Council - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the combined agenda and regular meeting of the Monroe Township Council on this October 6th, 2025. Would you all rise as we honor our flag? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. You all may be seated. Someone I'm good. Would the clerk please call the role? Councilman Charles Dapiro here. Councilman Michael Markell here. Councilwoman Rupa P. Seagull here. Council Vice President Terren Vanzora here. Council President Miriam Cohen here. Would you please read the Sunshine Law into the record? In accordance with the Open Public Meetings Act, it is hereby announced and shall be entered into the minutes of this meeting that adequate notice has been provided by the following. One, posted on the bulletin board within the municipal building on December 27th, 2024 and remains posted at that location for public inspection. Two, printed in the Home News Tribune and the Cranberry Press on December, excuse me, 27, 2024. Three, posted on the Monroe Township website. And four, sent to those individuals who have requested personal notice. In accordance with chapter 3, section 17 of the Monroe Township Code, public comment shall be limited to five minutes unless further time is granted by the council president. Thank you. We have the following proclamations this evening. It is Becker musculardrophe awareness week the 5th of October through the 11th. Rhett syndrome awareness month. Hindu Heritage Month. Italian American Heritage Month. National Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Will the clerk please read the ordinances for second reading? Ordinance 082025021 ordinance amending chapter 108 article 6 zoning district regulations reszoning of highway development district along Butcher Road. Thank you. Item seven of the resolutions for consideration under the consent agenda R10 2025-191 through R1020 20225-209. Anyone on the council have a request to make? Yes. Uh, council president, I wanted to go uh back to uh 20 21 on uh number six on that. Um I read through that ordinance and I and I had a conversation um with our attorney about it. It's a 50- foot height and I was a little concerned about the 50 foot height being a uh a change where most of the buildings are 35 to 45. So I I don't I don't feel comfortable with that 50ft height on the uh the change of of the uh of that zone HD zone. So, Councilman, I I I spoke with the administration and um I think we share your concern. So, uh and they asked me to appine as to whether or not that would require a a renotice and I don't think that it would. So, if you would like to during the regular meeting make that motion and I would make it before we go into um the public hearing so that we'll amend and then we'd have the public hearing on the ordinance as amended to remove to move the height from in this we're talking about the residential portion of the correct from from 50 to 45. We could do it then. Correct. Thank you. You're welcome. Moving on to the next resolution. on the

um the only one that I have that I uh that I would ask is R10 2025 192 that could be voted on separately. I appreciate it. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? We will move to the public comment section of our agenda. Uh, please remember that it's limited to agenda items only and five minutes per speaker. May I have a motion to open the public comment section, please? Motion. Thank you. A second on that second. All in favor? I. Any opposed? No. Yes, sir. Hi. Good evening, Council President. Good evening. George Councilman Monroe. I have a question about two items in the consent mercy on page two item 203 R10 2025 203. Um what equipment is are we talking about here? Is are we imitating ICE with our vehicles? What are we talking about? Council President, please. So uh uh no, Mr. Gunglman. This is uh equipment that the county provides to us uh free of charge if we enter into this program. And we've utilized uh their sky towers, their light towers uh for our Fourth of July uh events. Um they have uh sort of mobile uh command center areas that they would give to us in the case of a flood disaster or other natural disaster and um and certain fencing for big events. Um, so those really limited to that. If there's a a flood event, we um we could access their high water vehicle, but that's pretty much it. Thank you.

Thank you. Um, the other the other item was item um 206 media replacement. What is that? That's what media that's been this destroying the filters in uh me too. Uh okay now I know now you know he was now you know right yes it's uh the media that actually is in the filters in the vessel for iron I understand nice to be known by his suit alone right he stands up sort of meteor it's a good You never know. Praash Parav 33 Lead Drive. Good evening, Mayor and the council. Good evening, Dr. Parab. Uh, one thing good good uh resolution R10 2025 194 um NJ transit bus stops at Texas Road. Um so that is a good news. The question is are these Texas road bus stops from NJR transit are to the New York or New Jersey? You know there are buses going to New York. Are they going to New York or New York? New York. Yeah. Council President, um I believe this is the 138 line that goes to Manhattan. Manhattan. Thank you very much. Uh there's a request from Appleguard to the Newark. So I hope uh you guys are lobbying for that and that will be successful in future. So that is a request. Uh there's another one thing uh resolution R10 202528 that also very appreciative on the links drive. We are going to have pedestrian

uh improvement that has been used for a lot by a community. The request to the council in future let us have uh you know sidewalk also in the halfacre road between force gate and prospect plane. Lot of people walk on the side road. So that is the request. Okay. Um now coming to this lot of misinterpretation is going on uh in this ordinance 082025021. I'm sure it will be discussed uh in the public forum but like to confirm that this ordinance which uh every one of you worked on and went to the court also uh to correct it and I think this ordinance will um dictate that there will be no warehouse in the bureau road which we talked about and mayor and council all council members correct supported that and that is the agreement and I understand that the warehouse now which we got rid of that location as per the court order we are going to have a residential place similar to Manur place uh that is my understanding there will be a residential place and the 25 acres which we have there 10 acres is there there will be a recreation center that is my understanding and my third or fourth understanding is that route 20 33 whatever the warehouses are coming they should have direct access to the route 33 not going through the residential uh areas. So that's my understanding. So if there is a difference in understanding I would request you to clarify. So the my only clarification is that there's no there was no litigation. Okay. This was just a negotiation and and a settlement but all of the things that you indicated are all correct. All correct time to thank you very much. You're welcome. Anyone else wishing to address us in this agenda session?

Seeing and hearing none, I Oh, I'm sorry, ma'am. Moving quickly. Moving quickly. Sorry, this is this was on uh this is on the ordinance. Please, you're welcome. Your name and address for our record. Just for the record, there there will be a public hearing on the ordinance. You can speak about this. We're in the work session now, but there'll be a public hearing on the ordinance. Not our last opportunity. Let me let me know that. My name is Ann Studholm. I'm a lawyer from Post Pollock and I'm representing and I have to look it up. Center Square at Monroe LLC and Monroe Gateway LLC. And they own the property right sort of within the L-shaped lot 32. And so we're here to support the ordinance and say it would make sense that I have a planner with me to include my client's property, which the town may want to do. To include what? to include my client's property, which is sort of the little out parcel within block 32. And so they'd be included in the change in ordinance. What the change in ordinance does is it makes it so that they would have to have a variance in order to do the permitted warehouse use because they don't quite have frontage on 33 even though they have it at the intersection, but they'd be happy to do housing, which is probably more appropriate if they're going to be surrounded by housing. probably more appropriate to do housing rather than warehouse probably. Um, and so I'm happy to talk about it now and put my planner on now in the work session or we can wait for the public hearing session, whatever. You're you're not going you can speak and your planner can speak but you're not going to have the opportunity to put on a witness if that's what you think you're going to do. Well, I mean my planner is an expert. I mean, he can speak, I guess. Well, the answer is you this is the So, this is the public portion of the workshop session. That's why I mentioned to you that there's there'll be a public hearing on the ordinance. And when there's a public hearing on the ordinance, you can speak and your planner can speak, but this isn't an

