SHARE:  

Spring in Teaneck Creek Conservatory as seen by Senator Weinberg from Arbor Terrace

When Do Residents Get to Know What’s Going On?


PUBLISHED BY TEANECK VOICES

5/6/2024

Contents:

  • When Do Residents Get to Know What’s Going On?
  • Teaneck’s BOE Approves the District’s 2024-5 Budget
  • Finally Park Benches
  • Our Next Edition – 60th Anniversary of Teaneck School Integration
  • This Week in Teaneck – May 6 to 12


Announcements:

  • EVNA Listening Session – 5/19
  • Community Chorus Spring Concert Honoring Stephen Bell – 5/19
  • Juneteenth in Teaneck - 6-15-19
  • OTOV Fundraising Event – 6/22


Contacting Teaneck Voices:

  • Email: teaneckvoices@gmail.com
  • Phone: 201-214-4937
  • USPS Mail: Teaneck Voices, PO Box 873. at 1673 Palisade Ave. 07666

When Do Residents Get to Know What’s Going On?

The missing municipal budget – As of noon on May 5, the Town website’s agenda for the May 7 regular meeting of Council provides not a single word about introducing the 2024 budget. According to state regulation, (Click Here, p. 2), Teaneck should have approved the introduction of this 2024 municipal budget at its April 2, 2024 meeting. The Town Manager indicated that would be done at the April 16 meeting. It was not. It apparently will not be included in this May 7 meeting. 


State officials began threatening individual fines for municipal officials in 2014 when Teaneck was last out of budget approval compliance. Apparently Council’s budget subcommittee is engaged in closed session meetings seeking either: 1) expenditure cuts from the 6.99% increase first recommended by Manager Kazinci at the 3/14 Council budget meeting; or 2) finding new revenue by adding gimmicks such as quick selling the Town’s cell tower. Meanwhile the public is without either information or opportunity for input. 


It is noteworthy that meanwhile the Board of Educations “preliminary 2024-5 budget” was publicly introduced at BOE’s April 17 meeting, after which School Superintendent Spencer took that budget on a 3-school “Roadshow” where publicly-suggested changes were recorded. This public input led to specific revisions in the final BOE budget that were publicly described by the school district’s business manager prior to the 6 to 1 BOE trustees vote for the final budget on May 1. 


What is happening with the DPW site at 1600 River Road? The Council has, without any explanation, approved non-bid contracts for 1) site renovation engineering and 2) yet another environmental assessment. Are there unspecified concept plans for this long-troubled municipal property? As early as 2016 the township planner reported the on-site risks to both DPW workers and residents bringing recycled material. 


The Manager’s 6-year Capital Improvement Plan calls for $1M per year for 6 years for the “DPW facility” (Click Here, pp 185) indicating that some plan exists – but it remains publicly unexplained.


The Redevelopment Plan for American Legion & Beverly Road: Town Planner Spach Trajan announced (reading from her PP slides) at the end of the March 27 meeting that the 3/27 meeting was the “last opportunity for input before drafting a redevelopment plan” for those two Areas in Need of Redevelopment. The slide went on to announce that the “Next Steps” were to “prepare a draft Redevelopment Plan”, presumably by Ms. Trajan’s firm, Phillips, Preiss. 


Redevelopment law in NJ (NJSA 40A.12A ff.) requires that the governing body [Council] be the entity to authorize the preparation of such a redevelopment draft plan. Council did not do so. From all the information of which Voices is aware, it may be assumed that the Council’s Zoning Subcommittee has (improperly) been the authorizing entity. Council, by contrast, has promised no further AINR action until the new Master Plan is passed. Again, the public should be informed about a matter so clearly of public concern. 


Where is the Audit of the State Monies Given to a Tri-partite Entity Known as the Garden of Human Understanding?


Over the last several years the NJ Department of Community Affairs (DCA) has granted $300,000 to $400,000 to the collective “Garden” composed of the Holocaust Memorial Committee, the Enslaved African Memorial Committee, and the Teaneck Library for two monuments to be built on the Memorial Green. Among other things, the grant specifies that no monies can be given to committee members employed by the committees and the few available accounts demonstrate that that stipulation has not been met. 


Also, Council has authorized the members of the 3-part partnership to proceed individually, yet all have used thousands of dollars of monies granted to the full 3-part entity.


Since DCA grants comprise taxpayer (our) funds, it is imperative that Council authorize a professional audit of the funds granted to the Garden of Human Understanding.

If our readers are concerned about other Town government matters about which information should be forthcoming, let us know at teaneckvoices@gmail.com

Teaneck’s BOE Approves the District’s 2024-5 Budget

The Township’s Board of Education had announced that its May 1, 2024, meeting would focus on a final public hearing on the District’s 2024-5 annual budget. The Board did approve by a 6-1 vote  the budget as described in the meeting’s Resolution 7 (see below):

It is noteworthy that the Board had previously been working with a “preliminary budget,” a document shared since mid-April on its website and then taken by Superintendent Spencer on a three-school PTO “Roadshow” where public input was taken and recorded. Subsequently, changes were included in the final 23-slide budget presentation (Click Here) and they specifically were reviewed at the Wednesday, May 1 meeting. 



