometimes you really don't know what to do, but there are, and that brought awareness to that whole issue. I also want to thank our police department, the ambulance and first aid squads, and the other community groups who came out and attended the event that morning, and that's what made it a success. We discussed the footbridge. And I want to thank you very much, Mayor, for bringing that up. And thank you, Steve, for allowing us to honor your father with that. No, thank you all. Thank you. And I spoke, OK, so something not really related, but I spoke with Ken Heerman. He's from the Passaic County Election Board. Just in case anybody's interested, they're having problems getting people to work the elections. And I've been doing it for a number of years now. So he asked me, in my official capacity, if I could just say, if you're interested in being an election official, a board worker, they pay $300 a day, they are training people, and they do need people for this upcoming primary. It doesn't matter if you're a Democrat, Republican, Independent, it doesn't matter. They will train you and they will give you that information to actually work on election day. So if you're interested, contact the Passaic County Election Board and that is all online. I also, so go back to now, I attended the open space committee meeting. And both council liaison Steve Begg and I were there along with you, Mayor. And Steve, you're going to give a report on some of this too, right? Yeah. Okay. So we kind of share a little bit. But what I did is I asked the commissioner, Mike Vermaglia, to come out and kind of explain to us because we really do need monies when we do our open space projects. The monies are... They used to be $200,000. They used to cover a whole project. It doesn't anymore. Inflation is so bad that it doesn't cover a cost. It takes us, and I hear sometimes complaints, well, it's taken forever to get things done. That's because we don't have adequate funding. Not because of us, because we do a wonderful job, but everything is so expensive. So to buy a piece of equipment, it takes three or four or five times more money than it used to. So we approached the open space group and Commissioner Remaglia was very gracious and he brought the director of the county open space program. Her name is Maeve McGinley. And she was absolutely lovely and they gave us some ideas on what we can do and how to apply better. Michael, I'm going to sit down with you and just kind of make sure that we're following all that. She gave us also insights for future programs, our grant applications for the county. And I'm going to let Steve talk about the rest of that. I also attended the VFW post-2906 Memorial Day Memorial that day. It's a shame. that the weather was not conducive to picnics and parade, but it was a very touching memorial. And the new post commander, Connor Otto, he was my neighbor. I know him as a little voice. And he's a police officer on our police department. And he did a wonderful job and he gave guidance with a beautiful prayer and a story. And the VFW, they handled the whole memorial service so beautifully. I'm very proud to be a part of that. We're going to be, I guess the mayor and council, we're going to be selecting a date to dedicate the PAL basketball benches that were placed down by the basketball courts in honor of Rich Fleischer. We're going to come up with a date in June, just so you know. And I'm just waiting to hear back from some PAL members, which, of course, Bill Begg was one of the co-signers of all the checks of that program for many, many years. And so when I get a date, I'm going to let everybody know we can all be there. Thank you. I'm going to ask our attorney again, has the governor's office responded to any of our letters regarding the DuPont and the $75 million natural resource damages, and are they responding to anything? That's ridiculous. All right, so just so you hear.

That's two letters though.

That's two letters, and you're going to, you have a system where you're going to file another one, and I want to know if they respond. And then we have to maybe do something else. Three times, we'll give them three. And I also went to the stroll, the mini stroll. I thought it was a great idea, and we ended up having delicious smashed burgers out of one of the trucks. But they also had vendors too, so, and the vendors were very, Very interesting. But more important, I think, is that our big people that, you know, for the restaurants, they were active, they were open, they were giving out trays of food, and it was really, it was really a lot of fun. Liz and I were walking around buying popcorn for the grandchildren and stuff like that. So if you can go to the next one, you know, try to get out there and, you know, eat your dinner there. Eat your dinner out by the, on 1 and 2 Avenue.

I forgot to mention one thing in my report. We did have a meeting with the DCA and the governor's office with Michael also about trying to get some funding for the the DEP building from them. We had a good conversation. There was good open dialogue. They asked a lot of questions. So I'm hoping we'll get some money. This is a $9 to $10 million project that we're looking at doing for the DPW. So it's a big chunk of change. Obviously, we don't want to put it on the taxpayers. So if we can figure out a way to collect money from everywhere we can, it will only soften the burden. So the governor's office, I have to thank them for at least listening to us on the DCA, listening to how we can make things better. Councilman Bennett.

