someone needs help well watch the town council meeting symptoms catch me visibly damage of the intestinal lining at 12 weeks and one year that may occur before treatment and check for infection tell your doctor
about it liverpenterologist all around my hairline get ready to rise with your shine introducing the all new collection now at ashley precision boils right for
targets to change the right amounts over or under contract it's locked lock my yeah i'd like to call the meeting to order at 700 p.m april 8th 2025 madam
clerk if you don't mind adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by forwarding a copy to the courier news star ledger and posting on the township website at least 48 hours prior to the meeting all in accordance with the open public meetings act this meeting will
not substantially go past 10:30 p.m mr kudo yes mr glouster here mrs ellis yes mr machado here mr moran present mrs pope here mayor in we stand for the flag salute
please to the flag of the united states of america to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you okay i have a proclamation here that i'm
going to read you can hear whereas children are vital to our state's future success prosperity and quality of life as well as being our most vulnerable assets whereas all children deserve the safe stable nurturing homes and communities to foster their healthy growth and
development and whereas child abuse and neglect are a community responsibility affecting both the current and future quality of life of a community and whereas communities that provide parents with the social support knowledge of parenting and child development and
concrete resources they need to cope with stress and nurture their children ensure all children grow to their full potential and whereas effective child abuse prevention strategies succeed because of partnerships created among citizens human service agencies schools
faith agencies and the business community and whereas we recognize the need to prioritize kids and invest in more prevention initiatives like home visiting and family strengthening policies economic support and community based child abuse prevention programs at
the national state and local levels and now therefore be resolved by the mayor and town council and the township of berkeley heights we do hereby write to proclaim april as child abuse prevention month through this 8th day of april 2025 great thank you
okay conference session yes it is please um i am liza vana i'm the township administrator this is diane sherry she is our cfo i'm going to figure out why this stopped working all of a sudden but
we are going to give you um a brief overview of the budget which we are introducing tonight virtual of course well i work on getting the panic huh don't panic that's when your brain shuts
down i'm fixing it but um so that makes a little sense i'm supposed to read this part but she's going to just do it for a second okay the main goal of our 2025 budget is to
provide the residents of berkeley heights with a budget that means a level of services they've become accustomed to and with our increased development this budget includes some of the major investments in the wastewater treatment plant that not only bring the
plant into and stay in d compliance but also ensure priority of their infrastructure upgrades as were completed as to be completed as soon as possible all required financial matches for draining and the infrastructure grants that we have received including balmoral
bridges drain drainage road and other road construction projects the straight safe streets to school sidewalks on snyder a the springfield ab sidewalks and lights project and and many more
there's also a million dollars in capital items that are being funded through the current budget to help manage our debt service for a better tomorrow and borrow less money and how are you doing here should i go to the next one i'm going to share i'm going to share my
screen so that um i'm going to go to slideshow that's easier to read now oh there you go you want to take over the challenges of the sewer department okay technical difficulties um
you're not sharing the same screen maximize it put in screen share mode i'm just kidding you read this one no i didn't read that okay all right we're going to start with some budget challenges um we always have major drainage issues uh that we've been
trying to tackle in the past few years as most people know we've been tackling them as grant monies and capital funds allow um because we only try to borrow between two and $3 million every year because of our debt um we want to keep up with the debt payments and also not
add to the debt any more than necessary than absolutely necessary uh these grant monies are really crucial to allowing us to do as many capital projects as we've been doing um the westside drainage project it is still in progress the overall project is 20 is roughly uh $25
million our focus right now um is phase one which is the sawmill portion of the project still under review by the new jersey infrastructure bank we have roughly $2 million in federal aid to add to the $500,000 in federal aid received in previous years um we're hoping uh
that this project will be approved by the um i bank in case we need more funding this year and hopefully we can start it next year um we also included in our budget um we have certain deadlines by which we have to award
grants so we have to make sure that our matching portion or the remaining monies needed to fund each project if we did not get the grant amount for the full project cost we have to make sure that those are funded in each budget year um to make sure we don't miss any deadlines by which projects need to be awarded so
those are also funded this year uh we're also trying to seek more out more grants to pave roads improve sidewalks and improve pedestrian safety um storm water runoff continues to erode streets and decrease their lifespan to that uh notion the township passed a new storm water ordinance this year to be in
compliance um but we still have to fix a lot of the roads that continue to erode because of water runoff and then um as usual material supplies and chemicals and inflationary costs um are have been a challenge in the past two years and this year the new tariff wars which we've already been um experiencing the
effects of uh are also a challenge that we are trying to to plan for so the next set of challenges is our wastewater treatment plant um and the related systems infrastructure so not only do we have a wastewater a very
large sophisticated wastewater treatment plant but we also have hundreds of miles of pipeline uh we have four or five pump stations um and other pieces of equipment so we're facing roughly $60 million in projects that need to be
addressed over the next few years to get things up upgraded um to where they should be at the at the sewer plant the township has been diligent in recent years addressing crucial parts of the sewer infrastructure most in need of upgrading either for safety or for d compliance that's how we've been
prioritizing items uh we invested almost $10 million in the 2023 budget uh over $2.3 million in 2024 plus another a million dollars in state funding uh unfortunately that doesn't make a dent in the projects that need to be done and those are just the capital costs in 2024
alone our operating costs just for that department were over $2 million um and this year they were $2.3 million um we still have roughly almost $22 million still owed on the municipal complex as mentioned before we can only borrow so much money for other infrastructure
needs and with the wastewater treatment plant needing the most attention other projects and departments tend to get put off and we're only funding their what items are necessary uh excuse me are absolutely critical um or that are needed to keep up with what residents
