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Video-1: youtube.com/watch?v=yzWklCeKZFI

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That could very well be. >> Frank, can you hear us? >> Yes, sir. >> I tried to put that as close to him as I could the microphone to the phone. So we could hear him. >> [snorts] >> Okay. Are you ready?

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Ready? Okay. Good evening, everyone. I hereby announce that pursuant to section 5 of the Open Public Meetings Act that adequate notice of this meeting has been provided in the notice that was sent to the Asbury Park Press, the Two River Times, and posted on the bulletin board in Township Hall, and filed in the

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Township Clerk's office on January 6th, 2026. Mayor Imperiale Duda? >> Here. >> Mr. Foster? >> Here. >> Mr. Vontempo? >> Here. >> Mr. Romano? >> Here. >> Mr. Vanderham? >> Here. >> Mayor, you have a quorum. >> Thank you, Wendy. If everyone can please

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rise for the pledge. >> I 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. >> Moment of silence, please, for the men and women in uniform that keep us safe

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at home and abroad. Thank you. So, before we get to public comment, I just want to draw everyone's attention towards the latter part of the meeting. We have our tax assessor, Eric Aguilar, here. He's going to go over sort of the the basics around property taxes and pilot agreements. There's a

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lot of confusion, I guess, or misinformation that floats around, and Eric did this did this back in November, and so this is just sort of a another update of that information. Chris, before we get to consent agenda, do you want to address the key points in there? >> Sure.

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I wrote it in there, so I have a copy of the list, but I'll I'll go through it quickly. >> Is your mic on? >> I'll I'll press the button. >> Thank you, sir. Appreciate it. >> All right. So, I'm going to go by number 137, rehiring of our camp counselors. 138, that's extending our grace period

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for the third tour quarter tax payment. We do that because the state we have to wait for the state budget to be approved, and for the county to put all the taxes together. 139, repayment of agreement with the Mel Jif. That was for our second special assessment that we we

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we received from the Garden State Jif. They're giving us a no-interest uh, repayment plan, so it won't affect our taxes. 140, adding revenue line for the shared service we have with Highlands. Uh, we've been assisting Highlands in doing some construction, and uh, we get

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revenue for that. Um, 141, uh, this allows us to be eligible for community block grants. Um, our town usually doesn't isn't eligible for community block grants, but, um, this year we are going, uh, to try to get uh,

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the senior center's ADA compliant doors for the front. Um, and our hope is we got to put a presentation, and our hope is that we're voted in to get it. Uh, 142, donation of a used, uh, storage trailer that we don't use anymore to the Homedale off-site correction to the Coltsneck

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Fire Academy. Uh, sorry, fire company. Uh, 143, award of phase one project for Wilson Park demolition and limited improvements to the uh, to the lowest responsible bidder. Um, 144, uh, this is to contract with

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T&M to update our zoning maps that reflect changes that have already been approved. 145 would be contracting with T&M Associates to obtain DEP permits and and the bid for the repair to, uh, 17 Tiburon.

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Um, the homeowners there have been, uh, very patient over the last few years. There we had a failure to our storm water management system, and it's actually taken off a large portion of the of their, uh, backyard. But, um, we did fund this last year. We've been working with them and trying to get this

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corrected. It it is getting closer and closer to their pool, so our hope is to have that repaired this summer. Um, 146, T&M to complete the design for a DOT municipal aid aid funded road that would be Union Avenue. We got a full grant last year for Union Avenue. This is just

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to allow T&M to finish the design work as required under DOT, uh, rules. Uh, 147, contracting with T&M to complete phase one due diligence report for the purchase of 34 Crawford's Corner Road. That is the piece of property in front of home that the home that

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high school and the SAT school. That has been approved at prior meetings. This is a phase one due diligence giving the committee and the town some indemnification making sure that we we know it if there's any issues with any contamination.

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148 is to approve the submitted green team their green team report that that lays out future and current and future plans that we are we are doing in the town to improve our energy efficiency. And then 149 I'm going to

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pass to our attorney who can just briefly hit that one. >> Sorry, which resolution is that? The quorum one? >> Sorry? >> The quorum one? >> Oh, sure. So, you know, when in speaking with the township committee, we do a resolution every reorganization meeting

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that has some rules for the meeting and we thought it made sense to amplify those rules. There's court rulings that say that it's appropriate for governing bodies to specify the particular protocols. So, it's really nothing that goes outside of

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the ordinary expectations on how we conduct the meetings and doesn't contradict our current practices at all, but it does set forth uh with a little more precision the expectations for decorum and the fact that the mayor is our presiding officer or whoever sitting in the the

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mayor's seat is the individual to either enforce the decorum rules or to delegate authority to myself or to the clerk to do so and how the the chief of police or his designee if there's an officer here essentially serves as the sergeant-at-arms for our meetings. Um which is always, you know, been the case

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if if we have law enforcement present. So, I don't think there's anything earth-shattering in there, but I'm certainly happy to answer any questions. >> Thanks, Mike. All right, Chris, thank you. Uh we have now public comment for agenda items only. Yes, sir.