Thank you, Mayor. I want to congratulate the Arbor Day essay winners. I too have learned the importance of trees, especially in our flood-prone areas. As mentioned before, I was absent from the last council meeting. I attended the annual Girl Scout of Northern Jersey business meeting where they acknowledge adult volunteers. I was nominated for and was one of the recipients of the Volunteer of Excellence Award for my work with the Steel Magnolias robotics team that I mentioned quite often up here on the dais. the steel magnolias are all girls all girls Girl Scout sponsored high school level first tech challenge team and we're currently accepting applications reach out to me if you have any questions it was a great event did lots of networking and I want to thank the folks that put that together and thanks to the folks to nominate me for the award There were like 400 folks in attendance that night. I was one of five men, including three who were on the board or stepping off the board. The spring stroll, as mentioned before, was Thursday, 5-21. I attended this right before and then again after the Pompton Lakes High School Spring Concert. I want to thank Mr. Shar Schmidt, also known as Mr. S, for doing such a great job with the music program over at the high school. There's two more events. I don't have the dates handy. I think I wrote down the wrong dates initially. The redevelopment agency did not meet in May.

Library board met last Monday. They discussed

the process to borrow museum passes. There's some museum passes that are available to the public to be borrowed and then you return them once you visit the museum. And in addition, they discuss trustee training requirements. As mentioned before, the Memorial Day Parade was canceled due to rain, unfortunately. Know that it was a tough decision because the folks worked very hard to put that event together. But the ceremony that was held indoor was very well attended. Barely any room to sit or stand. And I want to thank those folks for all the hard work in putting that together. And that is my report, Mayor.

Thank you. Congratulations on your award. Thank you, Mayor. You're one of the five. Who am I up to? Councilman Beck.

Thank you, Mayor. This month's CBC meeting was canceled, so I don't have a report for that. I'm sure we'll meet this month. I attended the open space meeting. It was an extremely productive meeting. County Commissioner Mike Remaglia was there. He came and spoke to the group, stayed for the entire meeting. And in attendance with him was Maeve McKinley, as you mentioned before, and she's the assistant county administrator. So they really put us in a lot of connections and connections with the county engineer. So we discussed our ongoing projects and how the county can assist us. And they were really good. Like, they asked me to send aerial shots. of Lakeside Ave to possibly extend the sidewalk all the way to the bridge to make it safer for our students to walk to school and stuff like that. So super responsive and I think we all appreciate that. We also discussed at the meeting was the signs for the lightning detection system at Willow Field. The signs are in now and they have instructions on them so people know what to actually do if lightning occurs and the system goes off. So I think we're gonna go down and take a picture next month. So another really good thing that we put in for the town. And then this Saturday, I'm sorry, this Saturday before was the Prevention Coalition's Walk for Hope and Diamond Classic. Both were successful events. The walk had 155 participants. I want to personally thank Doc Shoup for being our guest speaker at the walk. He's somebody that I personally know was able to get to come and speak. He did a great job of getting everyone psyched up before we started the walk from the high school to Herschendale Park and then back. I also want to thank Councilman Cruz because he helped me out with doggie duty. Walked my dog on the way back, so thank him for that, even though he's not here tonight. I attended the first spring stroll as well last Thursday. It was a really nice community event with tons of vendors, activities for kids, and a DJ was playing music for the evening. I think the next one they're going to have a band, right? They're going to have a live band there. There are two more strolls left. That's June 11th and July 16th. So please come out and support our local businesses. On Sunday, I attended the Memorial Day celebration as well for VFW. Unfortunately, the parade was canceled. However, they did an excellent job with the ceremony, despite the fact that it was held inside. And then last night, I attended the historic meeting. Again, first meeting at the Civic Center. They're currently in the works on putting together a reenactment for the 250th anniversary at Pompton Day. So that's in the works, and we're going to have tents set up and reenactments set up of what they would cook. And what they would do during that time, they're going to shoot their muskets off across the lake. And they've got a boat coming in that they'll have people help caulk it. It's a revolutionary boat. And their company actually crosses the Delaware every year on Christmas. And so they want to use the boat to kind of cross-pop the lake. So hopefully that'll be a great event. And then after the historic meeting, I attended the recreation meeting. They wanted me to announce several things. So summer camp is June 29th to July 31st. Registration is now open. This year's senior picnic is Saturday, August 15th. It's at the Elks and it starts at noon. Pickleball is every Monday and Wednesday starting July 6th from 6 to 8 at Hirschfield Park. Volleyball will take place Mondays from 6 to 8 at Hertzville Park starting July 6 as well. The paddle boats and kayak rentals have begun. They started this past weekend except for the rain. That will continue through Labor Day and they are on Saturdays and Sundays from 10 to 3. There will also be cornhole and ping pong available as well for free if you want to come out and just have some fun at the lake. And then this year's summer concert series will be on Thursday night starting June 25th. The 3M band will kick off the first concert series. So hopefully everybody will attend those as well. And then lastly, I just want to make sure everybody knows this weekend on Sunday at 10 o'clock, we have a trail maintenance day. And we'll meet at the Lincoln Park entrance if anybody wants to come out and help support that cause. So thank you, and that's my report.

