Don't go. Okay. Hey, good evening and welcome to the township of Clark Council meeting. It's Monday, July 21st, 7:30 p.m. Roll call, please. Council member Huff here. Council member Hund here.
Council member Maserella here. Council member Maniti here. Council member Okconor here. Council member Tol here. Council President Smith here. I'm going to ask everyone to stand and we're going to have uh Troop 145
senior patrol leader will post uh will present the colors. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and
justice for all. Please remain standing for a moment of silence. Okay, I'm going to ask the senior patrol leader to please post the colors at the deis. Okay, thank you. Please be seated. This meeting is in compliance with the open public meetings act as adequate
notice of this meeting has been provided by mailing the annual schedule of meetings to the star ledger union county hawk union county local source and tab into clark by posting such annual meeting schedule on the bulletin board and town hall reserved for such announcements the official website of the township and the proper filing of
said notice formal action may be taken at this meeting. Thank you. Can I get a motion to suspend the regular order of business? So moved. Thank you, Council Member Hun. Can I get a second? Second. Thank you, Council Member Ha. All in favor? Any oppose? All right. I'm going to ask
Mayor Albanesey's uh to go to the DAS and I'll join you. Good evening everyone. It's wonderful to see so many scouts in one place. Um we're glad you could make it. Tonight we're going to be honoring
some special troop leaders. Ed Marola, John Cistaro, Sharm Porscowski, and Herman Garcia. Can you come up and join us at the podium?
[Applause] So these gentlemen have been involved with the scouts for over 12 years. They joined the scouts in two 2013 and became increasingly involved in scouting. And
by 2017, they had taken on more responsibility within the troop. In 2019, when the boys crossed over to Boy Scouts, John Cistaro, Herman Garcia, and Ed Morola transitioned into assistant scoutmaster roles. Admirola
also took on the additional responsibilities of treasurer, executive chair and registar. Sharon Prescowski stepped up as advancement chair as in addition in 2020 John Marola became the scoutmaster
and together Ed, John, Sharon and Herman had led the troop for the past five years providing exceptional guidance and leadership. Under their direction, the troop has served as an example of how Boy Scouts organization should be run,
setting a standard for excellence and commitment. And it's it's really amazing how in Clark the Boy Scout troops have so many Eagle Scouts. And when you look at the list of citizens who are now grown men, grandparents that have become
Eagle Scouts, and we have so many here tonight that have been honored recently, um it's really um a tribute to you, you know, scout scouting and to you uh individuals in taking on these duties. So, we really do appreciate that. And uh
at this time, we're going to have Bill read the proclamation. Okay, this is the mayor proclamation and it's the same for the four years. So, congratulations in advance. Uh, whereas John Cero has been involved in the Cub Scout Boy Scout Troop 145 in Clark, New
Jersey for over 12 years. And whereas he joined the Cub Scouts in 2013 and became increasingly involved by 2017. Whereas in 2019 when the boys crossed over to Boy Scouts, he transitioned into assistant scoutmaster. Whereas he has helped lead the troop for
the past five years providing exceptional guidance and leadership. The troop has served an example of how a boy scouts organization should be run, setting a standard for excellence and commitment. Now therefore, be it resolved that Mayor Angel Albanese and the township of Clark does hereby honor
and salute John Cero for his outstanding achievement with the Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts and extend to him all the best wishes for his future endeavors. Congratulations Uh, this proclamation is for Ed Morola. So, I want to congratulate Ed.
Thank you. And this one is for Hernand Garcia. And unfortunately, I don't think Sharon uh Prescowski could join us tonight. So, I'm going to ask if one of you can give this to her. That'd be great. Would any of you like to say anything? Please come on up. Say a few words. You've had many years. You should say a
few words. Thank you. Thank you. Just speak loudly into that. Thank you. Um I'd like to uh thank the mayor. I'd like to thank the council and the president. Thank you very much for having us today. And uh thank you for the resounding uh attendance here. This
is pretty amazing and we we do appreciate it. Um I'm touched by this. I've said it many times. I will say it again. I was more impacted by this than I think I ever impacted any of the boys and uh it it makes me very happy to uh have spent such a good time with such an
amazing troop. Thank you for all that you do. Thank you for the parents that have taken over and uh thank you for the boys for being amazing. We're going to ask you to stay up here. We're going to ask all the scouts and the rest of the leaders to please come on up. You want a picture just us four
first? Okay. All right. Yeah, we'll get them up here. Come on up. We'll get big big people behind the podium. I'm going to stand back. I'll be right back here. Yep. You come back here with
me bigger. You guys want to come down? You guys come down. still growing. Yeah. Hi. How are you? How's your dad? Very good. Yeah, he's good. Yeah, he's [Applause]
We want to see you guys at some of our council meetings getting those government municipal badges. Have a good night. Yes. Is it here? [Music]
Is Matias Lopez here? Matias Lopez. There he is. Your mother welcome to stay but if you would like to leave we'll take a 30 minute a 30 minute 30 second recess and once you depart we will continue the meeting. Okay, we have another presentation this
evening. I'd like to invite Matias Gabriel Lopez to come up. Okay. So, the state of New Jersey um DCA has a semi uh has a new New Jersey state leading municipalities Lewis Bay II
future municipal leaders scholarship competition and for 2025 there were many participants in this uh contest and Matias from Clark uh is was one of the finalists. So, we're here to honor you
with a certificate of participation. And I just want to talk a little bit about what was involved and what was in your um speech, unless you want to uh tell us about it. But let me first say that um this was a statewide competition. The
theme for the year was what I like about my hometown. And as I said, Matias was one of the semi- finalists. He's lived in Clark for five years. Uh he's interested in pursuing an education in public safety and budgeting after high school. And he acknowledges the
hospitality of his neighbors, peers, and community, commending Clark for being able to share diversity of many cultures and backgrounds. And um do you want to tell us some other points about your speech if you if you don't mind? Um come on up here.
I'd like to point out that my town was very nice to me. I it's a great place to grow up in. And it's really a nice place for our community to like grow and develop character um over time. I had the experience of doing that. I've been to the high school. I got an opportunity to find my career, what I like to do.
So, I really do think Clark really knows how to like develop character and bring out the best in people. Thank you. Okay. So, we're going to present this certificate of participation. I'm gonna ask Liz if we can come over. [Applause]
Thank you, Mr. President. Okay. And now I'd like a motion to resume the regular order of business. Thank you, Councilman Tol. And can I get a second? Second it. Thank you, Council Member Hoff. All in favor? Opposed? All right, we're going to move to communications from the mayor and
reports of township officers. Actually, we'll start with Councilwoman Hoff and we'll go back to the mayor. Okay. So, tonight I have two reports to give. The first one is from our library. So, first I want to just point out that
the website for the library is clark library.org and they have a very active social media channel. So, I would encourage you to take a look. Is that me buzzing? Sorry. Um, so I would encourage you to go look there. Um, all of the events are posted there. It's an incredible, incredible library. Uh but
the most exciting thing for me is that they now have the Metropolitan Metropolitan Museum of Art passes which are available to check out and you can they have five passes you can um each one will get free admission for two
adults and any children under 12 and all you need is a library card. So that's been something that the library has been working on. So I think it's fantastic that they finished that and now have another resource. We have had uh 7,838 visitors to library for June and over
7,000 website visits. And in August, they have science heroes uh teens. They have an earring earring making class. They have adult summer reading finale, which is a paint and sip on August 12th and a glow party for kids on August 15th from 4:00 to 7:00. So again, please go
to their website, clark library.org, or their social media page, and you can see all of the events that they're doing. Um this is a small fraction of it. And then regarding the board of education, um the board of education website is
clarkschools.org. If you go visit that site immediately, what will pop up is the popup about the bond referendum which is taking place on September 16th. All of the info is there. If you click um go to the website, click menu, and then the drop-own menu is bond referendum. They
have the flyer there and all of the information about that referendum which is being accomplished with no additional school tax burden. So there's no additional cost to the taxpayer to do the things that are included there. Um again encourage everyone to go and take a look at either their social media page
or their website to see the things that are able to be accomplished this way. And lastly, I thought it was excellent that over $9 million in scholarships were given out this year for our ALJ students. And I think that's pretty awesome. So, congratulations to everyone. And that's the end of my
report. Thank you, Council Member Hoff. Mayor Albanese, are you ready for your report? Sure. Um, first announcement is very near and dear to my heart because it relates to finance, which I've devoted quite a few
years to, and that's congratulations to our CFO, Christy Vieira, who's here tonight. She passed her certified municipal officer test and will be appointed as our CMFO hopefully this evening by the council. Um to the Clark graduates, all
those moving up seems so long ago. Just a few weeks ago, we were out on the fields and uh it was a great um experience being out there with the graduates. Some of them here in the room I was able to shake hands with. Um, so,
uh, congratulations and the best in the years to come. Um, there's been so many events and activities in town. You know, the fireworks July 4th, it's perfect weather, great turnout, great event. And I just want to shout out, uh, special thanks to Ralph Bernardo, the recreation
department, all the people involved in setting everything up, uh, DJ, um, the police department, fire, and EMS, all working together. We did have a little emergency but they got through that blip. Um so thank you for that. Also the
Clark pool we have over 800 members this year. So we exceeded last year and uh we just recently spent the um celebrated the 51st anniversary of the pool. Also pleased to say that our Clark recreation program is thriving. We have
over 1,100 campers, 170 counselors and several adviserss. and of course Ralph Bernardo. Um, you know, it's kind of crazy when you go over there and you see some of the videos that Liz has been putting up on the website. Um, it's uh organized
chaos, but the the kids are sure having a great time. In the library, we had a pro week last Thursday night. I stopped by there. It was a huge success that were 100% booked with over 150 children and parents. There's a lot of fun activities going on and honestly at the
library, I think most of them are already booked. Um moving on to um a big improvement um which is a very important item, bathrooms. Our bathrooms at the recreation center have been completed and uh everyone seems to be very pleased with that.