This “budget presentation” is remarkable in its review of how the District’s priorities are being implemented as a prelude to a clear picture of the budget and its impact. Voices recommends a review of this presentation by our readers.  Considerable attention has been given to the fact that to hold the budget increase to 2% (as defined by the State), the budget calls for a 29-person teacher reduction – 14 of which are the elimination of positions not currently filled.  In the following three images taken from that presentation, readers can see 1) how the impact of a 2% increase compares to several alternative increase levels that were considered by the Board; 2) how the selected final budget will impact the tax levy to be met by Town property owners; and 3) where the reductions are impacting specific positions and programs

The video of this “budget hearing” meeting (3hrs&31mn) understates the actual length of the meeting which included a lengthy closed session. The adjournment came several minutes after 1:00 am with the budget approval vote. (The video is available if you Click Here).


A major factor in its length was the intense public input discussion of issues related to whether and if so how the Board should address a long list of 26 revised policy change proposals from the Board’s Policy Committee.  Several of the policies (notably #2260 & 5520) involved the already controversial specification of how (and from what source) Board policy should address issues of student free speech and protest. In the end, the decision was made about the entire list of changes not to treat them as a First Read but to send them back to the Policy Committee with a request that it find some mechanism to clarify HOW the revisions would change current policy. 



Readers seeking to delve into what was proposed can do so if you go to the Agenda (Click Here and move to pp. 23ff). The Board itself spent more than 30 minutes (go to the video and move to 1hr&53 minutes to 2hr&26min) sorting out what – particularly after the extensive public input and the late inclusion of the proposed policy changes – the Board should do with an issue which Board Vice-Chair Reyes pointed out had not been the publicly-declared as a purpose of the meeting.

Finally Park Benches

For several years, Boards directly or indirectly advisory to our incredible parks have urged the Town to install park benches in our parks. Roosevelt Sills, the Secretary of one such board, the Senior Citizen’s Advisory Board, has been particularly persistent in making this ask. As is seen above, the work of Roosevelt – and of many - has been successful. Congrats.

Our Next Edition – 60th Anniversary of Teaneck School Integration

The evening of May 13, 1964, was the night when by a 7-2 vote, the Teaneck Board of Education voted to voluntarily integrate its public schools. The Monday morning May 13, 2024 edition of Teaneck Voices will be a Special Edition featuring that distinctive day in our Town’s history.

This Week in Teaneck - May 6-12, 2024

Teaneck Council Regular Meeting – May 7, 2024, at 8:00 pm in Council Chambers and by Zoom Click Here and add passcode 372777. For the agenda Click Here


Early in the meeting, a public hearing will be held before action on two ordinances that were introduced in Council’s prior meeting. 


Introduced Ordinance 6-2024 would complete the tortured process by which Teaneck’s government and Holy Name Medical Center agreed to expand the hospital zone while protecting the residents to the west and south. This ordinance defines the status of Chadwick Road within that newly –defined zone.


The process leading to Ordinance 8-2024, is, by contrast, much less publicly understood. Yes - Teaneck is a tree-loving community, and getting tree management right is a community priority and challenge!  Still, this is an ordinance governing tree removal that is said to be occasioned by evolved state DEP requirements.  It addresses approval requirements for the removal of large trees from any place in town and any removal of much smaller “street trees”. The draft ordinance is extremely complex! And it does not replace existing requirements found in Chapter 37 of the current code. When this ordinance was introduced absolutely nothing was said by anyone about what it meant. Presumably, questions posed in the public hearing will solicit substantial and understandable explanations before it is approved by Council. 


After voting on the new ordinances, readers will likely look for the resolutions and backup information on the 2024 municipal budget. Though very late, it is not there.  (see discussion of this issue elsewhere in this edition)


The meeting then moves through G&W toward a set of 11 resolutions (many of which were added late Friday) and a $14M+ Bill List. 


The sole Ordinance to be introduced addresses specific parking changes.   Consistent with our concern that Council uses meeting time to do Township business, Voices hopes Council will take more than the 105 seconds it spent in the last meeting to explain what it is doing.


Cedar Lane Management Group – May 8 at 6:30 pm at 555 Cedar Lane, Suite 4. No other information is currently available.



Board of Education – May 8, 2024 – this previously scheduled meeting and final budget hearing occurred on May 1. See the additional article discussing that meeting in this Voices edition.


Planning Board – May 9, 2024, at 7:00 pm (note this change from the normal start time). The meeting will occur in person in Council Chambers and by Zoom if you Click Here and add passcode 066713.


  • This Planning Board meeting should be of significant interest to the public. It will include a full hearing – with announced public input – on the Environmental Resources Inventory (ERI) just completed. It deserves a read by our readers (Click Here) as it details just how extensive and important are those diverse resources. It has been authored by Barbara Heskins Davis (VP at the Land Conservancy of NJ) who brings to this current account of these resources the extensive knowledge of the Township she has developed since authoring both the last ERI Update in 2013 and the drafts of both the 2007 and 2019 OSRP (the Open Space and Recreation Plan - the latter revision of which has not yet been fully adopted by the Board). 
  • In addition to its review and presumptive ERI approval by the PB, the PB will likely go into executive session as it seeks a new Board attorney and likely a closed discussion of the draft Master Plan, the preparation and approval process for which the Board assumed at its last meeting. The Board’s interim attorney is currently Mark Madaio who also serves as Board attorney for the Board of Adjustment.


Announcements

Contacting Teaneck Voices


Co-Editors: Dr. Barbara Ley Toffler and Dr. Chuck Powers

IT Editor: Sarah Fisher

By Email: teaneckvoices@gmail.com

By Phone: 201-214-4937

By USPS Mail: Teaneck Voices, PO Box 873. at 1673 Palisade Ave. 07666

Teaneck Voices' Website is www.teaneckvoices.com


Sign Up Now
Send a Comment
Submit an Article
Editorial Policies
LinkedIn Share This Email