Did you have a motion? Was it you?

Oh, I missed. Sorry. Yeah, go ahead. And I guess lastly, I'd like to make a motion to approve the request of Pompton Lakes High School to close Lakeside Ave from the Pond Hole entrance to Adrian Street on Thursday, June 18, 2026 from 2 p.m. to 9 p.m. for the 2026 high school graduation ceremony. That will commence at 4 o'clock. Rain date is Friday, June 19, 2026, with the time to be determined depending on the weather forecast. Please fire on first aid to be notified.

Do we have a second? Second. Councilman Bennett, all in favor?

Aye.

And just to follow up on the senior picnic, that's open to all seniors. It'll be at the Elks Lodge on the 15th, like Steven mentioned. There's food and music, and it's a fun time. It's not just made up for the senior groups in town. It's made for any senior. And I don't know what that means, actually. What is senior? I don't know. Are we checking IDs at the door? I don't know. You qualify, man. Do I qualify? All right. I'm going for a free hamburger then. But yes, that is open to the whole public. Councilman Hinton.

Thank you, Mayor. Speaking of seniors, I attended a senior meeting, and they had a speaker, Charles Clarkson, Esquire. He's a project director for the Senior Medicare Patrol of New Jersey. Never really heard of it. It was the first time. And he was there speaking on Medicare fraud, Medicare, Social Security. So it was a very interesting presentation. As far as the bid. spring stroll, a lot of the seniors didn't know anything about it. So we have to, it has to work a little better on communication in that respect. Attended the, I was marching the parade already with my umbrella, but it got canceled, but went to the ceremony. It was an excellent ceremony honoring all those servicemen and servicewomen. who gave all for our freedoms. So it was well attended, like everybody said, and it was a great presentation. I want to thank Liz for all her time. I want to thank Liz for all the help that she's done for me through the years, even when I came in at 4.30 closing time. I yelled that, but thanks again, Liz, for all you've done. I want to thank the Shade Tree Commission also for the essay contest, Maddie and Ann, and all the fifth graders that participated.

Is there an opening position on Shade Tree? Yes, there still is.

If anybody is interested, we do have an opening for the Shade Tree Commission. It's a great commission, and I've been on it for quite a few years, and they do a lot for the town of Pompton Lakes. They give their heart. And let's see, our tree planting is tomorrow. We're planting 17 trees and three replacements of trees that died. So we're putting in 20 new trees in the town of Ponta Lai. That's a good thing. And that is my report.

Okay, thank you. Councilman Santers.

Thank you, Mayor. I also attended the Walk for Hope. It was a great turnout. It was a beautiful day. We had plenty of students, teachers, and town residents who participated, and it was a really, really nice day. I also attended Memorial Day Ceremony. For the bad weather, it was a great turnout, the VFW, and it was packed. I attended the Spring Stroll, like everybody said. The vendors were great. Weather held out. It didn't rain. And all the restaurants were crowded. Tony's was crowded. Max's was crowded. So it was good for our local businesses as well. For the Board of Education, a reminder that the tree dedication for Carl Padula will be June 2nd at 7 p.m. at the Board of Education. So they make that 21.

If you would say what time, I'm sorry, what time?

7 before the board vet meeting. The planning board was canceled this month and I attended the MUA meeting. There's nothing to report, but I will mention about the fire hydrant also. And that is my report.

Great, thank you. Chairman's report.

Thank you, Mayor. I'd like to do a little bit of housekeeping first. I'm looking at Ordinance 2619, which was the solicitation ordinance. I don't know exactly what happened, but the solicitation ordinance was supposed to consist of two parts. One was the charitable and the other was the non-charitable, both of which were supposed to have the same time constraints. This ordinance is only pertaining to the charitable. I would ask for a motion to reconsider and rescind the introduction so that I can have one ordinance go forward at the next meeting for introduction. controlling both sections of the code because we shouldn't be restricting one differently than the other. Okay. So that was an oversight. I apologize.

Can I have a motion to rescind Ordinance 26-19?

So it's a motion to reconsider and rescind the introduction of Ordinance 26-19.

What he just said. I make that motion. Council President Kent, Councilman Sanchez, all in favor? Aye. Against? So then the next meeting we'll have both of them on the agenda.

