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The Week That Was: Planning Board – Master Plan


PUBLISHED BY TEANECK VOICES

4/15/2024

Contents:

  • The Week That Was: Planning Board – Master Plan
  • This Week in Teaneck – April 15 to 21
  • Information Please - DPW Facility and Cannabis Ordinance
  • Teaneck Voices Hard Copy Announcement
  • And Don't Forget
  • Announcements


This Week in Teaneck - 4/15 to 4/21

  • Teaneck Municipal Alliance Against Substance Abuse (TMAASA)
  • Teaneck Council Regular Meeting
  • Teaneck Historic Preservation Commission
  • Environmental Commission (EC)
  • Board of Education Regular Meeting
  • Senior Citizen’s Advisory Board (SCAB)
  • Board of Adjustment (BofA)


Contacting Teaneck Voices

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


The Week That Was: Planning Board – Master Plan

Thursday, April 11, 2024, was the first meeting of the Planning Board where the Board agenda addressed what is the Board’s premier statutory responsibility – the preparation, oversight of public input, and adoption of the Town’s Master Plan (C. 40:55D-28).  In fact, other than minutes approval, the Master Plan was the sole agenda item (Click Here to watch the 1hr and 20 min PB meeting though the sound does not begin until minute 7) 


To be sure, work to gather public input about what should be included in the new Master Plan has been ongoing since July 2023.  It is work that has included public meetings and a survey to which 1800 residents responded. (Summaries of those information-gathering efforts are available – and very worth reading if you Click Here and sort through the Master Plans list for the 5 reports done in 2023.) That 2023 preparatory work was done by a Master Plan Steering Committee working with Town Planners though that Steering Committee was informally appointed and never authorized either by Council or the PB.


Hence, the Planning Board as a body was introduced to “what is a Master Plan” and its statutory role in a 20+-minute informal presentation to the Board made on Thursday by Town Planner Spach Trajan. That presentation evolved into a dialogue between the Planner and the Board. It emerged that the whole Board had received the previous week a 140-page proposed draft of the new Plan which the Planner had written and reviewed with both the unofficial Steering Committee and the Council Zoning Sub-Committee. No member of the Board reported having waded through the entire document before Thursday’s meeting. 


As the discussion proceeded the Board set for itself some flexible timelines for conducting their reviews of and suggestions for the draft Plan. The Board also decided to retain the evolving draft as a “deliberative” document not to be shared with any other public or entities until a Board decision to do so was made – likely in late May or early June.  


Unfortunately, only two members of the public were actually in attendance and able to provide input to the Board.  Both emphasized the twin challenges of the Board taking the time to meet its full and unique statutory responsibility and yet, when a draft is ready, to provide adequate time and opportunity for active public review and comment.  The Board was reminded that when the prior 2007 Master Plan was prepared there had been extensive public vetting that resulted in a consensus forming about that earlier MP and its version’s Goals and Objectives. 


Why, Voices asks, were there only two members of the public in attendance at this all-important Planning Board meeting to initiate the formal Master Plan preparation and adoption process?  The answer is simple. No access or agenda information about the 4/11 Board meeting had been placed on the Town website until 48 hours before the meeting. And even then the agenda information was revised on Thursday afternoon (several hours before the meeting) to indicate that the Board’s MP discussion would actually take place in a public, not the closed, PB session that the prior agenda had specified. In other words, residents literally could not possibly have known that if they came they could hear how the Board was planning to assume its statutory MP authority!

This Week in Teaneck - April 15-21, 2024

Please go to Teaneck Voices’ website for additional access and agenda information that becomes available during the week. Click Here


Teaneck Voices finds it noteworthy that the Town’s official entities rarely observe the Township’s code-defined obligations as to the timely release of information about location, access, agendas, and prior minutes. This week, only the Historic Preservation Commission’s leadership actually met those obligations. 


Teaneck Municipal Alliance Against Substance Abuse (TMAASA) – Tuesday, April 16, 2024, at 6:00 pm – Zoom-only access – Click Here and add the passcode 464052. 


Teaneck Council Regular Meeting - Tuesday, April 16, 2024, at 8:00 pm – in Council Chambers and a hybrid meeting – zoom access at Click Here and add passcode 530668. For Agenda packet information Click Here. The agenda, due at COB on Thursday (except for emergencies) was significantly changed on Friday afternoon – and may well change again on Monday or even Tuesday. 