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>> Patrick Truscita, 56 Line Road. Uh I'm in full support of the uh demolition work at Robert Wilson Park. It's great first step. I think uh the the price that it came in at, I think I was pleasantly surprised it was lower than I

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I thought. And uh hope to have this completed in the fall so that we can open Robert Wilson Park. So, fully support that. Thank you. >> Thank you. Any other comments? Yes, ma'am. >> Uh Karen Strickland, 26 Heyward Hills

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Drive. Um I am wondering about the authorizing scope of work for township engineer updating the zoning map. Um I did hear you say that it is for properties that have already been approved. And I am concerned there are

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11 properties there, and I'm just wondering about what is our process. You know, when you change zoning, it should be consistent with the master plan. And I feel a little bit like Holmdel, we've just been kind of approving things right and left and willy-nilly. And um I'm just kind of I

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just wanted to raise the issue that uh you know, I I assume this is needs to be done, but I would like to encourage consistency with our master plan because that's where zoning is supposed to come from. Thank you. >> Thank you. Chris, do you want to speak to or Mike? >> Yeah, I

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>> I would just comment that the zoning map work is simply um on the zoning map modifying it to reflect any of the changes to the zoning that have occurred over the past few years. I think most of the changes involve um compliance with the state affordable housing mandates,

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and typically and the two redevelopments that we have ongoing that are new. Um in each of those instances, if there was a zoning ordinance introduced, it did go to the to the uh planning board for master plan consistency review. And I believe in each of those instances, the planning board found that the uh

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amendment was consistent with the master plan. So, I think everyone could rest assured that uh these changes are just reflective of those past actions, which uh do comply with the master plan. >> Thanks, Mike. Any other questions, comments on public on uh excuse me, agenda items?

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Yes, sir. >> Lance Loopy Lime Road. See, we're donating a trailer to Colts Neck. Not sure why we didn't sell it. Um what's being demoed for $445,000 that the bid was for? I'm sure that some in here would have

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preferred we would have taken the high bid at $1.15 cuz we like to spend money. Curious about the work being done for $157,000 at separate 17 Tiburon. This is only for [clears throat] the plan. The $60.5 thousand for Union Avenue to

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TNM, also for a plan. Curious what the uh what we spent on that green team costs um project. It's kind of funny, there's a line item on the budget that we bought 300

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petroleum-based plastic glasses on the same line item as we bought t-shirts for the green team. So, kind of conflicting, confusing. Um pickleball, $1,800. Not sure what that's for. Um I wonder if we do a cost-benefit analysis in all the shared services

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that we're paying for and that we also are on the other side of and making sure that those are in the best interest of the town. Um $10,000 to Kramer Engineering for drainage. Not sure why we're paying them. We have T&M. Uh $4,700 for equipment at the

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library, plus another $8,300 for shelves at the library. Curious if there's that many books that we need to buy that many shelves for. Um see almost $17,000 for Gone Running. Like to understand what that is. $29,000 for Middle Road improvements.

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$1,200 for mirror installation. And another $575 to T&M for some other work that they're doing. And $2,200 for iPads from T-Mobile. Thank you. >> Chris, I know you hit some of these when you did the intro to the consent agenda.

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Um So, the So, let's I've got the trailer donation to Colts Neck. Do you want to speak to that? The good >> The old The ultimate uh thought was that if if another another municipality or um you know, that can take something that's

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that old. It's It's a 2013. It's basically just good for storage at this point. Um you know, we that happens often. We'll donate it to a a volunteer organization that can use it uh for something they need. Um so, to sell something like that, we can end up getting hardly anything for it. It costs

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us more to try to get rid of it than it is to actually uh just donate it. >> Okay. There was the the cost to demo work related to um I'm pretty sure it's the Robert Wilson Park demolition, which you were >> that whole project that we had uh that we already had a public hearing on last

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month and or a couple months ago. And it explains it. It's pretty pretty in-depth. >> Um so, the the plans for 17 Tiburon, Union Ave and let's hit 17 Tiburon, Union Ave, and Middle Road.

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>> All right. So, I could I could talk to 17 Tiburon, as I said in in when I did my introduction on that that this is a home that's probably lost 40 to 50 ft of their backyard has washed away due to a break in our storm water management

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system. And this is a uh it has to be rebuilt. It has to be rebuilt by DEP standards. So, if it doesn't get rebuilt by DEP standards, we'd be in violation. Um we'd also open ourselves up to a lawsuit um if it doesn't get taken care of. Um they've been very patient with us

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and we did a lot of this money last year in our capital budget for for any storm water problems we may have going forward. >> [snorts] >> Thank you. Uh library costs, there are a couple costs for shelves amongst other things. >> Yeah, these are just the the library has

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a a um a budget and they've used the money from their budget that they needed for replacement shelves and storage and uh they've come to us and asked for that and uh we we filled them. That was a budgeted item. >> Uh uh the 10K for Kramer Engineering on

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drainage. >> Kramer Engineering, that's an escrow. Um we changed that ordinance this year. Uh Kramer is one of our consulting engineers. We don't give everything to T&M. We do uh try to farm stuff out to smaller engineers. Um these are homeowners who are required

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to do uh grading and storm water management on their properties when they either add a pool or something of that sort and uh they pay for it. It's just a matter of it's coming out of their escrow, but we still have to pay it through our bill list. >> Okay. And then um