Yeah, and I think that I'll put them in one warden so that we don't have to publish two separate things. Okay, so thank you for doing that. I just had an update with respect to the railroad issue that we have been discussing over the last couple meetings. The annual maintenance cost has varied between like $4,600 and $6,100 for the last four years. The courts have no documents they need to get back to us on the OPRA request, and the attorney for the railroad has not gotten back to us yet either. We do know that it certainly appears, and we have some corroborative evidence, not the only evidence being the newspaper, but we have some other documents that refer back to a settlement agreement. So we have a good for a belief that this was settled in accordance with what the original agreement was that we would pay for maintenance. We believe that there were some terms in that settlement agreement that required them to give us advance notice and approval prior to the bills actually being paid, but we haven't been able to identify and locate that settlement agreement. So we have two choices at this point. We could pay one of my associates to go through the boxes that are in storage. And we know that there's going to be an expense attached to that for her time, as well as the retrieval expenses from the storage facility. Or we could reach out to the railroad company and just ask that, try to come to terms with them and say, guys, let us know in advance what the expenses are going to be, which we understand was the obligation under the settlement agreement. Again, I have no reason to think that there's any basis for us to get out from under an obligation to pay for maintenance. We do have the original agreement from decades ago, and we do have corroborative evidence of the fact that there was a litigation and a settlement that didn't alter the fact that we were paying for maintenance. So I don't want to be just spending money without the governing body authorizing it to hunt through records, which my guess is it's going to be futile. I don't think that we're going to find the settlement agreement. I could be wrong, and if we do, then we'll definitively know. But in the final analysis, it seems to me that it's likely that the only thing for us to do is to get the railroad to give us advance notice as opposed to just giving us a bill after the fact. And if that's the case, maybe it's just easier for us to reach out to them and try to establish a new relationship with them and get them to agree to do that.

So let me ask a question. Do we know why the bills are different? Does it depend on the maintenance they're doing?

Well, it certainly depends upon the maintenance. There's different degrees of maintenance that they've done at different points in time. But I'm certainly not an engineer and I really can't explain it to you from a basic knowledge.

So I'm going to make a suggestion and the accountant can tell me how you feel about this. Why don't we come up with a number and have our attorney reach out to the attorney from the railroad and say, look, we're willing to do a $4,000 a year or whatever it is maintenance and just flat rate at $4,000. So there's no questioning. what the numbers are. Maybe they go for it. Who knows? I don't know if they will. Are we okay with that? Because what I think he's trying to say at the end of the day is we reached out to them for this agreement. It was an okayed agreement. There's nothing fishy about the agreement itself. It was done how long ago? Maybe 20, 30 years ago? I don't even know. Longer. Longer. So I understand what Councilman Hinton is saying. We're paying this money every year. I think it was the 60s. But we asked back then, not recently, to have this maintenance done. So somebody at that time was concerned about the maintenance. It went to a settlement that we lost, so we didn't win that. Let's try to at least get something out of it. That's my suggestion, but if you have some better suggestions, I'll take them.

Was there any communication with the past attorney, Ken Petrie? No. Who was handling that? No. Is that still a possibility?

It's a possibility, but I could tell you, and I don't have... a mega mind, but if you told me about an easement agreement or a litigation that I had five years ago, I wouldn't remember the terms of settlement. This was something that was 25 years ago. I can't imagine it would be fruitful, but we could try.

We could always try. I suggest we just make the call and see what happens. He might say, I don't remember anything. I don't know if they'll go for it, but we can reach out. They have some attorney working on this, I'm sure, right? Well, I don't know.

We're getting silence. We didn't get a response yet. But, you know, we'll follow through with phone calls. We initially, we led with a letter. So, you know, letters could be put on the desk. If we get someone on the phone, I don't.

And, you know, we can come up with a number that we paid for the last 25 years, whatever that total number is, and say, hey, look, we paid you whatever, $50,000, $60,000. We need to go forward knowing what the number is yearly to budget. That would be my argument, to say we have to budget for this. Let's see what they go for. If they say no... $4,000 for 25 years is over $100,000.

That's a lot of money we're paying for and we don't see much really being done there.

You have a railroad crossing that you asked for. That's an issue of safety and convenience.

They haven't come up with the contract themselves, the railroad?

No. They haven't responded to us. Who knows? When we get them on the phone call, maybe they'll they'll have it. And when you say the contract, it's really the settlement agreement, right? Because we have the original contract from 67. So I could proceed that way. Councilman Hinton, you said that you had Mr. Petrie's telephone number? No, I didn't. Oh, okay. So someone could please give it to me.

Sure, Liz might have it, right? Do we have this?

I can.

Yeah, I'm sure we have it.

It's in our book. Yeah, it's in our book.

Yeah. All right, so are we okay with that idea? We'll start there, make a call, and I'm sure he's not going to remember I agreed, but let's try. And then the next step is if we can get somebody on the phone from the railroad, say, look, we just need to budget because we have to make things work for us, and we can't just guess on numbers. So we'll just give you a flat $4,000, see how that goes. They might say, forget it, we want to, and then we're out of luck, but we'll give it a try.

