Village Council - Regular Meeting

Good. Good evening. This is the village council public workshop. The date is May 6, 2026. The time is 7:34 p.m. Adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by posting on the bulletin board in Village Hall, by mail to the Rididgewood News, the record, and by submission to all persons entitled the same as provided by law of a schedule, including the date and time of this meeting. A notice of this meeting was also posted at ridgewoodj.net. Roll call. Council member Mortimer here. Deputy Mayor Pin here. Council member Whites is not yet present. Council member Winterrad here. Mayor Vajanos

here. Will you all please join us in a salute to our flagg 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. And let's go right to public comment.

Good evening and loving Rididgewood resident. I just wanted to thank uh Mr. Casmark. The third mirror is up in the tunnel. Perfectly placed. Thank you. It It's just great. Thank you very much. Thank you. An Carol Maloney. I'm a Ridgewood resident and I'm a senior citizen and I was asked by Deanna Shabck to please represent some of the people at Hilt to say I understand you're talking about a senior um parking something today. Pass.

Pass. Uh, I I thank you. And I'd just like to say if you would consider our ages, how we need canes to get around. We want to be able to go downtown and park and enjoy. We We're there between 9:15 and maybe 1:30. So, we wouldn't take anybody else's parking space because you're all at work or everybody else is at school. We just want to be able to to go down and not have to find a kiosk and then to have to try. I always can't. The glare is too much or all I can find so many excuses and I don't need to, but I I hope that you all vote in favor of this senior parking permit for us. Thank you.

Thank you, Carol.

David Fine. I live in Woodbine Court. I'm the rabbi at Temple Israel on Grove Street. Uh I understand the council is considering or looking into uh mending uh aspect of the zoning ordinance that affects houses of worship with uh giving more uh latitude uh for us to look for third party tenants. Um our interest is uh in terms of helping us uh to survive in difficult times. Uh it's uh often a uh needed essential uh source of revenue for the houses of worship. uh also allows us to bring in third parties that can help us do the work that we do whether it's a preschool and providing uh space for young children whether it's adult programming, senior programming, educational or social. So uh feel that the uh greater latitude we could have uh to facilitate that process would would uh would certainly be uh would help us and we believe would be in the interest of the village as well. So we're grateful for the attention there. Thank you, Rabbi.

Evening, mayor, deputy mayor, council members. Uh Tom Tom Matthews, Father Tom at Christ Episcopal. Uh just want to express my appreciation as my colleague uh just did for the effort that the council is undertaking to clarify the zoning in a way that reflects how houses of worship of really all shapes and sizes continue to serve communities like Ridgewood today. Houses of worship have long been places where people gather not simply for services once a week, but rather as places where people gather, support families, encourage education, outreach, and of course create spaces where community life uh can flourish. At a time, as you know, when loneliness and isolation have become growing concerns across our society, places that bring people out of their homes and the isolation that is so much a pandemic of today, out into a real community matter now more than ever. And so I appreciate especially your ability to provide some clarity and guidance around educational and related community uses. Early in my ministry, earlier than I like to admit, someone once told me that there's nothing sadder than a house of worship that sits empty between weekly services. And I've never forgotten that. These spaces, after all, are at their best when they are active, welcoming, and filled with community life, filled with learning, service, and of course, connection. In many ways, the effort that you are undertaking recognizes the constructive

role that faith communities continue to play in village life and helps to align the ordinance with those realities. These kinds of flexible, broad community and educational use also help long-standing houses of worship like Davidson and Mine and so many others remain active, well-maintained, and accessible as gathering places that continue serving the broader village of Ridgewood. So, thank you once again for your thoughtful work and service.

Thank you, Father. Cynthia O'Keefe, Ridgewood resident. So, I have been here many times to um talk about artificial turf and the health hazards um that it, you know, brings to communities um especially ours because, you know, honestly, I don't know if there are artificial turf fields next to private wellwater. I'm going to have to do some research. Um I don't believe there are in the state of New Jersey. Um but what I find interesting is um that I still haven't heard any um I guess rationale. I've just heard that this council disagrees. We've got a member of Green Ridgewood here. We have some clergy here. Um and you know, I have been praying to the dear Lord that you guys will change your minds. Um, you know, I mentioned a few um things, you know, in in past instances where, you know, I really consider it willful blindness um or willful negligence because, you know, that microlastic pollution uh is is a thing. It's real. Um, our own deputy mayor has talked about artificial turf being a fossil fuel product and that no um artificial I guess turf vendor will contractually guarantee the absence of the chemicals and the PAS and you're talking about putting it literally feet from private wellwater. We are not on municipal water. We are on private wells that we depend on for our health and our safety. It's our water source. It's our clean water source. And so I think it's willfully negligent. You know what you're doing. You're going to

pretend that it's all okay. And then maybe you'll write a proclamation or a memoriam for one of us if we do get cancer and die or something horrible happens. Maybe we'll get another disease. Um, I don't think you can sit here as a as a, you know, a council mayor and council and talk about Green Ridgewood and how healthy and getting these grants and how wonderful we are. We did the daffodil festival. It's all fun in games until someone gets hurt. Isn't that a saying that we learned when we were very little? I'm also a senior and I heard you mention you were a senior as well and I'd like to live to a ripe old age, but I can't do that if you're going to put impediments in our way. and I'm fighting for my neighborhood. I've been here probably to like several hundred meetings speaking to all of you and you may not answer back and that's fine, but I do pray that you will change your mind because what you're doing is negligent. It's grossly negligent. Um, and to say, "Oh, well, we voted on it, so that's, you know, it's already done." You can change your mind at any time. So, I put on record that I respectfully ask you to change your mind about artificial turf next to private wellwater in Ridgewood on the Shedler property. Thank you.

Thank you, Cynthia. Anyone else? Seeing no one, we'll go to hybrid access. Rurick, you're up. Hi, uh Paul, do you hear me? We do. Yeah, good. Uh, I read a statistic somewhere. Would you just identify Halib village resident?

Thank you. Uh I read a statistic somewhere where an average grass field is used 800 hours a year and the rest of the time it is done for maintenance uh where you apply all sort of chemicals and fertilizers that truly could pollute the groundwater etc. while a artificial turf field is used on average 3,000 hours a year. So you're having a quadrupling of the amount of time that artificial turf fields are used, which means that so many more hours of people getting their exercise, people of all ages, young people, middle-aged people, and older people. So factor in the helpfulness of the use of the field and I think it'll more than counteract any disadvantages to the use of artificial turf. Secondly, once and for all, please stop using wellwater as an excuse not to have an artificial turf because if you're on 17, the there's a good chance your wellwater is polluted anyway with a runoff on 17, especially if you're anywhere close to a business that use chemicals, etc. Now, there's a very easy solution for wellwater. We have Rich with water. Pick up the phone and call Rich Calb. I'm sure he will I can't talk for Rich, but I'm sure he will do more than come up with a plan that makes sense for the rigid water and for the people who who convert. So, this idea of fear-mongering

about wellwater is just ridiculous. Thank you very much. Thank you, Roric. Amy, you're up. I just want to note that Council Member Whites has arrived at the meeting. Thank you. Apologies for being late. All good. Amy,

um Amy McCambridge, Rididgewood residents. Um normally I'm working I got a new job, not with the Maroons, but with um an amazing club whose um girls soccer team actually won counties um sectionals and states. And most of them are multiport athletes. We use grass fields. Um it's it's pretty incredible what's happening there. Um I I do want to talk about I mean you have like a priest I believe there. You have Green Ridgewood there. I want to ask of them like did you think like in your priesthood or what you know I don't know what you do specifically but was it in God's plan for us to mess up and pollute and contaminate what God gave us. He gave us land. He gave us trees. He gave us water. Is it and all of you sitting there on the council are you godly people I believe you are or whatever you believe in. Do you think that this is okay? Was this part of God's plan to put an artificial turf? We live we're supposed to live in a balance um of of life with all species with all nature. This is not fear-mongering. This is real. What legacy are you guys leaving behind? Green Ridge Rididgewood. What legacy are you leaving behind? Not questioning this like crazy questioning this. You are going to wipe away, you know, you talk about the wellwater and Rudolph um or whatever his name is was just talking about, you know, the contaminants off 17. Well, now you're taking away the natural air filtration system that's written in the Ridgewood master plan to allow more, you know, pollution to just come flooding through. And it's not okay. And again, what legacy are you

leaving to these kids? If these kids knew how many like thousands of species will die, the bats that eat thousands of mosquitoes, every species from the ant to the worm to the trees have their purpose. And you are putting us and disconnecting our youth and our communities from that purpose for youth sports. And still to this day, I don't think any of you have contacted a natural fields expert. I can tell you in the town I work with, the the fields are immaculate. Um, they're immaculate. The pressure is not there. And these athletes are doing far better than Rididgewood's athletes, if that's what it comes down to. I'm a professional soccer trainer. what we're doing to these kids on their joints, you know, let alone the impact of, you know, when it's heat and what happens when that heat leeches off the field and they're breathing in. Um, we still don't know what's happening. But if these kids knew, if they knew that you were taking away habitat from those deers, from from all the living life that they probably love, I don't think they would would agree with you. I have young girls, you know.

All right. Um last comment is, you know, um to to Miss Winterrad. Um I just want you I want to invite you to my rescue to see what I do. Um since you had a problem with it and I'll end with that.

Thank you, Amy. Anybody else? Seeing no one, I'm going to close public comment and we'll go right to our managers. Oh, excuse me. I do this every time. I apologize. Would anybody like to respond to any of the commenters this evening? No. I have one comment um for um uh uh Father Matthews and and Rabbi Fine. For those of you who are unfamiliar, they're um the ordinance working group that um Pam and I are uh members of. We work with um staff um our attorney, our manager, planners um and we have been discussing a tweak to an ordinance that would allow houses of worship, just so you understand why they came tonight, uh that would allow houses of worship to utilize private vendors to do those services that they are currently allowed to do themselves. So, for example, they can run a nursery school, but they can't lease the facility out to a nursery school. Um, they can have an they can um do an adult daycare center, but they can't lease it out. And so this is this ordinance that we are reviewing that has not yet made it to the council uh but that we are working on now would change that to allow houses of worship to be able to do this which would allow which would supplement their income because they want to do these as father Matthews said these good works for the community but they don't necessarily have the bandwidth to run different things in there. So that's just just to put it all in context. That's it. Anybody else? No. All good. Then we'll go to our manager report. Keith.

Um, thank you, mayor. Just a few report things to report out tonight and some announcements. First, I want to thank all of our village staff, especially our directors and supervisors in the blue collar space. I especially want to thank Heather and Jennifer and the clerk's office. Last week, we received for the first time in anyone's recollection the platinum safety award from the Bergen Joint Insurance Fund. Uh, traditionally, Ridgewood has received the gold award. Uh, but through the efforts of increased safety training, online training opportunities that our employees have taken advantage of over the last year. Uh, this is the first year that we've reached that elite level. It also has an effect on our insurance premiums through the Bergen GIF. So, I just want to thank all of our employees for participating, all of our directors and supervisors uh for enacting this training to make sure that not only our employees are safe, but by extension that the public remains safe. I want to congratulate RBSA on a tremendous opening day. They were battling some uh inclement weather that morning. Uh but the parade and the festivities here at Vetsfield went off without a hitch. So, I want to congratulate Scott Mueller um and the more than 100 teams that participate in RBSA here in Ridgewood. Two Fridays ago, I had the opportunity to attend a conference at New Jersey Institute of Technology where both Mayor Vagenos and our director of Ridgewood Water, Rich Calby, spoke to a group about treating PAS and about the progress that we've made here in Ridgewood um in effectuating proper treatment and building out the necessary facilities. Um, as most in this room know, we're spending $150 million on PAS treatment. And by this time next year, we'll be able to proudly say that all of the water that is being delivered to all

four communities that Ridgewood Water Services will be properly treated for PAS. Um, the mayor talked a lot about our ability to go and secure federal monies. um along with state appropriations through Assemblywoman Lisa Swain last year to offset the cost um that to offset that $150 million investment. And then Rich shared his expertise, his technical expertise uh with the group assembled on the initiatives here in Ridgewood. I want to also thank and congratulate the Ridgewood Recreation Department along with Green Ridgewood on sponsoring a wonderful daffodil festival and Earth Day fair. Um, apparently the turnout was the largest we can remember and the weather was very cooperative because it was a little dicey going into the day. Uh, but great job, great community event uh, down at Vaness Square. Just to update the community on the Shedler project. Uh, we started to remove dirt yesterday. Um, everything went off relatively smoothly. Uh, we had multiple trucks through the site. Uh, the police department is monitoring the situation. We had representatives from the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection who will be on site for the duration of the project in addition to representatives from Matrix New World Engineering which is our environmental firm who has done all the testing, the delineation and everything that's required to come up with the plan to abate removing uh the soil that's in need of remediation at the site. Uh tomorrow we will have um additional dirt removed. We're going to double the amount of trucks tomorrow. We eased in to the rotation to make sure that we had enough space. Um they're staging further south on Route 17. They'll be able to access the site by the end of the day tomorrow. They'll be able to do a complete turnaround without having to back in and out of the site and the police will regulate all access uh to

the site by any of the dump trucks uh that come onto the property. I just want to update everyone on our grants for 2026. Um, as you know, it's the beginning of May and already this year, the village of Ridgewood has been awarded $1,235,000 in grant money uh primarily for lead service line replacements at Ridgewood Water. Um, but also for water and sewer improvements uh through the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs legislative appropriation process. Um, and we also have a technical assistance grant for energy efficiency here in the municipality. Even more importantly are the grants that are pending that have been written in the first quarter of 2026 that total over $5.6 million in pending awards. 5.6 million.

