Borough Council - Regular Meeting

I'll sit down. Hello.

How are they? And then eventually comes back on somebody.

Are you ready? Yes, sir. Call the October 27th, 200525 Burough Council meeting to order. Will the clerk please read the open public meeting statement? Adequate notice has been provided as required under chapter 231 public law 1975 specifying the time, date, and location of this meeting by posting a copy of the notice at the municipal building on the municipal website and providing a copy of the annual notice scheduled to the official newspapers of the burrow. Notice is also on file in the municipal clerk's office. Will will the clerk please call the role? Council President Dambrano present. Councilman Collins here. Councilman Mco

here. Councilman Pnanski here. Councilwoman Payne here. Councilman Potter here. Mayor Murray present. Bur attorney VNO present. Brow engineer Mike Mlen here. B engineer Lanka present. Administrator Fred Carr present.

Will everyone please stand for a moment of silence followed by the salute of the flag. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Will the clerk please read ordinance 25-1575 by title please?

Um believe we have open first. Mr. Mayor, we got a couple things. Presentation comments, questions, resolutions. The presentation is postponed. Correct. Yeah, the presentation's postponed

and then we're open to the public. Uh comments, questions, audience, now is time for public comment limited to the resolutions listed on the agenda only. If you wish to speak, please step up to the microphone, state your name and address for the record. Again, this is the public portion is limited to the comments only on the resolutions listed on the agenda at this time. There'll be a fivem minute time limit set forth by [snorts] the rules of council. If someone raises their hand, please come up to the microphone, state your name and address for the record. Seeing none, I'll close audio. Oh, go ahead. Mhm.

How are you? Thank you. I just have one question. My name is Angela Campilia. Uh, my question was, will the new block party ordinance make it easier for residents to hold neighborhood events? Um, it will they're actually it's gonna I think they were just having so so real quick this you're supposed to only be asking on resolutions not ordinances. So but that's all right. But it's a great question that you have and and we're going to be rem I hope that'll answer your question. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you. My name is Eduardo Pendas. Uh can you please share the bureau's actual score on a 2025 best practice survey and how it compares to last year's? It'll be discussed as a resolution later in the agenda. So,

I don't have the exact number of points that we received last year compared to this year in front of me right now, but I do have access to that when I get back to my DCA thing. So, if you take my card, I will send you the actual number. I will tell the council we since you've asked the question and you sir that we have answered sufficient questions to meet the requirement and not lose any money which is the important part. Thank you. But I'll give you the numbers. Perfect. Thank you. Very good question sir. Thank you. Thank you.

Resolution 2025349. Uh, is that going to be dealing with the uh the state appropriated funds, the million dollars for the lead line replacement? Mr. Reiniac, well, I know who you are. If you could just state your name. I apologize. Charles Oin, 322 South Main Street. I'm sorry. Please again. Char Charles Oriniac. O R Y N I A K, also known as Trouble. Um, yeah. 349 deal with the uh um money that's appropriate from the state, inserting it into the budget. Is that what it's basically for? Correct. Okay, cool. Thank you.

Seeing no further comments, I'll close audience comments. Um authorizing Oh, I'm sorry. Now we get to the ordinance. [clears throat] Yes. All right. There we go. Uh, will the clerk please read ordinance 25-1575 by title, please? Ordinance to amend and supplement chapter 4, general licensing and business regulations of the revised general ordinances of the bureau of Miltown to include new section 4-41, residential block parties. May I have a motion and a second for ordinance 251575? Please, I'd like to make a motion we table this ordinance.

I'd like to second that. I have a motion made by Councilman Collins, seconded by Councilman Potter to uh table ordinance 251575. Is there any comments? So, just to let you know, the reason why we're tableabling it is because we're going to be um the chief of police this week. Uh Councilwoman Payton said the meeting. So, we're going to this will be one of the items we're going to discuss, right, Council? Yeah. We just need to review some of the language and the proposed ordinance and um you know, we intend to get it back on the agenda. Uh hopefully by the next meeting, it's not the one after that. Just needed some tweaking and a little bit more discussion.

I I think $50 is too much for a garage. I mean, for a block party, I mean, it just seems out of uh out of um the cost is too much for most families to, you know, it range out $50. So, we have to put a mo a adjustment in there for a rain date. So, I think that should be done, too. Thanks. We'll take it under. Thank you. Okay. Will the clerk please call the role for tableabling? Council President Zambrana. I. Councilman Collins. I. Councilman Menco. Hi. Councilwoman Payne. Hi. Councilman Posnansky. Hi. Councilman Potter.

I. Motion carries. Mayor to take. Thank you. Authorizing payment of municipal obligations. Next on the agenda, we have authorizing payment of municipal obligations. Will the clerk please read resolution 2025- 341 by title? Resolution 2025 341 authorizing the payment of bills, claims, and statements against the Burough of Miltown in the total amount of $2,337,85357. You have heard a reading of this resolution. Are there any questions? Yes, Mr. Mayor. I had a question on that. On page four, it says Councilman Sabra got some money. You know what that's about, Bill? Yes, sir.

So, I didn't know you were Phil. Uh I can answer the question. He's just being reimbured for all the things that he put out of pocket for the for Miltown Day with the receipts. Break down for you. Thanks. Item by item. I appreciate it. or you want to look at the bill list is rather substantial right there. All the receipts. That's a good Thanks, Phil. No more questions.

Uh I have two questions. Um I've spoke about this before, but I'm going to speak about it again. It's um 25-1599. Um it's it's uh for BAMRA Home Improvement 15,300. Um, I've seen fees here for 2,00 3,000 for 15,300. Uh, Mr. Carr, can you can you explain that? Yes, sir. And we'll get out. Well, I I'd also like to know, is there a fee limit on this? Because like I said, I've seen 2,000 3,000 and I've asked, but [clears throat] 15,000 I mean, that's that's that's a lot of money to to ask the taxpayers to to put up.

So, it's not a fee. So, it's not a fee. What is it? It's for the home improvements done to the home under our rehabilitation program. Does it cost the taxpayers money? Yes, sir. That's why I brought that up. That's perfectly fine, sir. Um, this is the these are the home improvements done as part of the borrow of Miltown's COA uh program, affordable housing program, part of our rehabilitation, I understand,

portion of that. uh and they have done um so they did electrical work. They installed smoke alarms and carbon monoxide alarms. They provide they replaced the shingles on the roof. They replaced the water heater. They pulled down the there's an attic ladder that they replaced as part of the program and they replaced uh the rear entry door of this home which met the guidelines uh of our rehabilitation requirements in the burrow. So there's there's no limit to how much it can cost taxpayers for a person's home

for if you meet the the COA guidelines. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. There's a limit. It's established by this burrow or by us. Um we look at all the bills. We can set a limit if the burough council would like in our COA obligation, but you'd have to do that by count by ordinance. Well, I hope people understand why I'm asking about this. Oh, sorry. It's a valid question. $15,000 to rehabilitate somebody's pro how on the CO guidelines. Yes, sir. Sure. And and there's no limit either to to how many times they could have someone come in and do work on their home. Am I correct?