  • The current agenda packet for this Council meeting suggests a relatively light and short meeting. Among the issues likely to draw attention are two resolutions (not included) which apparently will be proposed by members Goldberg/Orgen and by Gee. Each may generate fireworks.
  • No reference is made in the 4/16 Council agenda available on 4/14 to a proposed 2024 municipal budget Introduction, the state deadline for which was the 4/2 Council meeting.  
  • The agenda includes a proposed resolution to AGAIN approve a professional services (not competitively-bid) contract for Collier Engineering and Design that appears to be identical to the contract actually approved on 2/13/2024 and based on the same requested Collier proposal the Town received on January 30.  See discussion in this Teaneck Voices edition under Information Please.
  • The agenda also belatedly includes two new ordinances proposed for Introduction on 4/16.  Ordinance 7-2024 is an amendment to the already amended ordinance that specifies amended procedures for Cannabis facility licenses. The second is a new Ordinance 8-2024 with rules for tree removal that would expand Township authority to provide for removal approval.  Both ordinances deserve resident review – and we do note that the final public hearing before a vote for the adoption of each of these new ordinances would occur at either the first or second Council meeting in May. Nevertheless, Voices believes an explanation about the genesis and substance of these ordinances should be forthcoming on Tuesday.


Teaneck Historic Preservation Commission Wednesday, April 17, 2024, at 7:00 pm by Zoom only at Click Here and add passcode 268462. The agenda may be accessed if you Click Here

  • As usual, the leadership of this Commission has provided its members and the public with a robust agenda that reports recent developments (eg., historic marker progress) and explores future Commission activity.  


Environmental Commission (EC) – Wednesday, April 17 at 7:30 pm. As is routinely the case, the leadership of the Environmental Commission has provided none of the code-required information about access, location, or agenda to this 4/17 meeting as of Sunday, April 14.


Board of Education Regular Meeting – Wednesday, April 17 at 8:00 pm. Unfortunately, no information about the location, access, or agenda for this meeting is available on the Teaneck Schools website as of Sunday, April 14 except this clip from the website’s description of scheduled BOE meetings for 2023-4

Senior Citizen’s Advisory Board (SCAB) – Thursday, April 18, 2024, at 1:30 pm in the Rodda Center Game Room. As of Sunday, April 14, none of the other code-required information concerning this meeting’s agenda nor the prior meeting’s minutes was available on the Township website. 


Board of Adjustment (BofA) – Thursday, April 18, 2024, at 7:00 pm in Council Chambers (??) In fact, nothing about this second monthly meeting of the BofA (except the date) is currently found on the Township website  – and the pending applications before the Board (of which there are many) are currently scheduled to be heard beginning on May 2 and later. Voices therefore concludes that it is unlikely that this board will actually meet on 4/18 – and if additional information is forthcoming about this scheduled 4/18 meeting, Voices will update that information on its website (see above).

Information Please…

As Teaneck Voices repeatedly reports, the twin lessons of the Township’s 2022 election were 1) the need for transparency and 2) the need for a thorough re-evaluation of how the Town is conducting its development policy.  That these twin concerns persist is seen in the creation and or growth of neighborhood associations that prioritize them – and more recently the fact that these neighborhood associations have joined into a coalition, the Coalition of Neighborhood Associations for a Better Teaneck whose leadership meets weekly and authorizes statements for its members to speak in the Coalition’s behalf. 


The persistence of these issues and of the constituencies that articulate them is all the more important because the Town’s communication mechanisms fail so consistently to timely provide information about the location, access, and agenda of its official entities (boards and commissions) that address these issues.  Perhaps a new website will help. But it is also clear that the residents are rarely given a heads up about what is actually happening on issues that the public – when informed – has come out to address in large numbers. 


What’s Going on with the DPW Facility at 1600 River Road? Not since the Council meeting which immediately preceded the 2022 election has the Town provided us with more than a glimpse of what it is planning to do with the dangerous and contaminated DPW site that since 1973 has been acknowledged to be a neglected municipal property. The 2022 announcement followed decades of proposed alternate locations and embraced a plan to share facilities with Leonia, which did not come to fruition. Then came the “share Englewood’s DPW” idea, with a similar no-go outcome. Along the way, the Council in 2019 even made the 1600 River Road property one of its Areas in Need of Redevelopment (AINR) sites – and it remains today so designated.


On Tuesday, April 16, the Consent Agenda for Council includes a proposed professional services contract with Collier Engineering and Design, a large multi-engineering services firm located in Holmdel. It is Resolution 110-2024. The odd thing about this contract is that its recipient [Collier], the contract’s projected cost, and the cited Collier proposal are identical to those same items projected in an approved February 13, 2024 resolution (73-2024).  In fact, Voices can find no differences between the two resolutions. 


We note that the proposed contract in both resolutions is said to be not printable. When we tried to understand the scope of what Collier proposed (in both resolutions) to spend $128,400 to do it appears to be the same. And for those with the fortitude to ignore document warnings (“insecure”) to view the January 2024 Collier proposal on which this contract is based, you will see a series of projects including complex surveys and concept site plan options (Go to Click Here and then click Collier Engineering Jan2024 Proposal for Architectural Design 1600 River Road). We do note that on December 22, 2023, following an RFQ for engineering services, the Council approved a resolution 342-2023 that approved a contract with Collier which may or may not be related to the two resolutions just discussed.