Is everybody good with that? Or at least tell us at the beginning of the year.

Yes, we need to know the number, because we can't budget for something we don't know about.

But they should really come up with a copy themselves of the settlement agreement. Yeah, but they don't have to give that to us.

They'll just say, go find it yourself.

Well, when you say they really should, so should we. I mean, we're both under an equal footing to have the record. You know, it's a problem when you're dealing with something that's a half a century ago.

All right, so we're good with that? Yes. Yeah, because we're going, you said 1967, we're going almost on 60 years. Right. That's a lot of money in maintenance. It is, I agree with you.

Okay, anything else?

I don't think so, no.

Okay. Thank you, Mayor. For an update on the shared services agreement with the Borough of Oakland for solid waste recycling and vegetative waste collection services, the Borough and our Department of Public Works is in the process of getting ready for the implementation of these services to begin on Thursday, July 2nd, 2026. As you know, all of the new hires have been authorized and are scheduled to begin on Monday, June 8th, 2026 for the onboarding process. The 32 dumpsters have been received by the borough and will be delivered to the borough of Oakland soon. We have also signed the contract and confirmed the delivery for the two new garbage truck rentals and we are in the process of procuring the two new trucks for delivery later this year or early next year. In addition, we have been working with the Borough of Oakland on messaging to the residents ahead of the start date of the services, including information on our new recycling center. We have implemented a new decal system and have one of our existing DPW employees up at the center to plan for the potential influx of Oakland residents, again, attending the Pompton Lakes Recycling Center.

So could you talk, because I have some residents asking about that. Explain what we're talking about with the decals. So they have to ask for the decals? How does that work?

Yes. So when the resident pulls up to the recycling center, when the Pompton Lakes resident pulls up to the recycling center, excuse me, The DPW attendant will, or should, issue the resident a new decal. So we're issuing them on a when-you-come basis moving forward. So that's the new process. And how long are we going to do that before we're just going to have to... That's the process moving forward permanently. Permanently. Right.

So may I ask a question? Somebody said to me that there's a deadline. And then if you don't get it by the deadline, they're going to charge you. Is that true?

No, I haven't heard that.

Okay.

It didn't make sense to me either.

Okay.

Yeah. So, yeah, we'll keep you updated on the shared service. Please note that Meridia Cappadagli has completed the resurfacing of the new Lenox Avenue residential parking lot, as well as the new patching of the Borough Hall parking lot and in front of the new Civic Center. The Meridia Cappadagli team will be milling a portion of Wannekew Ave in front of the new development to Babcock Place tomorrow, May 28, 2026, and paving on Friday, May 29, 2026. There will be alternating traffic detours in place at this time, and we have posted on our social media channels. In addition, the Borough Engineer's Office is coordinating completion of the remaining punch list items for the Albany and Watervillette Avenue resurfacing project, including the restoration of lawn areas and repairs to the walkway at 104 Albany Ave. the contractor is expected to come back on saturday june 6 2026 for the work to occur behind the curb line and will not require any road closures or traffic disruptions so we're looking forward to that and again the ribbon cutting ceremony for the hirschfield park pedestrian bridge has been scheduled by passaic county for monday june 15 2026 at 12 noon so we are looking forward to that And again, for the record, the Civic Center grand opening is scheduled for Monday, June 8th at 4 o'clock with light refreshments to be served. And lastly, I just wanted to thank on the record the DPW for installing the new American flags and America 250 flags along Colfax Ave. Thank you.

Did they, when they paved, did they do that piece in front of the door back where the old trailer was? They did, yes. Oh, good. So we got that all paved right to the... Correct. Perfect. Okay.

Any questions for the administrator? Just, you know, one quick question, just because a couple residents asked me. Have we decided about when we're going to start picking up grass clippings in town?

I think that's going to be a workshop item in the near future. Okay. So I'll talk... It's definitely now. So it won't be... It's not going to be this season.

Yeah.

I'll talk to Dan.

All right. Thank you.

Any other questions? Yeah, there's three flags. down by George's. They're all torn. It looks hideous when you're riding. Yeah, they're on poles.

Did we point that? No, actually the Pompton Lakes Business Improvement District called me about that today, coincidentally, and put us on notice for that, so we're going to tell the DPW. I think it's old. It's years ago, and I don't think anyone's ever noticed it.

I just noticed it. And then the curb... The handicap curb, I know it's a county road, but the handicap road on Hamburg and Ramapo, right by the auto natural damage.