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there was $1,800 towards pickleball, I think. >> That that'd be on me at this point. I would have to look go more in depth on that stuff. >> All right. Thank you. Any other public comment on agenda items? One and done, Lance. Middle Road, Chris. Middle Road

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improvements, Tiburon, and Union Ave are the three. So, Chris, can you hit Middle Road and Union Ave? The improvements there. >> Okay, so the Middle Road one I'm going to have to look up, but the the Union Ave is a DOT funded grant that we received last

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year, and it is funded through DOT, and it has to be designed by an engineer required under the DOT grant structure. So, this is we have a what's called section 20 costs, what are costs that are done to an engineer, and then they get approved by the state, and the state reimburses us back for the

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repairs of the road. >> Okay. Thank you. Lance, if we missed anything, you can come up in public comment at the end. Anyone else agenda items? All right, let's move on to Get a motion to vote. >> A win.

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Can I do a separate vote on 139, please? >> 139? >> And Wendy, I'm 149. >> So, wait a minute. So, 139 we're going to exclude right now. And 149?

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Okay. Okay. So, we're going to be voting on resolutions for the consent agenda 2026-135 through 2026-149, but we're taking out 2026-139 and 2026-149.

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>> For further comment. >> Motion. Motion. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Mr. Bontempo? >> Yes. >> Mr. Foster? >> Yes. >> Mr. Romano? >> Yes. >> Mr. Vanderham? >> Yes. >> Mayor Improta-Dudo? >> I'm going to

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abstain from 137, but otherwise, yes. >> Okay. So, the resolutions have been successfully passed. So, we're going to have a separate discussion on 2026 139? >> 139, yep. >> Okay. >> Chris, could you just go in a little

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more detail as as to how we how we got this this bill for 139? It may It may have predated you. >> So, in 20, I believe 21, um the town chose our last insurance fund that

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we were part of was the Garden State, Jeff. And when I when I got hired back in in April, I was a little concerned right off the bat when I came in because I I had heard of some financial difficulties that this this um

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this actual JIF had. Um and we we've pretty much been stuck in the middle of it. [snorts] So, every time that the JIF doesn't cover its costs, it specially assesses is the the the membership. It has a large

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membership, um but we're we're stuck with some towns that really didn't fit us. And unfortunately, we were hit with two uh special assessments over the last year. Um totaling between the two of them about $749,000.

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That was basically going to fully year extra of what we normally would have paid in premiums. Um when we moved JIFs, they uh all of a sudden accelerated. They were mad because we left and they accelerated our our special assessments. We moved to a JIF that's very well funded. Um and

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right off the bat, the first thing they said was, "Well, we'll give you the same uh funding the same funding sources to cover you and you can pay it back like you were if you were to stay in the JIF." My biggest concern right now and and um I have about 10 other uh towns who left them and we've been

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communicating is we don't think this is over. We think that they're going to come after us again for this year for the 25 year for the past year. So, we're waiting to see what what comes up next, but these special assessments and Michael probably could talk to him better than I can, and it's they're legally binding. We we're we're stuck.

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We had lawyers send us letters telling us what we owed. >> So, we we What if we didn't pay? >> Generally speaking, um there's a provision in 40A:11 that establishes joint insurance funds, which are basically, to put it in layman's terms, different

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towns all get together and create their own insurance company, and it's not private insurance, it's all the towns standing together, putting all their insurance proceeds into a pot of money. I think it's fair to say that the former JIF, you know, was not sufficiently funded, and so, you know,

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the way the state was written, it gives them the power to impose an assessment, kind of like a condo association, if there was a, you know, a loss in a condo, to make an analogy. So, that's what they're doing here. [snorts] Um in terms of the governing body action, the Monmouth County JIF that the township moved to has offered to

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essentially front the money for the township, uh pay the assessment, and then we would pay them back over a substantial amount of time, at no interest, I believe, which, you know, from a budgetary standpoint, is a huge uh offer by them, in order to avoid having

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to shell that out right now. >> Do Do we know how they came up with this total, Chris? >> It's There's a formula. Um I can get it and kind of ship it out to you guys, you can take a look at it. Um I think it might have even been in that lawyer's documents I sent you, but I I'll double-check,

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um because they've been kind of harassing me for the money now. They're like, "Well, where's our money? Where's our money?" cuz we left. Um what happened is 10 towns left, and the 10 towns that left were the best towns, the towns that had the lowest um issues that were going on. So, as I said, I expect

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this to keep going a little bit, and I'm hoping that we can fight it. >> I think what I'll suggest is, you know, if the governing body adopts the resolution that'll authorize entry into the into the agreement with Monmouth to front it, but prior to us signing that, I'll work with the administrator to get

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some more information on the specific questions that committee member Bontempo raised to get that to the committee cuz I do think that those deserve answers. >> I just I just [snorts] Just a lot of money, Chris. >> Yeah, I I absolutely agree it's a lot of money and

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I wasn't happy about it. So, I actually um they were unhappy with me because how fast I pulled and got us out of it. Um they they even tried at the last second to get us to stay and I was like, why would I stay and keep paying? I'm going to have to pay these fees. I can tell you now that the JIF we're in right now

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is funded so well, they have $12 million in surplus and that's just the local section of it. It's attached to the state and the state actually Mel JIF is the one who's loaning us the money, not even our own. So, they we've that that JIF has given back dividends almost