And um I did want to mention one other thing about um I did receive correspondence from the um director of community affairs, Jacqueline Suarez, and she congratulated us on our recent condemnation of the um uh property on
Westfield Avenue as we move forward with redevelopment of our downtown Westfield area. So I wanted to share that with the council. And that concludes my report. I might add something later on. Thank you. Great. Thank you, Council Member Hund. Thank you, Council President. I have the
Clark Police Department report for June, 2025. We saw a total of 1,961 calls for service, including but not limited to 132 ambulance requests, 78 alarm calls, one arrive call for mental
health requests, one burglary, eight fire department requests, nine fraud identity thefts, four motor vehicle and residential lockouts, 95 motor vehicle accidents, 35 shoplifting and thefts, and 222
91 911 calls and 1,19 miscellaneous calls. There was a total of 26 adult arrests including but not limited to seven for warrants and 14 for shoplifting. The youth uh aid bureau handled a total of 12 cases including
but not limited to two for shoplifting, four for offenses against the family, and one for short-term custody. That concludes my report. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Maserella. Yes. Thank you, Council President. I have two reports this evening. Uh,
electronic drop off will be July 26th from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Um, that's in the DPW yard behind this building. Um, ID is required. Please remember that. Uh, grass pickup is every Tuesday.
Grass clippings only, ladies and gentlemen. Um, branches and brush clippings are starting to become a problem in the grass bags. Please put your branches aside and only put your
grass clippings in the bags. Um, that would help us out a lot and it would uh stop from uh public works not picking up your bags. Okay. To schedule any DPW services, go to www.our
at ourclark.com and click on the tab for online services. This covers tree permits, bulky and appliance pickups, tree trimming, tree removal pickups, mulch deliveries, potholes, etc. Please let us
know what appliances you have and what metal is to be picked up as well. A bulky and appliance pickups appointments are required the Thursday uh before the week of your scheduled pickup. Bulky
items and small items must be bagged. No paint and chemicals will be allowed. Please remember that branches can be placed out this week um on for pickup on July 28th. Please, once we pick up our
our crews will be and will not be out until August 17th. Please make a note of that. Our streets are con uh are constantly getting more and more filled with um tree debris. So,
um please follow these schedules. It would help us keep our community clean. And um for more information, email dpwourclark.com for more information. Now I'm going to turn to storm related information.
If you had flood damage, please email dpwourclark.com. This is for flood flood damage pickup only. All normal bulky pickup will will not be picked up. Please use
www.ourcclark.com to schedule your bulky. Okay, make a note of that please. Uh we have picked up to date 22 bulky flood requests so far uh with estimated of five tons of
debris. DPW along with Union County DPW cleared over 10 yards of debris, washed up um out of backyards and um lodged under three bridges along the pump pumpkin patch brook. Some items
collected are limited to firewood, coolers, wooden frames, flat screen TVs, recycled totes, um, cut branches, and little plastic cars, and other items.
All sanitary pump stations were inspected for proper operation, so we don't have to worry about them. Ladies and gentlemen, DPW checked and cleared and jetted all storm
water lines in the flooded area to make sure nothing washed up into the lines, impeding the water flow. DPW will be out again since the river has receded
completely. Please, if you live in or on the riverbank, avoid placing grass clippings, branches, and firewood or any other items which will wash down the stream
and further clog um the catch basins and the waterways. So, please help us um to keep our community clean. Thank you. That's our the extent of my report. Thank you, council member.
Thank you, council president. In June, the Clark Fire Department responded to 64 calls, bringing their total calls for the year of 281. Instance incidents included five for fire related, seven for rescue and EMS,
10 for hazardous conditions, 15 for service and good intent calls, 25 related to false alarms, and two severe weather and natural disaster calls. Um, I'd like to thank and extend my sincere thanks to the Clark Fire Department, also to police department, emergency
management, and DPW for their vital roles during the recent severe weather. And also want to thank them for their dedications in keeping our community safe. Full report, full fire department report is available in the clerk's office. This concludes my report. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Okconor.
Thank you. I have two reports as well. first on finance committee. The township continues to have uh the ability to meet its current obligations. So, thank you Jim and your crew. As the mayor alluded to, based on tonight's vote, we may be appointing a new chief municipal finance
officer. So, um that's some news. And then, um from the emergency squad, I apologize. I need to read it from my phone as the uh email came in late. So, I got to put my little readers on. Here we go. All right. Recent squad activities in June. The squad added two
probationary off uh members. The squad currently has ambulance 515 out for remounting and county has lent us the ambulance to be available should ambulance 514 go out of service. Please check for recent fund drive requests and support us as best you can.
Okay. Call volume. There was a significant increase in ambulance requests this month. June had 141 calls with seven mutual aid calls. This does not include any calls that were dispatched and canceled on. Total hours responding to calls is approximately 915 man hours. This does not include any
hours that members are on duty when not on calls. Your dedicated call volume is 672 calls. With regard to membership for those who would like to assist the squad but may not have time to do EMT training, we are accepting applications for people who are interested in becoming drivers for the ambulance. Must
be 18 years of age with clear driving record. Next training course is August 3rd, 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the squad. Anyone interested can email the squad at www.ourcclark. hourclock.org or membership em.org. Servicing the community. The squad
hosted 34 blood drives in June and is looking to expand the number each month as the need for blood is increasing. Due to urgent need for blood at this time, there will be a blood drive every Tuesday at the squad from 1 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. for July and August. Please consider donating. The squad provided
coverage for conf and ALJ graduation ceremonies. Congratulations to all those who graduated and their families respectfully submitted. Lorie Sheldon, trustee. That concludes my reports. Thank you. Great. Thank you, Council Member uh Tol. Thank you, Mr. President. The Environmental Commission was supposed to
have a meeting in the month of July and they went basically on summer recess. So, they're going to be SK looking to put something together for the month of August. Soon as we have a date, it'll be announced through the proper channels. Uh the mayor mentioned the Fourth of July fireworks. What a great time. If
you were there, you experienced a wonderful show. Safe, reliable. Our fire, police, and emergency squad put on a great show along with the course Ralph Bernardo and the recreation department. It was just a really, really nice, safe presentation, and we got to say thanks
to a mayor and to the town council for allowing it. The fireworks were not a regular occurrence in this town. Years ago, there was no fireworks on the 4th of July. You had to go into another town. But the township of Clark, under the proper toutelage of Mayor Sal and now Angel, continued doing the firework
shows every Fourth of July. No matter what, it's there. If the weather's good, we just had a really nice time. If you were there, you understand. And if you weren't YouTube, everyone's videotaping now. So, you come home and you see the entire fireworks show on on your phone. So, that's all I got to say tonight. Thank you, Mr. President.
Great. Thank you. Uh for the pool and recreation department, the Clark wreck program is averaging over 700 children a day. Uh, our rec director Ralph Bernardo has a full daily schedule planned with games, shows, arts and crafts, and water
days. Uh, it's for kindergarteners through 9th grade. Uh, and all the campers are having a great time. I'd like to recognize Ralph and his entire staff for providing such a fun and safe environment for the kids. Uh, the Clark Community Pool had a great month of July
after a rainy start in June. Uh memberships, as the mayor mentioned, are over 800, which surpassed last year. Uh still time to join the pool. Uh there's plenty of events. There was membership appreciation day. There's a plenty of themed days. There's DJ days, water
floats, games, and more. So stop by the pool for details. All right. Now, we are going to move on to ordinances, appropriations, and Mr. Mr. President, for the record, no objections have been received in connection with the proposed ordinances.
First ordinance is 25-21, an ordinance to amend chapter 76 entitled alcoholic beverages, section 76-10 C entitled Regulations of Licenses of the Code of the Township of Clark. Great. Thank you. At this time, I'll
open the meeting to the public. If anyone would like to come forward and speak on this ordinance only, you'll have five minutes or duration. Please state your name and the town you reside in. Okay, seeing no one, I like a motion to close this portion.
Thank you, Councilman Okconor, and thank you, Council Member Hun. All in favor? Any opposed? At this time, I'd like a motion to adopt the ordinance. I'd like to move that, please. Thank you, Council Member Hun. And can I get a second? I'll second it.
Thank you, Council Member Hoff. Uh, any discussion? Jim, do you have anything to add? Um, the only change we're making is to the Sunday hours. The Sunday hours were formerly 10 to 5 and now they're going to be 10 to 7 p.m. Okay, thank you.
