okay can everybody hear me yes yes okay i call the meeting to order at 3:30 p.m madame Clerk would you please read the open public meetings act 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 4:30 p.m roll call madam clerk Mr kudo here Mr foster here
Mrs illis Mr machado here Mr moran here Mrs pogue here mayor Deainy I'm here will you all please salute the flag i don't think we
can stand wait I have a flag here we go awesome we go good job Susan all right all right i pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to
the stand indivisible liberty justice all for all there we go well thank goodness the co days are behind us that was uh not very together
all right we have one item on the agenda but we're moving into the regular agenda so we'll open up the um citizens hearing i think that's you Manny i did send a script i don't know if
everyone saw it was today as well i think it's me in the middle what's that me i I have two machines in the second one all right John do you want to do it sure okay
all right um Mr welcome during the public comment period on a matter I open to open the I move to open the citizens hearing motion we open okay
Susan second it yes discussion any discussion none roll call madam clerk Mr kudo yes Mr foster yes Mr machado yes Mr moran
yes mrs poke yes okay comments are welcome during the public comment period on any matter over which the township has jurisdiction to make your comment the speaker must state his or her name and address for the record each speaker
is limited to three minutes and hopefully John is in a position he has it okay perfect he has his timer so just keep an eye out for John and with that the citizen hearing is now open okay I'm going to go in order from like top to bottom here
um Mr lyster's tab 7 S7 i'm guessing that's Richard Lyster uh go ahead Richard richard richard you can speak now i'm going to ask you to
unmute did you put your hand down maybe okay sorry Richard 49 497 Avenue struggling because I'm on a tablet today um and the tablet doesn't seem to have as many options as a regular computer uh
I'm just asking a question about the uh resolution the resolution doesn't seem to include a commitment to artificial turpp or is that not correct the plan Richard is to install an artificial turf assuming that uh all the
D regulations are met but we believe they will be right but is the is that part of the lease agreement with the board of education that resolution i'm sorry is the resolution which you're going to
vote on today part does that include a commitment to artificial turf oh you mean a written commitment i I do I don't have I don't have it with me but I believe the intention from both governing bodies is to install a artificial turf field yes yes and I can
if I can just elaborate no the the lease agreement does not specify that a turf field will definitely be built but it is the understanding that that is the of the church um so go ahead Richard uh yes so um I
sent the uh council and also Caroline George uh some information about artificial turf versus natural turf um you know um it's not clear to me that artificial turf is necessarily uh the
best way to go i'm not saying the commission is not saying don't put in a turf field we're just would like to have an examination of uh the best choice whether it's artificial turf or natural turf that's
why I sent this information for the council to examine natural turf grass just want to clarify yes yes and and one more thing uh the in February there was salt spread
on the streets because of the storm and was asking that that salt be swept off the street i was wondering if that ever happened richard Eliza will get back to you on that i don't know the answer to that i'm not sure i'll check with Joe yeah
because that that's part of our MS4 requirement for our permit that's in the MS4 regulation understood and we have a regular street sweeping schedule i just don't know what you're specifically the area that you are um let Liza get back
to you i know there's a schedule and I know the machine has been broken off and on so I want to give you the correct information okay thanks so much i just wanted to make people aware that that is a requirement of the MS4 thank you very much thank you thank you
okay um I see one other hand uh Debbie Vernerin no debbie are you there i'm here hang on okay sorry i was trying to get my phone to respond
hi Debbie Vnerin 20 Wle a Berkeley Heights um I just want to uh make a couple of comments first I would like to um thank the mayor Liza and the entire town council for um the support on this
uh lease agreement it's been um a rough let's say year and a half but uh we're we're finally at the end to start some wonderful things for for the community um and I know that there
um are some negative comments going around on uh social media um but I just want to reiterate something that I've been saying for the last couple of years that um this project is not new this
project started even before I became a member of the recreation commission it dates back to 2017 um there have been multiple different engineers involved in this um project there have been multiple members
from the board of education as well as um township officials and myself involved in this project there has been a lot of research that that has been done and um in respect to a synthetic turf
um yes you can argue that it's not safe but we can also argue that it is safe i don't think that we will make everybody happy there's over 14,000 residents in in the community um so I'm sure that um