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every year. >> So so so basically they they were running at a deficit cuz they didn't properly manage their business for lack of a lack of a better term. And now that they're

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now that we're leaving, they're saying Homedale you owe us half a million dollars. >> Well, everybody owes it, but we owe it now fast. They accelerated our payments. They no longer wanted to give us the 10 years to pay it back. They want ours right away. So, that's when the Mel JIF said, well, no problem. We'll give you

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the money and give you the same terms. The other lot of them almost every other town who left actually has to pay it. So, that's where I got into the conversation. Some of them are being forced to do special bonds that they're allowed to do for this just to cover their costs and that's rare. And that's because they

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just can't afford to do that. >> I understand. Mike, what will they do to us if we don't pay? >> [snorts] >> I would imagine sue eventually if the township didn't pay. >> So, we can incur legal fees and we'd have to if we lose handle the payment as well. Great. What was >> I would I would imagine there's probably there's a potential fee shifting

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provision in in the agreements where they can recover their fees if we were non-compliant. >> Greg, what was the criteria for these guys when they were selected in '21? >> Done by the administrator. >> What does that mean? >> The administrator had had a had a um

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a relationship and was familiar with them. So, I'm not sure if it was if it was Bill at the time or was Sharon. >> I I believe it was Sharon. >> Bill Bill was against this. >> Yeah. >> Yes. >> He he uh he uh was concerned about about the financing. And uh we we we we were

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very much I was very much in front of this when I got here and Bill was in agreement with me that I was going to find you guys the best um funded one cuz we we didn't want to get into this again. >> So, Bill was right. >> He was he was right. He he knew he knew looking at it.

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>> Okay. But, voting in favor of this will allow the Monmouth County Monmouth County JIF >> The MELJIF, the state MELJIF >> JIF that covered the cost >> to cover our cost up front and then we will pay them back over extended period of time and we can budget for that. We're comfortably we're comfortable.

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First of all, we we got a lower rate from them overall, so we're basically paying what we used to pay at the Garden State anyway to pay them back right now. So, we're good. >> Okay. >> It's just a lot of money. >> Yeah, we won't Looks like the wrong shot was called.

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Can I motion to vote? >> Motion. >> Anybody want to second? >> Second. >> Mr. Bontempo? >> No. >> Mr. Foster? >> I mean, it sounds like a bad decision was made several years ago and it put us in it. I'm not going to legally

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jeopardize so I'm going to vote yes. >> Thank you. Mr. Romano? >> No. >> Mr. Vanderham? >> Yes. >> Mayor and Private Duda? >> I have to ask, what's the So, I'm going to vote yes, but I'd like to understand why we'd vote no on someone absorbing the costs for a bad decision made in 2021.

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>> It It's It's I I I'd like to see the formula and how this how the five almost half million dollars came about. It's not in this packet. >> So, you're not I just want to make sure I understand. You Your vote is to delay

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moving us out of a bad situation? Cuz that's the vote. The vote is to go to these guys and have them absorb the cost. And to Mike's point, we can >> come back and have a discussion around the formula and to see if there's any opportunity >> to address things, which it doesn't really sound like there is legally. So,

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I'm just I'm I'm struggling to understand why you wouldn't want these other guys to absorb the costs for us while we if you want to do further diligence, you can. >> The The the half a million dollars needs to be

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looked at a little more closely because taxes, as we saw in the last meeting, are going up fairly significantly in the town. If there's a way we can reduce expenses, I I'd actually like to understand this a little more because coming up with that this number seems

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significant. Um and so, I'm not in favor of of proceeding. I'd like to push a little further and try to get some some relief from this number. I don't think the number is locked in, and I'd like to get that number lowered. >> Can you unpack your your your statement around taxes going up a little bit?

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>> Taxes have gone up. >> Sure. >> The town can save money, we can lower our assessment, and help offset the increase in taxes. >> We're at like the lowest tax rate in 10 years. >> Again. >> And so, I understand your point,

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but you know, you bring up matters and issues as if they're new, and you didn't address them when you were mayor. So, I'm wondering why you would try to address them now. Our tax rate's lower than when you were mayor. >> The The our our overall assessment in the town has gone up. So,

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tax really haven't changed based on extra money coming into the to the town. So, um there's a lot of money. I mean, we have residents coming talking about $1,700 charges that are on our bills payable. Half a million dollars is a lot of money. I'd like to see if we can

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negotiate this number down. >> Okay. I I I don't see why we can't do both, but you know, okay. >> Have you tried to lower this number? >> Well, as we just discussed it. We said we can we we said we would >> Or this meeting, have you tried to lower this number? >> The discussions have taken place between the administrator and the JIF. The

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number is locked as far as we can tell. If there's a way to move it down, we'll move it down, but in the meantime, we need to be covered. >> Have you personally been involved in the conversations to reduce this number? >> Why would I personally be involved in the conversations to reduce this number? >> million dollars. >> It is a half million dollars, and I trust the administrator to handle it and

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report back. >> So, you haven't been involved? >> Craig, you were the ones that you were the one that brought these guys in. Now, you're coming to me saying why didn't I fix it? This [snorts] was on your watch. >> Okay. >> But you blame the administrator. >> No, I don't blame the administrator. >> You did. You said it was the administrator's decision. >> That That's usually what it is. As Chris

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is driving this one, which probably a better decision. >> Okay. >> But in hindsight, everyone's a Monday morning quarterback, right? >> Yeah. Listen, I'm just you're coming to me saying have I negotiated it down, and yet you're trying to absolve yourself from all sins for bringing these guys in. >> I didn't I didn't say that, did I? >> No, you did. You blamed the administrator.