I just love hearing that come out of your mouth. That's fantastic.

So, we get a report every month. Um, we we tallied it up and did the math, but I think it's worth noting for the public uh that we are aggressively pursuing every source of funding possible to offset the burden on our taxpayers here in Ridgewood. I also uh want to give a shout out to the Ridgewood Fire Department. Yesterday morning, uh I was actually coming in early uh to head over to Shedler as we were starting that project and there was a report of a working house fire over in the lawns. Um I want to thank Chief Judge and his crew for their quick action. I also want to thank a neighbor um who saw smoke coming from the house. Um but most importantly, and this really is a public service announcement, um four lives were saved in that house yesterday morning because of working smoke alarms. Um and Carol Balcowski, our communications director, and I had a conversation today. Um that is actually going to be our lead item in our newsletter that goes out on Friday. It is so important that we have active um smoke detectors, carbon tax detectors in our homes to be able to prevent tragedy. But through the efforts of a lot of quick thinking yesterday morning, um both life and property were saved. The village launched its downtown parking survey this week. Um, if you are frequenting the central business district, whether you live there, whether you work there, or whether you visit there, um, we are asking everyone to take part in filling out this survey. It takes about 10 to 15 minutes to complete. You can find the survey on the village website as well as links from our social media pages and our my Rididgewood app. Uh, the survey closes on Friday, March May 22nd. Uh we encourage everyone who lives or owns a business to participate in this. All this information will be called, gathered and shared with Walker um who are is our consulting firm who is doing a comprehensive downtown Rididgewood parking review and study. We also

recently announced that the Motor Vehicle Commission mobile unit will be here in the Village Hall parking lot on May 28th. All New Jersey residents, not just Ridgewood residents, can begin scheduling appointments tomorrow, May 7th, at 11:00 a.m. These services include Real ID licenses, license plate returns, registration transfers, registration renewals, and replacement titles and registrations. Online registration for grade and pool and the tennis and pickle ball courts began on April 1st. You can still register through community pass and pool badges can be picked up on Saturday, May 9th or May 16th from 10 to 12 at the Graden Pool office. As a reminder, the two-day per week irrigation schedule is in effect. Odd numbered addresses for irrigation are Tuesday and Saturday. Even numbered addresses for irrigation are Wednesday and Sunday. The senior bus has expanded its services. Our new hours are 8:00 a.m. to 300 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday. If you have a medical appointment or need to go to the grocery store or want to stroll around the mall, call my office and speak to Beth Spanado at 2011-670500 extension 223 to make a reservation. The bus will be going to Shopright in Whiteoff on Wednesdays weekly. The last day to register to vote for the primary election is this coming Tuesday, May 11th, at the Rididgewood Public Library. the lobby there will be um you'll be able to sign up to register to vote between 4:30 and 900 pm um on that day after village hall closes. Uh before that you can sign up in the clerk's office during regular business hours.

May 11th is a Monday. May 12th. Did I say the 11th? Yes.

My bad. May 12th, this Tuesday, nine o'clock is the registration deadline. There will be a tree dedication for Ronald Fiser, who was fatally injured on the job 30 years ago. The tree dedication will be held on May 12th at 400 p.m. at Habernickl Park. The public is welcome to attend this dedication ceremony with the family. Touch a truck day will take place on Thursday, May 14th from 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at Vaness Square. Take a seat behind the wheel of a real police car, climb aboard a shiny firet truck, or explore up close the DPW fleet and other emergency vehicles here in the village. The Ridgewood Chamber of Commerce spring fling sale days will take place on Thursday, Mar May 14th through Saturday, May 17th from 10 to 6 while businesses are open. Please come down and shop in the CBD. Project Pride Planting Day is Saturday, May 16th, begins at 7:45 with a rain date of Sunday, May 17th. The committee is looking for volunteers. It's a 2 to three hour commitment on that Saturday morning. Please contact council member Winterrad if you'd like to participate. And finally, upcoming V Village village council meetings. May 13th is a public meeting. May 27th is a work session. June 3rd is a work session. June 10th is a public meeting. June 24th is a work session. all begin at 7:30 p.m. And at the May 13th meeting, it is anticipated that we will adopt the 2026 municipal budget. That's all I have. Mayor,

thank you, Keith. Let's go to our council reports. Frank, with a touch of truck, Keith, is it limited to kids or can council members go too? Listen, you're the truck guy. Not only you're the you're the Bman, but you're the truck guy. So,

yeah. I want to start by talking about the daffodil festival because it was wonderful and um that's why Nancy Bigos is the director of parks and wreck because every year she brings sunshine. Last year I forgot to put in the request for no wind and this year she delivered. So and it's real for me it's such a a great event since I've been doing this since 2012 participating there at Vanest and to see it grow every year is phenomenal. Um, and then what's also great is just everyone's pretty much happy there and it's just it was packed like to you you said it correctly, Keith, but you still underestimated how it was packed and we went this was we started a half an hour early and there were people there from the very beginning to the very end and it was just a wonderful event and so I was really stoked my uh now for my council reports I parks and wreck met um and the important thing I wanted to share is that the shade The sun shades at Grad and Pool have been delivered. They're in already installing them. So, they got to get that checked out. And then also the playground and pavilion equipment at King's Pond has been delivered. So, it's just nice to see that moving along. And uh also on May 12th at 7 p.m. is a art um reception at the library. The Older Americans Community Art Showcase, which will feature um artists from around there. And at 7:00 p.m. on the 12th is a reception for that. So I hope to see everybody there. And that concludes my report. Mayor,

thanks Frank Siobhan.

Sure. So um I have a couple announcements. So um Access had a wonderful event at Puzos. We're thankful to them and everybody who attended. And our next event is going to be at Parisa East. So, um, for those of you who have never attended, Access runs a monthly dinner, um, catering to the Access community, more so kids with sensory issues, um, neurode divergent kids, um, going out with their family. It's it's really, really hard. So, we have partnered with Main Street, the restaurants take an off night, take the noise down, the staff becomes more familiar, and we have first responders there. Um, you know, alopment is a big issue for neurode divergent child. So, the more that our police and fire know them, the better and stronger the community is. This will be our last dinner for this school year. Um, so if anybody wants to attend, it's a wonderful event. It's beautiful. You get to meet a lot of your friends and your neighbors and you get to see how a basic night out is a real treat for families with kids who have neurode divergence issues. Um,

Sioban, what's the date of that? I missed. It's May 19th. It's Tuesday. Yeah.

Just Teresa East has amazing food, by the way. We um we also have an access meeting coming up next week and the deputy mayor is going to be running that and we are going to be discussing activities for special needs community that as a social activity and we're centering around the idea of possibly bowling. So if anybody's interested in that, those meetings are all on Zoom to make them very accessible and because I will be attending a graduation, Pam will be running that. Um, I wanted to let everybody know in the community that PG at the high school is running their I think this is the fourth year there are signs. So, our signal department, um, the first year that Evan and I took our seat, a hundred street signs went missing, which caused a lot of chaos, right? Because no one knew where they were going and it also created a a really big expense and we found out that it was sort of a high school prank to steal the signs. So, we have partnered with PG, which is Project Graduation, and we sell the signs, and they're awesome, and you can contact the high school and Jamie Kitty, and I always say it's great because it benefits PG. It helps us keep our signs, sort of thwarts any theft, and it's it's now looking like it's a tradition at Ben. So, we're very excited about that. Um, I too wanted to thank Daffodil Fest, and I want to thank Green Ridgewood, Pam, and Frank. Um, obviously, Shade Tree had two tables. We gave away hundreds of whips. Um this year we potted them and they went very very well. People are very um warm on the idea at Daffodil Fest of a flowering tree. So we were left with quite a few swamp oaks, but we were everybody who took the others was very happy. I just want to echo the sentiment that it's an awesome day and we were really grateful to our students and the shade tree commission who made it happen and of course my fellow council members. I also had the pleasure of attending College Club of North Jerseys author lunchon yesterday where um we heard Ala

Jooshi speak. It's wonderful. And there is uh an unsubstantiated unfact check that Rididgewood New Jersey may have the oldest book club in New Jersey and I'm going to go with it and say that's a fact. But um I want to thank College Club and the speaker. um they've been benefiting local women and making college um very affordable for hundreds and hundreds of women. It was an awesome speaker and her next book out is called six days in Bombay. Um we had a fields committee yesterday morning at 8 a.m. Um it was very very productive. Uh Keith already updated on um RBSA. I do want to mention that this coming weekend is lacrosse day. it's slightly different and we're grateful to our partners um in lacrosse team because the scoreboard, you know, all the donations and they're very excited. We also discussed that on Memorial Day if you're in town, it will be the annual Memorial Day run. If you're not a runner, you can walk it. If you're not into any of that, you can volunteer at it. And we had an update on our World Cup watch party. Um, as many of you are aware, the World Cup is a big deal in the world, but it's a big deal in the state of New Jersey because Metife Stadium exists here. Um, and we are going to be hosting two World Cup watch parties. One in Vaness Square, which will benefit the vendors, and that's very exciting. They're all team USA, so they'll be later because the USA plays in California, and the other one will be out here on Vetsfield to kick off um the Father's Day tournament for the Maroons. Um, and one more thing, I too just wanted to give a a shout out. Yesterday, I was able to attend the site visit for Shedler since the remediation effort went. I do want to say it was um very well coordinated. I'm very grateful to the people who've taken the time to factor many things in and to our engineering, to our professional staff, and the police. If anybody should have any concerns during the remediation process, please reach out. We are taking

them all seriously. And I just want to thank the outside vendors, Keith, and our professional staff for making that first step happen. And I think that's it. Thanks, Siobhan. Evan,

yeah, I'll be quick. Um, so first, last Friday I got to attend the Art Institute fundraiser with the mayor who promptly stole my gig of being the guy that calls out the number as I've done in previous years, but Paul usurped me, but more importantly, they made some money for a wonderful cause, which which uh certainly is more important than my ego. Um, I also got to attend the RBSA parade. Um, got to present Scott Muller with um a proclamation on behalf of this council um celebrating the RBSA and thanking the RBSA for all they do for our kids. And then finally, I got to spend some quality time with Frank at Council Chat uh last Saturday. Um as many of you know, once a quarter, two of us uh hold residency in the room next door. We sit there for two hours. We uh hear from folks from the public who want to come in. Um I have to say I this is my third year in change here and I've done it several times. Would love if more people would come out. Not that I didn't enjoy the conversation, Frank, but um it's really great opportunity to get the ear of at least two council people. um we take copious notes and we generally get a lot of stuff done and hearing from the public is really a privilege. So the next time um we do it would encourage all of you to consider showing up.

Thanks Se and by the way they made more money when I was hosting it. So just a second Pam.