are expecting in this town just some specific projects that are funded at the waist treatment plant this year just to give you an idea of cost you know a boiler replacement is over half million dollars uh 300,000 in collection system upgrades which ideally we should be probably spending 500,000 but we're
spending 300,000 um 300,000 for a chemical feed system that's been in progress for about a year and a half 212,540 for an irration baser and flat basin airator and flash mixer replacement $100,000 in manhole improvements which is one of the top
priorities for the dp so a lot of things down at the sewer plant are expensive and this is just to give you an idea of some of the services provided to our residents with a very small portion of the um your tax bill it
actually goes to the municipality an effort to offset some of that tax burden we do try to engage in as many shared services as we as we can that are beneficial to the township some of these include a shared a shared court with new providence and summit um sewer
for new providence it through madison and some of these others um i'm going to throw it to diane for this this is essentially a slide showing the appropriations breakdown for this year's budget okay um i just want
to point out that our appropriations have actually gone down a little bit this year but you as you can see from the graph the major the four critical areas that we spend their most money are insurance public safety public works and
our debt payment and the rest of the portion of the budgets are relatively small in comparison most of these um expenses are controlled by contractual agreements we've already made price increases statutory
things and there there really is a small portion of the budget that's actually within our control for the operating budget of the day-to-day running of the township um the next is our revenues and i just personally took the five categories we
bring in about 5.5 million in local revenues that includes fees and small things of franchise fees all of these little fees add up to about 5.5 million we that
includes all the pilots we get 1.5 million from the state the uniform construction code is anticipating about a million dollars shared service brings in brings back to us about 60 63,000 and right now our
grants are only appropriate at 159,000 which we anticipate will go up as the year goes on and we get more grants approved by the state and other sources and then we will add them into the budget via resolution uh i'd like to remind everybody that
when you get your tax bill in the summer that um the municipal portion is only 19 18% of the entire tax liability that you will be paying majority of it is the school which is almost 60% of your bill
the county takes another 18% and library gets 1.8% and open county open space is.76% so this presentation is basically only talking about the 19% of your tax
bill and we estimate um that the the municipal increase will go up 2.28% 28% which means for an average household that is currently valued at 321,000 321,000
um will have an average increase of less than less than $100 a year so that's $99.40 less than 10 bucks a month is what your total impact will be to the um average homeowner and the average um total average um
taxes will be two 200 2,679 and a whole pic year and this is just to give you an idea of some of the projects that are funded um with our capital um our capital budget this year we are not going to be borrowing money right away
for all of these um but we wanted to at least put them in the ordinance in case we needed to borrow all of it later again we wanted to at least account for we've already had a $70,000 price tag increase for one part needed for our
sewer plant um we just wanted to make sure that money was approved if needed for some of these equipment pieces that we might need coming in that might be more expensive um but again we're only borrowing um the i think it's roughly 2
2.6 million um off the bat um there's a variety of sewer improvements included in this line item uh manhole rehabilitation uh which is also part of the d uh priorities for our sanitary sewer system um storm water also um with
our our ms4 permit from the new jersey uh department of environmental protection there are certain things we have to do each year to keep up with our storm water permit those also that might include um storm water mapping um making sure that we switch out the metal in the streets to make sure all they're all d
compliant um there is one vehicle for uh department of public works um stream cleaning in case that there is a storm there always seems to be storms that require us to um you know do an emergency appropriation to do some
cleanup so we're trying to put that money aside uh this year um we have a vehicle acquisitions uh two for the police department some it upgrades um improvements to the firehouse uh road uh road and drainage improvements um we can
we're continuing with our document scanning project uh we put a little bit of money um spend a little bit money each year for us to continue scanning things um so that they're easier to access for oper requests easier to access for our staff and so everything is cloud-based instead of digging
through piles of paper that could be god knows where in this building or other buildings uh related to municipal operations and then um the radio equipment that is actually for um the new antenna that they put up council
member maria might be able to speak better this uh they put up at gl for the radios and the communications this building was built in such a way that the frequencies do not penetrate the building exterior so this is a device
that allows the communication to go in and out of this building for the the radios so um that's a rundown of the capital items and that's it mayor arrived just in time what was it okay
uh does council have any questions um i noticed those two top priorities for the wastewater treatment um and that came specifically from d those are the two that they said are so it's not just psns that's dictating that it's the d correct correct that we try to have our
spending be guided by what the dep is saying is utmost priority to us it's a long laundry list of things that that sewer plan so they're where they're very happy with the progress being made and the leadership down there so that's good there's still a long way to go yeah
thank you and and dredging for the streams you have a list of streams here you plan on dredging or not yet no okay no not yet that would only be a case of emergency though right for storms yeah for storms possible that one
i'm talking about right yeah okay we'll discuss that one right i know they're working i know they're working really i know you worked really hard on this budget i know both you and diane were were a good team on this and you see a difference of a qualified cfo
helping us so thank you so nice having um it's it's it's a lot different and uh a lot calmer your your fear of grant money is mine i hope it goes everything goes well and we'll see what happens so
thank you by keeping the cost down it's up to the county now they're the same and uh let's let the school board the county and the school board the same soon as we soon as we get their uh approved budgets will um add them on we did you know update
them on the uh cost of living was what 3% last year something like that so we're just below that so we're still doing we're doing better than everything else so kudos to you wait that's my name i'm not sure if everybody knows when you say the assessed value it's the assessed
value of the house it's not what the house is actually worth on the market and i think that confus 45% of the market price the average assessed value i have no further questions thank you i'm just jumping in here any other questions