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>> I said the administrator had a relationship with them and brought them in. >> Okay. And the administrator is handling the mess that was created. >> Have And have you been involved in lowering the number here? It was no. So, I I I >> No, I've been involved with the administrator. >> I'm not comfortable with half a million dollars.

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>> Okay. Well, listen, we'll just continue to clean up everything you did and we'll take it from there. >> Mayor, >> I I don't want to get in between the the committee members, but I will mention that the resolution authorizes entry into the agreement with the MEL. It doesn't necessarily mean that the check

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is going to them. So, as I said before the vote and before you guys going back and forth, we will get more information to the committee. I think that's appropriate here. I think it'll answer a lot of the questions and hopefully address those. >> And and >> And that's >> Can I just say one thing, Mr. [clears throat] Mayor? So, the the one

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thing that we all have to understand is that my predecessor, and I I have no problem saying it was my predecessor, voted on the first one at the GIF meeting when we got the first half of this. He went and said it was okay. I would have voted against it. Okay, the second one

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wasn't even approved till this year. We were already out of the GIF. So, we had no say in what they were doing. So, we were kind of stuck in the middle. One I wasn't there for cuz I wasn't here yet. And the second one happened in like March of this year. We were already in a different GIF. They weren't even calling us on this.

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>> What was the amount of the first one, Chris? Do you know? >> The overall is 749, I believe it is. I can get that for you. It was we we we voted on it earlier in this year. So, we offered it and we we we the mayor picked that one up earlier this year. So. >> So, we had a representative in the meeting and the representative agreed to

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>> Agreed to go and specially assessed everybody. And only there there wasn't enough to vote against that there. So. >> Joe, do you have a comment on 149? >> Yeah, I had a comment on 149. I'd like to know >> One second. So, you were yes, correct me if I'm wrong, for 139. So, 2026 139 was

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successfully passed. Now, we're discussing 2026 149, correct? >> Yes. >> Okay, thank you. >> Yeah, I'd I'd like to know what the reason for adopting this this or proposing this resolution is, you know. We've This is my third year on the TC and we've never needed anything this harsh. We've been able to communicate

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with the public and I just, you know, I haven't heard anything about it. I'd like to know what the the reason was for this proposing this. >> Sure. I, you know, I've been in conversations, you know, with the mayor, deputy mayor, and I would am aware that at certain

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meetings they've become lengthy and that there have been concerns among certain committee members and/or folks in the audience about the length and the process surrounding them. So, I suggested that it would be good to have

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a resolution that properly addresses how our meetings function. We do do one at reorg, but it usually gets swept away with all the other actions at reorg. So, this was simply looking to other towns that have these. It's a pretty standard practice. So, I'm certainly happy committee

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members to represent that I certainly put thought into the idea of having something of this nature. >> Have a motion to vote? >> Motion. >> I need a second, Brian. >> Yeah, I second. And Joe, I was just going to add actually two meetings

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earlier this year, you were like, well, this is going way too long. I got to go home. Like we're we're trying to move things along. There's people complaining. There's employees that are like, "Here all day long." This needs to be tightened up. >> Yeah, so it's it's it's not the length. It's There's a huge section in here, section G, about enforcement of decorum.

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There's all this stuff. And now we have a police officer standing in here. It just you know, I I agree we need to shorten this up, but it seems like there's there's it's just the language of this just seems very harsh. You know, that I I'm all for shortening the meetings, but I I think that this is going to discourage engagement. And I think maybe maybe

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speaks to, you know, the fact that we could communicate better with the public as well if this is where we're going cuz we >> We've never needed this. >> Okay. We have a second from Deputy Mayor. >> Okay. Mr. Bontempo? >> No. >> Mr. Foster? >> Yes.

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>> Mr. Romano? >> No. >> Mr. Vanderham? >> Yes. >> Mayor and Deputy Mayor? >> Yes. >> Resolution 2026-149 has been successfully passed. Thank you. >> All right, Wendy. >> Okay. Next is on the agenda is a public hearing on grant applications. The first

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grant that we're applying for is the fiscal year 2027 CDBG grant in the amount of 35,000 for ADA compliant doors at the Senior Community Center, 6 Crawford's Corner Road, Holmdel, New Jersey 07733.

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>> Any comment from the public? Is a legal public hearing on this grant application? >> Seeing no one right. >> Seeing none. Motion to vote. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Mr. Bontempo? >> Yes.

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>> Mr. Foster? >> Yes. >> Mr. Romano? >> Yes. >> Mr. Vanderham? >> Yes. >> Mayor and Provenzano? >> Yes. >> Okay. Resolution 2026-150 for the CDBG grant has been successfully passed. The next public hearing is for we're

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applying for a grant from the Monmouth County Municipal Park Grant for the Robert Labby Memorial Renovation Project located at 24 Orchard Avenue, Holmdel, New Jersey 07733, Block 50.32, Lot 86.03.