Thanks. Um first I want to thank our village attorney Matt Rogers for doing a park walk for the open space committee at Dunham Trail a couple of weeks ago. Um it was very well attended and Matt is a wealth of knowledge of everything that's there and uh I really enjoyed it. So did my husband. Um want to thank everybody who is involved with green with um the daffodil festival earth fair. That's the uh Green Rididgewood Green Team, the Conservancy for Rididgewood Public Lands, and also the parks department and Project Interact, the high school kids who came and helped. Um, and thank you for letting me lead the dog parade. Uh, that was really funny. Also, I wanted you to know that the three winners of the scavenger hunt um did take possession of their prizes, which were um an electric mower, an electric blower, and a rake with grass seed. Um, and let's see. Uh, I think I've mentioned before that the parks department is partnering with the New York New Jersey trail conference to um maintain trails in our parks and do a better job of that. And uh today I went for a reconnaissance walk with two of the supervisors of this project and um the representative from the trail conference through Kings Pond and down towards Gypsy Pond. And for that we are going to have um a project on October 5th. If you would like to volunteer and help, you can sign up. Uh I believe it's on the

village website, uh where you can sign up for the um two upcoming uh dates. One is for Kings Pond October se uh 5th as I said, also for Grove Park. That's going to be June, excuse me, July 12th. And um they're from 10 to 2. So, you have to bring your lunch. You all and you do have to sign up in advance. Uh, it teaches you learn how to um uh uh establish the blazes for trails so that people know where the trails are and to stay on the trails. Also, you're you're trimming back the overgrowth so so people know where the trails are, where to walk. You're not going off the trail. Um you're a and for the maintainers, we do need people to take say a mile, maybe even just a quarter of a mile of a trail to um go after a storm and see what needs to be fixed. Is there erosion? Uh are trees down that need to be removed? You're not responsible for actually removing the trees. you're responsible for reporting it up through the chain of command and they will get a sawyer to come remove the trees. Um, but you are trimming, you are looking for things like um the the uh mountain uh the mountain bike um ramps that kids build in the middle of a trail, which are not just a tripping hazard, but they're also really bad for the ecology. Um, one thing I learned today in the reconnaissance is when you walk off a trail and then you come back to the

trail, you're bringing those invasive seeds and stuff into you're just spreading them all over. So, one way to combat that is boot brushes. And if you have boot brushes at the head of a trail, then people can get that off their shoes. And so I thought that would be a good a good project for um for Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts. Uh so let's see. Another thing that's happening is the James Rose House tomorrow is having um a clean up and spruce up uh 10 to 4:00 session for volunteers who would like to plant and clean up the James Rose House for their opening this spring. If you don't know what the James Rose House is, take a look. It's a beautiful gem of history in Rididgewood on Rididgewood Avenue. Um, the Rotary AM Club in Ridgewood is having a firebox painting session in September. That's September 12th at 9:00 a.m. That's a Saturday. And they invite other people to join us if you would like. Uh the fireboxes are those things that stand around Rididgewood. They have a a red box at the top which has the word Gamewell on it and they are a very quick way to notify the fire department if you see a fire. In fact, it's the fastest way to get uh an engine to a fire. And I bring that up because of uh what Keith mentioned about the house fire in the lawns. um planning board met last night and we went over the zoning board's annual report. I won't me I won't go through their comments here because we're talking about the zoning

board's report later tonight. Um but we also did discuss the sidewalk display ordinance that was introduced last month uh ordinance 4096. And in general, the members of the planning board were very positive about our introduced ordinance. There were no negative comments about it at all. There, one person mentioned that he was glad to see that um that retailers will be treated equally with uh the restaurants in use of the sidewalks. Um, one member of the planning board said it would be helpful if the village council whenever it sends an ordinance over to the planning board for its comments to give them an idea of the financial impact that the ordinance will have on the municipality. So, I just bring that to your attention. Um, and let's see. That's all I have. Thank you.

Great. Thanks, Pam. Um, I only have um one item, which is um the community center advisory board that is spearheading the uh renovation of our first floor here in Village Hall to provide for senior center is having a tour and fundraiser on June 11th at 5:00. The fundraiser is only $25. I urge everyone to attend. Come and see what our um our new senior center is going to look like. Um make us make the small donation. Um it's goes to a very very worthy cause. So again, that's June 11th at 5:00. And then last but not least, um this Sunday, as we all know, is Mother's Day. Let's all be grateful for our moms and for the the women in our lives who have given so much to their families, to our community, and I wish every mother in the community a wonderful, wonderful Mother's Day with your families. And with that,

Paul, but I think that you forgot the the big hook about the um fundraiser. Wine and cheese. Wine and cheese. There will be wine. You can come and get $25 worth of wine and cheese. So, be sure now to attend. Thank you, Frank. You could combine them. Buy your mother a ticket to the wine and cheese.

Where would we be without this council? They are they are amazing. Absolutely amazing. They think of everything. Um, and with that, we will go to our regular agenda. We have a the annual update and presentation uh by Green Ridgewood, David Refkin, who puts in a tremendous amount of time. David, come on up. Um, he he is um all environmental all the time. So, David, it's a pleasure to have you here tonight. It is what it is. Would you make sure that your microphone is on green light? Good.

Okay. Thanks for the opportunity to be here for the annual Green Ridgewood update. We appreciate all your support. uh we have a lot to go through tonight so I will speak quickly. So uh each year we talk about what we accomplished in the previous year and what our goals are for 2026. Um so as we look at 2025 uh one of the major things we did was working with Columbia University on a study the initial focus which was transforming the Saddle River County Park into a model of sustainability. We'll talk more about most of these later on in the presentation. Um and then implementing the flooding recommendations, the 20 recommendations that we provided about uh two years ago and also applying for a NJ climate resiliency grant which was $1.7 million. It was not successful, but there's another opportunity. Uh we've started efforts to understand the energy usage of all of our village facilities here. The school district has has done that also. Uh we'll talk more about that. uh we we were trying to learn what the public health issues are around gas powered leaf blowers as well as what the economics the efficiencies and all the other challenges around that subject. Talk more about that. Um we also had uh a joint project with parks and recreation that we started last year for the first time. We worked together on three rain gardens. Uh just last weekend there was some more work that went on at two of the rain gardens. It was really a very successful effort. Uh and we've also been working with the board of education sharing knowledge, developing relationship with the board members and coordinating our efforts. That's been a real a real positive this year. They have a sustainability committee at the board of ed. And uh last year our our uh theme for the earth daffodil festival earth fair was H2 optimize uh which was very timely because while we are going to talk mostly about flooding tonight, in fact we're in the midst of a really awful drought. Our rainfall over the

last 20 months is down 30%. Really worried about fires this summer. Uh hopefully we'll get some more rain later this week. Uh and then we do a quarterly newsletter now. I think we've had eight or 10 editions of that that have come out. And we also rebuilt our website. So, uh a lot got done in 2025. And now turning to what our focus is now in 2026. Um we are very actively involved in trying to find regional solutions to minimize flooding. Um, I've said too many times that the Saddle River does not know where where Rididgewood ends and where Glenrock begins or where Hocus ends and Rididgewood begins. This is a regional county really statewide and beyond issue. Uh, and there's also now a second round of climate resiliency grant that has come out, more to come. Um, we uh we're trying to learn as much as we can about gas powered leaf blowers. uh what other communities have done including attending a session down in Maplewood earlier uh late last year and finding the appropriate balance between issues around efficiency and staffing. So talking with people uh who work for the for the village to understand what the challenges there might be. We've been assisting with an expanded food scrap collection program uh in that um we've also been developing recommendations and this will be ongoing. It's a real work in progress about how we can save energy and save money. As we all know, electricity rates have skyrocketed. Uh oil and gas right now is very expensive. Diesel, oh my god, $6 a gallon. Anything we can do to reduce our energy usage. So, we are we've we've received a lot of information, we're working on turning that into how can it help all of you when you put together the 2027 budget. Uh the green team uh under the leadership of Jerry Atwood is now organizing its efforts for our next round of New Jersey sustainability certification that's just kicking off. And uh yes, we were so lucky with the

weather. We were worrying for too many days, but it did stop raining at about 5:00 a.m. and we had a wonderful daffodil festival Earth Day fair. Our theme was sustainable yards and uh it was great. the scavenger hunt. We had kids and adults running all over the place trying to get all their stickers so that they could enter the contest for the giveaways. And one of the things that we do as part of this is the elementary schools have an art contest. This is the uh number one winner, Olivia Wong from the fifth grade at Ridge. Uh there was so many great posters to look at and what we do is uh we put them up all around the village in storefronts so that people can get to see how involved our young people are and how concerned they are about the health of our planet. So changing gears now uh let's talk a bit about our flooding challenges. Um, so as you know, 20 recommendations two years ago, we were implementing many of those recommendations and there's plans to do a lot more, which is really exciting. Uh, but I'm going to focus tonight on goal number six, explore Bergen Countywide solutions up and downstream. And this has been uh a challenging one. So the first part of this was we did a second study with Columbia University in 2025 uh with their uh with their their students in the SUMA program and it initially focused on transforming the Saddle River County Park into a model of sustainability. And I I enjoy telling the students regularly this is a 577 acre park more than twice the size of that little park called Riverside across the street from your university. This park's a big deal and it is in serious econom in serious ecological decline. There's flooding, there's lack of funding. If you go there and walk walk along, especially in the Ridgewood part of the park and see what's going on along the stream, it's quite concerning. One of the things this that we learned was that the county has only a general operating and capital budget for the parks. They don't break it out by park.

There's also not a person responsible for the Saddle River County Park. Um, and I will say that the the spending per capita in Bergen County versus Mars and Essex County is substantially lower than those other two counties. So, uh, as part of this process, we included all the six communities that had joined the Saddle River County Park and they were all interviewed and this was great because we developed relationships with the towns up and downstream. Um, I've been back to for presentations with Pamis, Glenrock, and Rochelle Park. um and we've learned about what they're doing and sometimes it's different than what we're doing sometimes it's different issues but they have their own innovative solutions so some of the key findings so I should say we just share knowledge and we develop solutions together so some of the key findings for the six adjoining towns and these are these are rather incredible in the six towns there are 7.2 2 billion dollar of at risk real estate. Four billion of that is Pamis. About 800 million of that is Rididgewood. Countywide 72 billion dollar of property at risk. There's a real worrisome pending insurance crisis as insurers are either leaving the county, jacking up their rates, or if you have to go to national flood insurance, the most you can get back is $250,000. Try building a house in Bergen County for $250,000. You can't. So here's the headline. Bergen County is the number one at risk county in the United States for flood risk. And people say to me, "How could that be?" Well, the reasons are we are largely paved over. We have a incredible amount of very valuable, especially commercial real estate right down Route 17. It's a floodway. When you're going down Route 17, that's that's the the heart of it. And and trust me, Saddlebrook, Rochelle Park, Loi, those communities are have really really big problems. So, uh, also emergency preparedness is not where it should be. We were rated number 709 out of a thousand in this study. And, um, and you know, we had a recent Bergen