Yeah. I'll try to reach out to the county engineer's office. But just as a reminder, the county is scheduled to resurface Hamburg Turnpike from Wanaku Ave to Terhune Drive later this year, so they're probably going to be not receptive to fixing anything right now because they're going to come in and install all new ADA programs. So that's something just to consider. But I'll reach out. Maybe a temporary patch or something can be done.

If somebody comes up with a wheelchair and they get stuck in the broken curb.

And I know there's been a lot of... on social media and calls to me and to other council people about the tree that's down on the aquatic that's right by the bridge there we are working on getting that out of there it's a major job to get this tree out this is not an easy fix we might have to bring a crane in to do it but we understand it's a safety concern for especially for flooding in this time you know we're in that flood time now and if that tree was to let loose we'd have some issues so we're aware of it and we're trying our best to get it out as best we can Any other questions from the jury?

Yeah, just a quick question. How long are we going to have the employee at the recycling center handing out stickers?

I don't know. I could find out for you. It's not like a permanent job? No, I think it's a temporary position, but I don't know for sure. Yeah, I'll find out.

Michael, are the old decals still valid?

I don't believe they are. We're handing out new decals as people come in. So we're checking regardless of whether or not you have an existing decal or not. So if you have an existing decal, we're going to replace it with a new decal.

Just a comment on the decals. The old decals you could put on the back of your mirror. These are not. You have to put these on the windshield. I've heard a few complaints about that.

Or your bumper. You can put it on your bumper. Put it on the outside of your bumper on your car.

I don't know that you can do that, can you?

I don't know. So the only question is, I've brought it up to you already. If you go to the recycling center and you're not handed a new badge, you have to ask for it. People are saying, I went in. They must assume I have one and I just dumped, but I didn't get a new badge. If you want a badge, then you've got to ask the guy right there when you drive in. I need a badge. Please give me one, and he'll give you a badge. We're not hiding them.

We're trying to get them out to as many people as we want. He's checking people and stopping people if they don't have one. Right. And then he gives them one.

Right. So I just want to make sure everybody, a couple residents said I went right through it and they didn't ask for something. I didn't get a badge. Okay. Any other questions? Nope. Anybody? Okay. A workshop. What do we got? Okay. Phase three. Thank you, Mayor.

Well, you skipped the police chief. Oh, I'm sorry.

I am so sorry. Chief Rodriguez has an update.

Just a couple of things.

That's a good thing for me.

No problem. So a couple of things. I'd just like to take a moment as a fellow BFW life member to recognize former Palmton Lakes Police Officer Bob McGrady. I know you mentioned it before, but Bob had dedicated a large portion of his life to the community and the BFW. Just to give a little history on him, we actually did a post for him on our social media page, and I'd like to read it to the community so they know too. Bob McGrady, he was drafted into the United States Army on March 23, 1966. Bob served six years total, two years on active duty and four in the reserves. Bob was deployed to Southeast Asia for 12 months and 29 days in defense of our nation. Following his military service, Bob proudly served as a Pontinex police officer for an incredible 42 years. I also have the pleasure of when I transferred here from the Sheriff's Department to actually working with Officer McGrady on the road. Good man. As you all know, he's a lifelong servant to this country and community. Bob, as you mentioned, carried out his family legacy as the master of ceremonies for the VFW Memorial Day for Brave for many, many years now. taking over that honored role from his father. And I just wanted to give Bob that credit for keeping on the tradition. He does a good job with the ceremony. He's passionate about it. I've seen him in our BFW meetings putting it together. He does a really good job, and I'd like to recognize that. This is one of a kind, Bob. That being said, I'd like to take the moment to also recognize the community engagement from our police department. We had a lot of members show up for the ceremony that day. I'd like to recognize everybody that showed up for the Walk for Hope. I was there too. We had a lot of members show up for the Walk for Hope. Switching gears. I just like to let you guys know, if you didn't hear, there was a lot of commotion on Friday. We had a 24-year-old male that was riding dirt bike or UTV in the woods in DuPont who ended up getting severely injured, which dispatched our Quad squad, so to say, so members of our police department and fire department, dispatch members that had all-terrain vehicles because this individual was, like I said, severely injured. He had either a broken leg, broken hip. He was trapped. He couldn't get him out of the woods. We ended up taking out our UTV along with other four-wheelers and we got to the individual that was injured. We were able to render emergency medical care to that individual and then we were able to transport him out to an ambulance that was waiting on the Wanaque side and he was able to get treated. So I just wanted to highlight that. This came in, I want to say, around rush hour on Friday night, but it was a great collaboration between us, the fire department, you know, everybody did a good job. You know, I know personally Sergeant, Detective Sergeant was there and he was on scene during the incident. He's the one that gave me the report to fill me in, but by all accounts, everybody did really well and they were able to get him the attention that he needed. That's all I got.

