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Key Council Meeting Agenda Items – 7/16



PUBLISHED BY TEANECK VOICES

7/15/2024

Contents:

  • Key Council Meeting Agenda Items – 7/16
  • Stormwater Control Ordinance
  • Introduction of the 2024 Municipal Budget



  • OSRP & Master Plan next steps for the Planning Board
  • The Week That Was
  • Rail Safety Rally
  • Board of Adjustment
  • Parks, Playgrounds, and Recreation Advisory Board


  • This Week in Teaneck – 7/15 to 7/21


Announcements

  • Green Acres Public Meeting on Rte. 4 Bridge Replacement – 7/30
  • Parks, Playgrounds & Recreation Advisory Bd – 7/11


Contacting Teaneck Voices:

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

Key Council Meeting Agenda Items – 7/16

Many important agenda items were packed into the 341-page packet released to the public on Friday, July 12. Click Here. (All page number references to the agenda in this Voices article are to this web address.)


See especially Voices discussion of the new stormwater ordinance to be introduced and the Introduction of the 2024 budget


The LONG list of topics (including “Bell Tower”) to be discussed by Council in the pre-meeting Closed Session is intriguing- p. 15


The public meeting will begin with the formal swearing-in of our new Township Manager, Jaclyn Hashmat, and recognition of the Youth Advisory Board.


Apparently, in response to sustained public input concerning traffic speeds and pedestrian safety, the Council is entertaining a possible resolution to expand the scope of the Council’s current Leaf subcommittee (Katz, Orgen, and Goldberg) to become the Leaf, Pedestrian and Traffic Safety Subcommittee. Residents concerned with these issues may want to inquire as to whether all meetings of this subcommittee will be as secretive as most other Council subcommittees (p.18)


Proposed Introduction of Ord 19-2024 - Amendments to Stormwater Control Ordinance.


This 30-page ordinance – most of which strikes out the prior ordinance, begins at p. 35. Apparently, the ordinance is being proposed as a response to changes required by the State’s Department of the Environment (DEP) but it is hopelessly convoluted for the ordinary lay resident. We encourage residents to ask the Township Attorney what is going on and how the new ordinance affects Teaneck, a Township traditionally struggling with water movement and flooding. Voices also notes that the Environmental Commission will discuss this proposed ordinance at its July 17 Zoom meeting 


Introduction of the 2024 Municipal Budget


Voices regular readers are well aware that the Township is months late in introducing and adopting the annual municipal budget for 2024. In March Council began reviewing then Manager Kazinci’s budget. He reported that originally his budget would have required a 9.97% increase and despite serious cuts still proposed a 6.9% levy increase. Residents have been given no additional information since March except that Council had begun looking around for municipal assets it might be able to market as a way to provide more revenue that could then reduce the taxation total that Town property owners would need to cover for the year.  


Council was focused on how to raise the revenue from the municipally-owned cell tower. It has taken four months and a new ordinance and two bid periods, but last Tuesday (7/9) the purchasing agent opened bids the Town hoped would bring $2M. In fact, the highest bid among 4 was for $3.55M. A Windfall! As of COB on Friday the completion of the deal with that highest bidder was still being closed – but perhaps by Tuesday a resolution to approve that highest bid will be added to Council’s agenda. 


What that means for the budget Council will introduce on Tuesday is not narratively explained to residents in the typically dense 67-page document that appears (beginning at p. 79 of the meeting’s agenda packet released just 24 hours ago as Voices goes to press.). What appears from our initial budget review is that the budget was prepared with the assumption of bell tower revenues of $2M (see p. 99 where “sale of municipal assets” is reported as $2M). How that and all the other changes from Kazinci’s March budget play out is this:


  • The March budget called for a Municipal & Library Levy of $65.331M whereas the budget to be introduced on Tuesday calls for Municipal Taxes of $62.243M – nearly $3M less. 


Hopefully, the new Manager & Council will describe in lay terms what is being proposed and be cogent in response to resident queries. Readers will keep in mind that the actual public hearing on this budget before the vote on its adoption takes place at the next Council meeting which has been moved to Thursday, August 22.

Planning Board Meeting: Some Progress but Unclear Future Path

OSRP:



At its “special meeting on Wednesday, June 10, a bare quorum of Planning Board members listened for 20 minutes to a tour-de-force presentation by Barbara Heskins Davis, VP for Programs at the Land Conservancy of NJ about more than her updated Open Space and Recreation Plan (OSRP). Davis not only explained why passage – with additional public input - will provide major financial benefits to the Town, but how that plan will enable important further development of Teaneck’s extraordinary open space, parks, and recreation resources. As she explains in the brief video clip below, Teaneck can with one additional PB session (scheduled for next Thursday, July 18) and then passage of her updated OSRP secure access to the full range of State environmental programs for the next decade (to 2034). ALL Our readers should watch this short video. 