County hazard mitigation plan that was done and that kind of raises questions about about, uh, you know, what what what shape are we in to really deal with some challenges. Uh, and just as this came out, the first round of the NJ climate resiliency grant came out and unfortunately we did not get that funding. So, one of the things that happened after we found out in December, we did not get the funding was the communities along the river felt, you know, we want to make sure we have a voice. We want to work together. We want to make sure that there's we heard there was another grant application coming. We want to make sure we're ready, that we do a good job this time. So, you can see who the communities are. Paramis was not included in the first round. Paramis will be included in the second round. And also we organized a meeting right here on March 14th and hosted it and it included those towns as well as the Hackinack Rivereper and the Payic River Coalition, two important NOS's. Um, I will say that the Bergen County effort in the first round was not as well executed as it should have been and this group decided that we wanted to work together on a new application that incorporates both feedback that we got from D that we requested as well as the OPER request that we put through and we got some very valuable feedback there so we know how we can improve upon this and Rididgewood will will be organizing the individual town responses to make sure that they're consistent. We're in the middle of that right now. So um the Saddle River Watershed Alliance which we are is an ad hoc group right now. It's nothing formal but we are all talking together and the goal here is to develop a grassroots enduring organization to give us a consistent voice as we develop solutions to minimize flooding. Um and Captain Bill Sheen who's well known from the Hackinack Rivereper he brought up the subject of a storm water utility. Uh we put that on hold for now. We know that there's a lot of issues and concerns about that but that issue was thrown out. I just wanted to mention that April 20th we had another zoom

call. We brought Lodi into the conversation. Uh Loi between the tidal poseic river flowing in one direction and the hack and the and the saddle river flowing in the other direction has some huge challenges. The group is uh has worked really well together. Uh as I said we're developing the applications that that make sure they're consistent. That was one of the criticisms from D and we've been having numerous discussions with with Pam, with the mayor, with Keith and uh I thank you for all your help with that. So, there is now a new grant application that just came out and it was released on April 21 and it's it has to be filed by June 7th. It's a lot of money, 2 to $350,000 for each one of the regions. So that includes all the towns, at least $150,000 for the two community- based organizations, and then additional funding of up to $2 million for D for procured consultant teams to develop the solutions, the specific answers that we need to minimize flooding. That's a start to addressing the challenges that we have. Uh having underserved communities is something that the state is looking for too. So uh it's helpful to have other communities including Loi as part of that. Um so we're working together to develop these uh regional um team member applications. Um and the Hackinack Rivereper and Pac River Coalition have agreed to be the CBOS. I guess I said that already. And now um we're starting our interactions with Bergen County concerning who will be the prime, how does that all work, and how do we partner with the other seven communities. So I wanted to mention two other key initiatives. Um, and the first one is two-stroke gas powered leaf blowers. And the issue here is that we have public health concerns, we have economic concerns, and as with all kinds of sustainability challenges, how do you balance those? So, the public health concern is that is that two-stroke gas

powered leaf blowers are very loud that they're over 100 dB and that's a logarithmic scale. So, they're really loud. And the air pollution based on studies from edmonds.com and others either half an hour or one hour is equal to driving an F-150 truck from Florida to Alaska in terms of the emissions. So the emissions coming out of these two-stroke gas leaf blowers are a lot. We learned that Maplewood and Montlair actually banned a two-stroke car leaf blowers and they put together a forum which four of us went down to to learn what what they did there and how that's working. Um, some of some of us have talked about it'd be nice if there was state legislation and state legislation is at a standstill right now. So, having had multiple discussions with park and wreck on the subject, talking with Keith a lot about this, we understand that there's a need for efficiency that the current inventory of leaf blowers has to be assessed. Uh, there's staffing issues as there are economic issues. So, what we've arranged is a meeting for our DPW department and the Maplewood DPW department to talk with each other and to learn from the actual operators what's going on, what's working, what's not working, how what are the efficiencies, and let's let's talk and see if there's something here that uh that makes sense. And that meeting is been rescheduled twice. I think it's in a couple of weeks. And then uh last on food scrap collection, there's a new state law in the lame duck session that said that the state mandates a 50% reduction in food waste by 2035. This is a hard lift. This is not easy. The good news is Rididgewood is far and away in leadership position within Bergen County on this. We have 300 homes. We're expanding to 800 homes. We're going to be adding from two to four uh drop off locations. Every other town keeps on saying, "Ridwood, what are you doing? we want to we want to copy what you're doing. And I'm proud to say that Green Ridgewood uh basically used our proceeds from the Earth Day Fair and we financed one of the new drop off containers.

So, how does this all happen? Um there's just a great group of volunteers that I work with who are really dedicated. Here's the group of them. Uh Jerry leading the green team, Justin charge of communications and green building. Peter, thank you for being here tonight. who heads resource management and conservation, so dealing with issues like leaf blowers, food scraps, and other things. Uh, and then Jane who handles finances for us. Um, it's just a great group of people. We meet not only monthly, but most of these subcommittees have Zoom calls in between our meetings. And, uh, there's a group of us, um, at the Earth Day Fair. It's actually about half of us. Um, obviously somebody in a straw hat stands out, but I guess that was right after the Daffy Dog parade. So, um, thank you all for your support. Um, and if there are any questions, comments, suggestions, happy to answer them. David, thank you so much. You are tireless in your efforts um at helping um Ridgewood protect its environment and the surrounding communities. Um, and I know we've had many discussions. Some of them get a little heated, which is which is great because you're so passionate about this and and we appreciate your leadership on this council. Do you do does anybody have any questions or comments for David?

I only have one comment. So, everything Paul said, thank you for everything and to all the people on your team. Um because Rich is here, I always wonder um when we're trying to achieve a higher status like from bronze to silver if we've partnered with Richard Water to include some of the cool stuff they're doing and if that would be allowed because you know Richard Water is our utility and there's some fairly progressive things going on there that might be advantageous to grants and you know I'm literally seeing Rich right behind you. So, we can talk about it offline, but I would really love to see us reclaim silver. And I've been sending Jerry everything from the other committees and awesome. But that would be a real big goal, I think, for all five of us this year because then we'd get even more grants with that status.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, we're uh we're really gearing it up. Um actually uh um New Jersey sustainable New Jersey certification has kind of been delayed a year because they're reprogramming it, reprogramming everything. But we're working right now on this even though we won't really apply until 2027. But yeah, we should be including what Ridgewood Water does. Yeah. And you can Jerry I sent her like I thought we missed it and then I heard it had been delayed. I was like yes and then I was really thinking there's some novelty going on over there. So you guys should connect and if it works and we can include it, it would just make it even more impressive. Okay, good. Thanks.

Um I was thinking along the same lines. However, I learned that if you are required to, for instance, um get rid of POS in your water by law, you can't get credit for it under sustainable Jersey. Similarly, with uh lead service line replacements, we're required to do that by law. So, you cannot get sustainable Jersey credit for those things, unfortunately. Even if we're way ahead of virtually everybody in the state. Exactly. I mean, again, we can you just get cleaner water, right? And we can there's also and you're going to have to be happy with that,

but there's things that Ridg Water is doing for drought conservation like leak detection, things that are outside of other things. I'm telling you, I think it's going to be a good combination.

Um, I uh I also want to say that we have a uh Green Ridgewood Green Team meeting coming up this Thursday. It's of course open to the public. We cover lots of different topics. Um the students from Ridgewood High School are always there reporting on what they're doing also. And um uh I also wanted to say that we have at one open one opening on Green Ridgewood and another opening on Green Team. And if you would like to apply the deadline for that is Heather 15th.

May 15th. Yes. The application form is online if you go under the clerk's department. Uh you can find that form online. It's a very simple form to fill out. And if you're vaguely interested, come to this week's meeting and see what it's all about. Anybody else? Yeah, David that um as you said that was you got a lot of um interactions with people at the daffodil festival and I'm just curious that with project thousand acres which is to engage the residents for those that don't know so they can do different green oriented things in their own yard. How close are we to a thousand acres?

Good question. I think we're about 40% of the way there. Uh we have to check. We'll take a look and see if people signed up, you know, at the Earth Fair. But, uh, I think we're blessed. I heard about 40%. So, we have a way to go. Yeah. Because I and I what I like about for people that don't know, it's it's that you get to pledge to do different green things in your own yard. And so, that way it really engages the all the residents. What I what I especially like about it is it's it's a menu. So it's not that you're required to do everything because when it comes to being green, people have different priorities and then the priorities can fit what you want to do in your own yard, right? Yeah. I think uh you need to commit to five out of 10. Yeah. So it has 10 and it's not Yeah.

Yeah. So thank you. And this is slow-mo May month and if you need a a sign for your lawn and you want to be part of it, um I have an extra. And Frank, where are the rest of them? That you can pick it up at the library, at the reference desk, and also at the stable. And we did the library, so it's after hours. So you don't have if you can after work, you can just stop by everybody. Good. Thank you, David. Thank you so much. Really appreciate your efforts. And let's go to our regular agenda. Keith,

mayor, at this time, I'd like to invite Rich Calby, our director of Ridgewood Water, up to go over his items. And also as Rich is coming up, if the council could pull C12, which is under budget, we're actually going to discuss that under Richard Border as well. Rich, that's the supplemental for the I bank finance. 9C12. 9C12. I'll go over it. Okay. Yeah, I don't have a copy of that chart. No worries. Here, I'll give you mine. I'll look on. This looks like four. Welcome, Rich. Good evening.

This is the expensive part of the night in case anybody wanted to know. No, it's not not not so much tonight. Only only low seven figures tonight, Rich or

there's three items for water tonight. Um then I don't know there are a couple of sanitation items too if you want me to cover those while I'm here as well. Um so on on the rigid water side of things, the first item um 982 uh is the recommendation to approve a change order, change order number one for the lead service line replacement contract with Revax. Um this is u mainly associated with overages in the allowances that were put in the contract mostly for traffic control, police traffic control throughout the four towns for all the replacements. an average of about $501,000. So, it's change order number one, total amount of $433,333 because there are some decreases in road opening permits. And that'll bring the Revox contract up um by about 13.3% to 3,686,983. Everybody good? I I just want to say Richard that because I had my house done that this was great that they are so efficient as it's like a NASCAR uh crew just working to replace the pipeline. Um and then just for the traffic control and thankfully our Richard police helps with that. Um but it's just it's been going extremely smooth I would say and I thank you that this vendor and your team.

Thank you. Hey Rich, I know it's only 13% um but it's like 300 somehat thousand. What what's the main driver for the increase? The main driver is um traffic control, police, traffic directors, and we have no control over that. They dictate whether or not they want police out there for the opening in the street because they have they have a big digger, so they have to go through the street. So, they have to close it for that reason. And there was no way to anticipate that. We anticipated $200,000, but it actually spent $71,000. I think it's a conversation for the police because we have to go by their request. No, I'm not saying we shouldn't do it. I'm just wondering next time maybe we think about it more. But

yeah, we never anticipated it would be that that much.

Uh the next item is uh recommendation for final payment and closeout on one of the PAS projects. This is actually the first close out. This is for a raw water main project. It's actually contract number two. Um this was an expedited contract to complete water manes mainly in Midland Park um to get ahead of some county and local paving. So the recommendation is to close out the project in the final amount of 650,000 $48.16. This is fortunately below what the project was awarded for at $673,938. Uh so it's recommendation to close out and issue the final payment to the the contractor on the ground utilities.

Everybody good? Yep. Thanks for coming in under budget. Yes, it's always good. And the the last item and this is coming from the You want you want me to do this, Rich? Yeah, if you don't mind. Thank you.

No worries. So, if if you recall um a few meetings back in April, uh we appropriated another $4 million uh for the construction of um two of the treatment plants. Um we need to adopt a subsequent resolution which is attached uh for the construction loan phase 4. Um this is to satisfy the requirements of the construction loan financing program through the I bank. So, this is from from Bob Rooney. Uh, but it outlines in the, uh, packet that you have, um, why this needs to be done. Um, and again, we've done all of our financing for these POS projects through the I bank. Um, and this will keep us in compliance with their requirements. Everybody good? Yep.

Let's go. Rich, thank you very much. Wait a minute. What about um the emergency 20-in valve? Did we talk? That was pulled. Um, but it should be coming back at a subsequent meeting. Yeah. All good. Yep.

So, do you wanna do you want to stick around? And actually, James, if you'll come forward, we're going to run through these. So, and they're not grouped together. So, um let's go to B, which is parking. And this is the establishment of the senior parking program in the central business district. Um Matt put this resolution together after researching the statute. So, Matt, do you want to give uh the highlights on this one? No, just the the concern of the council that they did everything they could. Excuse me, Matt. Microphone.