planning board meeting, you don't get to put quote unquote put on witnesses. So, you and your planner can speak if you'd like, you know, and I was I was actually I've was just hired on Friday, so I don't know what the interaction has been and how council would feel about my client, but I think it's important to hear from them now. Um, you could say, "Well, okay, you know what? We'll go and we'll amend the ordinance. We'll have Lou amend it and then we'll pass it." Um, and that would make perfect sense. Um, but we just we just walked in the door a little bit late, so I didn't know whether I should sit down now or wait for the public hearing portion. You will have an opportunity in the public portion. Okay, great. Thank you. We'll we'll wait over there then. We'll do that. Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to address us now? Seeing and hearing none, I'll try again. May I have a motion to close the public comment section? Thank you. May I have a second on that? Second. Thank you. All in favor? I. Any opposed? No. May I have a motion to adjourn the agenda meeting, please? Motion. Thank you. May I have a second? Second. Second. Good. Roll call. Councilman Dapiro. Yes. Councilman Markell. Yes. Councilwoman Seagull? Yes. Council Vice President Vanzora? Yes. Council President Cohen. Yes. Agenda meeting is closed. It's adjourned. We will move to our regular meeting and is being called to order. My motion, please. Motion. Thank you. Second on that. Second. Thank you. Roll call. Councilman Diapro. Yes. Councilman Markell. Yes. Councilwoman Seagull. Yes. Council Vice President Vanzora. Yes. Council President Cohen. Yes. May I have a motion to approve the payment of claims for the run date of September 30th, 2025? Motion. Thank you. Second, please. Second. Thank you. Roll call. Councilman Dapiro. Yes. Councilman Markell. Yes. Councilwoman Seagull.

Yes. Council Vice President Vanzora. Yes. Council President Cohen. Yes. Motion carries. Thank you. May I have a motion to approve the meeting? Minutes of the meetings written is written and presented September 3rd, 2025. Our agenda and regular combined meeting motion, please. Motion. Thanks again. Second. Second. Thank you. Roll call. Councilman Dapiro, yes. Councilman Markell, yes. Councilwoman Seagull, yes. Council Vice President Vanzora, yes. Council President Cohen. Motion carries. Thank you. We move to ordinance for second reading 08 2025-021. How do we So, we're going to take a motion to take it off the table. Motion to take it off the table, sir. I would make a motion to remove this from the table. Thank you. May we get a second on that, please? May we have a roll call? Councilman Dapiro? Yes. Councilman Markell? Yes. Councilwoman Seagull? Yes. Council Vice President Vanzora? Yes. Council President Cohen? Yes. Motion carries. We are going to I will read the ordinance is amending chapter 108 article 6 zoning district regulations reszoning of highway development district along Butch's Road. We're going to open a public hearing on a motion, please. Before we do that, I believe that the councilman wanted to make a motion to to um to um correct the ordinance to reflect that the maximum height for the buildings in the residential zone are 45 ft. Is that correct? Correct. That's exactly correct. Thank you. So, we need a second for the motion. We need a second on that, please. Second. Thank you. Now, we need a vote. We need a roll call on the amendment and then we'll have the public hearing on the ordinance amendment. Absolutely. May I have a roll call vote, please? Councilman Diro. Yes. Councilman Markell, yes. Councilwoman Seagull, yes. Council Vice President Vanora, yes. Council President Cohen, yes. Motion carries. Look what we did. There we go. Here we go.

Now we need So now a motion to open open the public hearing. A motion please. Motion. Thank you. A second on that. Second. All in favor? I. Anyone opposed? Nay. Motion carries. Please remember you are limited to five minutes and you must be discussing this ordinance only. Praash Purup 33 Dana Drive. I would like to repeat again because the what I speak goes into the minutes of the meeting. My understanding is that the ordinance calls for the correction that there'll be no warehouse in the butcher road area. Secondly, the land which is there for the was given to the B um the warehouse will be there will be constructions of the residential. And thirdly, my understanding is there is 25 acres of which 15 acres is a wet land whatever and 10 acres of land will be allotted to the recreation. And um fourth is whatever the warehouses are going on route 33 the zoning calls that those warehouses will have direct access to Route 33. They will not go through any residential area. Thank you. Thank you. Correct. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else wishing to address us on this, please? Sir, he's that gentleman is coming up and you will follow him. Your name and address for our record, sir. Uh Dennis Lou, 31 Beachwood Drive, Monroe Township. Yeah. I just have a question on the conditional uses. Is this uh the well the wholesale distri distributive and storage establishments with the ingress on 33 is uh this is the 108-7-2 standards of approval. Go ahead. Uh the question is is this just for that lot like no no

no that's for so what we did is we amended the highway district zone generally in in the in the town so that warehouses are conditional uses um in all of the highway uh development district and the condition there's only one condition the condition is is that they have to have a um access to route one otherwise they would require a use variance 33 excuse me 33 33. 33 between 1 and 33. Yeah. Well, there's 133 also, right? Where they're filming this. Yeah. I just wanted to make sure because this said said it was for the specific lot block 3, lot 3132. So, I make sure the public hearing to make sure that things are clarified. So, so there's so there's two different parts of this ordinance. So, we're we're reszoning that lot and block to take it out of the highway district zone. Okay. And then we're reszoning then we're changing the standards in the highway district zone generally. There's two different parts to it. Yeah, it sounds great. Just it just threw me off because you're taking it out and then putting it back in with this. Okay. No. All right. That's it. Thank you. Thank you. You're most welcome. Ma'am, you wish to speak to us. My name is Nancy Ferrante. I live at uh 950 Route 33 East in Monroe Township on Highway 33. Okay. So, what you're saying is there will be no warehouse near Butcher Road. Correct. Correct. Now, North Disbro Hill Road goes off of Butcher Road. Correct. Mhm. So, therefore, this is null and void. I don't know what you're holding. I'm sorry. This is a plan for a warehouse of 158,000 square feet. That's the federal business center one. That's correct.

Correct. That's the one that's being reszoned now for affordable uh for a um residential development. So what did we receive this for? You received that because so I'm sorry some people may have gotten the notice. So there's two different parts to this ordinance. one is reszoning that property and the second is changing the standards in a highway um HD zone. So you got that notice because whenever we change a property from one zoning district to another, we're required to notify everybody within 200 ft of that property um that there's going to be a change. So that's why you got that. You got it because you must own a piece of property that's within 200 feet of I'm going to call it the federal business center because yes everybody knows. So we reszoned that property where that warehouse was going to be. It's now being reszoned to residential. Okay. So therefore this gray area here is for the housing. May I approach? Uh um so you can see better. And therefore you will not be um filling in. Oh that's not our notice. That's not our notice. Council president. Yeah. Mark can explain. Excuse me. I'm being Yes, Mr. Rasmo. Yeah. Um, yeah, the resident had showed that to me before the meeting. Um, that looks like that that original application submitted to NJD for wetlands determination. So, I believe that's what it is. Um, and it does show the site was denied. Oh, I I can explain what that is. In order So, the property is being reszoned that that map and I'll explain to you what that map. The property is being reszoned to residential. So, there won't be a warehouse there. in order to continue their uh wetlands permits to keep the wetlands permits active, they had to renew their application, that was the plan that was on file with D. But once this ordinance is is done last last um last meeting, we bought part of the pro we authorized the acquisition of part part of the property. This now will