all right i i thank the council who worked on this budget as well as diane and liza who did a great job so thank you to the council people for all the time and effort that you put into the budget as well so um with that it looks like we're moving into the regular agenda and the approval
of the minutes please um i move that the following minutes as distributed be accepted and approved public meetings november 12th 2024 december 3rd 2024 january 7th 2025
january 21st 2025 february 4th 2025 and february 18th 2025 additionally special public meeting november 20 november 18th 2024 and december 23rd 2024
any discussion mr kudo yes mr foster yes mrs illis yes mr machado yes mr moran yes to january 21st february 4th and february
18th abstain from the rest spoke yes okay ordinances for introduction madame clerk can you do us the honor ordinance 2025-13 calendar year 2025 ordinance to
exceed the municipal budget appropriation limits and to establish a cap bank njsa4a 40-45.14 i move that the ordinance as read by the clerk be offered on the first reading that may 6 2025 be set as the day for
the public hearing and that the clerk be directed to advertise the same in the korea news second any discussion roll call please mr cuda yes mr foster yes mrs ellis yes mr machado yes mr moran
yes mrs poke yes uh i move that resolution 2025-154 resolution authorizing the approval of the 2025 municipal budget be introduced and established and establishing a may 6 2025 as the date
for the public hearing and final adoption any discussion roll call mr kudau yes mr foster yes mrs ellis yes mr mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs poke yes i move to
open the citizens hearing second any discussion roll call mr cuda yes mr coster yes mrs ellis yes mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs poke yes okay comments are welcome during the public comment uh period
during this m meeting on any matter over which the township has jurisdiction to make your comment the speaker must come forward to the microphone and state his or her name and address for the record each speaker is limited to three minutes the mayor and or council president will keep time please promptly yield the
floor when time is called and return to your seat your cooperation in adherence to these rules of order will ensure an orderly and respectful meeting and with that the hearing is now open jim truly 32 brookside lane berkeley
heights i i want to give some context uh into the recent events in connection with the lease of the board of education's lower columbia property by the township this to me has always been about to actually someone on the deis has always been about owning the
property that the board of ed uh currently owns not leasing it it was a big come down to lease it and unfortunately i think we've all paid particularly the gl tennis team in 2022 the mayor personally contacted the board of education president take him on a
tour of columbia property and show them the condition that it was in she made an offer to have the township upgrade the board's property so long as the board agreed permanently to sign over ownership to the property the board members were not interested in making that gift then again in 2023 the rec
commission requested a meeting with the school board's facilities committee which is in charge of buildings and grounds devarner representing the rec commission made a similar pitch for the school board to gift the ownership of the property i was present uh we were not in the school board was not interested however as a compromise the
school board's uh finance committee not the rec commission suggested a lease between the township and the board so they could partner together benefit our students deb was disappointed in this shortly afterward each school board member uh received an invitation to set
up a series of meetings surreptitiously with the mayor among just two or three school board members at a time in rotation to discuss the field the board did not agree to do this because meeting privately in succession to discuss the same request with less than a quorum of
the board members each time perhaps to avoid an open public meetings act violation is itself a violation of the open public's meeting act this uh basically i just think the township was
felt perhaps backed in to the fact that they would no longer have uh control of unique counties uh snyder park to schedule the field there'd be no future years to try and keep getting um ownership of that property that the board owns and it was very disappointing
initially to some on the deis but ultimately to people in the community including i wouldn't even be here if it was just adults i guess i just have one question i'm sorry i know a lot of people in the high school including um on
sports was all the damage done to this town by trying to whip up public sentiment to pressure the board on this issue worth it was locking up that tennessee unnecessarily worth it at the last council meeting current
school board member natasha jolly indicated that the lockout was unnecessary and the reason given by the township lacked any real basis since that time i checked into it and i believe natasha jolly was right thank you thank you
very sycamore avenue i've got a different topic than recently to talk about public participation aspect of the of council meetings um i want to talk about something last year and some of the changes that we made this year to public participation um some point
through last year there was the ability of a resident to uh send in writing by 4 p.m of the day of a council meeting any comments in the event they're not going to be here that would be read up to 3
minutes uh by the clerk um i don't that went away and i've never heard an explanation for that was it that a conscious decision uh was there a reason why that stopped and that's question for that one and i can talk about everything and have
any answers at one time um then considering the changes made this year um having one open session for final public hearing on ordinances that makes sense you all can handle the multiple issues at one time rather than opening
and closing uh a session for each ordinance and then of course there's moving up the u citizens hearing such that agenda items and and any other items can be heard so people don't have to wait till the end now that issue has been talked about many a time and there
was always what do we do um the the question i want to raise here after thinking about it is um does that change unless there's some parameters that can be adjusted um make for less
participation you know for example if someone is up to talk about several ordinances um that may be on the agenda at one time do they get to have three minutes for each ordinance they want to talk about
or just three minutes to talk about maybe five ordinances that may be up for final adoption i'm concerned about that because that would give it won't give a resident a full chance to um talk to all the issues because of that time limitation and a similar note on the
citizens hearing uh you know what if there are several items on the agenda that someone wants to talk about as well as talking about something that's not on the agenda can they come up and say well i'm up here to talk about something on the agenda they get the three minutes
then all the time come back to talk about something that's uh you know not on the agenda i think you see the point i see a few nods you know the uh residents have lost some opportunity to talk about everything they should be able to talk about under the prior
protocol and um are we going to do something to clarify the ability to get equal time that we had prior to this year so those are the questions what happened to the uh the ability for written comments for
those who couldn't attend and then my issues for this year are those all your questions yeah yeah i mean i was just all related but you know yeah so allowing the comments in writing was something i believe that we started during covid and it was just our feeling