Okay, number two, when you're ready. Oh, I'm sorry. Roll call. Council member Hoff, yes. Council member Hund, yes. Council member Maserella, yes. Council member Maniti, yes. Council member Okconor, yes. Council member Tol, yes. Council President Smith.
Yes. Ordinance adopted. Next is ordinance 25-23, an ordinance of the Township of Clark, County of Union, State of New Jersey, consenting to transfer of property designated as block 91, lots 8.01, 10.01, and 36 located on
Westfield Avenue and Washington Street, Clark, New Jersey, as assignment and transfer of financial agreement. Okay. At this time, I will open this portion of the meeting to this ordinance only. If anyone would like to come forward, please do so and state your name and the town you reside in. You'll
have 5 minutes of time. Okay, seeing no one like a motion to close this portion. Thank you, Council Member Tol. Can I get a second? Second. Thank you, Council Member Maserella. All in favor? Any opposed? All right. At this time, I
need a motion to adopt the ordinance. I'll move that. Thank you, Council Member Manitic. I get a second. Yes, I'll second it. Right. Thank you, Council Member Maserella. Any discussion, questions? Jim, you have anything you want to add? Yeah, this is just to transfer the 39 unit on Westfield Avenue um to a new
builder and it also comes with a 2% transfer uh fee. So, we will be getting additional funds and they're taking over the actual finance agreement and the pilot agreement that was already agreed. Great. Thank you. Uh, roll call, please.
Council member Hoff, yes. Council member Hund, I need to abstain. Council member Maserella, yes. Council member Maniti, yes. Council member Okconor, yes. Council member Tol, yes. Council President Smith, yes.
Ordinance adopted. Next is ordinance 25-24, capital ordinance to appropriate the sum of $200,000 for the installation of fire alarm systems at the municipal building and recreation center, fire headquarters, and fire station number
two in by and for the township of Clark in the county of Union, state of New Jersey, and providing that such sum so appropriated shall be raised from the capital improvement fund of the township. At this time, I will open up the meeting to this ordinance. If anyone would like to come forward and speak about this
ordinance, please do so and state your name and town you reside in. You'll have 5 minutes of duration. Okay, seeing no one, a motion to close this portion. Thank you, Council Member Maserel. Get a second. Second. Thank you, Council Member Hoff. All in favor? I.
Any opposed? All right. I need a motion to adopt the ordinance. Yes, I'll move it. Thank you, Council Member Maserella. Can I get a second? Second that, please. Hey, Council Member Hunt. Jim, you have anything to add? I think it says it all. Uh, we're just putting in new fire alarm systems.
Great. Thank you. Roll call, please. Council member Huff, yes. Council member Hund, yes. Council member Maserella, yes. Council member Maniti, yes. Council member Okconor, yes. Council member Tol, yes. Council President Smith, yes.
Ordinance adopted. Okay, we have one ordinance for introduction. Ordinance 25-25. Ordinance of the Township of Clark County of Union, New Jersey, adopting the amended and restated Westfield Avenue redevelopment plan for the
property identified as block 91, lot 21, also known as 81 Westfield Avenue, Clark, New Jersey, and block 105, lots 1.01, 01, also known as 56 Westfield Avenue, Clark, New Jersey. 2.01,
also known as 50 uh 52 Westfield Avenue, Clark, New Jersey, and 26.01, also known as Broadway, near the intersection of Joseph Street, Clark, New Jersey, as shown on the official tax map of the Township of Clark, having been designated as an area in need of
condemnation redevelopment. Thank you. Can I get a motion? A mot. Thank you, Council Member Tolk. Can I get a second? Second it. Thank you, Council Member Hoff. Anybody have discussion or questions? Okay, Jim. Yep. Yeah, we're going to um be adding the
Citizens Bank property to the combination area as we discussed in the past. Um we're going to be going with A, B, D, and H requirements, which are respectively substandard unsafe conditions.
uh vacant uh one of the buildings have been vacant since uh May of ' 07 and the other one is March of 23. Um also the that the obsolescence that's D. And then it also helps us with our smart growth
opportunities. That's um criteria H. Great. Thank you. Anyone else? Okay. Uh roll call, please. Council member Hoff. Yes. Council member Hund. Yes. Council member Maserella, yes. Council member Maniti, yes.
Council member Okconor, yes. Council member Tol, yes. Council President Smith, yes. Public hearing on this ordinance is August 18. Okay. I'd like to move to payment of claims. Councilman Okconor. Thank you. I have reviewed the bills for
the month holding $394,3548. Great. Thank you. Okay. Now, we're going to move to the citizens hearing on the agenda. At this time, I'll open the meeting to the public. The public comment portion of the meeting is to allow the public to bring to the council's attention their concerns or comments in accordance with
NJSA10 col4-12A and the code of the township of clerk. Each person addressing the council shall give their name and the town in which they reside to the clerk. All remarks shall be addressed to the council as a body and shall not exceed 5 minutes in duration. At the conclusion of the
statements or questions from a member of the public, the council president has discretion may choose to respond or not respond. So if anyone would like to come forward, please do so. There we go. Hello, John Greavves from Clark. Uh I just had a quick question about the affordable housing resolution
um that you guys are passing there. Um it seems that they're taking redirecting money that would normally come to us and putting it somewhere else so we would lose some money. Is there like a number on how much money we might be losing? And then there's one other element. I think I read something about how um it
lessened the ability for community- based rather than developerbased um projects. Um I I know that there's developer based projects that we've been working on. What are some of the community based ones that we might have to not do or whatever? Well, this is again this is as the resolution says
where the state is in control of this money and it was used to assist municipalities to um satisfy some of their affordable housing needs and some of their rehab needs and then using that for other purposes right now. Uh and
that's what this resolution is asking the state to use the funds for what they originally were intended to be used for. So I was So I guess how much are we losing and what thing are we going to be able to do that?
It's all based It's all application based. It's all application based. It's not money that's coming to us every month or every year, you know, it's it's money that they hold and it's used for different purposes for those purposes. It's not our money per se. It's the
state's money that they use to help offset some of these developments. Okay. What would we be losing like in a like as an example of something we're going to do that we're not going to be able to do because of this? I would not know that unless someone who
was going to apply for those funds from the state to offset some of these expenses. Okay. So a developer would do this. What a developer would apply for this? A developer or us. We could we could you know work with the developer to get the money.
Okay. Did we use it like last year or like is there any history how much we've gotten from? We've never used it before, but it's remember the affordable housing requirements are countywide. So, as part of that county number, if someone uses
them, you know, it helps us out, right? So, a lot of the different towns are appealing their numbers. In the end, those numbers are all going to have to come back to somebody. So, to make it easier to, you know, do some of these developments again. Have we used it? No. Could we use it in the future? I don't
have a crystal ball. Okay. Just curious about the details. Thank you so much. Thank you, Mr. Gre. [Music] Good evening. I'm Julia Collins, Clark. I have a question and on ordinance 2025
I mean 2525 which is going to be heard on August 18th. Back on July 7th there was an introduction of 2522. Okay. The only thing I can see different in the 2020 between the two is the
addition of block 91 which is 81 Westfield Avenue. What happened to ordinance proposed ordinance 2025 I mean sorry 20 2522. Thank you.
Thank you. Um that was the property across the street from Westfield Avenue that was part of the original condemnation because when they did the original condemnation in I forgot what year but
whatever year it was that was included. So we are just adding the additional property to the full combination of both the AMP and the properties across the street. Thank you. Good evening everyone. Michael Schulman, Clark, New Jersey. Uh piggybacking off
of Mr. Greavves's question about the resolution that wants the town wants to pass. Uh we have a municipal fund to do affordable housing. Uh that fund is able to be used, correct me if I'm wrong, to
instead of having to build simply refurbish apartments and I believe our housing obligation allows us to do that up to 50 units. The state, as I understand from reading the affordable housing information on the state's website, has a separate fund
where if we are looking to rehabilitate instead of build, the state would provide potentially matching funds or low financed grants. I guess my understanding is the town is sending a a strongly worded letter, if that's what
we'd call it, uh saying don't make modifications to the state trust fund. Obviously noting that the same piece of legislation, the budget for the state may be taking some of those funds and using them in other ways
to fix housing such as uh lowcost or uh supplementing young families purchasing homes towards down payments and things like that. Just to be clear, we haven't, as far as I know, touched
any of the $1.7 or so million dollars in the town's specifically designated fund to attempt to rehabilitate those 50 houses. So the reason why we haven't gotten anything from the state is simply we haven't done that part of the
affordable housing remediation by actually using it toward fixing apartments not just building and you can correct me if I'm wrong with any of those figures or understandings. You're correct with your figures however you're wrong with some of your facts.
Number one is we have been using those funds. we've you there's a couple of things we could use them for is and as we've done I guess going back the last two years or so uh we pay the first month's rent for all the affordable
housing units so we've been doing that in addition we have had conversations with um companies to come in and have the rehab programs problem with that is you have a
10year uh deed restriction. So when we talk to them, we say, "Okay, we're going to come and you're going to give you $25,000 to bring this apartment up. However, there's a 10-year deed restriction." They turn around and say, "Thanks, but no thanks." Right? Because I could get
$3,500 a month rent versus $1,200 a month rent. you're giving me money to upgrade it, but what good is that going to be do for me since I'm not going to have it for, you know, I'm losing $2,300 a month, give or take, depending on if it's low income, very low income or not.