Normally, they only do it once or these are these like if you if you consider that this how much work had to be done in this home, it was probably in much need of the the of the rehabilitation of that low to moderate income home. Yes, sir. But but the person owns the home and they can do this work have this work done and pay for it themselves. But yes, sir is paying for it, right? Because obligation to run a [clears throat] program like that. I and I understand that. But I'm just saying $15,300 is a lot of money to to put to me to put on the taxpayers in this town. I understand everything about it, but I have to talk about it. Yes, sir. Absolutely. All right. Um second question. Suckle Clooney. Yes, sir.

I appreciate that they're drawing down. Um, last month they were I believe they were less than $1,000, but now they're they're 2,000. I know that we have a new employee there. Is is she being trained to to to learn the processes that supple Clooney is is is right now providing? So, as I mentioned before, Subley Clooney does our bank reconciliations for the burrow of Mil of Miltown. I understand that that's that's that's the only thing this bill is for. So there are no day-to-day there's no purchase orders. This is all related to auditing and uh doing bank reconciliations which is a I do understand that but that's why I'm asking is the new person no sir

going she's the person that's not what we hired her for. No sir this is a specialized job function and this is permanent. Well unless we find somebody else who wants to audit it who wants to do bank reconciliations then yes [snorts] sir. Okay. Thank you. Is this done by a third party for this like as a separate entity of the town for safety control? Yes sir. So okay supply Clooney has been the bank has done bank reconciliation's been hired by the bureau for a number of years outside of even before last year the year before they are another set of eyes in the b in the burrow. So when when I first came in last year supple was here because I remember two people being there.

Yes sir. If you remember last year, there were two people from Subly Clooney working in my office because the person who did the uh accounts payable clerk quit on the 14th of Feb February. So that person was the one that was doing this work. So we had to bring them in, those two people from Subly Clooney to do what that accounts payable clerk was doing until we brought in Miss Santos who then left 90 days later. And then we cross-trained uh Stephanie who's currently working there and then the new lady's helping in there now. So are either of the two people that are there now going to be picking this up? No sir. It is expressly to be done as a third party for the safety of

they don't this is not their they don't this is not this is not in their skill set what they what I would like them to do. Okay. Thank you. Didn't Janette used to do the bank wrecks? No. Sly Clooney did. Okay. Thanks. Mr. car. I have two quick questions um that Gary actually sparked um for the COA uh rehab thing. Uh they um take out permits through the construction department, correct? Yes, sir. It's all goes through construction and they have to they have to follow all rules. Yes, sir.

Perfect. Thank you. And um how many credits do we get for that um residents being you know KOA requirement thing? Do we get any credits for that? We have a certain number of rehabilation. So this is until we reach that limit this is part of that obligation. What the numbers are I I don't know off the top of my head. I will admit I I don't have a you know I think when John memorized our our rehab obligation. I think that in the spring when we get a planner, we could ask him that specific question. There's probably like one rehab credit. Okay, thank you. I had a good question about that COA rehab project. Is there anything to prevent that person from getting the house fixed up and then putting up for sale?

Typically, there's a lean on the property. Oh, there is a lean on the property. Okay. There's a rehab mortgage that they take out. Okay. We just we just released one about 3 months ago from 30 years ago. Yeah. So if if they stay in the house for a certain period of time, the the the lean is is released. But if they don't, then it's probably a sliding scale under which they have to repay. Okay. So the taxpayers have a chance to get their money back. Right. Right. So it stops what you're talking about. Someone would, you know, put a quick sale up and yeah, have have the work done and then resell the property. And these are designed for people who are in their homes who need this work done um and likely are going to stay in their home. I mean, most of the people who were income qualified aren't aren't, you know, house flippers, right? Okay. Thanks.

And I believe I've mentioned before, councilman, that the burough can avoid these fees which come out of the current fund by imposing a COA fee at the burrow level for construction in the burrow that it's allowed by the state. It goes into a separate COA trust fund and only that could be used to the COA [snorts] obligation. We don't have that. So therefore, we're obligated to buy to use the current fund to pay for these mandated requirements. I see. Thanks. May I have a motion in a second, please? Motion. Second.

A motion made by Council President Zbrana, seconded by Councilman Potter. Uh, will the clerk please call the role? Council President Zbrana, I. Councilman Collins, I. Councilman Mo. I. Councilwoman Payne. I. Councilman Posnanski. I. Councilman Potter. I. Motion carries. Mayor, thank you.

The consent resolution has been prepared for the resolutions listed on the agenda. All matters listed under the consent agenda are to be considered to be routine in nature and having been reviewed by burough council will be enacted on in one motion. Any items may be removed from the consent agenda at the request of any council member and if so removed will be treated in a separate matter. Any items requiring expenditure are supported by a certification of funds. If any member of council wants any resolution acted upon individually, please give it a resolution number and it would be pulled from the consent agenda consent resolution. Seeing none. Um, may I have a motion in a second, please?

So moved. Second. Um, I have a motion made by Councilman Potter, seconded by Council President Zbrana. Will the clerk please call the role? Council President Zambrana, I. Councilman Collins, I. Councilman Mango, I. Councilwoman Payne, I. Councilman Posnansky, I. Councilman Potter, I. Motion carries. Thank you. Do we have any reports from any elected officials? No. Normally fourth second meeting. Seeing none. Uh reports from Burough Professionals attorney Peter Vinolo. Just just one thing. You're

your honor. Goodness. You are honorable. You're the honorable George Murray. Um the executive session that's on for this evening will not be necessary. So we can uh pull that resolution when the time comes. Okay. Yay. I understand. I understand. Thought I'd make you dead. Uh, her attorney see me. Sorry. There you go. It's it's it's catchy. Sorry. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just some quick numbers on the uh water meter project. To date, 2,368 meters have been installed. That's 20 since the last council meeting. Um, we're at about 90.7%. Um, we still have 203 that are not scheduled.

So, Lou, I do have a quick question since um I have still been getting calls. Has that phone line issue been resolved where residents can't actually get through to schedule their replacement of their meters? Yeah, we actually tried scanning the um the code on the uh notice ourselves and it works. So, okay. Um, now the um the contractors got limited dates because there's not a lot of people signing up, but they can still get in. And are they able to call on the phone? Yes. Okay. Because I know there was issues with them [clears throat] calling on the phone. Yep. Thank you. How long do we still have the contract with FEO

the installer? How long do we still have the contract for with the installer? There's really no limit to the contract. Um but obviously they want to get a certain number scheduled so they can come out and and get a full day's work.

Yeah, Councilman, I I expressed last week or week before that, you know, they were hired to install the meters, not a percentage of the meters and that we fully expect them to be to be available. Now they have reduced their time in the town from 5 days to two days or one day. And if it's then Miltown Monday and somebody calls, they should be able to reach an operator who says, "Sorry, there's uh nothing available next Monday or two Mondays from now, but how about Monday such and such a such a time and they should be good to go and then once they've signed up, they get off the list and everything is true that the most some there's a large portion of commercial accounts that aren't being No, they're residential.