that you know we like to see people one-on-one and hear their comments in person and so that was something that um we changed back to being in person um there have been a lot of changes with the agenda if you've noticed it's not just the citizens hearing having the one citizens hearing but um it's the a lot
of the housekeeping items are now on consent rather than written i mean reorg alone there's 90 some odd uh resolutions and the first the second you know and the roll call vote does make it quite lengthy um i believe for and let me double check this but i believe for the
ordinances for example next week when we have i don't know if we have i didn't check um any on for tonight it has its own um own hearing for each ordinance on adoption or right i believe that that's still the case but um if i'm misspeaking
um we've as you know we've gone back and forth with having the citizens hearing at the end you know doing things at the beginning we've you know heard feedback both ways and this is sort of i think our best compromise on the agenda to make it more efficient and to allow maybe um you know different kinds of
different things that happen the ability to speak so i think from our perspective and again correct me if i'm wrong that this is just the best most efficient agenda with the opportunity to speak you know in a fashion that we think is the fairest yeah and and like i said thank you for the explanation last year
because that that was really the question and i guess my issue is i i think it's fine to to do those things i i think my issue was the uh you know the adequate time to talk to a particular issue i mean because that remember we when we had an agenda hearing and a citizens hearing we've had you know kind
of two opportunities to address different things right and likewise we i in the past we did have i mean um be sometime this year we it was one one hearing for all of multiple um
ordinances so if somebody wanted to talk to a couple of them well they have to do two of them in three minutes or they get three minutes per ordinance because prior to that if indeed it is a separate hearing for each ordinance everybody be able to come up for that particular
hearing i think in reason i'm fair like for example the timer went off and you're supposed to ask a question and sit down but we're having a little bit of a back and forth normally i don't allow but i think within reason you know if somebody's having a conversation or has a legitimate follow-up you know question we're always going to allow
that you know as long as it fits the context of the meeting and what's going on i mean and then you mentioned something about an item that's not on the agenda well there was a gentleman about a month ago um who came forward and asked us about a discount for uh sewer fees for 100% disabled veterans
well guess what that's on the agenda tonight something we hadn't discussed or considered it was a great initiative and you know we certainly agreed with that person's position and now it's on the agenda for this evening so you know we there have to be rules obviously but we also like to be fluid when we can so i
think that's the best explanation and i don't want to put the mayor on the spot but i i do think that sometimes you know you go to a meeting and you have to wait till the very end and meetings could be long and you're sitting and you're sitting and you have to work the next day so i think moving anything you want to talk about to the earlier part of the meeting is really powerful and i don't
want to put you on the spot but i do think if something else came up and you had to piggyback you know how i love to piggyback that our mayor is very fair and she wants to hear from residents so i wouldn't consider that it's like a set in stone but you have to have rules you
have to establish the rules but we're we're kind of fluid and there are shades of gray it's not so black and white okay well i again i'm having the things is fine rearranging it it's just comparing opportunities for public
participation in that mode versus i think you understand and it is now on the table thank you thanks steve the other motion has to leave already he would have had to wait till the end of this meeting that's true yeah some some case it's 11:30 12 o'clock every day for
those meetings i don't know which meetings detail drive um as everybody's aware i've been up here a couple of times about water issues um on a neighboring property most recently the last three meetings i've been bringing
this back up due to a lack of response from everybody here um again there's an oversized driveway out of code there's no hydrarology study when the house was built that would have required dry wells there's an 80 foot long illegal ditch against code draining all the water to
my property uh the attorney has been blowing off the issue now for the last few meetings he did get back to me although uh within the last two days he got back to me reaffirming that this is a civil matter which it is not a civil matter um in his email to me he says
that construction of a single family dwelling is not required to obtain site plan approval i'm not sure like what planet that is but i don't think it's here in berkeley heights um hydrarology studies or storm water management plans
are not required for a single family dwelling that's not true um when the house was built and if you look at all the permits that are there it specifically says "storm water drainage information has not been submitted for review to the township engineer see enclosed drainage letter as soon as
drainage information has been submitted for review and approval by the township engineer the plans will be forwarded to the building department for the review and issuance of a building permit i've requested building permits i've requested site plans nobody seems to be able to find this um so i don't know
where this drainage letter is i don't know how they got a permit um it basically goes against everything that the attorney is saying uh you also provided a copy of a permit about widening of the driveway in question and that prior code says that residential
properties are exempt from this code now how can a residential property be exempt from code that's one thing i don't understand uh the earlier code stated 12t wide for a one-way driveway that it changed to 18 ft wide with the new code
um this driveway is 22 ft wide uh not only that i've opened every permit for this property several times and the permit never existed now all of a sudden it exists uh the permit says 20 ft wide
by 65 deep but it that's not even the size of the driveway it's bigger than that um and i'm not sure if this was ever inspected or not uh the permit appears to be a fake permit which was probably generated today because from yesterday till today this permit
suddenly appeared out of nowhere uh the permit the zoning permit is from june 2017 however it's dated april 8th 2025 so i'm not sure how that happens you can like backdate to 2017 and create
a permit i'm not sure um the format of the permit is a recent format because when you look back to 2017 and i just happened to have a permit from that same time and the format was different in 2017 than it is today and this permit is
in today's format so again it appears to be a fraudulent document i'm not sure if you guys could be doing this and falsifying documents and tampering with records but this is a pretty big deal if you are i mean it's actually a crime if you're doing that and that's considered
gross misconduct um you know especially if there's intent and quite honestly it feels like there's intent here so i'm not sure like you guys ever going to fix this issue i think our attorney has responded i'm