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>> Anyone from the public on this one? Mr. Schikita. >> Dr. Schikita, 56 Line Road. Uh Labby Park used to be a really nice park about 20 years ago and it's kind of showing its age. This this grant uh I think would do a lot of good to spruce

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it up a bit and uh to make it a uh a better park that all the people of Holmdel could use. So, I'm in full support of it. >> Thank you. Anyone else on Labby Park? All right. I got a motion to vote. >> Motion.

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>> Second. >> Mr. Bontempo? >> Yes. >> Mr. Foster? >> Yes. >> Mr. Romano? >> Yes. >> Mr. Vanderham? >> Yes. >> Mayor and Provenzano? >> Yes. >> Okay. Resolution 2026-151 for the grant for Robert Labby Memorial Park renovation project has been

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successfully passed. Thank you. >> Going on to departments, Mr. Administrator? >> Thank you, Mayor. Um so, a few things tonight. Um I wanted to uh happily say that the uh con- precon uh meeting for the Bethany Road

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project has been completed. Um and since school is out, they will be uh starting uh relatively quickly. Um they'll be working on concrete during the day, and once the concrete and sidewalk repairs, ADA compliant um ramps

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are put in, they'll be paving overnight. Um and it'll be done what's called echelon paving, meaning that they will have two pavers going at the same time to limit the seams that you'll see in the roadway. Uh that road is very important to the residents of this town, the residents of Hazlet, and and in

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general the residents of Monmouth County, um because again, it is very high traveled. Uh we are also looking at um for our DOT grant this year is to complete that road, um so we finish it out. And uh and hopefully in our in all

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of our times here, um that'll be it for for a very busy road. It'll be set and ready to go for many years to come. So, uh I'm excited about that. Um our 2025 road program is underway. Uh you many many of our residents have seen that and there's uh curbing being

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done, uh repairs throughout the town. You might see some paint marks on the road because they're uh you know, they're setting it for the uh paving company. Um we are putting it out on our social media and our website. Currently, as of yesterday, repair only's, which repair

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only means basically portions of the road are going to be done, is uh Winfield Way and Center Road. And then we are milling and paving the following roads, and I they're both they started this week would be Deer Pond Lane, Munsee Court, Sugar Lane, Mountain Lane,

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Thorn Path, and Taylor Road. There are many more. We have about 25 on our list. We will keep the the residents updated on that. If you do live in that area, you will receive a notice prior to that from the paving company. Watch our website and social media for more

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information. Um last meeting that uh we I had mentioned that we've been working on the crossing guard plan. Um my office and the police department along with Kramer Engineering who's again our consulting engineer, we've uh hired him to help us

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assist us in uh building the map out for um where crossing guards might work in this town or will work in this town. Um he's uh mapped out the area. He's actually uh he knows exactly what roads can be uh that are walkable at this point. Um

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we still have working out the amount we need, but we believe now it's going to be less than 10. Uh we're looking at about six or seven. Um we're also looking at our sidewalks that we will be responsible for to make repairs. We um and uh the reason I chose

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Kramer Engineering, I've worked with him in the past. He uh he comes He's actually the engineer of Shrewsbury where I came from. Shrewsbury is a complete walking town. He's gotten them grants in the past from quote safe routes to schools. That grant is coming out soon. And what's great about that is

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that if we can identify areas where we could do more sidewalks, we can get that grants through them to actually get sidewalks done. Um so we're working on that. So we're prepared and ready to go. Um and the committee is working on We'll

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probably be working over the next couple weeks and we will have a better presentation of what's going to happen with the map. Um I'm going to ask to Mr. Kramer to come to the meeting. He's willing to come and show um what he sees as what the future looks like for us. >> Great.

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>> Thank you, Mr. Chairman. >> Does that mean that the engineers have to physically almost like walk like let's say we have make up a number of 100 students are going to be walking, right? That like go to Greg's house at 22 Grandview Drive and kind of

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walk to Village School from from there to kind of see the path. Chris, is that is that how involved it is? >> It is involved to that point if there's a if we can see there's a a path there. There's no requirement for the town to actually build infrastructure that's not

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already there. But if it's there, we are walking those routes to make sure that if it's either our sidewalk or unfortunately, and I know a lot of homeowners don't understand that if it's on the front of their house or the side of their house, it's their sidewalk. There's no major trip [snorts] areas. I

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mean, you know, broken concrete is not not doesn't automatically make it unsafe, but we're looking for the safety issues. We're looking for uh where's places where hey, maybe that crosswalk's not in the right spot cuz we didn't think of this. Let's move that crosswalk. We can do that in house. We're trying to find ways to make it

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safe for like Greg and Ron Temple to make it to school. >> So if there's no if if like there's no sidewalk in front of my house, we're not going to put a sidewalk there because >> it would be physically impossible. And and technically, the law doesn't say you have to it's not walk. It says they're responsible to get their kids to school.