They're all residential. Not all but there are some residential there are some commercial like Orisa but you know most of these like 80% 85% are residents who have not responded. Thanks. Okay. Thank you. Uh, is there any member of council that hasn't any old business to bring before council?

What did you have something?

I just wanted to remind everybody about election matters that are coming up. Um, early voting began this last Saturday and it will continue through November 2nd. Early voting centers are open from 10 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. every day except Sundays, which is 6 p.m. Um, sample ballots mailed uh starting October 22nd, which is a statutory deadline. Uh, and the deadline for the county clerk's office to receive a vote by mail application by mail is tomorrow, the 28th. Otherwise, you can go in person up until 3:00 the day before election day. Um, the dropbox out here at the edge of the parking lot will remain open until 8:00 p.m. on November 4th. and in person on election day, November 4th. Polls will be open from 6:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.

Do you have anything? No, sir. I'm good. Thank you.

Does any member of council have any old business to bring before council? See none, I'll close all business. Does any member of council have any new business to bring before council? Seeing none, close to business. Open to the public. Public comment portion of our meeting is to allow the public's input uh to bring to the council's attention, their concerns or comments. Any council will respect the public's time by refraining from any comments until the speaker has finished. It should be further noted that the public comment portion of our meeting is not structured as a question and answer session. Please state your name and address for the record when you come to the podium. Just a reminder, under the rules of council, individuals wishing to speak during the public input part of the meeting should be limited to five minutes and may after other speakers have finished be allowed to speak for a second fiveminut period. If you if someone raises their hand, please step up to the microphone, state your name and address for the record. Uh Debbie Miller, 92 Ford Avenue. I guess I'm not supposed to ask this, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Is there any updates on Ford Avenue that can be released to us

at this point? It's still in litigation, so um I would rather not comment on it. Okay. Um, is there a plan to move forward with the firehouse on Main Street?

I would think so. Uh, we're in the process of putting together appraisals uh so that we can share them with the rest of the council before the the uh end of the year so we can have an idea of value, property value. Uh, we did this about almost three years ago. um probably stagnant at this time. So once we get an appraisal and we get an idea of what's going on, we have a QPA on board, we'll start moving forward with the uh with the plan. So I guess it looks like it's going to be sold to whoever. I wouldn't I wouldn't say that. What is it? So you just want to find out the value of it so far? For now? For now. Whether it's going to be sold, whether it's going to be rented, that's still up in the air. Okay. Thank you.

Whatever is in the best interest of the residents of the town. Um, so last month they or last meeting they passed the resolution for the professionals and I was just wondering if there's ever been a thought of a professional grant writer. That's a good idea. I'm sorry. What? Yeah, a professional grant writer. Oh, with the improvements that could be done for the town.

It's a good idea. We've thought about that in the past, but nobody's ever taken any action on it. Okay. Then on a positive note, um the Miltown Public Library had a great turnout for our third annual fall harvest festival. Um I want to thank the police department, the fire department, rescue squad, DPW, as well as our sponsors, Bronson, and Crabial, and of course the community. Uh thank you. Lee Weisenberger, 999 JFK Drive. Uh, tonight I'm hoping to get a little clarification on some items and uh, present some other stuff. One of the first ones I'll start with resident in the community gave me a photo going back in time. And this is Mayor David Crabial and this is July 2nd, 1969. This is the dredging of Mil Pond. That's when it took place.

Could I see Can we see that late? I can you can get to see it later. Oh, okay.

I don't have a lot of copies. This just came out recently now. Upon looking at there's many articles leading up to this. This [clears throat] went on for quite a while. Once again, council meetings so forth. What to do. I give Mr. Crabial credit at that time for reading these articles because I think he had the same problem we have today. He finally said to heck with it and he did it. He got donations locally and like I said, they dredged it. They applied to do below the dam. That took a while. I've been in contact with the D. I can find they found no permits for this. That's not unusual. There was many different departments. They did a deep search, couldn't find it, but it was dredged. So that was later on. 77 about but out of this particular photo because of all these articles I hit a treasure trove on a lot of stuff. Mr. Tribial in part of this mentioned something that happened in the 30s. The WPA 1937 depression year, New Brunswick Water was granted $87,000. From Weston Mill at Route 18 to Davidson Mill, 247 men cleaned out that whole stretch by hand, working out of boats, and little just little barges, little floats. In the article that's in here, they list

what they took out, the number of stumps, trees, debris, ton of stuff. There's two photos when this started and after. The before photo doesn't come out. This was taken from the railroad trestle, the big trestle looking back to town. It's fuzzy. It's out of the paper. But if you go to 1940 in historical aerials, it's very clear. Even though that's a couple years later, you'll see how clean that pond and that stretch is. It's incredible. The big part, and you'll see this photo, and I'll just flash it now. That was all swamp from the big trestle looking back to town. One of the standout features in this photo, Joyce Kilmer School. It's the only thing that could be there. A lot of people don't realize the distance from that trestle to the little trestle is not that far in a straight line. Like I said, they clean this whole thing out. It's pretty incredible. The other thing to this in that article, it goes back and forth, but Army Corps was involved in this

and they went to state senators and stuff too and I would suggest now I would just cut out the D. I would go straight to Army Corps, send them some information what's got to be done here. I would get together with the same towns that were here. This was done basically because of New Brunswick water because of the contamination and they're saying by the bacteria from the stumps and decaying material and everything else and that's why this was done. So, I don't know what's changed if they got better filtration or whatever here, but this thing, the mil pond weed problem goes back into the 30s, probably even before. There's many articles on it. Uh, once again, once you do it, there has to be a program that every so many years you go in and clean. The other thing that came out of this that I did not know and this is what they're saying. Lawrence Brookke is the only freshwater stream in Middle Sex County. That's why it was so valuable back then because it was supplying water to all the supplying towns or or surrounding towns. That hasn't changed much because the population has gone up dramatically. and Wins that's the the most valuable piece of water source we got and yet when grant money is put out for d snagging and the rest of this stuff the people that got that money who cares that's for recreation ponds and so forth you know water water is water and it's valuable so like I said I would go directly to Army Corps or I don't know which senator to start bothering somebody because that's what they did

and and see what can happen there, you know, cuz like you said, I knocking on doors in the county and stuff. Nah. Nah, you got to push it right to the top and see what we can do with it. Okay, that's part one. Part two, once again, this opened up a whole bunch of stuff and going through a lot of stuff again. Uh little data here for the historical society. That plaque that's on the railroad bridge 1907, that's the year the that bridge was built. It was installed in 1908. So this is 127 1908 out of the Central New Jersey Home News Archives. The new iron trestle, which is to be erected over the brook for the railroad, has arrived, and work will be resumed, which the Mitchell Entire Company is building as soon as the results of the recent blizzard have been overcome. And I'm still trying to find the exact date it was put in. It's probably in a different paper. It's going to take time to dig it up, but just another piece. Once again, Michelin owned it. We pass it through. Once again, we go to Mil Pond. Another interesting article, small, but it's out of a big article. This is April 13th, 1956. There's problems with the pond. There's problems with the pond going back a long time. Just because oil machines show up, different stuff shows up from the factory. The same people get involved with that all the time. Board of Health, State Board of Health, New Brunswick Water, Miltown. The people representing Miltown in all these articles is the