Get carried away here for a second. Um there was a concern of the council uh to do what they could to help seniors in the central business district and give them uh priority access with regard to a program that was set up by the state um to schedule certain permits for this um for this purpose. So, uh, by resolution, uh, the council was able to set up this program. Um, in reviewing this before tonight, um, when I s got the packet, I did send to Heather back on Wednesday a form of the resolution that really had the age threshold at 60 instead of 65. I think that's what the council wanted. That's

I went through the notes. It was 65. If they want to change it, that's up to them. Oh, the one I sent you on Wednesday the 29th was 60. So that's actually Can we ask That's one of my questions. What is the legal definition for age of a senior citizen? And well that's different than what the program's about. So well do we is there an actual like legal answer? Because sometimes people say I'm a senior that means I'm over 55 and then there's different payouts 60 to 62. The statute says 60. The statute that allows the senior parking priority says 60. So you can set up the threshold down to 60. So

okay. So can we talk about that now or can I jumping? So I do I do think we need to talk about the age because I was surprised to see 65. Um we had had discussions about this and it was going to be 60 and that's what I had sent over. But we can just make the change because it's a resolution doesn't have the same uh requirements that an ordinance does. if you make a substantive change. So, we can amend it to say 60 if that's where the council is. And um but we can do either. You can do either. Yeah. I just want to say for the record, the the larger you make, the more money

the more money we lose. So, the the the more eligible participants, and I'm not saying it should be 60 or 65, that's a council decision, but the more people you include in the program, it will have an effect on year-end parking revenue. I mean my first question was like you know how we legally you say this is this so what is this what age do we all think a senior in Rididgewood is for this exemption well at the ordinance working group as Heather said we talked about 65 and I am in favor of 65 that was in my notes as well yeah and and I'll tell you the reason I'm in favor of 65 the the impetus

well if it's 60 I still qualify but but I I think the issue is that we are trying to encourage seniors to stay to have a to have a to to not have to move out of town because it get it gets so expensive. And not that there's a retirement age, you know, it's different for everybody, but many people at 60 are still working. Me more are not working at 65. And so we're trying to help people stay um in town and we're trying to give them reasons to stay. again the the senior center in uh on the first floor here. We're trying to do a whole bunch of things, a suite of uh of programs, and this is part of it. And and I think that, you know, when you make it a little here, I never thought I'd say that 60 is a little too young. Uh but uh you know, for those 60-year-old whippers snappers, my my opinion is that that it's better to wait to 65. Also, for the financial reasons, the impact on the village. We don't want to hamstring the village by by doing too much. Just my thoughts. I

I agree. I think 65 because as you said, Paul, I think that's true. There's a lot of people at 60 that are still working and it seems like they'd have an unfair I'm cool with any anyone. I think and to be clear, I think the program's wonderful. Um my mom, I'm going to talk to her about this. This may be her Mother's Day gift because to echo some of the sentiments from council chat, you know, the seniors and the way they park, it's really problematic. you know, from the the glare to the back and forth. Um, you know, when you have a lot of the issues. So, I think it's great even if we introduce it as a pilot. I'm fine with it being 65. Just I didn't know if it was random or by definition.

Yeah. And to echo, look, I I'm excited about voting yes on this because even went back to when I was campaigning. This was one of the issues that I heard the most about that we need to do stuff for our seniors so they can park. So, I think this is fantastic that we're doing this. Um, I am a little concerned about enforcement. Uh, somebody has the decal on their car and they park without going to the kiosk, without using park mobile. How does the parking enforcement officer know when they took that parking spot and count for three hours?

It'll all be visual. The chief discussed that at the at the um ordinance work in group A. And I I I would like to see strict enforcement here because plaques and decals and parking passes are known to be rife and and ripe for abuse. There's not going to be a digital footprint on these permits. It'll be in the system, but it won't be registered through Park W. when they actually park in the spot, right? And it's also by vehicle. So, if you had like a grandchild who borrowed your car that there are some,

but I think it's worth exploring. It's been undone for a long time and we've been hearing about it. I know Chief Lions and Captain Ender have already started to put um some training guidelines together for the parking enforcement people, assuming that this is going to go through. Um so, we can have them come and talk to us about that. But, you know, this this will be a visual based system and they could go probably go old school and chop the tires. Can I ask I don't think we're allowed to do that. Do we have an estimate how many takers we'll think we'll have on this? We don't. So, it's just a No, but I mean, we don't. I'm I'm for it. I'm wondering how many people going to want to lay out 70 or 50 bucks at one pop. 75. 75. I read this wrong. Oh, never mind.

Um, Evan, have you suddenly turned 60? I was about to say, yeah, no, I'm gonna start. I have another question. Um, I I wasn't sure how many people can be registered owners on a single car, so I Googled it and so I don't necessarily trust the results I got. But, um, two people can, according to Google, can be owners on a registration, and it can be disjunctive or conjunctive. And if it's um one person, say say it's a married couple, one person is older than 65 and one person is younger. Now what?

In fairness, you have the same issue with handicap plates. So like my mother has handicapped plates and you know if I take her car, theoretically I could park in a spot. It'd be morally horrible, but I mean you kind of put up with it for the benefit of the overall um program. I mean I you know I think it's worth trying. I think there are definitely shortcomings here and there definitely going to be some abuse. Yeah. Um the overall good strikes me as as as pretty positive and I say that as one of the people not eligible for the parking. I couldn't help myself. Um but overall and listen if it blows up in our face we just won't renew it next year.

Yeah. I I I'm not overly concerned about um the uh people staying longer than three hours. I'm sure Chief Lions is going to develop um some guidelines for the parking enforcement officers. I'm definitely not concerned about, you know, a a married couple where one is one qualifies and the other doesn't. Um, again, we can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. No, I'm just bringing these things up because enforcement's going to be difficult. Do our uh PEOs carry cameras? I guess they have their phones as far as to document. Yeah, they they have they have the ability to document visually.

Do they have uh body cams? Okay. Yeah. I mean, to me, I think it's that I would rather create this to help our seniors as opposed to find ways to focus on the people that might try to game the system. Just it's the greater good for helping our seniors. I I think the handicap placard is the perfect analogy. um you know, we have that it doesn't we're we're not overly concerned about the any potential abuse there. I think that it's and I don't have any data, but I'm going to guess it is the exception rather than the rule and it helps a lot of people. So,

and it should also be noted in the resolution, the the last clause in the resolution actually, that um this is not these the spaces are not available for this program at the train station. So, it does not in any way, shape, or form affect commuter parking before 3M. Um, and none of the 15minute parking spaces as designated throughout the central business district. So, both of those be before 3 p.m. at the train station and the 15-minute parking spots are both excluded from uh parking with the program.

Did we did we also have an exclusion for um some portion of the deck that is used for uh employees? We had I had talked to the police department Glenn Ender and Ray Torino about that and their opinion was that they felt that the seniors wouldn't be parking up on the fourth floor or the third floor and walking down and walking down or taking you know taking the stairs down. So they thought um thought it they could leave it out. Again, it's a there are certain aspects of this that are a work in progress. Good. And by resolution it could be changed. But in the meantime, we'll see how that goes.

Good. Let's let's make sure that after this has been in place for 12 months, we see what our re how our revenues are affected and um how many takers we have and all that kind of analysis. I also want to thank Helen for bringing this up because she was the impetus for all of this.

Very good. We we we can we can uh amongst uh those of us close to this, we can refer to it as Helen's senior parking permit program because she buttonhold me at several Hilt meetings and she'd see me walk in the door to go, come here. I want to talk to you. And we did. So great idea, Helen. Thank you very much. A lot of people are going to benefit from this. Great. So everybody good with this? Yes. Good. Let's go.

So, a lot of the items tonight under the budget category are capital expenditures that were approved as part of the 2020 26 capital budget. And as James and Rich will both tell you, when we had our capital budget meeting with all the directors and the supervisors here this year, we made it clear that if they were making this request, it was a need, not a want. And I also encourage them once the a stople period passed to quickly order especially if there's a wait time on any of the vehicles or equipment uh to get these items ordered. So you're going to see uh list tonight of different purchases from the 2026 capital account. Uh the first is from our recycling coordinator uh solid waste supervisor Sean Hamlin. This is for a 2026 model Ford Maverick hybrid pickup truck. Uh this is going to service the clean communities program. It's will be purchased through Route 23 Auto Mall through a state contract. The amount not to exceed for the vehicle is $34,44.35.

Any questions? Good. Okay. The next is also from Sean Hamlin, uh recycling and solid waste. This is the 2026 model Ford F350 pickup truck to replace truck RC 252 in the recycling division. again, Route 23 Auto Mall through a state contract with a not to exceed amount of $61,195. Uh Keith, if it's a 2026 model Ford F350, then you need to change the year in the resolution. The typo was noted in your email earlier today and Sean's made the correction with Heather. Okay.

The next item is for a plow mount for the Ford F350. Um this is for the pickup truck. This is to assist with the recycling division uh which also assists the street division uh with snow removal through the winter months. Um this is through a source well cooperative purchasing contract um not to exceed $8,458. Everybody good? Let's go.

Okay. Uh also from Sean, this is the lift gate for the Ford F350. Both of these are associated with equipping that truck. Um this is again for the recycling division. This liftgate will assist staff members in collecting of heavy appliances for special bulk metal collection days. Again, available through the source source well cooperative purchasing program contract at a not to exceed amount of $5,97.50. Anybody good? Um, yes. But can I go back to 9C1? That's the Ford Maverick hybrid. That's for clean communities. Is that only to be used by the clean communities employee? Rich, I'll yield to you on the operational side of it.

Yes. Okay. And and what is the jurisdiction of the clean communities employee? Does he only work downtown or is it okay? No, he works throughout the village. He does other restroom cleaning at the train station at the field here. Goes back and forth to Chestnut Street, the public works building as well. Okay. And thanks for making it a hybrid. No, definely.

Okay. Um item five, this is under public works. Uh this is for the new truck mounted sewer jet for water pollution control. Uh this is the purchase of one 800 HPR truck mounted sewer jet to replace the existing international jetack truck which was purchased in 2016. Again, this is funded through the 2026 capital account and this is through a source well cooperative not to exceed $356,4941. If you have any questions on this particular truck, Councilman Mortimer, um James is here to uh to answer any questions that the council may have. This is it's a very specialized truck and I think that what what our um department does is that they're proactively going out and cleaning the sewers which is good. And then when I talked to uh um James Fely about the he's actually maybe some of our surrounding towns you might be able to generate income with this as well. So I think this is a great stroke and I hope I get to ride on it one time. And um I had a question uh about the use of this. In addition to cleaning out the sewer, the sanitary sewers, um can this be used to clean out the storm water sewers?

Uh I'll have to check on that, but I know that is for water pollution control, so they would prefer to stick to sanitary. Okay. And this is also the truck that Councilman Whites during our budget discussions talked about entering into a shared service agreement with surrounding municipalities. So once it's ordered, I've already introduced that concept uh to the 13 administrators that get together in Northwest Bergen uh to talk about how we could share this truck and and potentially either have a formal shared services agreement or come up with a rate schedule like we do with Northwest Bergen to provide that service to the other municipalities. So as we as we onboard this truck, we're going to investigate those opportunities as well.

From from the investigation of the truck, it takes six months of training to learn how to use it. So, I think it's good to have shared services, but our guys need to do it. We we would we would be using the vehicle. We would respond to an emergency in another municipality and our folks on overtime at the sister community's expense would mobilize the truck and uh and do the work. Yeah. They would pay for the truck and the manpower. We're not I just wanted because when we had the budget discussion, it was maybe that give other places the keys. I want to Yeah. No, no one no one else is getting the keys.

Yeah. And thank you, Keith, for remembering that. I know we spent a lot of time talking about it. It's a $356,000 truck. So, anything we can do to get some of that back by helping some of our Yeah. And remember, water pollution does do a lot of other things to to that actually generate income. They take um poopy water from other places and and we dispose of it. Isn't that the engineering term for it? Yeah. Tech technical.