not familiar with the letter so i can't why does the attorney have why are you spending money on an attorney for this i don't understand like you have codes in town why aren't you enforcing the codes of the town isn't this like your job have you guys discussed this at all has anybody sat down as a groups the last three or four
meetings i've been talking about have you all sat down as a group to discuss this and how you can address this well we can't because we'd be violating sunshine law okay well have have you broken out into groups to discuss this it is quite frankly it is not their role
to do it it is our departments and we have been doing it and i'm sorry that you don't like the answer that you're receiving but the fact of the matter is our attorney's letter stands the the driveway measurements you're talking about and he told you are for
commercial not for residential and that same conversation was had on the day in 2022 when you were up here that is for commercial so we are it is not up to them to decide this i have met so many times with our department heads over the past few years about this and the result
is the same and three to four attorneys have all said the result is the same so i'm sorry if you don't like that result but that is our stance well i i don't like the result because you're going against the code of the town now that's just it was not against the code and as our attorney said you
are free to take this up as a civil matter with your neighbor if you wish but as of now the township has no authority to do anything else this is not a civil issue this is a town code issue driveway's out of code there's no hydrarology study on the house it's not
out of code when it was built okay well and i'm not going to answer anymore because our attorney answered all your questions in his email and he's not here incorrect okay okay you guys put together a zoning permit today that is
so untrue okay so we're going to end this you said what you've had to say our attorney has provided a letter i think none of probably no one on the governing body has seen that but i have to believe because it's not our job dayto-day i'm not an attorney there's not seven of us
up here not one of us is an attorney so we're just going to end the conversation with that if you want to reach out to mr sammon for additional questions or i'm sorry julian julach attorney when it's a zoning and code violation issue what our township professionals have already given you
their ruling and that's their ruling yes you guys are so good thank you good hi my name is debbowski i live at 20 over a hillway with my husband and four children um we are a blended family
that moved to town about four years ago um so far so great except for one little thing that i'm here just for help um i don't know where to go how to do this and so i've come here um really quickly we moved to town four years ago we
bought a 1984 house in the mountain way um sorry cinnamon ridge area didn't even know that was called until about a year ago and um um the house needed a lot of work um we are an outdoorsy types family we love being outside so we started
working on our backyard this is the first home i've ever owned i lived in condos and co-ops before my husband did not live in this area of new jersey at all had no idea about having to file permits and codes so we started work in our backyard um neighbor called the town
we got permits to level off our backyard um back in 2023 and started that uh process of getting a retaining wall and um then met with tom bako tom saro in our backyard they suggested we move the wall back we move the wall back they
suggested we put $4,000 worth of river rock we put $4,000 of river rock there um we have this all on video camera we have it um recorded by our contractor um and now our neighbor has a problem because they think we have encroachment issues totally understand this is not your job fast forward we put a patio in
because we had a dilapidated deck it was like really old it was wood the kids were getting um hurt by it so we took it down we put a patio still had no idea i had a permit process so i've learned my lesson and so is my husband um we we started the process for a variance in
april of last year um we um had to carry it over to may because i accidentally sent it out a day later my fault um so we carried over till may um the first three meetings that we had with the board which were may july and october we talked nothing about the patio only
about the um leveling off of the of the backyard which we were permitted to do tom baka was there um tom sarro had looked at it he um you know we got charges for going to all these meetings from neglia neglia neglia from looking at the wall having to certify that
everything was done properly to code fast forward to january i had no idea where to go because i never got a response from the town sending absurd amount of emails and calls so i had to hire an attorney um august and touri and i hired bill hollows to come to a meeting we had to move that to march our
variance just got declined because of no reason other than a neighbor complaining not because our storm water management plan wasn't good not because of anything other than threatening that he would come here and speak on behalf didn't even know i could come here because i'm still getting used to the town so i'm
here to get help because i don't think we were fair treated fairly i don't think the way in which this all went down was fair mr sullivan made comments in a couple of meetings saying "don't worry we won't make take a p patio down before labor day weekend you know you
could keep it just just a little bit longer." who says that to a resident who's paying thousands of dollars who tells us that you know oh don't worry about it just get in under 30% come back well we did and we paid a close to like $10,000 to hire an attorney and an
engineer and get new plans to be denied if you were going to deny us back in october or whenever save us the thousands of dollars that we now need to use for our patio i totally understand we made a mistake 100% no one had ill will here i never tried to hurt anybody neighbors nobody but i just needed help
and i spent hours upon hours trying to contact people of this town i've sat in offices only to get bills from neglia contracting like i don't know where to go who to go to i've gotten threats calls you know tom safaro says after our meeting in october because i reached out
he was going to set up um a meeting with our neighbors to discuss it because he was meeting with them it took seven weeks for me to after emails after emails to get a response no response finally he calls and he threatens saying "if you don't figure this out with your neighbor you're going to have a
violation from the town." it's now march i don't have a violation from the town the only violation i do have and i'm sorry i talked to this guy's point is a violation for a dead tree that's not on my property that they literally in writing said "we are not survey experts we don't know whose tree this is." so they sent the notice to my neighboring
properties but i have a survey and it's not on my property so i don't understand the the you know the town's responsibility here and i'm just trying to get to an answer because really i'm not i'm not trying to hurt anybody i didn't mean to do anything wrong and i
like learned my lesson obviously got our kitchen done got the permits understand but where do i go from here you know and i feel like the things that even you know mr cariella was talking about in the meetings we weren't supposed to be talking about because it wasn't a
variance for my wall or you know the easement in my backyard it was for my patio and i spent thousands of dollars at those meetings trying to get a variance for my patio and then just got denied the board of adjustment is a an
autonomous board and there's a there's a a state statutory process for an appeal the appeal is the council to i believe we need to we'll have to get you the legal information so i think the process if the if you get