I know this has been an ongoing fight with DuPont and us and the count. Somehow that's on a website that that's one of the places to go It's offline. It's private property. If you get caught there, you are going to be ticketed by whoever, either our side or Wannekew. It is illegal to ride quads back there on the DuPont property. I say that, but a lot of people do do it, and this is what happens. When somebody gets injured, it becomes a real issue. So that's why we're, you know, it's not a fenced-in area. We've put up fence many times, and they've cut through the fence with large equipment to get through these fences to bring their quads in. DuPont is, I know, concerned about it too, but there's not much more we can do on our end, correct?

Correct. They have people that manage the property. And they really, they don't want anybody on their property. I'd say even including us, I tried to schedule some trainings out there because there's a lot, a lot of our officers are not familiar with those trails. And we've had some incidents back there where lost juveniles or even occasion like this. And we need to get people back there to be familiar so we know where to go. and I've gotten resistance even trying to schedule that. So yeah, we really don't have to contribute. It's private property. They control it, they fence it. We're kind of at their mercy if they want to let us in to use that property or to do anything there.

Okay, any questions for the chief? No.

Okay, workshop. Thank you, Mayor. Included in your packets tonight is a construction cost estimate for the replacement of the Hirshfield Park walking trail project. So with the completion of the Passaic County pedestrian bridge project and also the completion of the Hirshfield Park playground and the Hirshfield Park recreation storage building, that brings us to phase three of our park improvements of Hirshfield Park, which includes, again, the replacement of the existing walking paths, I did perform an inspection with the DPW a few weeks ago, and I'm sure many of you have seen that the county did pave a portion of the trail, but not the entire thing. So I did talk to our borough engineer from Darmophowski Engineering Associates. You do have a construction cost estimate in your packet. The total construction cost for the project, which includes Reducing the trail width from eight feet to six feet, which is a standard trail width that I've worked with the engineer in other communities such as Riverdale or Oakland. And that's typically what the engineer would recommend in terms of a width. And also talking about cost, we did reduce it to six feet. And you do have a total construction cost estimate of $159,750 for the project. And that includes any and all areas within Hirschfield Park and, forgive me, what's the other park, the name of the park? I'm drawing a line. Merlin Park. And Merlin Park, thank you. So again, that brings you to $159,750. and included in your packets is a proposal for engineering services and construction, maintenance, and inspection services from Domofsky Engineering Associates with a total recommended section 20 or otherwise known as soft cost budget of $40,000, which includes $15,000 for closeout, $20,000 for the bid specs and final design, and $5,000 for the surveying for the project. So please note that I did talk to our CFO. We did look into our budget for the Hirshfield Park Recreation Storage Shed project. And we were under budget, as all of you know, and we do have $205,000 left in the budget that we could extend for this project. So the recommendation tonight is a total cost of $199,000 for the project and the Section 20 costs. So we are looking for your support and if you have any questions or concerns with the proposal.

What are the material benefits?

This would be a porous asphalt. So we did talk to the engineer about that. I've talked to the flood board chairwoman about this. The existing surface is porous concrete, which has been known to deteriorate over time. But the engineer has had good success with porous asphalt. They did put porous asphalt at the Independence Park in Riverdale about four years ago. with no maintenance performed and it's still in excellent new condition.

Are trucks riding on it though?

No.

See there's the problem. The garbage trucks go in there and they hit that small patches and it cracks it up pretty quick.

So we could go to the DEP for a non-porous asphalt but you're looking at about you're looking at about $15,000 to get us through DEP to get a permit. So the recommendation is to move forward with the porous asphalt in terms of the upfront costs. You might have maintenance costs in the end, but our recommendation or our observance is that it's not going to be as poor of condition as the concrete was.

So the issue I hear a lot from residents who walk there is that entrance when you first walk in, You know, right at the gate entrance there. That's where it's all broken up. But that's because the truck's back in there to pick up the garbage and collect things. I mean, maybe we have a conversation separately with Dan to see is there a better way to handle picking up that garbage and not bringing the heavy garbage trucks on that path. because that's what's breaking most of the path. The rest of the path is fine. It's just that section in the front, which happens to be a very used section, right? When you're walking into the park, that's what you have to walk on. We've actually had a lawsuit there. I think someone fell there. So that's my only concern with that. I don't want to put it all in and then it breaks up in six months.

Right. We did talk to the DPW about that. We talked about the relocation of the trash and doing it a better way. The last thing we would want is for a garbage truck to drive on the new trail, so... we would definitely take that concern.

All right, so that would help greatly.

Yeah.

Any concerns with that or questions about that? I mean, it's well-needed. I mean, it is, you know, people walk there a lot, and there's some big holes there, so.