All right. The next item is item six. This is award of a professional services contract for the architect for the emergency operations center um for the proposed work at the office of emergency management building on Douglas Place. Um Jeremy Kleimman is recommending uh that this contract be awarded to RSC Architects at a total cost of $35,000. I don't understand what is the plan for each room in that building. I just Is this going to be like the dispatch center or are they treating patients there? Um,

none. Respectfully, none of the above. So, right now that that space is still configured as if we're running EMS services out of there. Shortly before I arrived here in Ridgewood, EMS service, ambulance response was moved over to the fire department exclusively. So you have a building that served one purpose, no longer services that purpose. So what we're looking to establish is an official OEM center where if we have an emergency, if we have a flood event, if we have an earthquake, if we have a hurricane that we can operate out of with all necessary personnel. Right now that space is us all crammed into a conference room downstairs in the police department. But we would need to have the space reconfigured. We'd have to have all the necessary communications to be able to respond in an event like that. Have different um areas of the center uh that would be allocated towards fire, police, OEM, uh communication with central dispatch, all of those different things. So, the proposal here is to come up with the archite architectural drawings that we can then bring back to the council so that you can see what Jeremy's plan is in creating this OEM space. Um, okay. There was something in here that I didn't Okay, under the things that are not that are out of scope, the last one says architectural renderings or models. So, I I'm confused about what these architects are doing. I do see that they're doing design development drawings and I I don't know what these me terms mean really, but

are they doing architectural renderings? Isn't that a drawing? I I think architectural renderings or models are more of a 3D concept, but I'll defer to James. You're essentially getting blueprints. You're not getting nice pretty 3D colorized. No elevations drawings. No elevation. perhaps elevations, but definitely no like 3D rendering is, you know, you're plugging it into AutoCAD or whatever design uh software you have and it's spitting out a nice design you can kind of put on a poster board, show to the public. It's not getting that. You're getting blueprints that everyone here can review u talk to OEM about and it's kind of the nuts and bolts versus, you know, the any exterior, but if this is just an interior room, you probably wouldn't need that anyway, right? Um, okay. That doesn't

You're getting traditional architectural drawings for the proposed space. We're not getting any type of models or displays or anything of that nature. Okay. Um, so from what you're saying, this is not going to be like a shelter, like if there's a heat wave. It's not going to be where people go for air conditioning. Um, it's not going to ha house people who have suffered a fire. And it's it's not it's not really for public use at all. Okay. It's just a command center. Correct. Okay. Um All right. And we've used RSC before. I know Jeff Schllect, so I'm in favor. Okay. Great. Everybody else good?

Let's go. Okay. Um the next item is from Parks and Recreation. And this is to resend and replace resolution 2682, the award of contract under the educational services of New Jersey co-op design, supply and install pavilion shelter at Kings Pond Park. Um after some new information was provided to us, uh the initial resolution um was from MCR, Inc. I'm sorry, it was from Hold on. M

I'm sorry. It was from RCP. Too many acronyms shelters. Um, but the actual parent company is MRC Inc. So, we need to simply um from administerial an administrative standpoint change the name. Um, but nothing will change as far as the order of contract. So, I just want to absolutely nothing with the timeline will change because this is tied to the diversion. No. Okay. And the stuff's sitting there. No, this is this is this is all administrative. Wait, wait. No, I'm just saying that the equipment was delivered so I don't know if the pavilion was delivered. The playground I I I think there's two parts.

The reason we have to do this is so that the vendor can get paid. So that we want to make sure that it's aligning with their business registration. I got it. I just want to make sure there's no timing issue with this. This is it's exclusively administrative so that um the finance department can cut the check to the right right at the right company. Got it. And because it is a workshop, it has it been delivered? I don't think it's been delivered yet. I can check. Okay. The pavilion. I haven't heard. I just heard I I think the first part arrived, but not the second. I know that definitely the playground. Cool.

Okay. The next one is the tree tree irrigation services for 2026. Uh James and Nancy Beos worked together. They opened a bid on Wednesday, April 22nd. Um, we had one proposal from Downs Tree Service. The quote was $143,360 for tree irrigation services. The quote exceeds the available funds uh for this purpose. So, we are looking tonight to reject all the bids that were submitted um under this initial bid proposal and go out for a rebid. Anything you want to add to that? Uh I'll answer any questions, but I would like to point out, you know, uh my start date uh came at a pretty important time of the year for the village, including this bid. Uh so we didn't get a full, you know, three or four weeks, which we would have liked. We had a twoe turnaround, so we only got one bid. Um by the time we opened bids, we got a lot of responses from other firms that said if they had more time, they would have

uh submitted a bid. So hopefully if we can get this going, we can turn around next week and open the bids again or uh publish it again and then hopefully we'll be able to get bids received and acclimated by, you know, the correct timeline and get all of our trees in the village. Thanks for preempting my question. In the RFP, when are you looking to start irrigation? Uh so last year it was May 1st to November 1st. Uh this year I was going to do June 1st to December 1st and I might have to push that to June 15th to December 15th. Can get really hot before June 15th.

I know we we should think with the new plantings about including in this gap time which I totally get of including an element of if the gator bag's on it the residents should go to help because you know that's like the especially for the new trees last year last October. if we could do that in communications just, you know, if you have a gator bag, take the effort because that those trees are the ones that we're the most worried about. Can we do that, Keith? I I mean, we'd have to identify the communications aspect of it.

Any anyone that was planted last year, I think, is the one that I'd be the most concerned with with the remaining gator bag. And maybe we could even we can she obviously we can help, but if the gator bag has a rip, you know, because sometimes people leave them on. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we'll we'll have to talk to Nancy when she gets back and and see if that's something that the parks department can put out. Yeah. Okay. All right. Um the next item is to authorize a shared services agreement for the styrofoam densifier with the Burough of Waldwick. I love the styrofoam densifier. Me, too. Great. Wait, and we did we include that in Green Ridge with because that's an awesome one for our scorecard. Um I can't remember. I think we probably already got credit for it.

Yeah, because it's been there a while and and before they they had the densifier at the daffodil festival to show it off. So I would I would assume that they have in the past like Pam said. Okay. I'm just going to keep writing Jerry emails. Good. Yeah, that's what I'm going to keep doing.

Next item is the award of professional services contract. So there are three work efforts that we need to engage Richard A. grub associates with relative to the shedler, the Zabriski Shedler house. And these are all requirements as part of the Shipo um approval um or the D approval um that is administered by Shipo. Um and the first is a proposal for the archaeological monitoring protocol which is required. Um that is the first sheet of the proposal and the not to exceed amount is $6,000 for that work effort. questions?

Nope. And there's a three-point work effort associated with that. Um, no, wait. I I do have a question. Uh, this one talks about monitoring during construction. And my question is construction of what? Is construction of the field? Okay. So, that would include the driveways, the fences, etc. Okay. Gotcha. It it is all marked out now. Yeah. Right now, the core one archaeological area is completely fenced off. so that there's no interference from the remediation process. Um, and that area will continue to need to be monitored as the park is developed.

And just keep in mind, there'll be development within it that I'll have more because the little catering parking lot and the access to the house that will allow us to use it will be in that area as will like the buffer so the house is protected. The second proposal in the packet is the proposal for the archaeological avoidance and protection program. Um there's an outline of exactly what that the scope of that work is and again all required at the end that Richard A. Grub submit an archaeological avoidance and protection program to Shipo and then they will need to monitor it during the construction as well. And the amount not to exceed for the avoidance and protection program is $8,965. And then finally um and this is the larger one. Um we're required to do certain documentation as part of the the D approval um on the project. So this is a proposal for the historic American building survey. The acronym is HABS documentation. Um this was reviewed by Kelly Rafel. um our historic preservation consultant. She worked with um with Richard A. Grub to come up with the scope of work here. And the amount not to exceed for this work effort is $17,32.

Everybody good? Yep. Let's go. Right. Okay. Uh next is the award of the paving contract and I'm going to defer to James on this one.

Uh so again, a very important item for the village. Uh we had a shortened bid time, but we got plenty of competitive bids back. Um and the lowest responsible bidder was also the lowest bidder, uh Smith Sandi. Um they've worked in Ridgewood a decent amount and I believe they were here two or three years ago as our paving contractor and they've done other work. Uh and I've got previous experience in pre previous municipalities working with them and I think they're going to do a great job for us. Um, I believe we've allocated somewhere in the 2.5 to$2.75 million uh range for paving. We have an initial partial award of 1.5 million. Um, and my staff has put together, you know, everyone's wish list of paving projects, whether they be municipal lots, municipal parks, um, streets. Uh and we're going to be working with other utilities to trade off paving streets here and there, but um we're here to do an initial award. We're going to have a precon later this month and we're hopefully going to start, you know, ideally June 1st.

And and I just want to thank James because Rididgewood constructs this bid specification very differently than pretty much every other municipality. And that was something that Chris brought to the table when he was the village engineer and the director of public works. And I have to tell you I it was brilliant because in other municipalities they identify roadways. They calculate the the linear feet of those roadways and that's what they bid out and then you're bound to pave you know Smith Street or Williams Drive or whatever it happens to be. In this case, we do it by quantity allocation, which gives the engineering division inhouse here the flexibility to move on the fly as we get through the year as to what projects become the priority. That's what allowed us to do the circle by the high school last year. It's allowed us to do the bumpouts on East Glenn Avenue the first year I was here. Um, and it gives us flexibility. So, as we do this, we learned yesterday in a meeting with PSENG that they are going to be doing some gas work in the lawns over by Hall School, which by the way is not going to start until after school lets out. We made sure of that. But as we negotiate and we figure out what the linear footage that they'll have to resurface will be versus what we have available in the pl in the um in the paving bid, we may have some flexibility to try to repave those streets curb to curb, which makes the most sense when we're repairing a roadway. So, this bid specification gives us a lot of flexibility to meet the needs of the village as we move through 2026.

That's great. Great. James, um first of all, um you you jumped into the deep end of the pool here and it turns out that you're a really good swimmer. So, we really appreciate it because there's a lot going on here. Um so, we're we're really happy to have you on board. Question. Um the cross the temporary crosswalk on Rididgewood Avenue in front of Tate, do we have a a guesstimate as to when that might turn into a a a permanent crosswalk? I mean, ideally tomorrow, but uh it's number one on our list. Okay. So, sometime in June, I would say. Okay. Can't wait to get rid of those concrete blocks. Yeah. Just curious. Thank you. Thank you very much. It's all and if if you if you want to go look, our our inspector Carlos has already painted it. He got it.

I've seen I've seen it's all painted out. Ready to go. No, it looks like it's going to be great. So, thank you. We asked him that today, too. We had a meeting with him. What's up with the crosswalk? Great. All right, let's go. Thanks, James. Thanks for James. For which one? E2. Um, you know what? Let's uh let's jump to that if if the council will indulge us. E2. So James can go home. Yeah, we'll uh we'll do E2 first and then I'll we'll circle back to the rest.

So E2, and we've talked about this here before. Uh this is a grant application that Matrix New World Design, our environmental firm working on the Shedler project uh for the remediation has prepared to the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection to the Hazardous Discharge Site Remediation Fund. Um, these grants are available for municipalities for the purposes of funding preliminary assessments, site investigation, remedial investigation, remedial action work plan, and remedial action. By the time we're done with um the remediation at Shedler, which you know should be by the beginning of June, um we'll have checked off all of those boxes of all of those different work efforts that I just mentioned. Uh but Matrix has put this grant application together. Uh the total amount for the grant is $333,000 and change. Um and this is to recoup some of the costs for Matrix and for the overall remediation pro project from the D. I don't have you have anything else you want to add to that?

No, I just want to give thanks to Matrix. They're proving their value by allowing us to recoup all not all some some of the money that we've we've spent on their services which have been fantastic in my experience thus far. Great. Good. Any questions? All good. Thank you, James. Thank you, James. Thanks, James.

Okay, circling back to D1. Uh, this is to a proposal to amend chapter 145, an ordinance which establishes the administrative fees for the Ridgewood Police Department for outside jobs. Um, in speaking with Chief Lions, and he did report out on this to the ordinance working group, uh, we have not changed the fee structure in about 10 years when it comes to the administrative fee. Um, and again, this will be for outside jobs. So, we're talking PSNG, we're talking Verizon, we're talking uh different different utilities outside of the village work. All right. And we're looking to increase that by $10. All right. Great.

Uh, the next item is chapter also a fee schedule in chapter 145 and this is for changes to the recreation fee ordinance. Um, as you remember a few meetings back, we adopted the new fields use policy, um, as did the board of education. Uh, so this updates and makes current all of the fees relative to the new field policy. Yeah. And I know parks and recck, we talked about this few months ago, so I think this is great. And that's also what's good about how the field policy was updated is that this is now pulled out separately. So we can update the the the fees and not have to worry about the the bulk of it. So terrific.