denied by the board of adjustment i believe the board of adjustment you can appeal to the council but let us um be sure about that um if you would leave your name and email and and uh a telephone number with liza sure um i
i'll talk to some of the board members and some of um and see what happened at the board meeting sure and i i obviously don't know the details so i don't want to speak to the details of your particular and i only have three minutes so i couldn't give you all the
detail and i know that's really not your wheelhouse here but really any help i i i don't want to have to file a lawsuit i don't i mean there were passive aggressive things said that insinuated we were getting not getting it passed for this you know from the beginning and
i would have loved to just know that so i didn't go and hire an attorney to try and help me because i couldn't get responses i mean i have it all and you know it's there's copies of everything i mean i i don't wanted to bring it to that level i don't you know i love this neighborhood i love thank you so much i
love my other neighbors i understand they're upset i just we don't send so i appreciate it yeah we'll get back to you let us do some you know understand it and then we'll get back to you but i think there is a legal process and i think the appeal body for the board of adjustment is the council the
township council not the planning board but the board of adjustment okay but let us confirm that okay because again i'm not an attorney okay play one on tv thank you got an email address too i believe my name is steve magnus i live on snider avenue
uh by me street if anybody knows where me street is it is a mess yes it's it's not a street it's a series of potholes yep um i'm 80 years old i've been retired for 25 years i've been in the town since
1998 one of the things my doctor told me to do was walk a lot i can't even walk down the street i took a fall the other day avoiding one pothole i stepped in another all i'm asking is that the street be
paved it's a mess yes this year it needs it needs additionally i think that we put the price tag roughly at like half a million dollars in drainage which we can't do this year but we're going to at least pay we're going to pave it this year and then do the drainage next year i've been here in this partic i've been
in the town 27 years in this particular residence 5 years nothing has been done in five years i have some pictures i'd like to give and for everybody's but if you check our website it is one of it is listed as being uh to be paved this year
i heard that last year so anyway that's all i have to say thank you very much [Music] i'm going to call it anybody else all right seeing no one else i move to close the citizens hearing second any
discussion roll call please mr kudo yes mr glouster yes mrs villis mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs pope yes yeah here i move to adopt the consent agenda consisting of resolutions 2025
through155 through 2025-162 with resolutions that will be approved in one motion any discussion roll call mrudo yes mr foster yes mr zilla yes mr machado yes
mr moran yes mrs pope yes madam clerk if you would please ordinance 2025-14 ordinance vacating riverside drive within the township of berkeley heights the ordinance by the clerk be on first reading and may 6 2025 we said as
the day of public hearing and the clerk be directed to advertise the courier news second any discussion yeah i have a i actually have a question um i think i um right now there's a couple addresses that are listed
as that riverside drive i think mount carmel is their address of riverside drive we're just vacating the street i'm not there's a paper street there's a paper street in the front of the old berkeley caterers that if you think that's driveway area in front of
berkeley when it was still standing oh okay it's not like parallel to springfield avenue that's actually a paper township street in order for the county to develop it or to continue the construction we have to vacate the paper
street in our property so the mount caramel is actually on river river i got mixed up sorry sorry okay legit legitimate question
all right uh roll call mr kudo yes mr glouster yes mrs ellis yes mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs pope yes um can you read the next ordinance ordinance
202516 establishing an ordinance for township service charges move that the ordinance as read by the clerk be offered on first reading and that may 6th 2025 be set as the day for the public hearing and that the clerk be directed to advertise in the courier
news second that any discussion roll call mr kudo yes mr foster yes mrs zillis yes mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs pope yes madame clerk can you do us the honor of reading the next ordinance please
ordinance 2025-17 amending the township code for the township of berkeley heights to clarify sewage fees for 100% disabled veterans i move that the ordinance as read by the clerk be offered on the first reading that may 6 2025 be set as the date for
public hearing and that the clerk be directed to advertise same in the korean news any discussion i just want to thank the gentleman who came up to yes i have a son um sorry
talking to people online there mr kudo yes mr foster yes mrs zillis yes mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs poke yes who's got the last one madam clerk if you could read ordinance or yes or ordinance
2025-8 an ordinance amending the minimum and maximum rate of salary and compensation of elected and appointed township officials and non-un employees in the various municipal departments of the township of berkeley heights i move that ordinance as read by the
clerk be offered for first reading on may 6 2025 uh be set for the day for the public hearing and the clerk be directed to advertise same in the courier news second any discussion roll call mr cuda
yes mr foster yes mrs ellis mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs pope yes okay moving on to township council reports um councilman cuda um it's been
a quiet week at least for me so it's a good thing i just want to say today's national impanada day so hopefully we'll get the empanada flags at um patrick she's got like these big flags oh stopping at later on maybe um and
that's about it all right awesome thank you john okay i got a couple things uh historic preservation committee meeting is uh tomorrow i mean thursday sorry my bad uh thursday april 10th 7:30 at town hall uh we're going to be prepping for the uh
hotel word festival which is well underway and we have a few things we gota talk about um the festival is going to be october 18th from noon to 4 randy it's october 19th um we're also going to be joining the recreation department at their community connections event on
saturday may 3rd where um which you're probably all going to get a flyer in the mail from the recck department about uh they're going to have community connections on at the complex uh it's going to tell you all about the recreation department um everything that they do here and what
you can get involved in and i got sidetracked there but we're going to be having a train station dedication of the historic sign that now adorns the building okay um the time's going to be determined on that uh so please join us for the unveiling we have a few things we're going to be talking about at thursday's meeting
um april 13th is commemorating the birth of national scrabble it's going to be national scrabble day the inventor alfred mosher butts and that's a three that's a triple word score right there okay um he he was an unemployed
architect and an amateur artist and he developed the can during the depression it was trademarked trademarked in 1948 um i know it's cold outside but monday the 14th of april is national guarding day so roll up your sleeves get out there and take care of your gardens okay uh i want to wish everyone who