reszone the remainder of the property to residential. So it would be all gone. Entirely residential from Butcher Road. Correct. Correct. All the way around. Correct. Correct. And on the other side of this barrel road, that piece of the property, we're buying. You're buying that, correct? The town is buying it where the cocoals were on the No, the other side. No, on the other side where the wetlands are. Well, it's not all wetlands. There's a significant amount of uplands there. Correct. Okay. So, are the wetlands going to be filled in, sir? No, of course not. Thank you. That's the future of our country. Well, hopefully it's not the future of the state of New Jersey, though, because they still have something to say about that. There's plenty to say about it. The coastal land. Yeah. And by shutting down the wetlands, we there is no future. So, and I agree. There's a lot to say. I I agree, but and there's probably two parts of this that you you'll probably really like. First is we're going to buy the property on the other side of Disbarrow Road which has some uplands but has a significant amount of wetlands. But more importantly, we've also there's about 40 is it about 40 acres about 40 acres of additional wetlands that federal business center is giving to the town. So once we own it and preserve it, the federal government could go to hell in a hand basket. We own it. We're not going to fill in the wetlands. Thank you. So that's one of the the ultimate way to preserve the wetlands is for us to take title to it, which is exactly what we're doing. Okay. So um the reason I ask is because I'm concerned about the future of of the world. Without wet wetlands there there is no whatever comes from within the wetlands is a future microorganism and such. Okay. I won't use my time because you've used a few minutes of my time and so none of this

our our land our property on 33 the state of New Jersey has stated to me by shutting down where behind Wawwa to wetland sir that the state of New Jersey said not to do Monroe Township did anyway. Our property suffers from that. That's not the property. It has nothing to do with this ordinance. Nothing to do with this ordinance. So it has another ordinance. Well, it's got nothing to do with this. But this is only a public hearing on this ordinance, ma'am. So if you don't, I don't know anything about your property otherwise. Okay. So this is gone. Yes. This is not going to be touched the wetland because what's going to happen is going to come down is the trickle effect. Ma'am, I'm going to ask you to close your comments, please. You're out of time for my husband. I'll sit down. No, you may not. No. No, you can't. So therefore, there's going to be residential. Good. We agree. We agree. Anyone else wishing to speak on this ordinance, please come forward now. Ma'am, thank you again for the record. Ann Studholm of Post Pollock um representing Center Square at Monroe LLC and Monroe Gateway LLC. Um and they own uh of lot three. They own blocks three and 33 which are within the wraparound of the property that is getting reszoned to residential. Um the lady was just mentioning no more warehouse on butcher road. Uh there are a lot of uses that we'd still be zoned for that the planner will mention. I'm going to go very quickly so that he can have his full five minutes. Um and including warehouse were we to qualify for that variance which from

this site due to the way that intersection uh geometry is probably a a variance that could be obtained. Um, however, we're perfectly happy to do housing. Um, two things that the council should know is that in order to preserve the owner's rights under the time of application, they actually did put a warehouse application in today. Um, I I am the attorney of record on it. I haven't even seen it. My understanding is it did go in today because they had to because they were the zoning is changing. Um, we also have a challenge in the lawyer's Walter Toto. Um, but I believe I'll be um handling that. The challenge for the HFSP, my understanding is the only other challenger is the SPI site that had the ball legals and all that litigation. By the way, the challenge that was filed was out of time. So, you don't have a challenge. Guess what? You don't. It's not out of time. And we can litigate that tomorrow if we want. Um, Judge McCloskey himself has found they're not out of time. So, I don't know if Judge Bookbuster wants to, you know, go against Judge McCloskey. We'll talk about that tomorrow. It's not out of time. Um, so we one way or another I think we have vehicles to negotiate an appropriate residential as I'm understanding the public wants use for our property rather than things like motel and car dealerships and other sorts of things that would still be permitted. Um, so with that, what I'd like to know, um, is if I can ask the planner who will talk with more intelligence than just a lawyer to these planning issues for this site. And he's right here. I'd like to introduce him. I don't know if you have to take him as an expert or if he could just put comments on the record. I need to ask you a question, please. Well, I I just want to just clear the answer is you have five minutes to speak and when you're done, your planner can speak, but both of you can't speak at the same time. So, if you're done, you you're done and you can have him speak. Your question is my question was I think that's it. Thank you.

Correct. So, you mind going back? You're not going to be able to sit here and ask him questions if that's what you think. Okay. So, you can go back to the audience. Please go to your seat and let him let him give us his name and address. And yes, I just going to ask council. I've got five aerials I'd like to share. Is that appropriate? You can give them to the clerk. Sure. You can get right here. Okay. Pictures worth,000. That'll make everything shorter. Thank you. You have enough for counsel. Want to share or get one down there? I don't need one. So you got one. I don't get to look at it anymore. We're okay. Do you want one? No, I'm good. I'm going to listen. No, I just let him speak. I don't just speaking. Go ahead. We're not taking just a hand out. I didn't hand it in electronically, so we don't have it to do that with. Okay. Good evening. My name is Craig. C R E I G H Randamp. R A H N K A M P. And as was said, I'm a planner here in New Jersey. I won't do qualifications. It's not the right form for that. No, it is not. Um, as you'll see from the aerial, and I this is why I say a picture is worth a thousand words. The ordinance that you're adopting tonight does two things. One is it reszones the property to the right of what you see in yellow outbound. That's that's our slightly under 7 acre property across Butcher are two existing residential developments. And now immediately to the going in the opposite direction to the right and to the south is the property that you're reszoning for multif family this evening. It leaves essentially a piece of the um business zone um left over after everything else around it has been carved away. um that seven acres as has was said there's an application now filed for warehousing but the other uses on that site include car sales, hotel um

office buildings. This is obviously not a world in which we're building new office buildings. So we've got this this lump of lands now surrounded by residential because of the actions that you're taking this evening. Um and it's time I think it would be appropriate not this evening but going forward um to begin investigating what would be an appropriate use for the site. um as council for the applicant or for the owner has said, um they're perfectly happy to develop it residentially as the other properties around it have have gone. Um and there may be opportunities to explore other uses with your uh planning staff as well. Um but clearly being a a just under 7 acre track left over of uh highway development zone now that everything around changed to residential just doesn't make a lot of sense in the long run. That that's the key point this evening. Thank you. Appreciate your time. Thank you. Anyone else wishing to address us on this ordinance only, please? Six. No. No. No. Same ordinance. Same ordinance. Same ordinance. Same ordinance. Excuse me, ma'am. I would like to have a motion to close. Close, please. Motion. Thank you. May I have a second on that? Second. Public comments. All in favor? I. Any opposed? Madam President, I just have a question if I could. um after hearing the public uh comments um I mean and the as the planner said the picture is worth a thousand words um it kind of it kind of I look at this and looks at it it makes sense to include it but I don't know what we have to do to

go about that to include that this parcel into this um into this zone because they're not going to be will get highway development frontage if we're so we're creating a hardship. And then a second, we're uh we're also looking at the neighbors in the in the across the street, which they want residential uh versus commercial. Um and if they did put an application in, I'm not a lawyer, but if they put an application in and everything, so I don't know, it just makes warehouse for a warehouse, uh I just didn't want to see a future lawsuit come down the road, uh another one on on a zone change. So, how how can we go about if we wanted to amend it and add this parcel to to this um Mr. Mc to our change? Council President, can I be heard on this for a moment? So, I would recommend that the council adopt this ordinance as it's written tonight for two reasons. one, we were trying to and successfully did prevent a warehouse construction at the former or the current federal business center site at um at North Disbro and and Butcher Road. Part of the way that we did that was to include that site into our round four affordable housing uh compliance plan for 158 residential units at that site. Um, we are also listening to the resident and our own professional experts regarding the highway development zone and what's compatible and what isn't. Um, and and and it was determined uh and it is recommended strongly to the council that having that ingress and egress on Route 33 is incredibly important. whether or not adding this property that we've just heard about into into this zone would create an additional I don't even know how many residential units because we