It's all good. Great. Everybody good? Let's go. Okay. The next item is to endorse a community development block grant for Share Inc. replacement of an air compressor for a sprinkler system. The cost is $5,495 for the grant applications to to CDBG. Everybody good? Yep. Go. Uh the next item is to authorize a transfer of a liquor license, PRM liquor to f to Lucky Family Liquor, Quicks Stop Wine and Liquor. Um Heather, I don't know if you have anything you want to add on this one. This was processed through your office.

Yeah, this has gone through the police department. They've um done the background checks necessary and they've um approved it for transfer. So now the council just has to do a resolution to do so. Everybody good with this? Is 83 Godwin that strip mall? Okay. Yes. Got it. So, it's not moving the location. It's just the ownership. Person to person, place to place. I'll toast to that. All good. I got it, Frank. I got it.

Okay. Jumping down to E3, declaration of surplus property for the recycling division. Um, as referenced in the prior memo where Sean was requesting the purchase of one of the vehicles, this is to declare the truck that I mentioned RC 252 as surplus from the recycling division. Um, the vehicle at this point has no overall value. Um, it's got engine issues, multiple oil leaks, and a rusted frame. Similar to that, the next item uh which is from the solid waste division is to declare truck SW61 as surplus. Again, engine issues, multiple leaks, a rusted rear bed, and a dead starter. Um no overall value to the vehicle.

Sounds like what I drove when I was 17. And then lastly, um

cars back then. Lastly on the agenda tonight, um as the deputy mayor mentioned during her report is the 2025 annual report from the zoning board of adjustment. They've made four recommendations um that I would recommend to the council uh gets referred back to the ordinance working group. It's actually on the agenda for Monday afternoon. Um, but they're they are looking to specify materials and increase the space between vertical bars for front yard fences. Uh, they're looking for the village to prepare and adopt standards relative to the potential placement of billboards that include objective conditional use requirements that consider impacts on residential properties, um, corridor view shields, etc. Um that is something that we do want to discuss with Matt um about the potential liability of completely restricting uh billboards in the village um and the polit and the um legal consequences of that. Uh item three is to review the lot area and with requirements uh throughout the village's residential zones. And the last is consideration of updating home office uses. The ordinance regulating home offices was adopted back in 2004 and contains standards that are outdated um in the context of a modern home office environment especially in light of COVID. So those are the four issues that we'll be vetting through the ordinance working group on Monday relative to the uh annual report from the zoning board

and that's going to be reviewed by the ordinance working group. I think we start there because we need some we're going to need some legal input. We're going to need input from John Barry, our planner. Um, and um, and I even had proposed, and this is something we can talk about on Monday,

uh, to Pam, the possibility of maybe creating a subgroup of the ordinance working group on this that would include members of the planning board because you receive this this report from the zoning board, comes to the council. When the if the council changes any zoning ordinances, it then needs to get moved over to the planning board for comments and recommendation between introduction and adoption. Then it comes back to the council for adoption. So, there's a lot of hands in this um as it goes through the process if there are going to be any considered changes. This is a really well done report by the way. I very much like the way this is laid out.

Yep. Um at the planning board last night we had a long discussion about these four items and with regard to the fences they felt that we should just leave it alone because thank you.

The impetus here is the aesthetics and it's not so much safety uh or or or anything else. It's just they don't like the large diameter of vinyl fences and um a couple members on the board felt that performance is more important than materials. Um and with regard to the billboard ordinance, they thought it was exactly as Matt found it to be that we need to look at it at the ordinance working group. Um, with regard to number three, they thought the study should focus first on where are the applications coming from. That um there are a lot of applications from homes that are on lots that are just not compliant with the zone that they're in because they're too small already. So, of course, anything they want to do on the property is going to end up in in front of the zoning board.

And so, where are those concentrated? Are they in a couple pockets in town? Then that's what we should be looking at rather than legislating for the whole town because we could be creating more problems than than solving them. And and I think we're going to need to bring the board secretary into that conversation and the zoning officer into that conversation so that they can go back over let's say the last three to five years, look at where those applications are coming from by neighborhood and then report back that information to the ordinance working group. Yeah. And um

that might be something Neil can actually help us with too from a GIS standpoint. And I think I think if you sorry I think if you identify the zone that they're in because more than likely they're in one of the residential zones you can set up standards that apply for certain properties that have a lot area of X and the standards go to that and lot area of greater than X up to a certain point. So there's different ways of approaching it. But you're right, don't make it villagewide. just deal with the locations or the zones that they're in.

And then with regard to home offices, uh just so the public knows, there was an ordinance for many years about home offices. And you know, it was like where you have a doorway from the garage and you're anticipating people coming to the home and and that home office and where are they going to park and and that sort of thing. Now after COVID with everybody just working at home at their dining room table, it's it's a different animal and maybe there should be um a more sensitive treatment of home offices. So, I think it is time to look at that ordinance and and bring it up to date. Um, so

Pam, I'm I'm happy to hear that the planning board did not like the fences because there's a whole thing about um neurode divergent um families put those fences up, especially the the thick ones so their kids don't alope. No,

it's alopment. So, when you have a a child, that was one concern. Yes. And as they begin to move the distance, the smaller child can squeak through. So elopment is is the term for wandering. It's um it's a serious issue which is you know obviously the number one cause of death to a neurode divergent child in New Jersey is drowning because when they do a lope they seek water. Um so people who have taken the burden of putting a fence in if we start to move the distance between them a kid could get through. Equally outside of the access issue is also um dogs. you know that if if it doesn't have the function that a fence to stop, people have been complaining about that. And I I think it's I think it's funny that number one, it's the first one that went and I love all the other ones, but I think we should leave the fences alone as well.

Yeah, I I really do for this. There's a family that knows specifically, so I just I just am for the safety reasons, it's silly. Good.

Um, also I wanted to s thank Sammy Thomas who did the analysis that's behind this. Uh you'll you have that in your packet. Um I was surprised to see that so many of the applications in front of the zoning board are granted. Um they're approved on condition and what the secretary and other people on the board explained to me last night is some people after coming before the zoning board get suggestions from board members of try it this way, try it that way. So they they they go away and they come back with a revised version maybe once, maybe twice. And many of them realize that just from the conversation that's happening on the board there, they're they're going to just they're just going to walk away. They're not going to look for a denial or an approval. And I didn't realize that that's how the zoning board works. So that's why you see in Sammy's analysis so many approvals. Sam is a terrific find. We're fortunate to have him on.

Yes, indeed. Anybody else? Mayor, that concludes my portion of the agenda. Let's go back to public comment.

Uh, good evening, Mayor and Council. Michael No, Richwood resident. Um there was a comment earlier from one of the gentlemen who hauled in on hybrid access and his comment was something like the advantage of turf fields is that they're used 3,000 hours a year. So I did a little math and I don't think that's actually possible. If you subtract the winter months, rain days, the time that kids are in school, um that would equate to over 10 hours a day, seven days a week. So, I don't think that's actually possible. Um the next thing is I was at the recycling center. I usually go there, you know, once every other week. And um very friendly guy helped me and it turned out it was Sean, the head of the recycling center. I didn't realize it when he said hello to me. And then the last thing I wanted to ask about is uh I know I had spoken to Mr. Kasmar about um the major sill problem in the Saddle River down by Grove Street and he was very kind. He sent someone out. They took pictures and it's you know pretty well blocked off and Mr. Casmark said that there was money in the budget for scooping out the uh silt I guess and I'm just wondering if there's any time frame on that. Thank you.

Thank you, Michael. Hi, it's Carol again. Um, thank you. Yeah, I'm Carol. We know you, but we need your full name and just whether you Maloney, resident or non-resident. Resident. There you go. Okay. Thank you. And I'm happily inviting someone to come to the next Hilt meeting or whatever Hilt meeting it is that you could come and explain our new little parking permit and how we can do all it and and etc. Thanks so much. I'll be there. Okay.

Uh good evening, Mayor and Council. Boyd a loving Rididgewood resident. Uh, Councilwoman Winterrad mentioned tonight about the uh, events for the soccer. I just point out that one of those events is taking place on Junth. Uh, I don't know if the village is sponsoring it or any village employees are going to be required to be there, but I'll remind you that that is a holiday. Village Hall is closed that day. I'm somewhat surprised that an event has been scheduled on that day. If it's a private event, of course, it's a private event, but if it's being sponsored by the village and any village employees are required to be there, I'm sort of surprised and disappointed that it is being scheduled on Junth on a on a holiday. Um, on another subject, uh, you may recall a few weeks ago I commented about the ongoing legal wrangle with Valley Hospital, and I know that you can't commented on it at all, but I will point this out. I'm a bit concerned that the database where you can look up tax records and where you can look up tax payments that the village I guess maintains through an outside provider that the property at 223 North Van Dean Avenue has been removed from that database. So there is no public access to any records concerning taxes paid, owed, assessment values on that property through that database. I did a quick search of all well not all but of some other not forprofits including the church that I'm a member of that father Thomas was here tonight and I find that there it seems to be every other property that I checked that is not for profit that doesn't pay taxes is in the database. So, I'm somewhat concerned that the database has been manipulated to remove that one taxpayer and I'm wondering why it was done or do you even know it was done?

Um, that's it. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Boyd. Good evening again. An loving Rididgewood resident. A number of weeks ago, um, I brought up the subject about the garbage cans in town and how these $60,000 garbage cans with a lid over them don't seem to be working well. And Councilwoman Winterrad stated unequivocally that open garbage cans that don't have a lid would become way, way too heavy if rainwater went into them and would present an injury situation. And I believe, you know, that that uh employees could be injured if they had to lift such heavy bags. Subsequently, I sent two or three emails to Councilwoman Winterrad pointing out that there are a number of those open garbage cans in town, including in Van Nest, and saying, you know, if it is truly a dangerous situation that the workers could be injured trying to lift such a heavy bag, why do we have any of them? I mean, I don't want anybody to be injured. And I received responses from the council woman, but they the answers were circuitous and did not explain why. If, as she says, they are just hazardous, why we have any of them. And I wish I could get an answer to that. Thank you.

Thank you, Ann. Anybody else? Seeing no one in the audience, we're going to go to our hybrid access. Cynthia, you're up. Good evening, Cynthia O'Keefe. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Cynthia.

Okay. I meant I meant to say Cynthia O'Keefe, Rididgewood resident. Um, I just wanted to clarify a point that was made by um Mr. Halib. Um, you know, he talks about the hours of healthy playtime on artificial turf. Um, this would be artificial turf next to a highway that also has toxic particullet coming off of it. Um, and you know, I don't look at Rurick as a pseudo intellectual. I think at times I've he's made some very smart remarks, but when he talks about turf, um, doesn't make any sense. Um, his numbers are skewed. The facts he presents are, you know, fallacy. Um, and he said, you know, he knows more about Shedler and cared more about the Shedler property than anybody. So, I actually am surprised that he would advocate for this, but I I do believe he was a financial backer to your reelection. So, or at least that's my understanding. So, I I believe he feels he has to support that investment by, you know, um, being a prop, you know, uh, in favor of things that you're in favor of. Um, but I do want to remind him that it's not just about the artificial turf next to the private wells. It's there are key health and environmental dangers which have been documented. Toxic chemical uh exposure, um, PAS and Forever Chemicals. You just talked this evening about going to NJIT and doing a panel with Keith and uh Mayor Vaganos on how great Rididgewood is doing with getting PAS out of the water, but yet you'll turn around and do the very same thing to those residents. Um so I don't understand that logic whatsoever. Um there is a heat island effect. So artificial turf absorbs

significantly more heat than natural grass, creating um surface temperatures that become very high and could cause skin burns. Um there's also huge concern over microlastic and particle inhalation. Not only um that but also microlastic pollution. Uh turf fields shed hundreds of pounds per year. Um so where is that? Where are those mic microlastics going to go onto the neighbors properties? Is that okay with you? Um there's also um disruption of ecosystems. Um so the installation of turf removes natural habitats for whether it's insects, pollinators, birds. So you're doing no mo or slow mo and putting these little cute little signs on people's front lawns. But yet this is completely contradictory. And I believe Frank Mortimer ran on a platform that was supposed other towns were going to look up to Ridgewood as a beacon of environmental I don't know stewardship. Where what's happening with that? I mean this is like

time is up. Um so you know there's there's just so there are so many reasons. It's not just about poisoning the water. Yes, that is a major concern. Cynthia, your time is up. Thank you very much. Amy, you're up. Um, hi. Can you hear me? Yes. Yes.