there's bound to be a couple of folks that uh will not be happy but our goal here is to give the community something wonderful for the kids to use for those people who don't have kids that currently play sports we are very
limited with multi-purpose fields in town um this will allow the kids to be able to spread out and actually uh practice on a full-sided field right now their practices are broken up into six
on uh Snyder A we'll also be able to um be able to use it as a secondary field to um to Governor Livingston and again um the recreation Berkeley Heights recreation does not benefit from this we
do not use any board of education property i know I keep saying that and people keep saying the opposite we do not use any board of ed property for any recreation purposes or programs um and I
think that this is just a a great project and again I'd like to thank everybody thank you Debbie okay next uh Robert Chinshuli uh if you just make sure you're unmuted
and just name and address for the record to make sure we're identifying by a label on Zoom okay robert Changuli 32 Brookside Lane Berkeley Heights New Jersey can you hear me yes okay i was on the facilities committee of the board of
education for a couple of years uh particularly 2022 and 2023 i just I want to want to be clear I'm not familiar with the current negotiate or the recent negotiations um I do want to have some context around the beginning of the
lease as well as um how it's been portrayed publicly mostly by the town council i have the others frankly blocked on Facebook so I couldn't even tell you what they're saying um good luck with that there was a meeting in 2023 of the facilities
committee uh Deb Varnner had attended with one other woman who really didn't say anything um she obviously was representing the rec commission um she brought a slide deck she wanted to do some sort of presentation she did it it
had to do with the you know among other things the map the lower Columbia field wanting to put down turf and it all sounded great then she gets to quote her words with the elephant in the room the elephant in the room actually is not what any of us were talking about even
including on this call i've never heard anyone mention it you see the elephant in the room according to Deb was that the map is an odd shape that's what this is about we want to just even out the map said the rec
commission um with a straight face um there was also a slide ultimate we and I actually said to her you just asked last year the township just asked last year to give us the prop to give you the property and
that's what Deb was after very clearly i said we just said no last year you went through this whole thing let's boil it down what changed from last year to this year what's the difference the Delta that we can consider this year to Deb's credit she said
nothing uh a little frustrated one of us did see on Deb's slide deck possible solutions instead of gifting the property for free to the township the BOE property instead just um leasing it i I don't know why she was caught off
guard considering it was in her slide deck but one of us said "You know what leasing's a good alternative thanks for that we'll bring it back to the board." an executive session i think that's something they'd be interested in and indeed the board was when I speak about the year before and gifting and this is
ongoing it was not one year this meeting with Deb it was not one meeting the year before my understanding is from board president Mike Dquilla was that Angie called him up come down to the field look how muddy it is they met and this would be great with turf and we have
money and we've collected money and again give us your property mike took it back to the board in executive session no one obviously was interested year in year out in gifting the township property it was ongoing
um we agreed to I just want I think the time is up robert did you have a question i want to make sure you get to answer your question um that's time no I can publish my comments elsewhere thank you thank you Robert
uh okay sorry I'm navigating um okay the hand raising option is not working for him but uh John McGith uh just unmute okay I think you're good uh good afternoon everybody uh I just wanted to
make a couple of quick comments i mean John can you just can you officially say your name and address for the record i'm sorry sure yeah absolutely uh John McGuis 56 Coun Avenue uh Berkeley Heights New Jersey um so I'm not like I've said a couple of times I'm not
really against this field at all um I think you know I I I don't have a problem with PAL or any other athletics organizations i think they do excellent work i think that if we can deliver on a turf field um you know that's that would
be a good thing my concern really was around this entire process and I'm I'm going to try to outline my points you know concisely uh you know that the actual lease agreement wasn't available to the public and correct me on the timeline if I'm wrong but I think it was like a week before the BOE meeting or a
couple of weeks before the BOE meeting that lease agreement wasn't available for public review during the ballot and my understanding is that the BOE had no uh input into the ballot and the ballot while indicates that the township is in support of the turf field that doesn't mean that it was in support of this