have no application in front of us. But I would say from the administration's perspective, we are not looking to add more residential units than we need to to comply with our round four affordable housing. We're not looking for another highdensity project. and the suggestion um and and I understand it and appreciate it from the property owner's perspective, but from the township's perspective, it is not beneficial and I would recommend strongly that the council adopt this ordinance as it is written tonight. And I I just want to clarify I'm not sure this is the property owner. I think this might be the contract purchaser. I think so. True. I don't know. I don't know the answer to that. Yeah. At this moment, then I'm going to request a motion to adopt ordinance 082025-021. May I have a motion, please? So moved. May I have a second on that motion? Thank you. May we have a roll call? Councilman Diapro, no. Councilman Markell, yes. Councilwoman Seagull, yes. Council Vice President Vanzora, yes. Council President Cohen, yes. Motion carries. Motion carries. We now move to the resolutions for consideration under our consent agenda. That was R102025-191 through R102025-209 with the exception of R10 20225192 which will be voted on separately. May I have a motion please? Motion. May I have a second on that? Second. Thank you. May I have a roll call? Councilman Dapiro? Yes. Councilman Markell? Yes. Councilwoman Seagull? Yes. Council Vice President Vanzora? Yes. Council President Cohen. Yes. Motion carries. Item six is resolutions removed from the consent agenda. May and that was

resolution. Repeat the number again. R10 2025192. May I have a motion, please? Motion. Thank you. A second on that. Second. Roll call. Councilman Diapro, abstain. Councilman Markell, yes. Councilwoman Seagull, yes. Council Vice President Vanzora, yes. Council President Cohen, yes. Motion carries. Motion carries. We move to our reports for the evening. May I have Mr. McGowan, please? Actually, Council President, I have no report for us this evening, but very exciting. May we have our engineers report, please, Mr. Razimoitz. Thank you, Council President. I have a short report. Um, thank you for the council uh awarding the Lynx Drive uh road improvement project tonight. Um the uh that's being paid for uh about 60% of the project by an NJ DOT grant of $552,000. Um hopeful to get that started before winter, but that project will be most likely uh uh coming on board in the early spring. Um, Prospect Plains Applegarth Road intersection. That's a Middle Sex County project. Uh, as I reported at the last meeting, the project was awarded to the contractor. Uh, it is underway though you don't see any work going on out there. It is there is utility relocations and coordination of the utilities um, prior to any construction out there. So they are working with PSEG for the gas lines and Jersey Central Power and Light for the overhead. So you will be seeing some action coming out there soon. James Monroe Park, the concession stand and park improvement projects that uh that project is moving along well. Uh the septic system uh is is already going in. Uh rough plumbing for the building is going in as well and we should be receiving the state permit for the new uh well uh soon. and then that that'll follow and uh we hope to be coming out

of the ground with the building very shortly. And last thing I have to report is the pickle ball courts and the parking lot at the senior center. That's moving extremely quickly. Um we plan on paving the new lot in the courts uh near the end of this week and hopefully completing that parking lot uh within the next two weeks um and get that open so the senior center can utilize that parking lot. And that's my report. Thank you very much. Moving to our council reports. I will begin with broad one, please. How did that happen? How did that happen? How did that happen? Uh I just want to make this quick. I just want to say a shout out to the human uh relations uh committee. They did had a taste of Monroe this year. Um we had a record number of people show up. with everybody. That was donations to the Betty Snider food uh pantry, which we had a tremendous a tremendous amount of donations this year. It was beyond belief. Um I also want to give a shout out to the senior center. Um I just want to give you an idea for the month of May, June, July, and August, they had about 33,000 people registered for programs for those months. Just to give you an idea of what the senior center does, over 33,000 people registered for things. Um, another thing is there was probably another item that I want to they transported um close to 16,700 people over those months to various things. So, our senior center who sometimes gets criticism because they can't they can't handle the amount of volume that they have. It's just beyond belief how much hard work these people do. Um, the only other thing I want to mention is October Fest

on October 19th. It's a great event. Thousands of people show up. You'll get to meet a lot of uh Monroe people and a lot of different uh v um vendors and so forth. So, put down on your calendar October 19th for October Fest. I hope I didn't take anything out of Ruper's uh speech, but I had since I'm first tonight, I had to say something about something. Thank you very much. W two, Councilwoman Rupus Seagull, please. Good evening. Thank you, Council President. Uh I have a very brief update tonight as well. I just want to share some upcoming events. Our cultural arts commission this Sunday is our Township Diwali event. Uh for from 400 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the senior center. Please come join us as we celebrate Diwali and enjoy cultural programming from dances from India. It's an opportunity to support our local Indian restaurants and vendors too. And we end our night with a the lighting. So it's free admission. Bring your families and come join us. And also um se Sunday October 19th after the October fest the culture arts commission is presenting ABBA tribute band at 4 pm at the high school. So tickets are on sale. Please join us there. You can have a full Monroe day starting at the rec center. And then I just want to put a reminder out there. There was a park survey that came out to residents. I would like to make sure people saw the brief survey to gather public opinion about how to best use the two parcels of land being converted into parkland with the support of state funding. The two properties were um near Garvey's Restaurant and Pub and also the 10 acres near Butcher Road and Disbra Hill Road. So the deadline for responses is 5:00 PM on October 17th. The information is on the township website. Thank you. Short what? Three, Councilman Deiro, please. So the pressure is on. Everybody's got

short reports. Reports. I'll try my best. Um, talking about 405 spots for Gravel Hill, I just wanted to put a shout out to uh DPW. Uh they cleaned it up really really uh nice. They got the trees cut and now it's u now it looks almost like a park. So I just wanted to say thank you to uh our staff on on getting the property cleaned up. Um and then whatever whatever the survey say we can we can all look at that and listen to the comments for the uh for the request on uh on the two parcels that Councilwoman Seagull just said. Um, also I was happy to see New Jersey Transit requesting another bus stop on Toby Terrace and also Texas Road, but we also need another bus stop also by Spotswood English Town in Buckaloo up by the Regency if we can put a little pressure on New Jersey Transit. A lot of the residents are looking for uh a bus stop. We have another one on spots on Letown Road in the corner of Old Texas Road by the firehouse and people use that. So, it is definitely a plus. The um 522 water tower. I want to thank Joe and his staff on on putting that together uh and successful bid because we did receive uh some emails from the residents from Heritage Heritage Chase and it's if you if you look at the water tower from the outside you wonder say what's on the inside and this will take care of the cleaning on the outside and the inside and uh I just wanted to say thank you Joe to you and your staff that that made that happen and and our uh town administration on getting the funds for that. So, so thank you. I have a little concern about the paving contractor uh

this year. Um I I went back and I I looked at some of the paving that they did, manholes, uh broken frames. Um I opened a couple of the valve boxes. I've noticed there was asphalt uh along with some paint from the striping contractor. So hopefully we're holding some money. Uh and there is a punch list from our engineering office to make sure that this contractor lives up to his obligations on doing the job right and he doesn't leave us with our infrastructure with broken manhole frames uh and where we have to go back later and patch pave them in because that's something uh that I think our MTA look at and also our administration from uh from center state. So, if you guys could uh get back to uh to to the council on uh on the on the repairs because there is quite a bit of work that needs to be done. I also wanted to talk about everyone get out and vote. The election starts um so just make sure everybody votes on 10:25 early voting uh and then election day of course. Uh but it goes from the 25th of October through 112. Uh so it's at it's at our library for early voting and there's other locations throughout the county. But I wanted to uh wish our clerk's office, you guys always do a phenomenal job well before and and and I know that you guys work hard at it and I just want to say uh good luck with it and good luck to all the candidates. Uh the green fair we went a lot of us attended the green fair at the high school along with a car a car show from the the PTA. It was well attended. It was a beautiful day. We had a flag uh from the fire company station