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It's not. So, but doesn't mean in the future that if we can find grant money or ways to do certain things that are feasible, we we're going to try to do it. So, it's just a start. We know where we're at now and this is where we're going to go. This is our new our new map our way to do things and we're going to

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do it that way. So. >> Thank you, Chris. And just for public context, the Bethany Road project is also in partnership with Hazlet, is it not? >> Yeah, it's a partnership with Hazlet and it is a DOT grant-funded project. So, that's why I'm going for the 2027 cuz I

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know it seemed like we stopped, but I I I see why they ran out of It wasn't just enough money, but we think it's a good time to get it done and then that's a road we don't have to worry about anymore. >> Thank you. Uh Eric, we'll move on to you for the pilot presentation. >> Okay.

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I understand at the last meeting there was a number of questions uh surrounding not just pilot agreements, but also more generally about property taxes, assessments, um the inspections that are going on for the the assessments.

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So, I packaged the presentation this presentation together to kind of cover all bases here. So, it's broken into two sections. We're first going to talk about property taxes and uh and the tax assessment function, and then we'll get into the pilot

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agreement portion. And if you were here for the um the Vonage presentation uh about 6 months ago, you'll see some of this is a little bit uh repetitive. But, property taxes, they're used to fund uh local government services and

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and I'm referencing 2025 taxes here because the 2026 tax levies, rates, they haven't been certified yet, but I will have a slide on here that shows uh the expectation for 2026. But, for now, we're talking about 2025. So, Monmouth County had to raise $445

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million last year uh for for taxes. That's inclusive of their open space funds and the county health, the county library, and the county budget in general. Uh that $445 million,

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that gets split up based on what town is valued, their equalized value relative to one another. So, Holmdel will pay its proportionate share of the $445 uh based on the value of Holmdel relative to the rest of the town. So, Holmdel's just shy of 3% of the value of

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the county. So, Holmdel in 2025 paid $13.2 million uh in county taxes. In uh 2025 five for the school the school district tax levy was 67.8 million.

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Uh that represented about 69% of your property tax bill. Uh this year I think it's 72 million. I'll have a slide on that. And the township uh portion is about 17.4% of the tax levy. I think it's 14.8

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million dollars. For every one dollar of property taxes that a Holmdel resident pays, 86 cents stays completely within the town. Uh the remainder of that goes towards the county. And you do receive some benefits of course from county services.

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Uh but for the 86 cents of the dollar goes stays completely within the town between the school and the municipality. This is the 2025 tax levy tax rate certification. You could see what's highlighted at this moment is the county

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tax the county uh levy for what Holmdel residents or Holmdel property owners had to pay. Uh then you have the school budget. And the municipal portion which is inclusive open space uh tax as municipal

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open space as well as the uh regular municipal purpose. Looking at it like a pie chart. Uh this is what that would look like. So, the Holmdel municipal budget that covers everything you can think of municipal services. Uh

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you know, police, fire, EMS, DPW, road maintenance, trash well, I guess not trash collection in in Holmdel. I think you pay separate for that. But um you get the picture. Uh this slide and by the way, this this is or will be posted on our website if you want to refer back to it. It'll be

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on the tax assessor page. But this is the last 10 years of tax levies from 2016 to 2025 broken out by uh component. And you'll see from about 10 from 10 years ago, we have to now raise almost

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20 million dollars more. Well, this year is going to be 104 million. So, yeah, 22 million dollars more over a 10 year span. And you can look at each component there and and see, you know, where the changes have come from a property tax standpoint.

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The county budget, it's relatively the same. That doesn't mean that the county taxes have not gone up. The county taxes have gone up over that period of time. But what has happened is the the shore towns have appreciated at greater rates

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than Holmdel Township has. So, what ultimately happened is the county taxes, even though they've gone up overall, they've shifted off of Holmdel onto generally the shore towns towns that are closer to the to the beach.

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So, when you when you add up all that had to be collected last year in taxes, it's 98 million dollars. And where I come in as the tax assessor, I have nothing to do with those numbers that we just spoke about.

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What my my role is is to analyze the market value of every property within the town. And then that 98 million dollars gets split up based on your proportionate share ownership of the municipality. So, if you think of

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the town as a pie chart, you own a little sliver of it. And you'll pay that same sliver percentage. If you own 1% of the value of the town, you would pay 1% of the 98 million dollars that has to be raised. So, a very simple example, if the town

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had three houses in it only, you would have and they were one was worth 2 million dollars, the other two two were worth 1 million dollars, that 98 million tax bill would get split up. Let's call it a hundred million to keep it simple. The blue house in the picture would pay

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$5 million in taxes and the two white houses would pay $25 million a piece. The way the tax rate gets calculated is it's the amount of money that has to be raised, so the $98 million divided by the value of the town, all the assessments of ratable properties

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combined, which in 2025 was $6.37 billion. It's very simple math. $98 million divided by $6.37 billion, 1.539% and that's what everybody paid their assessment times the 1.539%

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in 2025. What to expect for 2026? This is not really great news, but this is not great news pretty much across the county to be honest. Every tax levy that I'm looking at it seems to be going up substantially.

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The municipal budget is the same. However, the total I expect to be about $6.3 million higher. That means that versus last year, the Holmdel property owners have to come up with $6.3 million

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more dollars for property taxes. And we know that the school tax levy has changed. That's part of that reason. But probably what people aren't aware of is the county budget has gone through a pretty substantial change, too.