So, it's it's a great plan. However, if you know of any people who own apartments that are willing to do that and lose $2,300 a month in order to get $25,000 or even a $50,000 upgrade in their apartments, let me know because
there are none in this town and we've talked to them all. In addition to that, we've also talked to uh two firms actually to come in and have um you know housing for developmentally challenged
people. And what they came back and said is the same thing. They did an analysis of the town residents that are available. It has to be one floor primarily because they're going to have to get wheelchairs and emergency services in and the cost of those houses
in this town are too high to make it economically feasible for that. If we want to use the whole $1.6 million for it, yeah, we could pull one off and we could get nine units, but that's not going to help me help us any way in any way, shape, or form reach our affordable housing requirements.
In addition, there aren't many properties available. Turn your microphone on. One of the issues as well. Mayor, can you turn your microphone up? That was one of the issues as well. There aren't many properties that are available. As Jim said, you need to have at least five bedrooms, at least three bathrooms, and right now there just
aren't properties available for sale in general. Sure. And we don't have to get into a debate. We can converse this after. I guess the question wasn't using 1.6 or 7 million to purchase one house. It was um and I don't know if the figures are accurate or not, but we have a number of
larger apartment complexes. Many of them the residents may agree may need a refurbishment as well. Many already probably qualify uh for potential affordable housing and until tonight was not aware the town has and we'll look into it actually
approached those larger owners. We're not looking at mom and pop owners and trying to put them in a bind. We're talking about the folks that are here uh running these very large apartment complexes who I think we can all agree can always continue to put more into those apartments to make sure those
residents have better facilities and the affordable housing budget permits them to maybe upgrade many instead of one or two houses. But we can always address that after. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Schman. All right. At this time, I'd like a
motion to close the citizens hearing on the agenda. I get a mover. I'll move that, please. Thank you, Council Member Hun. Can I get a second? Second. Thank you, Council Member Hoff. All in favor? I. Any opposed? All right. When you're ready, Madam
Clerk, we'll move to uh resolutions. Sure. We The uh subject of the resolution is just coming back in the door. Hold on one second. Okay. So, number five is appointing Christy Vieiraa as chief municipal finance officer effective July 21, 2025
for the remainder of the year subject to renewal as permitted by NJSA4A 9-140.2. Okay. Can I Is everyone interested in doing the EC for this? Yes. Christie, please. All right. So, the entire council want to congratulate
Christie. Great job, Christie. Thank you. Just it just turns push it here. Did I take it? I think you took the oath your desk. Hey, Marco.
It's all right. You're on TV. [Music] I, Christy Vieiraa, I, Christy Vieira, do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the State of New Jersey
and the State of New Jersey that it will I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same that I will bear our true faith and allegiance to the same. And to the governments established in the United States and in this state. And to the governments established in the United States and in this state under the authority of the people
under the authority of the people. And that I will faithfully impartially and justly perform and that I will faithfully, impartially, and justly perform all the duties of the office of all the duties of the office of certified financial officer.
Certified finance officer. according to the best of my ability. according to the best of my ability. For the township of Clark. For the township of Clark. So help me God. So help me God. Congratulations. Yes.
Very good. Thank you. All right. We'll catch up with the signatures later. Thank you. It's official. Before [Applause]
we do the roll call, I just want to say congratul ratulations, Christy. I think I've known you for about 20 years or so. So, I remember from the softball field. So, I want to say this is a great day to have another person who grew up in Clark uh take on a huge role for Clark. So,
congratulations from the council. So, roll call when you're ready. Council member Hoff, yes. Council member Hund, yes. Council member Maserella, yes. Council member Meniti, yes. Council member Okconor, yes. Council member Tol,
Next Generation, yes. Council President Smith, yes. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Next resolution is authorizing the submission of a grant application by the Township of Clark to the Union County Preserve County Program
Preservation of the Robinson Plantation owned by the Township of Clark. I get a motion. Moved. Thank you, Council Member Tol. Second. Second that, please. Thank you, Council Member Hun. Any uh discussion or questions? Yes. So, as everybody remembers, we're looking to replace the roof. We're still
in the process of getting the money getting from the state. We got approved for about $150,000 grant from the state. It's going to cost over $300,000 to change the roof of the Robinson House. To offset some of that additional um
cost to the municipality, we're applying for a $75,000 grant from the county. Right. Thank you. Anyone else have any questions? If not, roll call, please. Council member Hoff, yes. Council member Hund, yes. Council member Maserella, yes.
Council member Maniti, yes. Council member Okconor, yes. Council member Tol, yes. Council President Smith, yes. Number seven is authorizing the business administrator to execute a semianual service contract with Universal Fitness
Services LLC to maintain the equipment at the senior fitness center in the amount of $300 per call effective September 25 2025 to December 2025. I get a motion. I'll move that please. Thank you, Council Member Okconor. Can I get a second? Thank you, Council Member
Hunt. Any discussion? Go ahead, Jim. Yeah, it's just as it said. The only thing I do want to bring up is that if you see it's only for a few months uh through the end of the year. Reason being is we voted or you voted on I guess about two years ago now. Uh we put neodora in to do all of our contract
tracking. Uh we cleaned up a lot of that stuff. What we're doing now is we're going to try to have most of our contracts expire at the end of the year. This way we just negotiate them and have everything go out at once as opposed to this peace meal across the year. So you're going to see a few more of these as as time goes on. Um, just to make the
gap through the end of the year. Great. Thank you. Uh, roll call, please. Council member Hoff, yes. Council member Hund, yes. Council member Maserella, yes. Council member Maniti, yes. Council member Okconor, yes. Council member Tol, yes. Council President Smith,
yes. When you're ready, we'll move on to consent agenda resolutions. Okay. The following items are considered routine and non-controversial items by the township council and will be enacted upon by one motion. There will be no separate discussion of these items
unless a council member so requests in which event the item will be removed from the consent agenda to be discussed and voted on following the approval of the remaining items listed on the consent agenda. First resolution is rescending resolution 25-121
which authorized the tax collector to prepare and mail estimated tax bills which are no longer necessary. Next is opposing the redirection of affordable housing trust fund monies in the proposed fiscal year 2026 state budget.
And number 10 is authorizing the return of the performance bond to Vinbell Homes LLC for $1,000 pertaining to 8 Ivy Street. I get a motion to adopt the consent agenda. A move. Thank you, Council Member Tolk. Can I get a second? Second it.
Thank you, Council Member Hoff. Roll call, please. Council member Hoff, yes. Council member Hund, yes. Council member Maserella, yes. Council member Manetti, yes. Council member Okconor, yes. Council member Tol,
yes. Council President Smith, yes. Is there any new business on the calendar? There is no new business. Uh before we jump into public comments, we're just going to ask the police director, Pat Grady, to come on up and
say a few words to the residents. Uh good evening everybody. Uh we just wanted to take this opportunity tonight uh to speak about uh ebikes and remind people of the you know the dangers uh
that are accompanied by by these bikes. Uh what brought this up is uh personally on my own time u within the last two months driving around town you might have experienced the same thing. Uh young people on these ebikes traveling at fairly high rates of speed. A lot of
these bikes can be modified and and can move at fairly good speeds. Um, but you know what what caught my eye on these couple of occasions was the sheer aggressiveness and and dangerous maneuvering uh in and out of traffic.
Um, which, you know, which brings me here tonight to just put out a reminder to everybody that there are ordinances and laws um that regulate these bikes. It's a reminder to parents and these young people out there that may be watching, uh, you know, there are laws
to to to follow. Um, we encourage the public if they see this to please call the police, let our officers go out there and address the situation. Our officers have been spoken to. Um, they've been instructed to enforce enforce the laws that are there. Um,
both ordinance, state laws, motor vehicle laws. Um, also too, I if if you if you would like, I know Mayor Albanese and and Captain Chris Lot a few months ago did a sitdown. Uh, you can you could go on YouTube and listen to their
sitdown that's around 20 24 minutes long. It's it's very informative. It goes into detail about the laws, the ordinances, and how we as a police department and a town have been proactive uh on this subject. But, uh, listen, I just want to keep it out there
and keep it on everybody's, uh, radar and attention, uh, you know, before something, you know, goes, you know, really bad. That's that's what we're trying to to prevent. Uh, before I go, I know Christy, uh, left, but like like the president, I've known the family for a long time. I graduated with dad, and I
want to wish them a congratulations. I know both mom and dad are very proud. Thank you. All right. At this time, we're going to open the meeting uh public comments uh public comment portion of the meetings to allow the public to bring to the council's
attention their concerns or comments in accordance with NJSA 104-12A and the code of the township of clerk. Each person addressing the council shall give their name and the town in which they reside to the clerk or remark shall be addressed to the council as a body and shall not exceed 5 minutes in
duration. At the conclusion of the statements or questions for a member of public, the council president his discretion may choose to respond or not respond. So at this time, please come up. Uh if you're interested, give your name and the town you're residing. You have five minutes. Hello, John Gre from Clark. Um, I was uh
I wanted to ask a question about the budget. Uh, I brought it up at the budget meeting, but um, I had sort of a follow-up. Um, the cell tower rental, we talked about that. there was uh $660,000
in revenue from 2024 and then it shows 2025 at 500,000 and you said that if I remember correctly that that was because you didn't spend the money from six from 2024 and you just rolled it over but shouldn't that go into the surplus and I
don't see anything in 2024 line that says the realized cash because it feels like it's like a double book if someone was reading this they would see it and it would look like there was 1 16 million. It It's not double booked. Again, it was It's not double booked. It was not used last year
as you know, we were originally planning. So, we just used it this year. Yeah. But I'm saying, shouldn't at the end of 2024, you made 660. So, there was 500 left over after 160 roughly from what I'm seeing. Shouldn't that 500 have gone into the surplus and then that
would have been because it looks like there's two years of revenue when only one year of revenue. did not. No. So, back to what you were saying, right? It was not used in the budget last year, but you you booked it as revenue again.