Okay. Amy McBambridge, Ridgwood resident. Um, I just had like a couple people message me during all of this and thanking, you know, me and others for speaking out because they're scared to speak out to the council. Um, people have been bullied at the meetings. I wasn't there when any of this happened. However, um, I do understand completely why um, with Miss Wiggrad, when you're willing to use your position of power to go after my nonprofit that prioritizes environmental stewardship on federal public lands, protects these American mustangs. We work with combat veterans and trauma victims is so disgusting that you use your position of power.

Yeah. Point of order, Paul, because um our section 320 of our code requires enforcement of decorum and I ask that it be enforced. Yeah. Um Amy, um you can't go after a particular council member. Okay. So you can refer to the council in general but not not go after a particular council member.

Well, okay then the council which you guys were probably in all of this. I see why people are whatever but that was such a lowb blow. Um what you guys did and while all of this is happening um we are under a drought warning and with Green Ridgewood speaking like I got like you guys did nothing like literally nothing. If you want to help the floods, replace just like Mayor Vajano said. It makes sense you go back to grass. That will help the flooding. Uh but let's not do that. Um we're being told to conserve water while waterways are being contaminated in Ridgewood. Like how embarrassing. We have three turf fields contaminated with PAS. Ecosystems are being destroyed. And the artificial turf fields continue flooding chemicals and microplastics into our rivers and streams. And then we have our green team being like, "What do we do about it?" One day our children are going to ask what we were thinking. They're going to ask why we poison the water that once carried life, why we cut down forests older than ourselves, why we replace living ecosystems with plastic and chemicals. And if they truly understood what was stolen for them, because that's exactly what you are doing, they would be devastated. Not just the trees, not the land, but the species disappearing quietly. Um, more the bees, the pollinators, while adults argue about property, values, convenience, politics, profit, and even more ridiculous, Pam, about how the elderly are going to scheme like the the tickets like re like insane. Um, the bats that protect an entire ecosystem, the pollinators vanishing from the fields, turtles, foxes, fish, I could go on and on and on. life forms that hold nature together in ways that most people will never even take the time to understand. Children still understand. They wonder. They stop for the butterflies. They hear life in the forest. And they believe rivers are supposed to be alive. And meanwhile, you guys, the grown adults, poison the

waterways, flatten habitats, flood rivers with contaminants, and stand under Earth Day banners on a turf carpet and say you care about the planet while you actively destroy behind closed doors. And for what? More money, more status, another synthetic field, another photo op. Pretending that you care about the environmental leaders while ecosystems collapse around you. Time is up. Time is up. Okay, with the history will remember the difference between the people who fought for the living world and you guys who sold it. Thank you, Amy. Roric, you're up. Uh,

Roric Halib, village resident. Yes. I have made contributions to every one of you and you know something my contribution my investment is in the future of Rididgewood and having lived in Rididgewood for 56 years I have never felt better than to see the five of you at the dis so hard for the good for all of us compared to previous administrations it's like night and day now to those who talk about shedler. Let me remind the comment commentator. I fought against the burm and I was there by myself. I've heard me say this before when the burm was done on the sly and on the cheap when the shedler was turned into a dump with these huge piles of dirt. I was the one who fought it. I was the guy who fought the copper gutters on the shedler house. None of you have copper gutters on your house, houses, etc. And so I'm proud of what I have done. Anyway, let me just say to the five of you, keep up the good work. You are looking after Ridgewood. You are looking after our our future. And yes, one more turf field isn't going to do the difference big difference between night and day. So keep up the good work. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Rurick. Anybody else? Seeing no one, we're going to close public comment and entertain a resolution. Oh, excuse me. I do it every time. Would anybody like to respond to any of the comments made this evening? May I just have

um nobody on this council has used their position of power to go after your business, your nonprofit, your horse refuge. Nobody on this deis has done that. And I object to an unfounded allegation that any of us have done that. Um, I also object to the implication that we act for more money um for our own personal gain. Um, I would wager that that is also unfounded. That's all I have to say right now.

You know, there are a few things I think all five of us agree on. Um, but what Pam just said are two of them that we all absolutely agree on. Um it is really sad when we use our position as citizens who attack those that have been elected to power. Um Siobhan, I don't believe a word anybody's saying. Um I take it as an insult to us all when any one of us is called out unfairly the way um I think Stran has been. Um and there's just simply no place for that in a civilized society. As to money, uh I guarantee you all five of us probably lose money in this job. Uh guaranteed. Um, so the idea that somehow we're getting rich being council people, um, it's uh, I don't know if it's more preposterous or more sad in its statement.

Yeah. Um, and and I will say, as I've said before, Siobhan Winter is the hardest working member of this council. She gets more done than probably any three of us. And um, I am grateful that she serves on this council with us. and she would never ever attack anyone the way she has been attacked. Um, mayor, if I may, by all means.

Yes. Uh, in regard to some of the allegations that were made or accusations I should say that were made, I think I need to straighten out a few things for the record because these have been made on social media as well as public statements uh before this council uh during meetings. uh back in around November uh 6th or thereabouts of 2025, uh Siobhan called me and she said that someone had just dropped off an a letter in her mailbox making certain allegations against um the Unbridled Heroes Project in terms of the the way they operate and do certain things. Uh she provided me with a copy of the letter at that date. I read it. Um it had allegations and it had it was anonymous. was not signed or identified as who the author was, but it was identified as somebody who had worked at this location before, worked at the Unbridled Heroes Pro and made allegations. I told Siobhan not to do anything with it other than to provide it to the police department because it was not within her jurisdiction, not within the council's jurisdiction to do anything about it. We don't know the veracity of it. We don't know whether or not someone has a vendetta or something different than that, but it should just be provided to the police department so they could decide to do it. The Ridgewood Police Department doesn't have jurisdiction over such facilities as was um alleged or such issues as was alleged in the letter and they turned it over to the proper um authorities to decide what to do with it. Um we we heard through the grapevine or through the police department that an investigation was done and that the investigation was completed. Um that there was nothing found to be wrong. But in any event um the recipient of the letter was the amount of work that or amount of effort that Siobhan had in this whole thing. someone felt comfortable enough with

Siobhan to give that to her to alert the authorities in one way or the other of a problem that they thought they had. And whether or not it was personal, whether or not it was professional or anything else, we have no idea. But at my direction, it was turned over to the authorities. When you see something like that, you have to turn it over to authorities and let them decide what to do with it because the council doesn't have any jurisdiction. And as the attorney for the council, it is not something that we would get involved in or investigate or um or look at any more than just getting the letter to the authority to the enforcement authority within the village. That was the extent of it. There was nothing else done, nothing else sought out. And um the conclusion of that is something that we have never really even been informed of. So what could have happened um other than the accusations that have been made never happened and simply just transferred and communicated that communication over to the police department. That was it. That's all that was done. Um and uh in that regard um I'm hoping um and if anybody has any questions about it, they can discuss it with me in terms of the involvement. I'll be open to discuss it with them. But if anybody has any questions about it, uh they can certainly contact me at any time to discuss it.

Anybody else on any other topic? Sure. Yeah. Okay. Boyd, I can't use my phone. We don't use our phones on the deis while we're in session, but come to me afterwards. I want to check the um the the tax payment. I have I have a response to that. Oh, okay. Fine.

Um, just a few issues, Mayor. Uh, first, with regard to Mr. No's inquiry about the flood mitigation project, we're probably looking at fall. We had a tremendous meeting, which I did not report on uh with NJIT last week. Um, they are on the ground here in Ridgewood. They are actually going to be installing cameras and some other monitoring devices um to help us with flood mitigation efforts. So, at James request, um, he's asked that we allow NJIT to get on the ground, start their preliminary investigation before we decide exactly what areas along the Hocus Brook we're going to do that flood mitigation project. Um, we do have the streets division out currently and the parks division out identifying uh trees that are in danger of falling where they've fell subject to erosion or anything of that nature. So, we're doing the preliminary work, but we're also we also want to coordinate with NJIT before we put the scope of work together and therefore the specifications. So, that's that. Um, Mr. Loving, with regard to the soccer event, um, the three soccer associations in town, the Maroons, RSA, and Rasa requested use of the park um during the World Cup tournament. So, while we were up here, I do have my phone up here. Um there are four matches on June 19th which were obviously scheduled um by the folks who run the World Cup. Uh but the USA is um playing against Australia, Scotland and Morocco, uh Brazil and Haiti and Turkey and Paraguay. So there are four matches that night which is I think why they aligned the request to use Vanessa Square for that event on Junth just because of the night that the matches are scheduled. Um, in addition, uh, the former Valley Hospital property on Van Dean, I can't get into the litigation matter, but we finance was directed by our legal

special legal counsel on that uh, to make that adaptation to the tax uh, platform online. Um, so that was done at the request of our special legal counsel. Um to Miss O'Keefe, uh Cynthia, um again, I just want to extend the invitation uh to sit down with you and your neighbors with Rich Calby and Ridgewood Water. I know we heard tonight a lot of the concerns um that you've continued to express about the wellwater. Um, I just want to again extend a meeting to talk about the possibility of hooking up to Ridgewood Water and having a conversation about what that expense would look like, um, and what Ridgewood Water could do to be helpful in that space. Rich is open to that conversation. We're also open to monitoring and reviewing any wellwater tests that residents in that area um, have privately conducted and Ridgwood Water is willing to do an evaluation of any of those test results. I don't believe we've received any recently relative to that. And that's all I have. Mayor,

I have two things.

Um, I don't want to get into the hours of playable time, but I did want to highlight several things about our existing turf fields. They are playable in the rain. And one of the things why they're used so much in northern communities, including like colleges that play, is that that we do plow them in the cases of excessive snow. So, I just I'm not going to get into the math off of the utilization of the field, but turf does where our grass fields this week were closed due to the rain, the maple field remained open. So, that's just some information. Additionally, with um the World Cup event, they were very warm on the idea of watching USA games. So, the USA teams, then they wanted to make sure the kids could see it. So June 19th was picked because one the USA is playing all of the USA's home games are in California and some start earlier. So they did have that discussion. We had it at fields and everybody um felt that it would be a good celebration and you know a chance to celebrate. Um Mrs. Loving, with respect to the emails, I I really did in our back and forth try to answer all your questions. I can't quote it, but the garbage can image that you sent me the day after we talked about the street cans was a park garbage can. And I believe I don't have it in front of me. I said different cans have different equipment and different pickup. So I, you know, the parks department was added into it as was our supervisor. So a street can they have to get out of the truck, go get it, get the garbage bag. We have equipment that drives up to a park can and picks up the garbage bag. So there's less distance, less lifting. So, and there's also a less frequent schedule, so you won't have the same volume. I do just want to say that council doesn't pick the garbage cans, and this was the message of the email. The prior garbage cans were falling apart. They had they ceased to exist. They were blowing away down the streets of Ridgewood, and we needed new ones. the combination of police due

to the bomb blast which is why we don't have the stone ones sanitation parks um and signal came and just to give you an idea the each individual garbage can I think was $650 and we needed about a hundred of them. So um the the simple answer that I put in there with the images is parks has a different schedule, different volume and a different method of picking up. So, um, and I believe I included all the supervisors on my response to you. I didn't want to get too much into workplace and safety, but they were all on that. Um, should you have any other questions about their methods, but when you see the little park cart, they they pull up right there.

Another vehicle I'd like to try to drive on. Anybody else?

All good. Let's have a resolution to go into close session. be resolved by the village council of village of Rididgewood that the village council meet in close session on May 6, 2026 at 7:30m or soon thereafter as the matter on the agenda can be reached and is that close session be held in the caucus room on the fourth floor of the Richmond Village Hall 131 North Maple Avenue, Richmond, New Jersey be further resolved that the matter to be discussed in close session limited to personnel matters to include FMBA negotiations. This matter is allowable under NJSA10 col 4-12. SEC and be a further resolve. The minutes of this meeting shall be made available to the general public when such matters have been deemed completed by resolution of the village council. I have a motion. So moved. Second.

All in favor? I. Anyone opposed? Thank you.