51. I mean, it was just a great community together uh gathering to see u the green fair and uh and it was just a good a good event to um pull everything together for the community and and I thoroughly had a good day at the car show and also at the green fair and at Regency. They had a car show at Regency as well. I even joined that. It was always a good good time uh to look at the old cars, bring back some memories. Um I was I was wondering about a proposal on the LED street lights for Monroe. Do we have any proposals from JCPNL yet? Mr. Muen, uh Council President, we don't have those proposals yet. We're working closely with JCPNL to get the existing street lights repaired. Um and they've made an incredible progress. I talked to them today and they're down to uh about 70 street lights. This is not in the senior communities. This is out in the rest of but we also connected with managers at the senior communities. Um some of which have had a better experience over the last month or so than they had previously. So the new representatives there are providing a a better service, but it's it's still always a challenge and always a struggle. So thank you. Okay. Thank you. and the police department. Um, I've heard that we have some issues with the contractor. Um, I'm not sure Mark or Kevin didn't say anything about the police department, but um, where are we? I mean, where are we with the completion date? Where are we as far as budgets concerned? And is the contractor working? Did the contractor walk off the site or can someone give us some insight on what's going on with our police headquarters? Mr. Mac, you wish to Your mic's off. Thank you, P. There you go. So, I'm sorry, Councilman. Obviously,

you know, I mean, there's there's a lot going on um legally with this, including negotiations. We we certainly are going to avail ourselves of whatever remedies we have. We've talked we've uh looped in the bonding company, but we're confident that we have the resources and enough money left in this contract that we can get it we can get the project concluded and that's the most important part. So, so I don't think there's not much else I can say publicly about it as you can imagine. But we're pursuing to go after the bonds of of course we always whenever there is an issue with regards to a contractor, the first thing we always do is put the bonding company on notice. We have that we have done that and I mean you know we haven't heard anything and I know we're well overdue on the completion date but I was just concerned on what are we doing and uh the contractor if he's there he's not there whatever you guys are going after the bond so okay thank you you're welcome Mr. Mayor, do you wish to add some to the discussion tonight or you also had a short Oh god, it's the new suit, Terry. Oh, I It's your new suit. I apologize. In fairness, I was leaning forward. Council vice president in a gorgeous new suit. I apologize. Have very little to say tonight. I I also enjoyed going to the green fair. I was there after all the other big guys were there. Showed up in the afternoon and stuff, but had a nice time. got a few bananas and uh they all the people there do really do a nice job and and it's something that's that's necessary. Reminder again, as they said, October Fest is October 19th. Election day is November 4th. So, whoever you vote for, it's important to get out and exercise your constitutional rights. It's something that not every country can do. And and we have that privilege and we have that right and we have that duty. So, go out there and do it. whatever your uh whatever your persuasion may be. Um I do want to compliment the

administration on the tremendous job they did on that ordinance 2025-21. You know it you hear what happened but what you don't hear is what could have happened. This is a case where we denied that warehouse very easily could have led into a very costly lawsuit. We don't know what would have happened in the lawsuit. We may have prevailed. we may have not prevailed. And you know, um, our legal department with our administration, what did they do? They negotiated and they were able to work something out that was agreeable and I think clearly benefits the town. Now, I also heard um the other folks talking about an application. My feeling on that is I don't know anything about their application. I don't know anything really about their property. I see where it is and I get that. But I think the the better process would be for let them to submit something in full and just like every other um submission that we have any other application, we can consider it. Let's see what it is. If it's for the benefit of the town, we'll go for it. If it's not for the benefit of the town, I I presume that we would deny it. Um, but at least this way you're making a decision based on intelligent information before you and you're not just um saying something off the cuff without really knowing what's involved. So, um, but again, compliments on on getting uh getting that uh done and passing that ordinance. I think that was great. So, thank you. That's all I have. I apologize again. It's the new suit that threw me off. Mr. Mayor, thank you, Madame Council President, for allowing me to to provide some remarks. Um, I do want to just piggyback on on the the discussion of the ordinance and what uh Councilman Vanzur said. Uh to me, having been a member of the zoning board, you rely on the zoning and planning board to do a full vet with uh with an application where there's

multiple witnesses where uh you have uh resident input as well as trying to jam um an an application that could be hours and hours of discussion in 10 minutes, which I think would be a travesty to to the to the public. So, um, with that being said, um, I know Councilman U Markell had mentioned about the, um, uh, human relations and the successful event that we had at our senior center for a taste of Monroe and, uh, getting food for our food pantry, for the Betty Schneider food pantry. Obviously, want to thank everyone who had donated, but I do want to thank those who uh, participated the the restaurants. In particular, I'd like to highlight the Bearded One Barbecue, uh, Cherros, Dunkin Donuts, Fine Fitness and Lifestyle Coaching, Forsgate Country Club, Istanbul, Mind the Gap Coffee, Mrs. Kumar's Red Agavei, and Tomato Pies Italian Kitchen for providing some tasty treats for the residents that were there. and uh in particular reag I I I I you know being raised in Catholic school, right? I you always hear the the the Bible story of of the wedding of Kaa, right? Where there's not enough food and you and there's a conversion going on where there all of a sudden there was unlimited food. I think Red Agave is working with the big guy up there because they just kept pumping out food and I don't know where it was coming from. So just an observation, slight observation. Um, I was so very proud to be part um of the uh donation ceremony with our Monroe Township Senior League softball. Uh, last week uh the group raised $42,000 for a donation to the Makea-Wish Foundation right here in Monroe Township. So, uh, I do want to thank

obviously those who donated, but to the, uh, the executive committee for the Mandro Senior Softball League, they they really do a a great job. They have a lot of fun throughout the summer playing softball. Uh, but they always cap it with a tremendous um, donation and this one in particular was was fantastic. Um, just a couple upcoming events. I know Diwali and October Fest was mentioned, but we have uh, this coming Friday uh October 10th between 5 and 7:30. Please show your support to our local F uh VFW. Uh they have a spaghetti dinner uh at the Jamesburg Elks. So hopefully you can see you there. Uh also did want to highlight I'm bringing back the uh Passport Clinic. Uh it will be held on October 23rd between 2 and 5:00 here in the municipal building. Please be on the lookout for some information. And obviously at the end of this month is uh the great holiday of Halloween um here in the municipal building. Uh it's everyone gets dressed up. It's a lot of fun. So if you have some kids, grandkids, you want to bring them through. Um it it's fun. They decorate the uh the building. Um also just please be careful. Obviously, to those who are will be participating, walking around, getting their candy, but those who happen to be driving through the streets of Monroe Township, please be careful. It is getting a little darker. Daylight savings time is coming up soon enough, but still just just be careful out there. So, madame council president, I thank you uh for allowing me to report. It is always a pleasure and an honor, sir. Uh I am going to ask for a motion to please open our public comment section of the meeting. Please motion. May I have a second on that? Second. Thank you. All in favor? I. Any opposed? No. Remember that there's five minutes for speaker. You wish to address the council, please