We booked it as revenue again, correct? That's But that's not Isn't that against generally accepted accounting principles? No, it's not because the auditors reviewed it, right? So, it was not put into the budget last year and it's on the budget last year.
It was not put into the budget last year and it was not used last year and we put it in this year. But what I'm saying is shouldn't it have been put into this year in the it would have gone into surplus last year and then it would have been coming from the surplus. But it was not put into the budget last
year and it was put in this year. If you want we could go through the numbers. I could show you where they are. I don't have the budget documents in front of me. I'm just saying that was back in May. Generally, if revenue is received in one year, you book it that year and then the
next year if you you had extra money, that would be in your surplus. Um, and then the next year, you would say you got zero, but you had that in your surplus. Um, it seems like a double booking. I I it it's just I could show you where all the money I I will bring it to you at the next meeting
and I'll show you exactly how it worked. Okay. I don't, like I said, I understand like I realize it's battle blue. I wouldn't expect you to have every single detail right in front of you. Um, if if you're saying that's like that, I would like to see the details, but I understand that you don't have it. Show it to you. All right. Thank you. Um,
I guess one other thing I just wanted to say is, you know, I I feel like there's been host and what I I just want to say, you know, I think having hard conversations is an important part of life. you know, whether it's with your family, your kids, your friends. I think
it's also important to have it with your leaders. So, I just wanted to say, you know, I heard that people were saying that I was being disrespectful and not coming here with facts. Um, I I think that's incorrect and I'd like to let you guys know that I'm trying here to help us have the best community that we have.
I I live here. I want it to be good. Um, one of the hard conversations is about um, the budget and in taxes. And um, one of the things I just wanted to bring up was, you know, you guys said that the town budget or the town taxes are only going up $54.
But I just wanted to point out that um, the that's also in part because the surplus that was used was the largest use of the surplus in the last like 10 years. And then also people look at the bottom line taxes. They don't always just look at their town tax. And the
bottom line is almost definitely going to increase this year because the tax levy for the school went up by the highest amount I could find in the last 10 years, which is $1.4 million increase this year. And the second highest increase was last year at 1.2 million. So it's a $2.6 million increase in two
years. And you know, I know that there's a lot of stuff with the school that's separate, but some of the decisions we make here do contribute to that and pilots is one of them. you know, it adds burn to the schools and it shifts the burden of paying for that to the residential taxpayer. Um, and you guys
say that the schools are doing fine with money, but like I said, they're asking for the most they've done before. And also the referendum is, you know, they need money from the referendum. And I realize that they're saying that that's not going to increase the school tax for the referendum, but that's because it's replacing a bond that already existed
from what I understand. So they instead of getting a tax decrease we are kind of stable on that front and then the levy is increasing. Um, so I just wanted to say that, you know, I think it's important for us to get a whole picture of the taxes and it's kind of difficult
for residents because you come here, you say the school's separate, the school would probably say you got to go to the town and it's really hard to find a place where people can discuss their whole tax bill. And you know, it's a hard conversation. I don't relish having it and I'm sure you guys don't either, but um you know I'd like to see if
there's some way that we can have a situation where we address people's whole tax bill in one place so that they can not be surprised when they have to pay their taxes. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Greavves. Good evening
Fogerty. Uh Goodman's Crossing off Lake Avenue. Uh just want to say it was great to see all these scouts there tonight. I myself did my cub scouts at St. Agnes and my mother was Denmother along with Angelica Dobin formerly of Conger Way.
Uh I did my scout scouts in Troop 33 in Fanwood. So I somewhat regret to say that. Um, I'd like to address uh some of the behavior of uh some of the people from this group that call themselves Stronger Clark in the in the prior
meeting. Um, I continually find some of the members of this group uh to make false accusations about the so-called incivility of people on this council. If anyone has been univil, I would say it's
members of this group. uh stronger Clark, which seems to have taken over the identity of the Democratic Party of Clark. Unfortunately, I have not seen such a litany of pretend victimhood, pathetic self-pity, and histrionic hissy fits from any group of
people since I last saw Betty Davis and Joan Crawford in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane on TCM. Now, Stronger Clark, after spending years saying what a bad town we are and how dishonest our council is and now
these bogus accusations of accounting irregularities. I mean, I've been an auditor in both government and corporate settings for 30 years and um have a lot of experience in different things. I'd urge Mr. Graves to learn
about GAAP and gas government accounting standards before he starts making comments about double booking and other um loaded claims. I find Stronger Clark using this term we love Clark on their signs very ironic because uh you could
have fooled me over the last few years uh with all the comments about this town and its people. I have never heard them say anything really nice about this town. I mean, you love this town. Why?
Tell us so. I mean, come on. I mean, is And you say, Mr. Graves, that you know, you're making such a sacrifice coming up here every time. What about the people in front of you who are spending their their time here? What about myself? What
about other people who talk? It's not just about you, Mr. Greavves. Um, you know, you'd think Stronger Clark would moderate some of their positions after the drubbing that Mr. Schulman got at the polls last year. And now he's up
claiming to uh talk for apartment dwellers like myself. Well, that's the first I've heard of it. I'd like a new fridge, Mr. Schulman. I mean, if you want to order one from Best Buy for me, I mean, you're more than welcome to do that, but this is the first time I've seen you talk about us.
Um, Mr. Greves would be more effective he if he got up here and actually defined his topics and had the facts straight instead of getting bogged down in endless irrelevant details. Sometimes he talks about schoolboard
issues which are for the school board and not for this council. Um, but that seems to be a pesky little detail. Then in the last conversation he claimed that if you don't uh agree or treat his
comments however unfortunate they are with certain level of respect that you're unamerican. Well J Mr. Graves um I find some of your positions to be unamerican. You coming from the party that has flooded our
country with illegal aliens and your own Governor Murphy who claims to have housed one. Furthermore, political prosecutions by Merrick Garland and Matthew Platkin and you you just had to make comments
about our former mayor. Well, guess what? A lot of us don't consider sending a few faxes on work time to be a quote unquote crime as you do. Whereas we find a lot of the issues that some of
your people have done to be far more serious. You have 30 seconds left. Yeah. So, Mr. Graves, if you want to keep getting up here and slamming our town, slamming our council, making these
incendiary statements about double booking, um, go take an accounting 101 class first, please. Um, try to be more coherent. Um, because I could be doing something
better tonight than responding to you, sir. Thank you very much. [Music] Thank you, Mr. Fogerty. Nancy Toaskcus Clark. After the workshop
meeting, I happened to go home and there was the Clark newspaper that comes in my uh mailbox once a month and I was going through it and lo and behold, there was a little article about the lawn signs
and it was a really wellwritten article that informed everybody exactly what the story is with lawn signs, how they should be placed on the lawn, so on and so forth. And I was um you know very impressed with the it might have been
all about five paragraphs very easy reading and it made me think that that was a good use of that particular newspaper. I know there's a lot that goes on in that newspaper with different types of activities in the town and awards that are given, but this was the
first time I sort of remember there being something that would be good information for the residents of Clark to have. Um, I hear all the time about the lawn clippings and putting, you know, don't
put your twigs and your leaves and all this in the lawn clipping bag. Maybe everybody doesn't know that. I know my mother probably was guilty of putting that kind of stuff, hiding it in there because somebody told her that's kind of what she should do and she didn't come to town council meetings to hear that
she shouldn't do it. Um, another thing is with this storm we had last week, I observed a lot of people on my street had their lawn bags and their their um branches up against the curb. Well, as
soon as it stopped raining for two or three minutes, I ran out and moved to make a clearer way to get my water to go down the storm sore. So, because it was piling up in the street and maybe people don't realize they should if keep an eye
on the storm sores, especially if it's in front of your house. I was maybe kind of told and maybe this isn't correct that if you have a storm sore in front of your house, you're kind of responsible storm sore. If there are leaves all on top of it and grass bags
on top of it, you kind of have to go out and move it away because you're defeating the purpose of the storm sores if you don't clear the water from the street. As I talked with the engineers when they were doing my street, I asked, "What's the purpose of the Belgium block along the curb?" And they said, and it's
such an obvious thing, common sense. Well, that's so the water doesn't seep into the ground. Because if the water seeps into the ground, it'll go into the water table, the water table will rise and the water will come in your basement. Well, I have to say, since the storm since the street was paved and the
Belgian blocks put in there, because we didn't have curbing before, the whole thing with the flooding in the basement seemed to have gone away. So, just throwing out there. I don't want to give people more work to do because I know everybody is really busy. But it was a good use I thought of that newspaper to
put something in there that would get the uh people the residents of town thinking about why there are certain things that are, you know, laws or resolutions that are passed and what's the purpose for them and there might be other things we could use it for. Thank
you. Thank you. [Music] Good evening again. Mike Schulman, Clark, New Jersey. I'm going to piggyback a little bit off what you said, Nancy. The storm. We had a our yearly every 500 years yearly storm
again. And Clark made the news for having more rain than I think every town in the area. And um neighborhood after neighborhood was underwater and storm drains are important and we
have one next to our house and and we try to do our best with the neighborhood contingent of boots and rakes. But I remember moving in now eight years ago or so and asking about an easement because our street has very high water tables and we were as a block of
neighbors looking to get additional drains put in. Um and that wasn't met I would think with the openness that maybe it could have been because our neighborhood in Carolina and Georgia Street uh again was a river again looks
like and I'm from Cranford so we know what hurricane look like. This wasn't even a hurricane. This was a few hours of rain. Um, so my really is a question. Um, does the town have a plan to deal with what are now more and more common
issues of flooding? Um, we have development here. We have development our neighborhood towns where we are getting runoff into our town. Uh, also on Carolina Street, my neighbors across the street have these two,
I don't know what you'd call them, sewer drains with this makeshift grate, and the runoff from Westfield and Crawford comes in and the DPW here does what it can do, but it really needs to be uh cleaned out more thoroughly. Um, I know the town's aware of it. We were
very happy to get the grant to assist with our pumping. Um, but I guess the question really I have putting forward is what is the plan that this town has to deal with the what is almost yearly devastation from the water damage? Are
we going to require new development to deal with uh the taking over of land some of it used to just accept that runoff? What are we going to do to make sure other towns are not developing on our borders and having their runoff come in? Um,
does the town have any plan to deal with this cohesively and comprehensively? Uh, including just simple things, making sure people know that they can put their cars at school parking lots, the ones that are higher up, or if they need to
get some safe harbor for young families or pets to come into some of the buildings like the municipal building or the wreck building. So, really, it's it's just a question. Does the town have a plan to deal with what seems to be a continuing problem? Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Shman.