specific agreement which is fine i mean the board of ed voted on it and it is what it is um the second issue that I have and I and I brought this up at the BOE meeting is that our school has such high investments in athletics which again I don't really have an issue
with and but this represents yet another investment into that arena and we still are paying about 56 cents a student on textbooks and I could go through the whole litany of other administrative costs and I I feel like the school should have gotten something in return i
don't think a paved parking lot twice after its completion is is enough that's just my opinion uh the third is is I I really do I really have an issue with the fact that the board of education budget meeting was taken over by this
issue um we've had the the district has had significant issues with its budgeting and I'm not going to go into detail about that here but that really should have been about the students and I understand the argument that part of this is about the students but this
isn't about all the students and I think the township could have waited and there was really no urgency on this in my opinion unless there's something going on in the back that I I really don't know um so those are my my my three main
concerns you know the ballot and the the the the lease agreement surrounding that uh what happened at the uh the BOE budget meeting and the um I think that the district got itself into a bad deal and I guess that's good for you um but you know from from a more
global perspective I just don't think that that is uh it's a fair deal all right thank you very much for your time thank you John um mayor I see no other questions i I have a question family i don't have a hand to
raise so I gotta just I guess talk can you hear me yes can you just identify your name and um your name and address please i My name is Steve Griggski i live at 131 Lenipy Lane can I just I don't know if anyone else can hear you
well but I don't hear you very well at all sorry maybe you can speak louder okay can you hear me now it is difficult but it's We'll try yeah okay well my question is when uh when
would the um lease actually be available for viewing by the public um it is on the website it's been available for well it went on um today it did go on
the website today ah lovely and my sec I have a second question and that is if there is no ability to put a turf field on will it become a grass field or will it be used for something else i think if the turf field falls through
our intention is to to build a a natural uh turf field but um my understanding from the rep commission's investigation is that they think it's quite feasible to do the turf field okay thank you thank you i don't know if you got his name Liza i
did not steve steve steve okay yeah steve Veski thank you yep thank you it was Lenipe Lane thank you that's correct team effort thanks guys all right John i I need to ask the
attorney something um sure so uh I'm I'm trying to figure out how to do this while during a live Zoom um Tracy I am going
to chat you my phone number okay uh I'm not really sure how else to do this um you're okay and just if you can just mute yourself I'm going to mute myself also for a second everybody can please hold
okay all right well I think we can while we're waiting we can close the citizens hearing correct all right i make a motion we close the citizens hearing no I can oh okay all right I'll pull that back
i I think we could probably close that it's probably the resolution that we're questioning right there's probably something with the resolution no Liza said the whole book because we'll keep the citizens hearing open so okay you guys are in the sunspot of the
softball field here yeah this is giving me like post-traumatic stress syndrome from the from COVID i hear that to have a meeting like this is so crazy can't believe we did it for a year and a half oh my gosh i know
and teaching too was like crazy i know a lot of nice woodworking though hey guys can you hear me it's Natasha hello can you hear me yes sorry I don't have an option to raise my hand and I don't know if you
saw me on video no I don't see Wait wait till Liza comes back and this way right we'll give everything on record with the attorney and everything yeah your video is not on Natasha um I don't know i'm I thought it was in person i'm doing this from my phone so I
don't have many options to I don't know why it's not on okay natasha if you can speak sorry that's what I was trying to find out if you can speak go okay can you guys hear me then yes okay great just give your
name and address for the official record for Angela sure natasha Jolly um Berkeley Heights um good afternoon as you guys are aware I'm a BO a BOE member but I'm here to speak um you know my personal views and what has transpired with this lease um these do not
represent the opinion of the BOE or the district and my comments are focused on the events of this year and highlight what's missing from a timeline of key developments published by TAP without any input from the superintendent or BO8 missing from the timeline February 28th
PL president sends email to PL families telling them to write BOE to urgently support a turf field in Lower Colombia missing from the timeline March 5th email from the superintendent to the community stating that the BOE is doing its due diligence missing from the
timeline BOE special meeting March 6 to discuss the lease in good faith and work through revisions um not represented so accurately a mayor statement to tennis team parents March 13th um the mayor statement and the attorney letter was