come up stating your name and address for our records. Anyone wishing to address the c Please sir. You're welcome. Before I start, there are a few of us here who are speaking on the same issue, the same topic. I don't know if you want to lump us all together or I don't want to lump anyone together. Okay. I want everyone to have their opportunity and not to exceed five minutes. Okay. Then we're good. Fine. Okay. Thank you. Okay. name and address. Your name and address, please. My name is Peter Econamu. I live at 110 Diamond Spring Drive in Monroe Township in Stonebridge. Uh, council president. Yes. Council members, Mr. Mayor, um I'm here tonight to respectfully urge the council to pass a resolution in support of the Immigrant Trust Act, which is currently before the state legislature. This piece of legislation will codify and expand the state directive that's currently in place, which limits local law enforcement from collaborating with federal immigration authorities beyond what is required by law. The Essex County Board of Commissioners, as well as at least 15 towns in both blue and red counties, have issued such resolutions, including Atlantic City, Bloomfield, Chattam, Edison, Flemington, Carney, Leona, Maplewood, Madison, Morristown, Patterson, Planefield, Princeton, South

Orange, and Trenton. This legislation is not about politics. It's about people. It ensures that local law enforcement does not act as federal immigration agents and that our local resources are used to protect public safety in Monroe and not tear families apart. There are stories of the immigrant mother who drew a map on the back of her child's hand so he could find his way back home from school in case they were separated. A 16-year-old girl who could not register for school because both of her parents were in detention centers. and a 17-year-old teenage boy who has to figure out how to make a life here without his parents who were both deported. We all want a safe town, but when undocumented immigrants are afraid to report crimes, cooperate with the police, or seek medical help because of potential detention, arrest, or deportation, everybody is less safe. The Immigrant Trust Act restores that trust. It builds a firewall between immigration enforcement and local law enforcement so that people, regardless of their status, can come forward when something is wrong. Just to be clear, this act does not prevent our Monroe police officers from doing their jobs. On the contrary, it allows them to do the jobs they were trained for. It simply ensures that they are not deputized by ICE, which would otherwise strain our resources, erode public trust, and make uh the Monroe Police Department's work more difficult.

Enactment of this legislation into law could even result in lower crime rates, better cooperation with police, and healthier community relationships. Support for a resolution is also a human statement. It says that in Monroe, we value fairness. We value the hardworking immigrants who are our neighbors, co-workers, and friends, and who contribute to the local and state economies. And that we do not believe that fear and intimidation ought to be a part of public policy. In Monroe, we have the chance to stand with other communities in the state on the side of safety, trust, and human dignity. I ask that the council join Senator Greenstein and Assemblymen and woman D'Angelo and McCoy, who have signed on as co-sponsors of the bill, and pass a resolution affirming this town's support for the Immigrant Trust Act. This action will continue the momentum that is gathering towards the passage of this bill hopefully during the lame duck session of the legislature and it's signing into law by Governor Murphy. Um, I have copies of or a copy of the resolution. We have a copy uh the board of commissioners of Essex County uh issued and I'd be happy to give it to you. We have a copy of the You have a copy of that? Yes. Not Essex counties, but we have a copy of the proposed immigrant rights act. I do have that. And you have this also. This I do not have. You may leave it with us. It's fine. Thank you for your comments sir.

Thank you folks. Please would you hold your applause. The next person who wishes to speak please come forward and again stating your name and address for our records and the time limit remains five minutes Dr. Pab someone is reaching here you here again. Okay please. Uh Prakash Parab 33 Dana Drive. Um we Monro Indians for civic action for the 8th year are organizing SA Diwali food drive and um want to inform entire town that we have about 650 individuals who visit food pantries in Monroe and Jamesburg at it increases to 851 during holidays. So we have hunger and people who need food. So Diwali is a festival of lights and Sava is a selfless service to the community. So we have been raising for several years and entire community mandro community helps us in donations. So I request please continue to do that. And our g go go goal also is to teach our children who are some of them are born with a golden spoon. They don't understand what is needed. There is a hunger. So this sava teachings we try to do to educate our youngsters that hunger is there. So you have to do sava to the community. So this is the important event. Now going into some politics, the elections are going to come. So I request, we request everyone to participate in the elections. For the board of education, I tell you

it has become a political hub there. The children doesn't come first. The political agenda comes first. So please take into consideration when you vote for the candidates, ask them what they stand for. If they stand for politics, don't vote them. If they stand for the children first and do best for the children, education, sports and arts, we have to we have to vote them. So there are lot of challenges in board of education. A request to look at it and vote them and let us make it non-political. Give a merit for the best candidate. Thank you. You're welcome. Ma'am, you wish to come up please? your name and address for our records. My name is Brienne Peters. I'm actually a resident of Highland Park, but I've worked and spent time and money in Monroe since as long as I can remember. I'm here to urge you to support the Immigrant Trust Act, as immigrants are the backbone of our country and positively impact our day-to-day life. Seeing our neighbors get abducted off the street, out of their jobs, from their homes is inhumane. These folks are not criminals. They are contributing members of our economy and society as a whole. I'm speaking to ensure that all residents of the township of Monroe are protected, that police and both elected and unelected officials cannot work or share information with ICE. The Constitution guarantees due process to anyone on US soil, and we see that this process has not been followed nationwide. I urge you to support a resolution in support of the constitution to ensure these rights are respected and protect our immigrant neighbors by passing the immigrant trust act or a resolution in support of the immigrant trust act. Thank you for listening. Thank you. Next please sir.

Hello. My name is Ganeshwar Salamla. G Y A N E S H W A R last name S A D A M A S T U L A address 283 morning glory drive I have four points to tell I just wrote it so that it's easier to talk um the first thing about the updates on the pickle ball so first of all thank you to mono township for the pickle ball facility near the s center and the the tranquility trail near uh England road okay these are great improvements ments. Uh I still urge the township to also develop uh a long-term plan to preserve open space and consider uh like a one to two-year plan to for the rec center on the southern side of town similar to Texas road. Uh second point is I am concerned about the board of education like the filing of the lawsuit against Dr. Chanley is just a waste of tax taxpayer dollars. These funds support um not support the student. They just uh support the legal disputes and I encourage the mayor and the council to kind of make the voters aware that like on November 4th when they go for the BOE elections vote for candidates who prioritize the education and not politics. Um the third one is I'm not sure if this uh this happens a lot of time at BOE meetings where the public forum is just kind of a drag and it just goes on forever and we don't have time parents to participate in the public forum because there's no fixed time. So I request if possible to have a fixed public forum um during like council meeting also it'll help because sometime the council meeting also go like late late time. So in the BA in the council or the BA meeting so that residents can have uh