Again, Dia Collins, Clark. I have a very brief thing to say. Uh, the flooding in Planefield was horrendous. It has nothing to do with Clark, but on um tomorrow evening at 6:00 PM, the
Planefield Area Humane Society is looking for help. They received an overabundance of donations from the public, from companies. They're at 75 Rock Avenue in Planefield at 6 PM.
And also on Wednesday, um it's not in Clark, but it's a fundraiser for the animal shelter at the world famous waiting room in Rae, and they're giving a percentage of their uh take for that night to the Planefield
Area Humane. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Collins. I'm not a very good speaker. Angela Demarzo, 23 Cornell Drive. I've been living here since 1970. So, I'm here 55 years. And I'd like to say that you guys
are doing a wonderful job. I don't feel better. I feel so good. That's why I came here tonight to hear everything that's been going on. Angel, you're doing a great job. Want to say congratulations to Pat on his promotion. I loved what you were saying because I am concerned about those ebikes. I've
been seeing that. So, I'll look that up on YouTube and um everybody's doing a great job. So, thank you. Keep up the good work. Thanks, Andrew. Thank you, Mr. Morzo. How are you? Martha Kamatov Clark. Um, I want to first off thank you for
recognizing our Boy Scout troop leadership. I've been involved with the Boy Scout program for 25 years now. Um, and it does my heart good to see leaders recognized as well as the scouts. Um, what brings me here? Well, that brought
me here tonight. Uh last meeting I was here and a woman got up and I didn't get up after her to speak again. Um I let her say her piece and kind of just sat back and let it all sink in. But she made reference
to kind of insulting the integrity of our police department, saying that if anybody were to come up and argue with any of our councilmen that they would be afraid of retaliation
by the police department and our emergency services. Our police department has the utmost integrity. They live by the oath protect and serve. I I couldn't even imagine, you know, what she was insinuating that
they anybody would even think that they would delay a response in a life and death emergency. And that's why I came here tonight because I really really resent the fact that she would make that comment publicly
against not only our departments but against our council. And I think you guys are doing a wonderful job as well. Keep up the great work and see you next month. Thank you, Martha. All right, seeing no one else coming up,
I'd like a motion to close this portion. Motion. Thank you, Council Member Hoff. I got a second. Second. Thank you, Council Member Okconor. All in favor? Hi. Any opposed? [Music] Um
Jim, on the Mr. Schulman's comments on the um the drainage system in the town. Didn't we just do a two-year deal with was it the Planefield country company or a company to come in and uh videotape or take pictures, map all the uh the system
in the town so we can see where there are blockages and see where it needs improvements and things of that nature. Yeah, I mean we have a couple of things, right? So, we brought in Parsa to evaluate, identify where our sewers are. Um, look for low points, look for places
that we may have some issues. And there's also a bunch of other things that we've done. We worked with Woodbridge, we worked with Scotch Plains, you know, because Woodbridge is up upstream from us, uh, coming down the pumpkin patch into the
reservoir. So, they cleaned out theirs, we cleaned out ours, and then it went into scotch. We worked with Scotch Plains um after Ida to clean all of that out. One of the things that actually that Councilman Maserella brought up was we reevaluate we were evaluating all of
our um all of our brooks and our streams. And one of the things that we saw that was a critical area that we needed to clean up was again the pumpkin patch. Um I forgot how many tons we took out of there, but we called into county. the county was in there on Wednesday uh
helping us out a crane that actually can go over the bridge and and and clean a lot of that stuff out. We also bought the Bobcat just recently to help us clean out all of these creeks and streams. There's also one of the things
um that we've been working with is the Rowway River Association because you know it's not just what we do here, it's what they do over there. And I mean you see how Cranford gets, you saw how Planefield got, you know, we're downstream from a lot of that. And it's
just going to make its way out to the Rarid in one way, shape, or form or another. So, it's not just a a situation where we're going to we could put in 12 foot um 12t in diameter um sewer lines. I mean, it has to go somewhere.
And, you know, this is more of an issue for, you know, we keep talking about affordable housing. We keep talk about, you know, smart growth. It's not just up down here, right? It's up up river. So the more they put in apartment buildings
and get rid of green space, this is just going to get worse, you know, straight from Bound Brook all the way down to Vegas, get down into the the railway river. We're actually in between two, you know, so the Cranford goes down to the railway and then you have everything
that's coming out from like Woodbridge Scotch Plains also coming down. So we're we're actually in in between two areas of significant flooding and damage. So while you know it it sounds good to you know to say okay what's your plan what
are you going to do the the plan that really you know is in our court is let's clean out what we have it's the reservoir project will also help that a little bit right because now you have another place for it to go but you know during that storm and I agree with Mr.
showman and you know the hundred years storm seems to be coming you know every year or every couple of years we had Ida we had this one um and you know we are in the fact you know in fact you know preparing but there's only so much that we can do it all goes downstream if
downstream's backed up if and then you have all of this additional building upstream you know in the areas that were always you know farmland you know there's you know you take a gallon of water pulling it pour it into a 12 ounce cup. You're going to get the same
results all the time. So, you know what I would suggest, and this is there's a bunch of storm water projects going on. Um, what I could do is I'll sit down with the engineer and I I could put together a report of all those things that are going on. But, you know,
there's I think the Brown Brooks s um stormwater projects been going on and don't hold me to this, but it's been, you know, at least 12 years. I mean, maybe one of you, you know, may know better even, but that project's been going on for 12 years. It's tied up with
the Army Corps of Engineers. So, it's not like we could turn around tomorrow and say, "Hey, we want to do it." You got the D, the DEC, you got the Army Corps of Engineers, you got everybody. We wanted to, you know, shore up some of Pumpkin Patch. We've been over a year
now. We've been trying to get the permit to shore up Pumpkin Patch, right? It's, you know, it it's just a a paperwork nightmare. So, while, you know, there are, you know, potential solutions, I mean, we could only do what we have
approval to do and what we can do um, you know, within our community. It doesn't help from the downstream. So, again, I I also agree with what what Mr. Shman said and we need to, you know, remember that it's not what 100% what we
do here. It is the surrounding communities and how how that affects us also. And I'd like to add on to that as well. Go ahead, Pat. I just want to jump on what you had to say. Conor, you're absolutely correct. When with the reservoir project, we see how narrow the reservoir got at the featherbed lane
bridge that it wasn't that narrow to begin with, but over time with the with the with the soot the settlement built up, when we go to clear it out, D says, "No, no, you can't you can't clear it out now. It's going to have to stay that narrow because vegetation has grown. Um
there's there's some animal life there, I'm sure." So here's a perfect example where we know the right thing to do would be to widen it to give because that's the top of the reservoir to let everything flow down and we can't because the D says sorry can't do it. So
things like that add to the problem. Yeah. And you know like you said it's it is it's just a bureaucratic nightmare. I mean there's they found a couple of box turtles over by you know pumpkin patch. So that just you know made everything
exponentially more difficult and more expensive. Mayor Albanese. Yes. If I could just add on to that. So Jim gave us a the out, you know, the outline of what's happening in our surrounding area, but this is a problem throughout the state of New Jersey
because that seven or 12 ines of rain that hit the towns in our Union County with Ida, it hit other areas. And if you recall, I don't know if it was one year ago or two years ago, um our engineer Rich O' Conor came to a
meeting and we sent out they sent out letters to people in the town. this was right after Ida that uh he had heard that the Army Corps of Engineers in the state were going to create wider flood zones because as Jim said, if you take a
glass of water uh 8 oz glasses, put put a cord in that's just going to flow out to all these low-level places. There's no place for that water to go. And the people were up in arms. They said, "Well, what do you mean we we need to get flood insurance?" Or, you know, he
projected what they may do. And it still hasn't happened because this all moves very slowly, but it probably will happen. Um, I live on the reservoir. When I bought that house, the engineer said, "Don't buy that house. There's a
problem in New Jersey. Water has no place to go because of the overdevelopment." And I've mentioned that many times with the infrastructure uh load on all these towns that have to build additional housing. Bottom line of it is um
we're all in it together. Um but without with all this redevelopment, it's a it's a huge problem to overcome. As far as the reservoir, yes, I did ask the engineer about that. I said, "Well, we'll have more place to put the water."