the first that the board was made aware of an insurance concern no other communication written or verbal mentioned insurance as a reason to sign the lease what actually happened is the township essentially blocked the tennis team from practicing to force the BOE to vote on the lease the team was used as
leverage there was no sudden insurance issue as the kids were able to play on the courts for years prior to March 13 missing from the timeline March 19th morning email sent to several community members and district staff without including the superintendent in the me
email the mayor states that the township received the COI the certificate of insurance and therefore the tennis team can practice as I understand it it was sent to the recck department within 30 minutes of receiving the request this confirms that there was no need for a lease to resolve this supposed issue the
township attorney stated in March 13th letter that the township joint insurance fund has required that we list the board as an additional insured but we can only do that once the lease agreement is signed until that occurs from a liability perspective the township cannot allow its courts to be used for
school practices and meets please further advise the board that when students and parents come looking for someone to blame for why they cannot practice or hold their meets the township will ensure that fault is laid at the board's feet the tennis team practiced on Wednesday March 19th even though the lease had yet to be signed
all that was needed was the COI which could have been made available anytime the rec department requested it excuse me so I don't know where the blame really lies was the township going to accuse the BOE for locking the kids out um I
guess in the end I hope that students will benefit from this agreement that's been negotiated but you know my trust in everyone involved in this political maneuvering has been broken using kids to manipulate and threaten the BOE to get what you want is unacceptable thank
you thank you Natasha okay Liza any other hands raised i can only see the video um of the council members i do not see anybody else's hand raised all right John you want to close it
again i make a motion we close here second second any discussion roll call mr kudo yes mr foster yes mrs illis oh sorry mr machado
yes mr moran yes mrs poke yes okay i move resolution 2025-153 resolution authorizing the execution of a lease agreement with the board of ed for property known as Lower
Columbia do I have a second second any discussion yes I need to uh say something um I have to recuse myself from voting on this today to the fact I work for the board of education so I just want to say that being um on the
town council and being part of this um that there is nothing ever nefarious going on and with this with these negotiations or with the with this whole lease agreement this is for the betterment of this township and if we if
if people can't get on board with that well then this issue is going to just perpetuate itself into the future long past us and long past anything we ever put down here in writing today so I just want everybody to think about that um I know being on the council I know where
we're coming from okay because I work with these people and I think there it's a it's a great group of people that we're working with and all I got to say thank you um I just realized I probably shouldn't have second because I will also be uh I'll second all right manny
Manny's officially the seconder all right thank you and I want to piggyback on what what John said so I walk past this field every day and it's been unused i've been here 30 years and it's unused because it's so muddy all the time so I just really don't see what the problem is the way people are talking
about our land our land you think there was oil under there or something and that's lighthearted in in spirit but I just don't understand why you wouldn't want to make the field better for our community and that's all I'm going to say okay thank you Susan any other
comments and I'm gonna double piggyback off of both of you is that you know what I'm you know want to thank Debbie and the rec commission and the council members and board members that have all preceded us and doing the hard work um to get us
to the point i come from a sort of a recreation background being the open spaceman administrator i know with all the development that's has happened in town that I think it's really critical um to to provide recreational spaces for our residents um and as many know the
county fields um were taken over by the county a year a year year and a half ago um so it's really important and and that's great we and it's usable grain space but what we need is Berkeley Heights recreational space i think this is a legacy project back in 2020 when I
was negotiating with Fiserve and wanted this to be the community impact fee it was because what I saw was a legacy project something that's going to outlive this governing body and the board of ed governing body and it's going to benefit seniors and toddlers and teenagers and uh I thank you all for
your hard work on this so with that roll call madam clerk Mr kudo yes mr foster abstain mr machado yes mr moran yes mrs pogue i'm going to
abstain all right may I have a motion to adjurnn motion i make a motion to adjurnn all in favor i i all right go to South everybody have a great day enjoy thank
you all right thank you all thank you bye bye