celebrates it a happy passover which is starts on saturday april 12th uh also i want to wish everyone a happy easter on sunday april 20th um i also want to point out that world tai chi day is saturday april 26th at 10:00 a.m across 80 countries okay we're going to be
having a uh event in conjunction with that and the mayor's wellness committee okay anybody can participate hygiene is beneficial all ages and no prior experience is necessary uh last year the group explored the yang 8 form and uh
charlie's not here but i want him uh charlie pratt's going to be running this for us uh because he is um want to understand master master tai chi man and um he could explain that more um there's going to be some other times that you can come ahead and get practice for it
uh there was one tonight from 6:00 to 7:30 um i don't know if they were still going on the higher room saturday the 12th tuesday the 15th thursday the 17th and thursday the 24th um i think this is all going to be on our website and then saturday from 9:30 to 11:00 world taichi
day at the memorial field patio um bring your mat okay um and nice weather outside practice is best so if we can do it outside you're going to do it outside if not you're going to have it in the highlander room that's all i got thank you very much so john thank you sorry um
where can people find that information on the website that was an awful lot of dates that you just the flyer's coming the flyer's coming yeah and liza will post it on the website so sarah's working on it i think we just got it we just got it but i think sarah's trying to condense some of the our media
consultant some of the the dates and so tomorrow great hopefully tomorrow all right thank you john margaret um i've been away so tell us about paris instead um well i did go to the paris sewer
museum yes you did just because we spend so much time here in berkeley heights addressing the wastewater treatment issues i decided to see how they did it in another country um so they they talked about birds pats yeah they have
some very cool equipment that goes into the pipes in order to clear them out of the fatburggs so yeah it was great see you never and you didn't bring us anything back
from the sewer museum wow ding all right thank you marty souvenir bill um john and uh our president uh um town council reminded me that this coming friday april 11th is national pet day
and i just want to say a couple of words on national pet day national pet day is an unofficial holiday celebrating each year on april 11th it encourages us to take a moment to appreciate the invaluable role our pets play in our lives and the profound impact they have
on us this day reminds us to show our beloved companions the love and appreciation they deserve additionally it serves to raise awareness about the many dogs and cats and shelters that are yearning for a caring home highlighting their need for compassion and support
it's important to give these animals a chance to find their forever home so on this special day this coming friday let us show our precious fur babies the extra love and appreciation they truly love i mean they truly deserve and remember whenever possible adopt don't
shop thanks rest in pete nathan cooper thanks bill uh andrew thank you mayor i just want to say a few words about uh the agreement for lower colombia uh i joined the pal um about
1990 um and for years we talked about how to improve the fields for uh the youth of our commu uh community um my good friend steve stamler larry cohen uh led the fight to establish turfield at
the high school which dramatically improved uh the uh sports not only at the at the high school but in the pal and around town not only sports but the marching band so many
uses of that field um and i was on a police department when snyder avenue was developed into a sports complex rather than um 150
condos again that made a huge impact on our youth sports in berkeley heights i'm so proud to be a part of this group um that played a part in uh what's going to happen at lower colombia uh because
in all my time with the pal we have no shortage of kids that wanted to play sports but what we did have a shortage of facilities
um to put on you know really good programs we we made the best with what we had um but developments like the high school field uh snyder avenue and now lower colombia is going to play such a
huge impact um on options for our youth and it's so important now that they have something to do after school and off hours um i know john has probably seen that in his years in law enforcement
that kids that are involved in activities whether it's the band or you know um clubs after school or sports are less likely to get into trouble um but you know i think this is going to
be a major impact like those other projects that we had in town i want to thank my colleagues up on board for pushing this um and making this a reality thank you thank you andrew very well said susan so i just going to
piggyback on the scrabble thing i used to belong to a scrabble club in milbourne i'm like how come we don't have one here and i googled it we used to in 2010 oh but it was in the afternoon so that kind of excludes some working people who are scrabble nerds so i'm going to throw it out there if anyone wants to form a
scrabble club with me meet at the library and talk to the library i love that and you showed up with your game and you played the next in line and i learned a lot hone my skills there so um i want to talk about mayor's book club we are reading and we're meeting on thursday it's the things you can see
only when you slow down how to be calm in a busy world oh thank you we have a tiny little book um each chapter really should sit with you for an hour or two before you move on to the next chapter um but we all have to slow down sometimes like we are missing a lot we're all very busy the other thing i
completed the grant for it's a t-mobile grant it's called spice up peppertown park so the sherman avenue revitalization project and the parallel park of peppertown there was not a lot of money for furnishings left so i put
in a grant for about $23,000 for benches dog stations um tables ada compliant tables and different signs and so something to make it you know if you're walking downtown you get some takeout you walk over pepper town and you enjoy
a little picnic there and enjoy the the scenery so peppertown park was named for the settlers who came from italy and dried their peppers on the land and if you never noticed before there is a rock with a plaque honoring the early farmers in the area so take a look when next time you're down by pepper town and fingers crossed it's the whole country
and apply for this grant so never know but you got to be in it to win it that's right mhm and that's all i have all right thank you and thank you for applying for that grant i love the name all right administration reports bear with me i wrote my report on a softball
field a few hours ago so i don't know it might be a little disjointed um i was pleased to participate in um it's i guess it's called a steam program is that right deb um i was one of the judges and essentially it's like a shark tank for fourth graders fifth graders it
was absolutely amazing i don't know if they've gotten the results back yet but it was really like you're just in awe of how smart these kids are and the different things that they can think of and all the different potential you know hiccups in their design and their marketing so that was really amazing uh
as we mentioned tonight um we did um pass or at least introduce the ordinance for the uh sewer uh discount for 100% disabled veterans it's something we talked about at the veterans affairs committee um we are working on a veterans information event that's not the name of it on may 21st we have the