He said, "Not really. If you take a a bowl, let's say the that's like a bowl of water, and you make the bowl deeper, what happens? The water just stays the same. The level is going to stay the same. So, the deeper you dig, you're just going to be
accumulating more and more of this water, but it doesn't help us when you get seven or eight inches of rain in a few hours. There's nothing you can do about it. However, um, in response to your second point, uh, Mr. Schulman, as
far as what do we do, where do we go, where do we park, no one even expected or anticipated that that rain was going to come so fast and be so dangerous. It wasn't even a storm. As you said, it wasn't a hurricane, wasn't a storm, just
plenty of rain. And I applaud our emergency management team, Jim Olrich, ma working together to make sure that everything was deployed with police, fire, and our DPW workers. And um you know, it's it's I I appreciate
everyone's efforts and uh thank thankfully no one was injured. A few cars were lost, but no lives were lost. There were no injuries. It's all material damage. It is unfortunate. I know my house was flooded with Hurricane
Floyd in 1999 when that came. I had two feet of sewage in my s in my because the pump station power went out. Um it does happen and it's it's hard for people who are in it to really understand, you know, or or out of it. They're like,
"It's fine. you know, I'm I'm fine, but people have to live with this. And we're doing everything we can to make sure that what was going on during that storm was taken care of as best as could be with all our uh resources and also the followup, some of the points that
Councilman Maserella made about the cleanup that's going to take place. And I appreciate NY's comments because a lot of people had the branches out and now, you know, you're starting to put it back on to your lawn because the pickup is until July 28th. Um, in summary, uh, we
do need to we'll we'll do the analysis and, um, continue to improve, but I think we can anticipate if you live in a a an area that is prone to getting flooding,
then yes, you can call and find out where you can park your car. Don't park your car in low points. Make sure you have a wet back. there are certain things that you can do to prepare. Um, and I and I think that's that's one of the uh things that will help us if
people are more prepared. Um, because they know best what's going to happen. And we'll we'll be outlining some of the additional things that we'll be doing, safety measures taking to to understand where the water is deep so that people don't go into those areas. That's all I have on that point.
Right. Thank you. Uh, I guess we kind of morphed into mayor council professional comments though. You want to continue? Have any other comments, Mayor Albanesey's, as we go towards the closing of the meeting? Sure. As as in the past, I mean, Mr. Graves comes up. Um, you know, he's
running for office. He likes to make a lot of speeches about issues. Um, he talked about one word that in particularly bothered me is the hostility. I just don't see it. He he mentioned after he mentioned the
hostility at our last meeting, he said, "Yeah, you you always bring up that Oprah request for the 42 years of tax appeals that I asked for." But after that meeting, um, a citizen got in touch with me and they said, "Uh, there's a website you can go to and look at, you
know, opas that are put out there." And I had no idea. I'm committed to the town. I have no idea how many opas you have. I my my screen froze today when I was looking at the uh the number of them. Um it's just just amazing to me.
And some of the things are very routine, but um you're you're legally uh permitted to do it, but uh like I said, I I take offense to the word using hostility because I I agree with what was said tonight.
Sometimes it's the other way around. We feel that you're being hostile. when I was on council. We're here to do a legislative meeting, not to chitchat about different questions that could be answered in other ways as the way the other citizens
do it here. Okay? I know you say there there it's hostile here and people don't want to come. No, people do come. And I could go on for about 10 minutes about what I've seen over the years, how the employees in our township here, they're the first line of defense. They're
dealing with questions all the time. Secondly, I get emails, calls, texts about questions that citizens have. They're not afraid to come forward. And I, like I said, I can go through the years going back to 1999 when we had a
meeting with 700 people here because of the egregious Democrat master plan that was put forth. We had to have a special meeting in the gym across the street or the library meeting when the Democrats didn't pass the grant that they had agreed to. Well, you know what the
council did and the mayor? They went ahead and built the addition on the library. We had to use our tax money. We lost almost a million dollars on that. Just a few examples. The uh issue with the reservoir, we never asked for walkways and all these other things. We asked for the reservoir to be dredged.
We we heard what the people had to say and then we also asked the commissioners to come to Clark make it easy for our citizens to voice their opinion and they came to two meetings to do that. Um we've had many other things feeding
animals rules on that. Uh last year we were going to build additional parking at Bartell to alleviate the concerns about parking on the street for some of the citizens that are there. Um, a week or two, a meeting or two later, some citizens came representing the group and
they said they didn't want the parking, so we didn't put it in. People aren't afraid to come up and speak. I I just disagree with what you're saying and like I said, I take offense to the word hostility. Um, some of the other items you mentioned,
oh, again, you always bring up the schools. Um, they have an operating budget. they get all the funding they need that they asked for. The referendum they're doing is for capital. Okay, that is separate. Capital
items are separate from operating. So, don't mix the two up, please. Um, let's see the tax bill. I did put a letter in the tax bill that uh citizens received talking about the taxes for the municipality.
didn't discuss the school taxes, just addressed the municipality where we're thankful to be able to get the bills out timely. Um, our tax collector did a great job and um yeah, the the information there is correct. I didn't go back to look at how
much surplus was used in each year to say I'm going to take more or less to to balance the budget. We have to do what we have to do. That's what I'm here to do. And um I don't know. I'll have to listen to the replay to hear what else you asked about. But um I guess the one
thing you mentioned pilots again and you don't like pilots, but I've never heard you talk about what the alternative is. What you want to do? What do you propose in lie of
these pilots? It's a tool that the state has created for townships to deal with aging properties and also to address affordable housing. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Hoff.
I'm sorry. Um I do have other comments, but not from the discussion I'd like to go through. Do you want to handle that now? Yeah, continue because we're going to be wrapping up. Okay. Okay. We had all the Boy Scouts here tonight. I'd like to mention a
program. The Girl Scouts and the eighth graders from um uh Comp School got together and they are putting together a project that they'll be um displaying on July 30th. If you're
available from 3 to 7, please stop by. It's called an augmentive and alternative communication system. They'll be doing the ribbon cutting there. And um we're very pleased to get this tool which can be used for younger people or people with learning
disabilities to communicate with one another. So I hope to see you there and I want to thank and I will thank them there. The Clark Girl Scout Troop 41248 and also the eighth graders. Um
again kudos to Christy. very happy that she's uh passed the test on her first goaround and um I think that's it. I'll right. Thank you, Council Member Huff.
Um I appreciate everything that um our administration has been saying. I think the information has been good. Um, I wanted to just share really quickly that uh I put it up on my councilwoman page that there's pages for information where you can get the facts for different things that are going on. So, our Clark
Township Police Department, the fire department, the DPW, the volunteer emergency squad, obviously the township and our mayor all have social media pages, but our website rclark.com, the school for Clark Public Schools has a page and the Clark Public Library. So,
if you're more social than websites, all of those things exist in which you can get um accurate factual data and uh alerts that are going out which can be signed up for on our website. Um and also the post about NIXL uh coming from the township which um the township with
the police department um which I think has been great um sharing out that information and just reiterating I think was important. I know we got an alert today about the blood drive. So, um, that's every Tuesday for u the next two months. So, just want to share that. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Council Member Hund. Thank you, uh, Council President. Don't want to repeat what the mayor and Councilwoman Hoff said, but congratulations to the scout leaders. That's a tremendous honor and a tremendous uh, for undertaking that they took to to
work with the children of the town. as they said, um, they may have learned more than the children, but I I I doubt that the boys learn a tremendous amount from their leaders and look up to them. I want to thank Director Grady for his comments on the ebikes. Um, I mentioned
it two months ago, I believe, or three months ago that I completely agree with that, the aggressiveness of the the children that are doing that. and hopefully nothing tragic happens um and people start to understand talk to their to their children about the dangers of
the ebike. The video will should be something everyone should take a look at. So, thank you Director Grady. Uh thank you to our the rest of the police officers and the captains for everything that they do for the town. I still enjoy seeing every night when the police
officers drive by with their lights on. keeping down crime I believe is particularly due to that fact they drive through every night. Um just wanted to see and also congratulations to Chrissy. That's a
tremendous job and to pass it on her first time is also a tremendous achievement. So that's all I have for you council president. Thank you very much. Thank you council member Maserella. Yes. Thank you council president. I want to take a moment to give a special shout
out to our police, fire, uh, emergency services, EMS, and our emergency management for the outstanding job they did during this past storm. They rose to the occasion once again.