But in addition, we encourage our readers – and all the PB members who missed the Davis presentation - to take 20 minutes to get the best possible “Teaneck’s environmental resources” tutorial that exists (Click Here and move the cursor to min 20 on of the Town video of the7/10 PB meeting).

Master Plan:



The final third of this 7/10 PB meeting was devoted to factors related to the evolving new Master Plan. MP was not an issue on the meeting agenda but was initiated by the Chair under the rubric of Correspondence. It began with the Chair’s announcement that the PB’s current draft will soon (next Monday or Tuesday?) appear on the Town website. It will be discussed by the Bd. at next Thursday’s 7/18 meeting. But public input about that draft will not occur at that meeting. (Those Chair’s initial comments can be watched/heard verbatim on the YouTube video below). The Chair’s comments kicked off a lively PB discussion of how the PB would handle the next steps of its preparation of a new draft Master Plan, the various possible implications of its distribution to the public of that draft, how and when public input to that draft would be managed and how after the input the Board would then approve the plan. This entire 25-minute Master Plan discussion may be watched if you Click Here and move the cursor to min56&30sec). Amid its MP scheduling discussion, Board Administrative Secretary Rosiland McClean reminded the Board that two site plan reviews (applications for a cannabis facility and a new one from Holy Name) and a lot reconfiguration applications must be added to near-term PB scheduling.


As has been frequently noted in prior Voice editions, the Master Plan approval and amendment is the sole responsibility of the Planning Board. As most residents know, the Town Council informally paused additional redevelopment steps and most other development processes until a new Master Plan is actually approved. It has now been one full year since resident surveys and town halls began gathering resident views about land use as a prelude to MP development. Once the PB has defined more clearly its timeline moving forward, Voices in subsequent editions will review the prior year’s steps and inform readers about where they can review the data about public land use preferences that have been developed.

The Week That Was

Rail Safety Rally – 7/8


New Jersey residents marked the 11th Anniversary of the Tragedy in Lac-Mégantic with a pledge to continue the fight for rail safety.


On Monday, July 8, New Jersey residents marked the 11th Anniversary of the Tragedy in Lac-Mégantic where a train carrying volatile Bakken crude oil (like what is in trains here in NJ) derailed and exploded like a bomb, killing 47 children, women, and men. 

A coalition of organizations has marked this tragic event annually since 2014. This year the event was moved inside to Knights of Columbus Hall at 829 Windsor Road due to the extreme heat. The Hall is within a few yards of the CSX rail tracks that go through 11 Bergen County towns and beyond in NJ, carrying some of the same hazardous materials that were involved in derailments in Canada and the US.

Board of Adjustment – 7/11


This short one-hour meeting saw the dismissal of several incomplete applications and the approval of several residential applications with modest variances. The Board paid appropriate homage to the retiring Zoning Official, Dan Melfi, and welcomed Adam Myszka who will pick up the reins from Melfi. 


Parks, Playgrounds & Recreation Advisory Board – 7/11


This in-person meeting at the Rodda picked up the active discussion of adding pocket parks which has recently been raised in various advisory board meetings. A presentation by resident Chondra Young and residents who live near Brooks Park drew this Board’s attention to waste cleanup and the lack of suitable toilet facilities at Brooks. In a second presentation, Michael Klatsky focused on the current challenges faced at Sagamore Park where he said the insertion of flood mitigation tanks and park renovation plans need additional engineering attention.

This Week in Teaneck –July 15 to 21, 2024

If additional information about access and agendas for this week’s public meetings becomes available, we will update our Teaneck Voices website at this post (Click Here) in RED font. 


Advisory Board on Community Relations (ACBR) – Monday, July 15, 2024, by Zoom Click Here For the agenda which is not a separate document, go to the website calendar and hunt for the ABCR meeting  Click Here


Teaneck Council Regular Meeting – Tuesday, July 16, 2024 - public session at 8:00 pm in Council Chambers and hybrid by Zoom (Click Here and add passcode 147608. 341-page Agenda Packet now available at Click Here

  • See discussion of this Council agenda in the Council Agenda article in this Voices edition


Environmental Commission (EC) – Wednesday, July 17, 2024, at 7:30 by Zoom, Click Here and add passcode 270019. Agenda is available at Click Here


Board of Education Regular Meeting (BOE) – Wednesday, July 17, 2024, at 8:00 pm to be held virtually only at (Click Here). Agenda TBD


Planning Board (PB) – Thursday, July 18, 2024, at 7:30 pm at MP-1 of the Rodda Center – by Zoom but not hybrid - Zoom TBD. The agenda is not yet available but see the discussion in Voices’ Planning Board article in this edition

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


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