consistent opportunities to speak and have questions. So if you have a fixed public forum time it will be helpful for both council meetings and VO meetings. Uh the last thing I want to tell is like uh I did follow up with the township I think send an email. There are a lot of street lights on on morning glory our drive and then I drove on Applegarth and when sometime drive on Bucklu there a lot of street lights which are just not working and these are all mercury lights okay so which take time to reach the full brightness. So I did follow up I think this was few months earlier this year where they were the township actually was trying to follow up with JCPL to basically upgrade this lights to LED. I'm not sure about the status on that. You finished sir. I think that's all I had. Thank you. Thank you. Uh yeah council president I just gave it's the same status that I gave before. Uh we had provided about 250 lights uh outages to JCPNL. are down to about 70 left to complete and those are h those have fault uh line issues that are take a little more time to repair but they are hoping within the next two to three weeks to have that repaired. Okay, thank you. And as a reminder folks, the board of education is elected by the residents of the town. It is an independent board with its own members and its own attorneys and we are not in charge of the board of education. No, we are not char. I'm just making a general reminder. That's all. Not No, I'm just wonder like if the council can just do a statement like you know what this sir, we are not in charge of the board of ed. That's okay. We all get to vote. Thank you. The next person who wishes to address us, please come forward. Your name and address for our record, sir. When was it? Hi, good evening. My name is Jacob Daniels. I am a resident of Highland Park. Um, before I start, I just want to

say it's uh really cool to hear that you are celebrating the diversity of cultures, Dwali. Uh, I'd probably be showing up to that if I'm if I'm around. Um, uh, my main question is, uh, does this council support the immigrant trust act? The council, that's not a question. No, this is your five minutes. This is your five minutes, not ours. I understand, but this council has not stated whether they do or not. I find that concerning. The council will review the immigrant trust act. You That is all I'm prepared to say tonight. Whether the council That's all I'm prepared to say tonight. Your five minutes is not up. You have things you I know you're still talking so I haven't I was going to wait for you to stop. Um, so if the township township this council does decide to not support the immigrant trust act, uh, I would like to make the strong suggestion to leave out the pledge of allegiance as it does talk about liberty and justice for all and it does not make the distinction between citizens and non-citizens. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your comments. The next person who wishes to speak, please come forward. Uh, hi uh, Monroe City Council. My name is uh, Troy Chartier Vignapiano. Uh, I am a resident of South River, so obviously I am not a resident of Monroe Township, but I, uh, do consider myself a concerned citizen of the state, so I do hope that that suffices. Uh, I'm here today, uh, this is not going to be a big surprise. I'm here today to humbly ask that the uh city council votes uh when the time comes to vote for a resolution to vote in support of the Immigrant Trust Act. Uh to me, this this act is a common sense guard rail for uh what I believe are unprecedented and downright scary times. Uh we have people on the

streets of our neighborhood throughout the state that are being taken away and sent to locations that aren't being disclosed to family members. Right? We don't have a lot of information being given out to family members of people who are being detained or to the public in general. Uh people are scared to go outside uh for really anything, even when it comes to immigration check-ins and appointments. Uh, and honestly, what's probably the most heart-wrenching in my opinion is the fact that children of immigrants are terrified of going to school, either out of fear of being taken themselves or to come home and find that their parents have been taken without them knowing. Uh, I've heard of cases in New Brunswick specifically of students whose grades have actually gone down as a result of stress induced by these chaotic, scary times. And that makes sense to me. I mean these people are scared for their own safety, their kids. They don't, you know, necessarily understand what's happening right now and they just want their parents to be home when they come home, right? So the the immigrant trust act is a step towards ensuring that people can use the uh critical services provided by the state uh that everyone is entitled to without that data being misused for purposes outside of the the jurisdiction of the state. Right? It's to reaffirm that trust that everybody should have in our local government to provide for us and to provide uh healthy fulfilling lives. Right? If the Council of M Monroe were to pass a resolution in favor of the immigrant trust act, it'd be a great act of commitment to the peace of mind of not only the citizens of Monroe, but also to everybody in the state. And I just hope that you all take that stance along with a growing number of city councils. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Anyone else coming forward, please? Sir,

your name and address for our record, sir. Uh, yes. Uh, Paul Peloquin. I live at 241A Monroe Township, uh, in in Rosmore community just, uh, across the road. Uh I'm uh I speak I'm speaking in favor of the Immigrant Trust Act from a a a somewhat different standpoint. Immigrants are being used as a scapegoat to distract from an attack on the country. It's been used. It's been used to create a a private army of the president which is invading cities on obviously protextual reasons and political reasons for his own agenda. That's one reason. It's very important at a critical time that that be exposed and opposed and and that the city council should uh take part in that by supporting the immigrant trust act. There's another reason. It's a distraction from the attack on our living standards. The big beautiful bill cut Medicaid over 10 years. The cuts to Medicaid will total $930 billion. Direct cuts to Medicaid. Cuts to Medicare because unfunded tax cuts have to be uh compensated with the cuts in programs will cut $500 billion from me from uh Medicare. This is not widely reported, but it is reported. And the to the total is over a trillion dollars over 10 years. That that tax cut that the that this bill does gives the 1% trillion dollar tax cut over 10 years. That tax cut is not a is a tax cut for

them for sure, but it's a raise in taxes for everyone that needs health care. The Yale Department of Health and the University of Pennsylvania did a study. They estimated that 51,000 Americans a year will die uh from those uh uh cuts in health availability of health care. You don't need to an academic study to know if you keep people from going to a doctor, people are going to die. In 10 years, 51,000 deaths per year are they would total the amount of deaths of Americans that died in World War II. So the president's bill is a fundamental attack on the country itself and the health of the country itself and this should this should be opposed and stated uh strongly uh by the city council. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Anyone wishing anyone else coming up, please sir. Ma'am, whomever is making it up first. Name and address for our records, please. My name is Alan Road. Chris, we talk talk into the microphone so we can hear you, please. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. So, um I want to encourage uh council to to vote uh for this resolution on the immigration trust act. I want want to encourage you guys to to vote for that uh and so support. And I

wanted to quote something that came to me uh I'm sure many of us of what's going on now presently in in this country and this is a a quote which probably many of you are aware of from uh this is a German Luther Lutheran uh pastor Martin Neolar Molau um and the pros or poem that he wrote which was written in 1946 uh is they came for me and I'm going to read you the German uh the translation from German directly that that he had written. He said, "When the Nazis came for the communist, I kept quiet. I wasn't a communist. When they came for the trade unionist, I kept quiet. I wasn't a trade unionist. When they locked up the social democrats, I kept quiet. I wasn't a social democrat. When they locked up the Jews, I kept quiet. I wasn't a Jew. When they came for me, there was no one left to protest. Yeah. Just want to leave you with that. Thank you. Someone else is waiting to speak with us. Please come forward. Your name and address, please, ma'am. Good evening. My name is Jenny Pasaki. I live at 97 North Main Street in Cranberry, but I also work at 1600 Pinionville Road in Monroe. I work for Jewish Family Services there. I'm here