I'm sure they have family that they're worried about, but yet they answered the call from 2:00 in the afternoon through past midnight responding to our residents that were in need of this
flood and responding to the motorists that were stranded. Also, this was a very unique storm. It was a downburst which happens throughout the United States. When something like this happens, it it
is a deluge and it and it creates such havoc in an area such as what's been happening recently with those with those Girl Scouts with that that girls camp that was washed away.
So, um our administrator is absolutely correct. When water comes down, it has no place to go but the lowest part. And it's going to keep on coming. And as I have said continuously,
we could do our part what little we can on the smaller events by keeping the branches off of the roadway, by cleaning the catch basins because that definitely clogs our system, clogs
the drainage system. And if if you could do our part, but you know, if you travel throughout our community, the residents, they don't pick up their branches and put them on their property until it's proper time for the branches
to be picked up by the township at no cost to you. And by just going out there, taking a rake and cleaning the top of the couch ba uh catch basin, we have a tremendous
result on lessening the flow going into our drainage system. So, you know, if if the residents could stop talking about what we could do, maybe they should come out and go in the
front of their houses and clean the area. So, you you're helping yourselves and you're helping your neighbors, too. And it's not an attack on anyone by saying that. It doesn't hurt it
shouldn't hurt anybody's feelings. It's normal basic dignity and approach to take care of your own residents as much as you can. Thus, you're taking care of your residents as well.
that uh with that I just want to say please ladies and gentlemen lock your car doors and residences at all times and if you see something that you don't quite like or if you need help don't
hesitate to call our police department or if you have a question about something call our administrator. We're here to help you and u they're not going to get annoyed by your responses or your questions and all of that. We're here to
do a job for you and we're going to do a job the best we can whether some people like it or not. We could only do the best we can. And until next month, be well, stay safe, and God bless. Thank you. Hey, thank you, Council Member Minity.
All right. Thank Thank you, Council President. Um, real fast just want to uh congratulate the um leadership in the Boy Scout uh troop 145 on their great accomplishments and achievements over the last 12 years. Also, I want to
congratulate Christie on uh passing her test and just a a job well done. Um I wasn't here in the last meeting, so um unfortunately I did not get a chance. Uh back in the early June, I think it was June 4th, I was uh honored uh to host
the student athletes over at the Grand Centurans for their annual um senior dinner where uh we gave out uh there was about maybe 30 to 40 scholarships to our student athletes from ALJ. And I just want to congratulate each and every one
of them. the uh booster club was personally responsible to handing out uh nine uh scholarships and well-deserved scholarships. Uh so congratulations to all all of them. I wanted to congratulate the class of 2025.
Um a lot of them I know and I want to wish them all the best on our future endeavors. Our students over at ALJ are just uh great people and I know they'll make a you know a dramatic difference in our world. And then um finally, I just
want to uh thank the uh members of the uh you know, emergency management, Clark Fire Department, police department, and DBW again for their hard work, but also uh to the mayor and uh the business administrator Jim for their coordination
of everything during that last storm. Um and I think they did a a great job. Uh, with that, um, that concludes my, uh, you know, my notes for this, uh, part and, uh, I'll see you, uh, in a couple of weeks. Thank you, Council Member Okconor. Thanks very much. Again, uh, without
saying again, everybody thanked everyone. I'm going to jump on board. Right. Boy Scouts, congratulations to the leadership. Christie, phenomenal job passing on your first time. I mean, if you take a test long enough, maybe you can pass it, but passing in the first time, that says something. So great
great job over there for her. Um with regard to, you know, um our EMS, our fire, our police, you know, great job. DPW, great job. You know, um we hear a lot of what they do. And you're proud.
Hey, that happens in my town. These are volunteers. My dad was a fireman. He was a volunteer. But until you see it in action, it it's it's, you know, it's a it's something you hear. I had an opportunity to see the fire department in action twice. Um, actually, yeah,
twice and police once. So, near my house flooded u Tutor Drive, Meadow Meadow flooded pretty badly. So, the fire um sorry, the police department were there. They they cut off the roads. They got some people out of their cars. My uh one of my best friends mom's basement
flooded 10:00 at night. Um he called the police. The fire department showed up. I was there. They u made sure that there was they shut off the gas. They made sure there was going to be no u carbon monoxide poisoning from the um from from the water heater or obviously from the
gas heat, but it's not heat now. And um the lesser known storm, let's talk about the one on July 3rd, right? Remember that bad storm we had? Really loud. Well, lightning struck my chimney, blew my blew the chimney to pieces. I was in the basement. I heard this loud crack. I
go outside. There's bricks all over my yard, right? So, I called the police. Police dispatched the fire department. They came. They came to make sure the structure of my house was good. They made came to make sure there was no gas leaks. They shut off the gas to my outside grill to make sure everything was good. They um they asked me if I had
any questions. And again, you know, I'm just a resident at that point because for me, they went someplace else. And this is the level of professionalism and the level of service that our volunteers give this town. They would have preferred to be back home with their with their families, even on even with
the flood. But they were out 10:00 at night at my friend's house slopping through the basement making sure there was no carbon monoxide poisoning. The funny thing was, not funny, but you know, some of them look younger than my kids. I mean, these are young kids
giving their time back to the town. So, I'm proud to say we have parents in our town and parents outside of our town who instill values in their kids to say, "Hey, you know what? Let's give back to the community." And they do. We see that with the emergency squad and um we see
that with our coaches and we see that with people who come back to Clark after they graded to come back and families in Clark because they want to be a part of the community that they grew up in where neighbor helps their neighbors and that's what we have here in this town and we're proud of it and that's why you
know when you see local people do well Christy local kid graduated my daughter right you know look at some of the people on council Paty Right. Great job, Pat. I mean, Pat grew up in this town. Now he's, you know, director of the police department. Not
because he grew up in Clark, but because he grew up in Clark, he did the hard work. He got the education. He proved himself in his field and he came back top of his field and now he has this role. It's great to see local people do well and we're proud of it. That concludes my report or my comments, I
should say. Thank you, Council Member Tol. Thank you, Mr. President. The 21st of July, where's the year going? It's unbelievable. We're already going to be in August. Just enjoy yourselves. Be safe while you're out there. Ebikes, whatever other the hangup is, be
careful. We're a small town. We're close community. You heard about for people raising to the top of the ranks. And that's what it's about. Giving back to your community. And to you all, please be safe. We'll see you next month again. Just have a great enjoy the summer is the most important time of the year.
Holidays are nice, but the summer just brings everybody out. and that's what the most important thing is. Thank you very much and we'll see you next month. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Do you have anything? Yes. I just want to congratulate Christie. Uh, everyone in town hall is very proud of Christie. Um, and I know
having taken a state exam, not many people pass it first time. So, we're very, very proud of Christie. Thanks. Thank you. Mr. Olick, you have anything? Um, well, again, I want to, you know, mirror everybody. Um, but I've known
Christie longer than any of you cuz I know since she was born, uh, she lived right across the street from us. So, um, but really proud of Christie and, um, I know she's watching this. So, now you officially you could park in the CFO parking spot. I just wanted to make sure that she realized that. Um, and it is
definitely an accomplishment and, you know, around three and 10 passed the exam. So, this was, you know, a first time taking it. Um, so we are really proud and we got a a great resource now in the town. Um, the other thing that I just wanted to bring up and I failed to
mention um, as part of the affordable housing trust fund question, uh, this is prim the the funds that they're taking away are primarily for, you know, smaller development projects and you also get a bonus credit with those. So,
as an example, if you um, you have 25 units, you get a 25 unit bonus credit. So to count as 50 units uh in order to get those 50 units and you know you would have to build somewhere near near 250 units to get 50 affordable units. So
I mean it's it's really important that you know we support the you know all of the municipalities and you know let our uh opinions known. I forgot about that one point. Um and that's all I have this evening. Thank you counselor. You have anything?
No report, Mr. President. Right. Thank you. Again, just want to congratulate Christie and the Troop 145 leaders. Uh, that's all I have this evening. So, a motion to adjurnn. Thank you, Council Member Tol. I got a second. Thank you, Council Member Okconor. All in favor?
Any opposed? All right. Thank you. See you next month.