Now, just if I may, we were thinking about including this as a bid at alternate in the Lakeside Avenue resurfacing project, but we, again, found out that we had this surplus of funding in our budget for the Hirschfield Park storage building project, And we did talk about using the county co-op that is used typically for paving. But we've decided to recommend to go out to bid because the price, although the cost might be $159,750, it could come in way under or way higher. So, you know, we'll have to evaluate the bids as we get them in.

And what's the timeframe? What are we looking at?

We're hoping to do this before Pompton Day. Yes. So again, we're looking for your consent tonight. We would have a contract award on for the next meeting for the engineering services. These are very basic bid specifications. So we're hoping to go out to bid by July 1st. a receipt of bids and award of a contract by August 1st. It's a very quick job.

The only issue we'll have is because we got the 5K during Pompton Day. Either they're going to finish it for the Pompton Day or not do it at all. They'll have to go the week after the Pompton Day.

That's something that we would have to evaluate with the potential contractor and their schedule.

Because I don't want it dug up while we're running. Right. It's going to get worse. Any questions?

So the only comment that we had is, and one of the issues that I brought up when they first put in the concrete was that they didn't put edging. So there was just a raw edge on both sides of the road. There was no edging. And it just cracks, you know, when when frost comes in and the water comes in, it just falls apart. So are they going to put edging in? Because that's what started, and then the heavy vehicles, and the police vehicles, too.

Yeah, this does not include edging. This is what you would see in a standard park trail with asphalt, that it just ends into the grass.

Yeah, but edging would cost a lot more.

But there is funding for grading and site restoration and lawn restoration. I don't know that you're going to have a drop-off, if you will. I think it's going to be flush to the surface.

That's one reason that we argued then, and they said, no, the cost was an issue.

Well, I like the fact that we don't have to pay extra for this. So we already have the money funded for this. So I would say we get it done. It needs to be done. I get a lot of complaints about that. Any other questions about it? Concerns? No.

No? OK. So go ahead. We're good with it. Thank you. That's it.

Motion to open the meeting for public comment. Motion. Councilman Begg? Second. Councilman Bennett, all in favor? Aye. Against? Anyone from the public likes to address?

Dave Rowan, five remain have. I just wanted to compliment the mayor and council. This winter, I was in a whiteout. I slid from Burton County all the way until we got to Pompton Lakes, and the roads were perfectly clean. So, thank you. I'd like to congratulate our great attorney on his appointment, and our great police chief on his appointment. And the only other thing, Stephen Bay, congratulations on the bridge named after your father. He was great. I remember when he was directing traffic on one at QF 40 years ago. And thank you for stepping into his shoes. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else in the public would like to address? Seeing no one, can I motion to close the public session? Motion. Councilman Hinton? Second. Councilman Sanchez, all in favor? Aye. Against? Thank you for the kind words, Dave. I agree that our DPW has made great strides. If you've been in this town a long time, maybe our roads weren't so good 15 years ago, but they have gotten much better. I used to hear it the other way 15 years ago. You leave Pompton, all the roads are clean. You're in Pompton, they're covered in snow. So I'm glad we're going the other way around. So that's good to hear. And thank you for the nice comments you made about the other things. Push to the floor. Anybody have a push to the floor?

I wanted to mention something. We're always trying to improve our downtown, as just everybody knows. And we have a Wannakew Avenue walkable community workshop. You can sign up if you wish. You go to Go Rutgers Education, Compton Lakes website. And what we're going to have is a work agenda from 9 to 10. It's classroom training, and then from 10 to 11, we're going to have a walk audit, and it's sponsored by Rutgers and New Jersey Transit Authority Group. Anyway, and you can just come and walk through town, and you can comment on 1AQ Avenue. And I know we do have people who comment on 1AQ Avenue. This is where you come in and decide whether or not you're happy with the road. You can make recommendations based on the training that they're going to give us. I plan on being there. I suggest if you can make it during the day.

What's the date?

The date is June 9th, Tuesday, June 9th from 9 to 12. So if you're not working and you want to do something, I think it's an interesting project. Thank you.

Anybody else? I just want to remind the public that in the months of July and August, we only have one council meeting. It's usually in the middle month, so just keep that in mind. We have one meeting a month that, again, remind everybody it starts at 7 o'clock. With that, can I have a motion to adjourn into closed session?

Motion. Second.

Councilman Bennett and Councilman Sands, all in favor? Aye. Against?

Thank you, everyone, for attending.

I don't think so, no. No.

No.

In closed session, we discussed negotiation and personnel. Motion to adjourn. Motion. Councilman Vanden, Councilman Sanchez, all in favor? Aye. Against? Okay, thanks.