attorney for the burrow. In this particular case, this is small, I'll read it. Reinhardt said that is practically impossible to open the gates at the dam without bulkheads and that Dickerson has pointed out there were legal legal aspects to the matter. The Also Corporation owns the dam and the pond at the building. The pipes are under the water. You people don't know Mr. Dickerson. I knew him. Really strange. Stanley Dickerson was an attorney out of South River. Represented many towns. Represented my family, a lot of my relatives. I have utmost utmost respect for Mr. Dickensson. He is mentioned in many articles. same problem because of the pollution with that. Once again, just verifying facts on the pond because this there's many articles about this going on for years and I'm going to get back to the the pond again tonight because I need a little clarification from Mr. Vanola. A few meetings back when I mentioned the pond, you made a a you gave an answer, a small comment that we don't know how that happened, which is referring to the tax assessor's office and how this property switched to the Burough Miltown. Mr. Granola may not answer that. I would like to know who we is, who's discussing this. If he doesn't answer the council, have you been discussing any of this with Mr. Vernold ownership? Anybody? I think the taxpayers deserve an answer. Nothing.

I don't I'm not aware of anybody having conversation about it. Um, for the record, I was merely indicating that to the best of my knowledge, um, from the information I've heard, I don't know that anybody has an indication of how, uh, it became, uh, designated as owned by the bureau on the tax roles. And frankly, I think you know that because I think you've spoken with the assessor, uh, you know, numerous times regarding that issue.

That's the point. We're going on probably six years from the previous council to this council. I don't know if you people realize how serious this is. And we're all on a hook here right now. We're not talking petty cash here, change, pocket change. We're talking millions of dollars here because once again, cleaning that pond, fixing things, millions of dollars. We ain't got it. Whoever did this this ownership dig whether it was to benefit us, harm us, I don't know. I could take some guesses, but I don't know. This can't continue. I keep saying it. You can fix this without a lot of hassle right now. You take what we got, the title searches, so forth. Take it to a judge. We made a mistake. Somebody made a mistake. We want it correct. Give him the deed. Give him the title searches. You got to contact Mr. Burger. I don't think he's going to check. Although he might get a little ticked off, but you got to do it. Every day this goes by, it's going to get worse. And whatever happens with Ford Avenue, it's going to come up again. And that's true. That property is all one piece. It's not been subdivided yet. And and that's what I don't understand with this whole mess. Along that line, the council passed an ordinance going back. This is 2013. I can go to the last page. Adopted on first reading, September 9th, 2013. Adopted on second reading, October 15, 2013.

approved by the mayor October 16th, 2013. This is within days of when Mr. Boray got the approval to go ahead with Fort Avenue. There's two things in this particular ordinance. Steep slopes and then a repairarian buffer zone. steep slopes. I understand repairarian buffer zone has got me really concerned. I don't know if this was pushed down from the state. It's it's very hard to figure what's going on here. I don't know who is involved with this. That's another question I have. Who writes the ordinances? Who puts them together? Depends on what the ordinance is.

That's what I said. But but it's either got to come out of the planning board or the zoning board. Uh no, no, it can't come out of here. Then the council is who prepares an ordinance. If it's a ordinance that is a zoning ordinance, it's subject to review by the planning board for consistency with the master plan. But everybody could contribute to it. Engineering planning board. The ordinances you're talking about, the steep slope and riparian buffer ordinance were NJP ordinances that were required from the state level for all municipalities to to adopt. That's that's what I'm trying to figure out. That's I I I I got that at the time so I can answer that question

right. [clears throat] I I tried to understand that. And so they can just come in and take that property that's owned by Mr. burger and just it's it's repairarian buffer zone now wetlands too wetlands regulations took a lot of property that people owned and said you can't use it anymore and no compensation no nothing that's between the state and Mr. It's us, too, cuz we've got the rescue squad in Mil Pond Park and there's restrictions on those zones.

That's right. So, I want everybody to find out what's the restrictions. Oh, okay. Well, it's tough. I I understand your point, but like I said, when the rescue squad building was given to us by Mr. Also, he has egress and e ingress rights to the pond in perpetuity and whoever he passes that on to. So, are they gone now?

Okay, Lee, if you could just finish up, please. Anybody else want to speak? [snorts] I'll I'll take you. Excuse me, Lee. Um, if you can, please in the future sharpen your focus. You know, it's you get five minutes and I appreciate what you're talking about, but you've been up here for about 15 minutes. That's fine. I could have you thought of of trying to to get on the uh Ford Avenue Commission because you know as much probably as the people there and you probably more beneficial being there than here. You you know what you get when you come here. I I've been speaking to everybody for years.

I I understand. But you you could try to get on the Fourth Avenue Commission. You could you could be a help to them. I'm trying to help everybody, but I'm not getting anywhere. But if you joined the commission, you could be a bigger help. Do you do you maybe think that if I had the time to do that? Like I said, my my time, too. I'm all over the place. I'm digging into so much. Our time our time is here. That's why I'm trying to help now. You know, this is a back and forth. This we help each other. I'm [clears throat] trying to explain what happened, too. I don't know who knew knew about this stuff. I just found out. But do you think anyone up here knows? Because they don't. I disagree with that. Really? Yes.

Yes. That's another thing I have to do now. I got to go back and find the names of the people that were on planning boards and committees and so forth and and see who was there. Okay? And like I said, the people that were there in 2013 when this ordinance was passed, that's why where did it come from? That's what I'm saying. who contributed to it. If I can't get that here, I don't think I'm going to get it out of those committees either or or the boards, but you can bring more information when you come next time. I I appreciate what you're saying. So, along that line, Ford Avenue redevelopment Lee, please. There there may be other people that

I said 20 minutes, but I didn't hear that, but I have to say I apologize. No, that's okay. I was going to say something late.

20 minutes. Dorian Kerber, 24 Reeba Avenue. Thank you for bringing that up because as of next year, we are to take care of the wershed planning, start talking about it, getting the public input, doing outreach for all our waterways in the town. It's required by January 2027 to have an plan done for our Brooks, the pond, and uh lower Lawrence Brookershed. This is to be done. This is a state law. This has been a state law for quite some time. And I handed out when I was on council the time frame and it's now is a time for the bordershed plan. So starting in 2026, you have to find out who owns what. Uh it's required to do the brook. Northbrook is causing issues. We don't have it cleared off. It's chopping people's backyards down. That's our responsibility too. It is Ford Avenue redevelopment has to be involved. engineer has to be involved. Your professionals in town need to be involved because it's a joint effort and it's a very communityoriented effort uh by the church. They they you know any of the churches everything. It's got to be a full community outreach. It's not going to be just a one or two or three meetings and then we have a rehabilitation plan done. It's several meetings and you need to do the full outreach. you know, involve your seniors. If they can't make it at night, then do something during the day. It's got to be mine's got to be put together and this has to be done. Now, you can hire the uh for less rates, the Princeton Hydro, you can hire Rucker's water resource program. They're going to be less costly than you picking out someone from some political party saying, "Oh, he's my PAR buddy and he can do it." No.