room book so that should be something great for veterans in town uh the senior affairs committee launched a special so if there are any businesses out there that want to participate we will put your logo and your discount on a flyer and we are um sending these out every
time there's a senior lunchon or at the recreational activities the tax collector's office well it'll be on the website um but it's been something the seniors have uh really been um appreciative of um the wellness committee did you okay you you we met we
talked about how we did we talked about feedback for next year for the happiness event it was a great discussion uh you covered tai tai chi day okay we talked about paint the the paint the town paint the town green yep the coalition for mental health awareness which is a group that we're now a part of we're pretty
much all set we're going to be the mayor's youth council is going to be helping to tie green ribbons all along springfield avenue we have banners our hope is that you'll have green ribbons from summit along uh on springfield avenue from summit new providence right to the berkeley heights to the border of
morris county and we'll have a similar banner um there going to be lawn signs for purchase um we're going to get that information out we have a meeting that on thursday you're double book too on thursday okay so we'll figure that out so just pay attention to the website we're going to have more information
mental health awareness is an amazing um coalition is an amazing group with a lot of amazing things uh happening um also on may 3rd in addition to the wreck uh events it is the senior information fair in the highlander room and we will be
handing out the uh lawn science for mental health awareness so this place is going to be popping on may 3rd so stop by there'll be something to do uh the mayor's youth council is working with the pal on a um a clinic for girls flag football uh in may all that's actually
in april sorry this is disjointed in may they are planning a dog fashion show to promote dog adoption uh in april they are this month are reaching out to all the local elementary schools to try to fluff up the bee pollinator gardens sort of fallen into disrepair so the mayor's
youth council they're they're killing it for a second don't cut your um dandelions that's the bee's first food just let let them grow while that uh the mayor's youth council and veterans affairs they actually came together and they did a mailing stuffing 150 letters
to veterans in berkeley heights to try to get them on a mailing list to tell them about all the wonderful programming that we are doing and i think that's all i had at least until the game started liza your report uh thank you mayor uh we launched the cap your pipes program
offering free sewer cap lateral sewer caps um to residents it's been wildly popular uh but that helps keep storm water out of our sewer system which is great a reminder that bulk pickup begins may 5th don't wait till the last minute to start going through your house and weeding out all the junk you want to put
out there um we're waiting for bids to come in for phase one of the sherman avenue project um council tonight awarded our round two of our big tree planting grant from the dp to a scotch plains based um planting company so
planting will begin in the next month or so if residents received a letter um please be aware that markouts are going to be starting soon and to contact the environmental commission um with the contact information sent on your letter if you'd like to move the stake and have the plant uh excuse me the tree planted
you know couple feet to the left or the right just a reminder um all trees will be planted in the right of way which is roughly from the curb 10 feet in on a resident's lawn so the first 10 feet of a resident's property is technically a township rightway reminder that people
should not have electric dog fences or sprinkler systems that's something frequent that we hit when we go in there um but those those items should not be put in the right of way because um you don't want them to get ever uh damaged um the spring shipping
program is going to begin actually begin yesterday all branches must be out um for pickup before the first day of your scheduled section more information including uh sections of our town and when they'll be picked up on our website uh a big announcement beginning next wednesday april 16th and running through saturday april 19th we'll be conducting
an inspection of the hampton drive wastewater force man uh as part of our plan upgrades to our sanitary sewer collection system work will be from 8 to 4 each day april 16th is really the big day residents in the area need to know about will we have been asking and we
will be asking all residents schools and businesses south of mountain avenue in between horseshoe and diamond hill and the surrounding areas to reduce water usage as much as possible during the hours of 8 to 4 that includes toilet flushing reducing shower times waiting to do laundry or run the dishwasher
until after the work hours are over at 4 pm this is vital to reducing the overall sewer flow going through these pipes at this time and to reduce our chances of a sewer overflow in the area so john if you could let your neighborhood know and your little text chain that that would be that would be great it does make a
huge it does make a huge difference in managing these types this type of work when residents reduce their water usage because there's not as much force going through and then may 6th i think right is the senior tax relief seminar that's
different from your may 3rd right um berkeley heights seniors uh homeowners and renters aged 65 and over are invited to a free session on the various new jersey property tax relief programs in effect uh organized by the recck department a represent from the state will come in and conduct a session on
tuesday may 6 from 11:30 to 12:30 in the highlander room of town hall this includes the anchor senior freeze and new jersey stay um there's details on our website as well also we are putting more events um on our township calendar which is on the homepage of our website if you scroll down there's three
separate tabs one for township events which is meetings and and um official meetings planning board zoning board council another for community events and another for seniors so the next few months we're really going to do a big push to put community related events on there so people can get in more get more
information there that will include the wreck programming as well that they do a lot for seniors will be there and i just want to thank the council echo what mayor deani said i want to thank the council for your help with the budget you know every year it's pushing and pulling to try to make the numbers numbers fit and everybody always has
good ideas on on how we can um wiggle some things around to make sure that our departments get what they absolutely need each year while still keeping the tax rate low so thank you and that's it thank you thank you i have a quick april it's just the one day april 16th yes i'll send that to you
thank you and with that i move that all township official reports be accepted i'll second it any discussion roll call mr kudo yes mr foster yes mrs zillis yes mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs poke yes one final thought before we adjourn i
just want to say congratulations to the gl softball team who won meet elizabeth 21 to4 in three innings i didn't even know that was a rule that you could play in for hours three innings yeah so congratulations to them and with that i have a motion to adjurnn i make a motion
to join the meeting second all in favor all right take care everybody happy easter to all to celebrate that's right everybody friendly