to speak again in support of asking the council to please support the Immigrant Trust Act, but for some very different reasons than what you've already heard this evening. As a social worker, I also use I currently work at Jewish Family Services. I've been there since July. Right before that, I was a social worker in a public school, middle school, and high school in South River, where there was a very large immigrant population. I had young people as young as nine years old coming into my office saying, "Why does President Trump hate my family? I'm scared to come to school. I'm scared that if I leave, somebody's going to stop and attack my mom or my dad." And I hate to tell you this, I also happen to be a member of a rapid response team in Cranberry and Mercer County. And yes, I also get reports about Monroe. ICE has already been through the streets of Monroe. They've already been trolling up and down the streets of Monroe. And I can tell you that just last Friday, I got something I got a posting from the Camden Center for Social Justice telling me that ICE is sending out notices to teenagers in high schools throughout the state telling them that they should turn themselves in. They should self-epport. They can get as much as $2,500 if they choose to self-deport. And they should also inform their parents to do the same thing. and if they have any friends who should be self-epporting to please notify ICE of those friends. This is attacking our young people as well as our older citizens. I will tell you my current clients who are Monroe residents are very nervous about taking their grandchildren to school. Schools are considered safe spaces, but unfortunately right now under the

immigrant trust directive, they are only safe in the private spaces, not in the public spaces. And walking into a school building is a public space. The last piece that I want to remind you of is this. The police are being told that they do not have to uh cooperate with the federal law enforcement. And that is true unless there is a report of a criminal act or a suspicion that a criminal act is going to take place. Being undocumented is not a criminal act. It is a civil violation. It's not a criminal violation. However, ICE has been known to tell local police forces that they are pursuing criminals and therefore forcing the police to come out and causing a trust issue between civilians and their police force. They did that in Trenton. They did it in Edison. They did it in Princeton. And unfortunately, I'm concerned that they're going to do it again in Monroe. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Um, your name and address for the records, please. Catherine, you need to be heard. Closer. Maybe that works better. Um, Katherine Hunt. Um, 121, letter P. Lowell Lane, Monroe Township. Um, and I also want to speak in favor of the Immigrant Trust Act. Um, it looks as if our elected officials are very quiet and we don't hear very much from them. So many of our churches and local community groups are the ones who are doing the

rapid response, who are reaching out to people who whose family member has been taken from them and helping them pull together the reports that they need to make for their lawyers. were trying to um find ways to to discover where their disappeared family members have been taken because for days or months even they'll not even know where that family member is. Um so it it takes a lot of work from the community to help in this situation. Um, a lot of people don't know their rights, so we teach them their rights. A lot of businesses don't know their rights, so we teach them their rights. You know, that's all our volunteer time just to just to let you know what what the volunteers are doing here. Um, number of us. Um, and I just wanted to point out why it's so so appropriate for municipalities to be considering a resolution in favor of the Immigrant Trust Act. We know that ICE almost never has a judicial warrant, which is in violation of the Fourth Amendment, and they do it every day. They often wear masks so as not to identify themselves. Neither do they document their mistreatment of New Jersey residents. Nor do they have a judicial warrant that names a person or a thing that they are taking because they would have to show probable cause and they don't have any. Most of the people that they take are simply people who are here working and

trying to follow our Byzantine system of immigration as best as they can. And we do remember that poem first they came for the name the target group which is just a distraction and we know how it ends at our own front doors if we don't stand up to it. We did have an autocracy once that was King George. As Hamilton uh says, "You'll come crawling back to me in the song La." British troops could come to your door or my door and take any man, woman, or child, animal, crops, any tools, goods, anything. People didn't like that. So they went to their municipal councils and the municipal councils passed laws, ordinances, resolutions which made it to the county level, to the state level and finally in our constitution as the fourth amendment which as I said ICE continually disobys and it's asking our police to participate in including on their off hours so that they will also participate in being completely unaccountable. And I know that as an RN, I am governed by the State Nurse Practice Act. I identify myself. I have the law looking over my shoulder just as much as the police do. I have to document every single thing I do. And that's a legal document. That's the patient chart belongs to you by the way, your patient chart. Yeah. So,

I would just like to say that I would encourage you very much to participate in our history of our democratic republic and do pass an a resolution in favor of the Immigrant Trust Act. Thank you. Thank you for your comments, folks. Well, I don't wish to cut off your right to speak. If you are beginning to repeat what each of you has said, correct my I am. But please, your name and address, please. Uh, my name is Gabriella Sto. I live at around the corner. Speaking for the mic. The mic, please. Thank you and thank you for allowing us the time to present our concerns and our supports and I appreciate your forbearance for any redundancies but I am a community social worker so policy and community are forefront in my life professionally and personally and I am also a naturalized citizen so are my daughters as such the immigrant trust act It's a very important goal for people like myself to achieve. In 2018, New Jersey Attorney General Rule issued the immigrant trust directive. This was the forebearer of the immigrant trust act that we have all been talking about tonight. It's very important to go back to that because it is the basis of what we're discussing here today. It defined the relationship and responsibilities between local county and state law enforcement and as you heard federal civil immigration authorities including ICE.

It was positive on a policy level on a community level and on a personal level. All this to preserve public safety and quilt immigrant community fears of reprisal or deportation if they step forward to report crimes or domestic abuse to law enforcement. Basically then the directive is a mutual social and safety support system. What it is not is a sanctuary tool. It does not restrict the state from providing assistance to federal immigration authorities in emergencies, nor from complying with judicial warrants, which as you heard are sorely lacking in many cases. No due process. Fast forward to 2025, immigrant communities are faced with serious challenges and threats to their welfare, physicality, privacy, safety, and families. But I would like to point out that so are we. In Monroe, approximately 25% of our population is diverse and far and growing. This is not an issue that will simply disappear and go away. It will just deepen and broaden. Today, we have the opportunity to support the intent of the directive and expand it by adopting a resolution to stand behind the Immigration Trust Act, a bill in the current legislature, as you've heard many a time, which seeks to protect and codify the roles and rights laid out in the directive. We have the opportunity to support the values everyone on the council has alluded to or addressed directly. We need to demonstrate our commitment to our community as well as to the law. We and Monroe are all linked to each other

in one communal effort to safeguard, contribute, and advance our town's helping safety, economy, social fabric, and quality of life. We will not achieve these if we permit any segment of our population to be selected, rooted out, routed, threatened, made to feel fear, and who may be sanctioned arbitrarily or without due process or simply disappeared. How this has become acceptable is beyond comprehension and conscience. We cannot invest nor aid nor rebet such actions. The moral, social, and economic costs are too grave. In the current context, we've learned that not protecting the rights of one group may erode the rights of others and finally affects all of us. What we can do is support our residents, businesses, and our safety. Clarify and protect the peruse of our community resources and law enforcement. stand up for civil liberties and rights is laid out in New Jersey and constitutional systems and promote communal compassion, strength and cohesiveness. Monroe supported the immigration trust act can fulfill these goals and our federal and state responsibilities at the same time. It is absolutely doable. I urge you to issue a resolution backing the immigration trust act and thank you for your consideration. Thank you for your comments. Anyone else wishing to address us? Seeing and hearing none, I'm going to ask for a motion to close the public comment section, please. Motion. Thank you. May I have a second on that? Second. All in favor? I. Any opposed? May I have a motion? Yes. Before we close the meeting, can I make a statement? Of course you can.

First of all, I want to thank each and every one of these people who came forward tonight to express their views and to step forward and show the courage and strength to let their views be known. Um there are so many reasons, many of which were expressed tonight and even other reasons that we didn't have time to listen to every single reason. But I just want to tell you as speaking just for myself as one person, one councilman, I will strongly and unabashedly support the immigration trust acts in any way possible. Thank you. Thank you, Madam President. You're most welcome. May I have a motion to adjurnn? Motion. May I have a second on that motion? Second. And the time is we are adjourned at 8:02. Thanks very much.