The whole premise of the ordinance that was done by the state is for you to do outreach with other groups. You're the state agencies, the county also probably would need to be involved. It's a joint effort on everyone's part and including all the council, the mayor, professionals, and your staff. That's the whole idea. You want to get input. We want to do this together. That's why everyone's thriving in Jersey City, Somerville, Hoboken, everywhere else but central New Jersey, Highland Park is doing very well. Matuchen is doing well. Woodbridge, they give money every year to the water resources program. So, they're doing all those towns. Uh what is it? Um Port Reading, um Carterette, that's all part of Woodbridge Wood, you know, as well as Fords, Islan, all them. They're all part of Woodbridge. those towns and they're implementing all these stormwater plans. It's your MS4 permit storm water storm water uh storm order uh coordinator Ralph Jezanowski. He's been going through all these trainings long before today. He's been going through since 2014. That's all they've been doing with the DPW uh stormwater coordinators all about this program. And this is the last portion. You've had all these other portions and what's coming up is there's 1,800 people and throughout this whole nation storm order fee. It is a one-time yearly fee for every church, every business, every resident to pay the fee. Now, I was sitting in at the um uh was it sustainable Jersey and Maplewood did an analysis. They came up with the figure of $150. They did the pilot program, so they got a lot of funding for it. And they kind like it kind of went down to $120 was the

average fee, but it's all based upon your impervious cover. So, the more parking lots you have, yes, you're going to pay more. the the the more that you do now and start planting or doing uh bio swells or rain gardens or even a a rain barrel and the more that we do in town with the homeowners. That's what's important that they get involved and do their part as well. It'll lessen their fee. I mean, some will be $20, some will be $150, whatever it may be. But getting these other outside agencies in will help us to determine a whole full plan with that when it the time comes. Miltown's usually the last to do the storm order fee or most anything else. However, uh, Maplewood's done, New Brunswick did it years ago, last year. They have a fee. Everyone pays it. It's you don't get out of it. And they're more impervious than we are. So luckily we have uh more uh you know land and stuff compared to some other towns but uh Maplewood passed it. Um there's several others in the state that are finally passing it. They've been talking about it for 5 years and keeping hush up on it. Now everyone's getting it done. So that's something you're going to have to look at starting out next year and by 27 you're going to know that many more towns in this state are passing it. And guess what? We're way behind comparative Philadelphia. They've had it for years. Everyone has had it for years. Uh because where's the water going to go? It's eventually going to be in everyone's basement again. Like that time where Ida and the two weeks prior to Ida, it's it's it's it's challenging, but the more we do upstream, the less people suffer downstream. And we need to start doing this. Um I plan on, just so you know, uh ma maintaining the uh rain gardens in Mil Pond. I'm going to uh take care of that this year uh with the help from workers. And since I am a GI champion, I

get a lot of benefits at no cost. So, I hope you take me up on that opportunity. Um if it's a green infrastructure champion pro program plan, resiliency plan, I can do it. I have the ability to do it. But, you know, if you want to hire people, that's fine. And make it more costly, that's your your decision. It's not my decision. But I can do this. I'm actually going to be uh doing more training, more installations of rain gardens physically. Uh we did one in uh Long Branch this a couple weeks ago. Uh we do the planning, we do conversation with the homeowner. They pay what they're going to pay, but we get the free labor. And there is a Middle Sex County nonprofit that wants to do more of these in Middle Sex County at the homeowners level. and I'm part of the group uh as well as Eric from the Rucker's Wood Resources Program. So, we're really pushing hard this winter to advertise it and we're getting good vibes. We're getting people signing up that they really want and it's not big. A 60 square foot is not a big rain garden, but it's going to do wonders for their their yard. The water won't be standing. You won't have, you know, you have somewhere to put your your storm water on uh raintorms and stuff. So that's what's important and I'm glad to be a part of this because I know this is going to grow in this county and in in the areas uh nearby. So if you need anything just let me know. I'll be happy to discuss it further. I'm putting presentations together so that's better understanding and we'll be doing that um in in the coming weeks. Thank you.

Thank you. Charles Rene 322 South Main Street. Um, first I want to thank Lee for everything that he does. I I I get a kick out of it and I love how how much uh research you do into all the history that uh uh that you've discovered that even I I I love learning about it. It's awesome. Um, also I want to uh throw a shout out to uh Rachel Freed for uh the very successful Milline that we've had this weekend. Um, it sounds like everybody had an awesome time and uh it was very enjoyable for everybody. Unfortunately, I wasn't here. I was at work, but from everything I've seen, everybody loved it. Um, another uh question, comment, whatever. Um, Debbie was talking about the the firehouse. Um, I want to clear something up that Mr. Lagatti had brought up a a few weeks ago, a couple months ago, whenever it was um when he said that um the only reason he voted for something was because it was going to be sold. That is not the fact. The fact is that the uh the mayor at the time, uh Steber, Miss Mayor Steber, he had said he had mentioned it as one of the options uh selling it. The other option was keeping it or um restoring it, using it for several other things. Um, also in 2019, I had brought a um petition forward that was signed by uh 1,588 people about uh saving it and keeping it in burough hands. Um, I hope that we can still do that and um I honestly hope that even after the appraisal um that we can keep it in burough hands and at least lease it out. So, uh, it will definitely it hopefully will be preserved because, um, we know that once we sell something,

we're not going to get it back and there's no guarantee that it's going to remain standing. Um, one other thing, well, another thing I wanted to mention was um, uh, with the I'm sorry, do we have um, street uh, repaving scheduled for this coming year? Is it is it in the budget for this year? Do we know? Yes, it is.

It is. Okay. [clears throat] All right. Um, is it just going to be like like like all the other ones that we've seen where everything all any trees are clearcut and not replanted because it doesn't seem like trees are being replanted? And that's very disheartening because it adds value to a house. It helps keep a house cooler and it's more pleasant to walk under trees than it is to walk down a barren street. Ju just a observation of mine and a something I hope we can do when we u um redo the streets from now on. Um and that's all I had. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Five minutes this time. Lee,

I'll go to the repairarian rights quick. I had family members had repairarian rights. They're like gold. You'd never give them up. Like I said, that's why it's going to be an issue in this fourth Avenue mess with the pond. It seems like the whole mess with Ford Avenue is the state. It seems like every rule, the housing, everything pertains to Ford Avenue. And now there's buffer zone stuff, too. Same thing. Like I said, it's it's bad. I'll move along quickly. Mr. Pazanski, I have a lot of respect for you and along what you were saying. I tried in the Ford Avenue redevelopment agency talking with Mr.