Teaneck Voices believes that given the importance of all of DPW functions, the Town’s recycling needs, and the likely impact of that contaminated site on the Hackensack River, the public should be given an update on what’s what with this problematic piece of municipal property.


Cannabis Ordinance 7-2024.  On Tuesday Council will likely introduce an ordinance described as a new amendment to the December 2021 Ordinance that amended the August 10, 2021 Ordinance that addressed the Council’s largely “secret” consideration of whether and, if so, how, when, and where the Town now intends to license one/some of the various cannabis facilities as allowed under the State law passed in early 2021. 


The Council subcommittee which originally made recommendations to Council in July 2021 has been replaced by a newly-minted 2023 Council Cannabis subcommittee. This new subcommittee began providing minutes of its meetings in the Fall of 2023. But it, in fact, only published one set of minutes (those of October 23, 2023) of a meeting where newly-appointed Cannabis Attorney Ronald Mondello was in attendance. And subsequently, nada about anything official. 


In the subsequent 6 months, various cannabis facility seekers have implored the Township to add locations, move more quickly to define licensing, etc.  Township residents from time to time entreat the Council to act either to exclude or broadly include cannabis facility approval. 


The 10-page Ordinance 7-2024 proposed for introduction on Tuesday does separate facilities that provide cannabis under medical prescription. It would increase the original licensing costs for other types of cannabis facilities.  It appears to continue the restriction of cannabis facilities to the Alfred Avenue Light Industrial area.  


Given the strong and diverse views among Teaneck residents about cannabis and its place here in Town, the public needs to know from the Cannabis Subcommittee what Council intends to accomplish with this new amended ordinance. 

Hard Copy of Teaneck Voices Now Available

Teaneck Voices is delighted to announce that a hard copy of our weekly newsletter will now be available!



Our IT Editor, Sarah Fisher, will create a PDF of each week’s newsletter, formatted for print. If you would like printed copies to distribute:

  • If you have a printer, contact teaneckvoices@gmail.com and we will email you the PDF to print as many copies as you wish.
  • We welcome suggestions for locations for hard copies of Teaneck Voices and help in distribution.

AND DON’T FORGET

Because much of Teaneck’s Council meetings time, and especially Good & Welfare sessions, is focused on local effects of international crises, Teaneck Voices will weekly present our “And Don’t Forget” feature, to keep current municipal issues at the forefront of readers minds. We will repeat some of these items, adding new “reminders” weekly. THESE ARE ISSUES THAT AFFECT OUR DAILY LIVES AND THE OVERALL QUALITY OF LIFE OF ALL TEANECK RESIDENTS. Past items are italicized.


  • NEW - Pedestrian Safety has become a critical issue in Teaneck, unifying diverse communities in town. Speed limits on residential streets are 25 miles per hour. Specific areas that allow greater speeds are clearly marked. However, traffic speeds down many residential streets, often rolling past Stop signs, threatening all pedestrians, especially children and the elderly. Why isn’t anything being done? At the NETPBA Listening session, one resident talked of visiting San Diego where almost every street contains speed bumps. Drivers in Teaneck who have driven on Tryon and Harcourt Avenues have been pleasantly surprised to find 2 traffic-calming speed bumps on that much-traveled passageway from Teaneck to Englewood. How did that neighborhood get them? Why are there only 2? How can we extend this safety mechanism throughout the town?


Earlier “Don’t Forget” Items that bear repeating 


  • We need an independent audit of the NJ Department of Community Affairs's $300,000-$400,000 grant to the Garden of Human Understanding, which includes The Enslaved African Memorial, The Holocaust Memorial, and the Teaneck Public Library. This audit is even more critical now that the Town Council has “decoupled” the tri-partite entity and has determined that either monument can go forward alone. What monies were spent by each for the joint effort? What happens to the money spent and that is still held now that the partnership is severed?
  • The March 27 meeting to introduce “A New Concept” for the Beverly Road and American Legion Drive AINRs left the residents who attended angry and unsatisfied. The final slide of the evening said that that meeting was the last chance to voice opinions on the project. The voiced opinions were loud and clear: WE DON’T WANT TALL APARTMENT BUILDINGS, A MULTISTORY GARAGE AND HUNDREDS OF PARKING SPACES!!!!  WE WANT TO RENOVATE CEDAR LANE AND THEN DECIDE WHAT TO DO WITH THE SURROUNDING AREAS. 
  • Teaneck continues to grapple with the almost constant passage through and idling of CSX freight trains in our town. The possibility of toxic derailments and explosions is even more threatening because Teaneck has lined the sides of the CSX tracks with numerous schools and apartment buildings. Large communities of students and apartment residents (many of them elderly) are at enormous risk in their daily lives. 

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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