Cahill. I wanted the name from somebody on the county who signed that agreement that we have with them. 20 plus years with the county, that agreement has changed. It's done everything. I can't get a name. You think that's right? That's what I'm saying. Something's wrong here. Something's terribly wrong. And like I said, I'm I'm looking at so much stuff and it gets worse and worse. And I'm just a layman, you know? I'm the little guy. And trying to interpret this stuff. That's I said when I saw this repairarian thing where you just the state comes in and boom, and he loses all the rights to the pond and stuff makes no sense. And then we get it. No, something's wrong. That's what I'm saying. I appreciate the time frame. Well, I could I could tell you this, Lee, and I noticed from experience back through the family that when they built Fington Lake, the city of New Brunswick owns 10 feet around most of the lake. A very

They own the land under the water, too. They own the land under the water, but they own the land 10 ft around, which most people don't know. Now, whether that carries down, I don't know. The WPA article that I have that pertains to the whole stretch except Miltown. Why? Because [clears throat] the rubbish companies owned it first. It went to Michelin. It went to Bura. It's as simple as that. But the water itself is New Brunswick's. Brunswick controls the water, right? There has to be so much water going over those dams all the time. That's D rules. So I don't care about that.

Yeah. I'm not sure whether worried about that the rights carried to New Brunswick now because it's part of the Fington the water. It's just the water flowing of the water. Except like I said they own below Miltown. Miltown's the only stretch where the companies that were here owned it. I see. It's that simple. It's in a ton of articles. It's in the deeds. Correct. This is what I don't understand either. But because the pond was there before the lake. Well, the [clears throat] pond was probably there. Like I said, you got to straighten this out. 1940s,

you have the you have the material to do it and do it before it turns into a mega dollar, you know, nightmare. So, somebody do something. Appreciate the time. Lee, I'd like Lee, I'd like to say I respect you and I appreciate what you do and I understand your frustration. I think in regards to Ford Avenue, there's nothing but frustration and and I appreciate you your due diligence when you still can't find things. And I I appreciate what you do because you take a lot of time doing it. I understand.

I respect you, too. I, like I said, looking back when that title search came out in 97, that first title search, [snorts] this town, like I said, I can go 50/50, but this town created the problem. They created the problem with Mr. Burger, if you read the the articles back then, cuz they pushed him and he didn't like it. And I don't blame him. And we're we're feeling the effects of that now. That's why this thing's gone on for a zillion years. That's my opinion. So, like I said, so somebody prove me different, prove me wrong. Go ahead. Otherwise, something else that's come out of all this archive stuff, you know what's referenced to Milttown many times? Recordkeeping. It was abysmal. Now you know why we're at.

Sure. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks, De. Rosa Tvaris, 100 Reva Avenue. Um, I wasn't going to ask yet, but I'll go ahead and ask. Is there a plan for how to handle the households that are not doing their part in getting their water meter replaced? And then, you mean someone who hasn't made an appointment yet, right?

Yes. Okay. Because because I'm directly involved, I'm now getting certified letters from the construction company about the fact that I have a lead line. So, how is this being is this going to be done? Peace meal. as we spoke spoke last week. I'm sorry not to interrupt you, but um we are going to be levying some charges um that will be monthly um as really an attempt to motivate those people. Um there is uh you know the idea of ter of terminating their services or shutting off their water is not an option based upon some of the time constraints in the winter the way but that's really just the best we can do. Uh but it's going to be probably 250 and it's going to be monthly and at some point uh I assume that that will motivate people to do it.

And so for the people that that that do have lead lines, are they going to be individually addressed or is the township going to do like one big rehabilitation of the problem? So I think that question should be directed to Mr. Carr who's not here. [laughter] This is not the BA you're looking for. Yeah. Yeah. Let me So, let me address your your letter from the construction department. We are mandated. It's not the first by the way, but it's not [clears throat] the first.

No, because we're required uh in the de so the EP and has mandated to the burrow as part of the lead conversation. I'll just use the lead conversation that homeowners who have lead pipes are informed by the bureau every year. Hey, you got a lead pipe. You know that. I know that. We all know that. But D says you got to send them a letter every year. In fact, right now as part of our analysis program, so let's talk about where we are right now. As the engineers mentioned, we're about just 203 homes who have not yet been evaluated. Part of that conversation of our water meter replacement project is to get a hard number because D requires us to say how many lines are lead lined and then they have mandated that it's the burrow's responsibility to replace those lines. Now the burrow can pass an ordinance saying it's not our problem, it's yours and then where our hands are clean. What we have done or the borrow has done is we have a million dollars as I've talked about before that we talked about tonight. So tonight's resolution amending the budget. We could not amend our budget until [clears throat] we had asked for the money. It's very strange. This is Jersey though, right? Let me let me wax philosophical. This is Jersey. We got the million dollars. It's in the budget. Jersey then requires us to ask for the money, which we already got. They have to approve the grant for the money we asked for. The mayor has to write a letter. I write a letter. Fill out a form. Then they go, "Hey, you get the money, which you already got, and now you can

Yes. Okay.

Okay. But we have to we had it in the budget, but we have to go through all this legislative hoopla to fill out a bunch of paperwork." And now it's next year sometime. When we have a clean letter and a clean number, the council and the engineer can sit down and say, "Look, we have 70 people in the burrow. We now it's going to cost us, let's say, $2 million to fix this. We'll ask for more money, of course. Okay, we can use our money and then we're going to replace everybody's line because we're not just required by the law to replace the water line, the lead line in your house, but we have to take it all the way out to the street and we have to prove to the D that connection to the main in the middle of the street in spite of the fact that we may have just paved that road.

Ah, yeah. Isn't that exciting? So, we get to dig up the brand new road to take a picture of it. So, we can say yes, there's no lead at that connection to [clears throat] the water man in accordance with the requirement. So, $2 million is probably a good start to get to that point. So, we have till 2031, right, Mike?

2031. So we So in this regard, in Miltown's regard, compared to the repairarian portion and the water gardens and whether or not we do anything with the dam, we're way ahead of the power curve because of the water meter replacement project that we started last year using grant money from the state. So, does the burrow know if there's larger water lines like in the street that still need to be repaired or is it just the individual lines to individual? So, these are the lead pipes that the that we're talking about are service lines. Okay. Okay. The ones in the street are ductile iron for the most part.

Those are iron already. So, that's already in place. Yeah. Okay. So the problem is from from day one has always been lead contamination or lead lines either the fittings or the joints or portions of them. Some of their older in cities we are now one Irvington, Newark, Flint, Michigan the line from the street all the way into the house with a with a lead pipe. And so it remains to be seen what plan the burrow will take in terms of how that'll be addressed whether the specifics of it. Yes. Right. Okay. But a good clean number as the councilman talked about is really important. Right. So the the letters are basicallyformational purposes.

Yes. In case you don't know that you have lead. [snorts] Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Anytime.

Uh Debbie Miller, 92 Ford Avenue. I have a followup to that. when it first started I thought there was also um galvanized is that included in so in the words of DP okay if you have a galvanized steel line which lead particles in the water can adhere to use word can can okay they classify the same as lead they didn't go to the same science class that Mike and Lou and I did um were we thinking it's galvanized give me a break. But D said if it's galvanized, it's just like lead.

So the houses that are considered lead, it can also mean that they have galvanized. No, we know exactly whether it's galvanized or lead. But for D's replacement project, be it galvanized and or lead, they treat them the same. But our analysis will tell you exactly what kind of service line the house has as part of the water meter project. We have an address listening that says these have lead, this have galvanized, these guys have copper or plastic. So then my question, next question is, you only get one. You said one followup question. I didn't get five minutes yet. Lee [laughter] of yours and everybody else's. So the reported numbers are lead

that we know. Yes. Lead or galvanized? Lead or galvanized, right? Oh, lead and galvanized. Lead or lead. led and or galvanized of our lead of the letters that went out to the people. Yes. So the total is the combined. Correct. Thank you. Anytime. This is why I don't have a report. [laughter] Charles Ron 322 South Main Street. Um once all the lead and galvanized is done I I'm I don't want to say assume I but I do assume that we are going to stop treating the water for um whatever where we don't treat for lead. Well no um when was it a year or two ago the trial methanes? Yeah

and how acidic acids I I think so could be. Yes sir. So lead that has nothing to do with lead pipes. It is a surface byproduct of chlorine in your water. If you'll remember back 150 years ago when we didn't put chlorine in water, people died of waterborne diseases. But now that you put chlorine in the water with organic material, you get trial. Okay. Has nothing to do with the lead pipe. That's a whole separate ball game. Okay. Because I I thought we were treating the water to contain the lead. I don't No, sorry.

Okay. All right. All right. All right. Thank you. All right, I'll close audience comments. Does council have any comments?

Yes, Mr. Mayor. Just one quick um thank you Gretchen for giving that update on uh election and the updates. Um just one thing I wanted to mention to everyone. If the if you desire to go to the polls, and you should, you don't have to wait until election day. Early voting is open. The closest early voting location is on Cranberry Road uh at the East Brunswick Community Center. Um folks have told me the lines were over the weekend when it opened were fine. Uh maybe it's something that you want to do if you don't want to wait till Tuesday, but if you want to do that um that's that's the nearest uh early voting location. And then um since we're talking so much about lead lines again, it would be um I'd be remiss if I didn't have to to say uh thank you to Senator Dagnen. Thank you to the assemblymen Cara Bench and Sterling Stanley for um being receptive uh to uh granting us uh a million dollars in lead line replacement. It's a start. It's not going to get us the whole way there. We still have till 2031. Yes, 2031 is going to be here before you know it. Um but it is it is a nice start to to get this problem uh underway. And um Assemblyman Care and Assemblyman Sterling Stanley are both up for election this year. like to see them stay there so I can keep asking for a million dollars every every year for the next six six years or anyone on council to continue to ask them for a million dollars every year. That continues my report. Thank you.

I I'd just like to say, Mr. Mayor, that um please be careful driving Friday. It's Halloween and the children will be out with their costumes and collecting candy. And uh please don't forget to vote on November 4th. I I if you think if Dave No, go ahead. Councilman, why don't you go first? Nope. Go ahead. I'll follow you cuz I'm on a happier note. So, I'm going to You might be asleep, but I'm on a happier note. You go right ahead, my friend. Okay.

Um, my intention and my purpose tonight is to keep fighting for the rule of law, first amendment rights, and for the residents of Miltown to be informed. I am accountable and answerable to them. That's my job and I take it seriously. I have three key points for tonight. One, the changing and manipulation of our laws bylaws. the tax commitment on the property and properties on Fort Avenue and Main Street, the contamination situation on the same property or properties. First, there's been an issue over the past two months regarding the changing of our laws without resolution and majority vote from council members. It is especially troubling considering the limiting and the abridging of the the speech to the residents of Miltown. They are owed transparency and the truth. Whether it be my voice or anyone else sitting up here, we need to keep earning their trust every day. In resolution 2025-22, we voted unanimously for council comments as its own entity. It was then changed without discussion or vote by the agenda committee. Mr. Car, as the spokesman, argued for expediency of meetings and stated that if we wanted to revert back, we should vote on it. The problem is we had already voted to decide on January 6th. The law was passed. We should not have voted again as I stated. We did however vote and fortunately a majority voted to uphold our law. This now brings us to the ret retribution for the re reestablished council comments. Committee reports are now to be reserved for the first meeting of of the month which they have been that also was established in resolution 2025-22 but for some reason not followed fortunately allowing reports for the residents. These reports are for the residents who pay taxes and deserve transparency and honesty. We all work for them. They do not work for us. We should have reports for them at every meeting as all the professionals sitting here should. And

if I can, I right now I'd like to make a motion to have a resolution to read reports at every meeting. Why you taking that? Just for the record, in order to do that, you would need to amend your rules of counsel and you have prescribed manner in which you need to amend your rules of counsel. One of which is to provide a notice of the intention to amend the rules of council which I can prepare and have ready for next meeting and then at the next meeting after that you would need to move the resolution. So if that's what you would like to do, that's what this motion should be just so you understand the framework for which you need to follow.

Well, I understand that. But what does that mean for the motion that I made? That means you can't technically make your motion right now because your rules of council have a method in which they need to be amended. In order to amend your rules of council, you need to follow the mechanism for amending. All right, then I will do that. Thank you. You got it. I got a question, Peter. How did how did this all come about in the first place? You're asking me? Yeah, you're the attorney. I am the attorney. Uh, right.

Well, that's what you Please explain that how this all started. Uh, as as I've indicated uh numerous times in the past, um, this council frequently um, ignores what its rules of council say and and doesn't do everything they're supposed to. And certainly Councilman Pausnansky has recognized that a change was made that was then changed back. But to the extent that Councilman Pausnansky has noted that council reports have been read at every meeting, uh both the first and the the second meeting of the month, that isn't prescribed in the rules of council. So the council was doing something that it didn't necessarily authorize itself to do in adopting the rules of counsel. So, if you I I am not the gatekeeper of of the the council's prerogative in in what it'd like to follow or not follow. I can just merely tell you what your rules say if you want me to answer the question.

Well, I'll also say when the rules were changed, when when we we went against the the sitting law that we had, they did not have to have a resolution, but then we were asked to have a resolution at that meeting to change back when there was no there was no need. There was no resolution technically. It was just a vote. No, it was a vote. It was a vote and it was it was made into law and there was no need. We went back to the old one. We went back to what we actually approved in the beginning of the year. You you you can finish when I'm finished here. Okay.

I know. I'm just tired of ad nauseium. We voted in the beginning of the year. Your request that day was specifically to go back to what we voted for and we did. So then your new request would be that you would like to change the rules of counsel again, which is why he's saying you'd need a resolution to change again change the rules of council. We are to the letter of the law as to what we agreed in January and I think January is coming. It's really just a few meetings away. We could do the whole thing then. We could start it over from scratch. We could make it anything we want it to be. Um, but I just think that, you know, um, I've got other horses to beat. Are you finished?

I am. Okay. When we voted my comments, so then I would like everyone to vote. I'm just want to finish my comments because I mean, obviously, we all have our freedom of speech. Interrupt you. Correct. You can. I don't care. I just want to make sure that everybody votes and if we can just move this along. Be respectful of everyone, please. My point is that we voted in January. We enacted a law. A law was changed without a resolution. So then we were asked to vote again on a law that was already passed. It is not necessary to do that. All right.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So I will end on a happy note. Oh, you're still talking. I thought you said thank you.

Did you say thank you? I'm sorry because I didn't finish. I I just have to catch myself back up here because of being interrupted. Thank you for that. All right, I'm almost there. The point I'm going to make here is is the the reports then were taken away as I I understand that we were going against what our standing law was doing reports at every meeting but but for the transparency to the residents it was very appreciated because I do get I do get reports they don't always come to me the I I get reports from the committees I'm a part of and they want me to do a report at every meeting. I got I got from Ralph I was asked to do a report tonight because of lack of transparency when we when we do the reports only once a month. All right. Now, I'm going to speak about taxes on Ford Avenue. I will speak about the taxes or financial obligations on the property or properties on Fort Avenue and Main Street. Some people are uncomfortable with me speaking about this issue. Therefore, I shall continue. How do we allow ourselves to get to a point of being owed over $7 million in the roughly 25 years of this disgraceful disgraceful situation in the center of Miltown? Did some past governances drop the ball in hopes of an easy resolution? Probably the taxes on this site have

been paid, make no mistake, they have been paid by you, young and old, struggling miltown taxpayers, the forgotten men and women. If and when this $7 million comes in, council members at the time need to understand who paid the tax bill on this site. It was with people. That means a real conversation should take place on allocating the windfall. The school board, as someone had suggested to us, does not get a dime of that money as we already supply them with twothirds of our tax money. $7 million owed plus 18% interest each and every year would be over 8 million by this time next year. I hope in the future that whatever figure the total amount owed is not fractioned away as you the taxpayer has footed the burden wrongfully and deserve the utmost consideration. I have one more thing. This is on the Ford Avenue contamination. I'm going to speak about the ongoing situation regarding the contamination of the old Michelin site land.

To the extent that that's relevant to the current redevelopment of the site, I don't really want to discuss that. I'd still like to speak about it. Certainly, Councilman Pansy, I can't stop you from speaking about it. I can just tell you that I don't believe it's in the best interest of I I I don't I I'll tell you I I will I'll take you up on that and I will discuss it. But I will also say you don't have any idea what I have here. I don't if you'd like to bet what you'd like to say with me in the future, I'll happily review it and let you know my thoughts.

Okay. Well, I will finish with this. First of all, because I'm not we we are not supposed to have um reports tonight, but I do have important things that I will bring up right now. First of all, I'm meeting tomorrow with Telly, the owner of TK1, here tomorrow at 9:00 a.m. to speak about uh hooking up for live stream here. That's number one. Also, I'm meeting shop owners tomorrow at 5:00 tomorrow evening to discuss demand fees. A lot of these people are very angry about this and some of them are ready to to give up their businesses here. Just so people know, I'm also meeting with homeowners to discuss their water and sewer rates. They're not happy with the rates and they plan to vent to me. And also, um, Ralph asked me to to bring this up. DPW leaf bags will be available Monday through Fridays and Saturdays 8 till noon. Uh, the pool has been repaired. A large broken pipe had been leaking water for most of the season. And the heating air conditioning replacement is still undecided for the DPW building and the firehouse. And also another note, the painting of the annex building will most likely commence in the spring when details can be worked out. The historical society with Barbara Wright at the helm is self-funding this project. And that concludes my report. Okay. Thank you everybody. And I apologize for the three families that have been waiting for this announcement for the past hour. Um, but also too, this is part of my recreation update. So, not an official report, but an update which we can give during council comments. So, we'd like to thank everyone who participated in the recreation department's first ever pumpkin carving contest this past weekend. 13 carved pumpkins were displayed along the Miltown Bridge on Friday and Saturday, and the creativity and detail in each p

pump pumpkin were truly impressive. This idea was originally suggested by former Councilman John Reagga. Thank you, Mr. Reagga, for inspiring such a memorable event, and we look forward to bringing it back next year. Now, it is my pleasure to announce the top three pumpkins. Number one, Millow Screen by the Cahill [clears throat] family. Number two, I'm not crazy, you're crazy by the Solomon family. And number three, Big Back by the Pastori family. Congratulations to all the winners. And thank you again for anyone everyone who participated. And also I'd like to mention um myself and I know Councilman Mango have um assisted with the haunted riverwalk this weekend. Um I can say the eighth graders eighth grade students did an amazing job and um put another one in the book. So we're looking forward to next year. And that concludes my council comments. Mr. Mayor. Thanks Dave. Both of you look like you have comments.

Not I have comments. We're waiting for you. Okay. Um I have my comments and it's not going to be that long. I promise. So, uh Mr. McClung, Mr. Piscanka, I have two quick questions for you. So just for clarity, the lead line and the water replacement project is not correlated the same. So the million-doll grant was for the lead lines for an installation of the lead lines. That has nothing to do with the water meters. Correct. That's correct. Okay. The replacement of lead service.

It's the replacement of lead service. Now, why can't we go ahead and start the process of replacing the lead line service now? um where if we have 200 and some odd residents that we don't know of or x number of homes that do not have lead lines in it currently. So we know it's already going to run most likely more than a million dollars regardless. So why don't we start the process now? Get the the homes that we do know. We know it's going to be approximately x amount of dollars per home. start using that money towards the homes now and start getting some relief for the residents that are currently have the money available. Um I think we should try to move this one forward and try to get that resolved um to assist with

we will work with Mr. Carr and um get you a scope of services and get your problem right away. Okay, I think that's a good idea. Thank you.

Here's a percentage that you can use on you know what your uh lead galvanized services as comparisons the total the 200 then could be estimated. Sure. And then the other services that we don't know yet, it's probably going to be a percentage, whatever it is. Um, we could go for that afterwards. But why should the residents that currently have um meters ident or uh lines identified, why should they be suffering because other residents don't um currently h, you know, have their their stuff identified? Um, and the uh water meters. Uh I I think if I'm not mistaken, correct me if I'm wrong, there is a a fairly um larger percentage that it's commercial. Um it's what's the percentage between commercial and residential uh for the meters not being installed yet roughly? I got to go to my my unfortunately I don't have the exact counts of commercial versus residential, only the totals, but um I know we have an issue at Rissa Home Depot still outstanding. I can tell you those two. Um there's a couple other miscellaneous ones. I'm just not sure which.

Have the burrow buildings been installed yet? No, we've been um awaiting pricing from the contractor. We got initial pricing seemed a little steep. We asked them to go back to their uh sharpener pencils and um they've gotten new pricing into us now. We're looking at that. Is that included or excluded of the total number of um meters? Excluded. Excluded. Yeah. It was an add-on. Okay. It was add-on to the original conversation when the original bid. So, it is it is covered. uh we're within the tolerance of the bid specs if you will to change our bid spec if you will uh we're within that tolerance to add these extra meters on there. Okay.

But it is outside of that number. Yes, sir. All right. Thank you. That's it. It's all I have. Um at this time I entertain a motion to adjurnn. Motion to adjurnn. Second. I have a motion made by Councilman Collins, second by Councilman Potter. All in favor? Any opposed? Thank you.