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The county tax levy has changed from $369 million to $384 million. That's a 4% increase. The trend has finally shifted slightly where Holmdel has performed values in Holmdel performed better last year over the past couple years, so your

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apportionment is increasing slightly as well, about 1%. So, the Holmdel county taxes year over year will be 5% higher 5.15% the county health budget has gone up

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from 3,139,000 to 5.177 in a single year. That's a 65% increase on that County tax levy. So Holmdel will see a 67% increase in payment to towards that Levy. And then the open space fund

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for the county there was a referendum last year the way the open space County taxes work is property owners pay a set rate based on the equalized value of the town and that rate is determined by the

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voters actually as of last year that that rate was 2.75 cents per hundred of assessed value or of equalized value and the voters voted somewhat overwhelmingly yes to be charged more taxes and

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voted to increase that rate to 3.75 cents on top of already appreciating market which means that the county tax County open space is going to be 48% higher. Last year they had to collect 55.8

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million dollars. That's now up to 82.4. It wasn't long ago. That was only about 15 million dollars pre-covid. So now it's 82 million dollars. And of course Holmdel residents Holmdel property owners will will see that increase.

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So the tax rate I'm anticipating it's 1.5% of course the rate is lower because the values are higher but you should certainly expect that your taxes will be approximately depending on how your assessment change relative to the rest

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of the town 6.4 6.5% higher your taxes will be Uh and because the way the tax bill is broken out, you'll see that entire increase on the

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back half of the year. Because your first and your second quarter are uh one quarter of what you paid the last year. We don't know exactly what the taxes are until the middle of the year. We'll get the tax rate certification in July. It'll show, "Oh,

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we we need to raise 6.3 million more dollars." We'll collect that entire 6.3 million extra between the third and the fourth quarter. So, your quarterly bill, you should likely you'll likely see it and I'm I'm kind of generalizing this cuz everybody's going to be in a different situation if your assessment

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changed different than the aggregate value of the town, but um you should you should expect 6.5% increase over year over year, generally speaking, uh which means that your quarterly bill is probably going to be 13% higher because of the backloading factor.

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So, just using an an example of a property that changed from $17,000 to $18,000 year over year, uh you that property would have seen their taxes in the first and the second quarter uh 4250, which is one quarter of

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the 17,000 uh for for for first and second quarter. And then we realize, "Okay, the tax rate is going to be this. This is your assessment. Oh, you owe $18,000." It's for the third and the fourth quarter, it's 18,000 minus what you previously paid in the first and the second. So, your taxes are going up a

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thousand. That entire $500 increase will be backloaded onto the second half of the year, the third and the fourth quarter. And then it would balance out uh for the following year for 2027, where this property would see um one quarter of the 18,000 for the first and

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the second quarter. All right. Again, I'm stressing where my involvement is I'm I'm the tax assessor. Uh I don't even know why they use the word tax because of essentially what I am is I'm a property appraiser. I'm appraising the values of all the property and based on my appraisals, that's how the taxes

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are distributed amongst this roughly 6,200 properties within the town. Um So, how are the assessments determined? And I understand some of the questions last week revolved around this, so that's why this is included in this

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presentation here. So, an appraisal, it's an opinion of market value based on what the property characteristics are. So, think of anything that would affect the sale price of a house. If you open

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up Zillow and you're scrolling around and saying, "Hey, that's a nice house. I would like to sell my house and move there." What are the things that you'd be considering? Obviously, the location, the size of the lot, the quality of the house, the condition, the style, various amenities. Does it have a pool? Does it

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not have a pool? What neighborhood is it in? All of those questions are uh what should be considered in the assessment modeling. So, um obviously, it wouldn't be practical for me to do this one by one and I and

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value every house individually. So, this is built into a model through what's called mass appraisal. And the goal of mass appraisal is to value all the properties based on the same standard. Uh

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We're trying to find market value on all homes and all of those things that I spoke about before, the location, the condition, all of that is built into the modeling and adjusted annually to best target market

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value based on what the sales data is telling us. Uh one of the questions last week was apparently about the inspections. We currently are inspecting all the properties on the north side of town. I'll have a slide on that. That is the

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That's one component of the mass appraisal. We have to consistent constantly verify that the data the physical data on every house is accurate. So we're required by law in order to do that annual reassessments. We have to inspect every property once

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every 5 years. We're on a schedule to to inspect every property in 2026, between 2026, 2027, and 2028. The last cycle that we had was between 2020, 2021, and 2022.

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This year we're inspecting the properties that are shown on the screen here. It's everything north of the tracks. This is on our website. You don't have to take pictures. It's on our website. Just I got you. So um

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everything north of the tracks and then extending down below into like the Gables and Bow Ridge. They're in this year's inspection area. I think we actually already completed the majority of these inspections already. They've been done over the past few months.

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Now just backing up real quick, you'll see some some bubbles outside of that area. Those are properties that are on the list for other reasons. They had permits or they were doing some sort of renovation, new construction, adding a pool. So those will be in the inspection. Those will get inspected every year

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as the work gets done. And there's a link here on this slide to the notice the public notice about the inspection process. Two other components of the mass appraisal is you know you have to analyze the sales data

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and develop and test logical modeling rules and statistically target market value. Uh the the goal again is to have as many assessments as close to market value as possible. That's the goal.

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Uh and the goal is that so that the tax distribution can be fair. For modeling purposes, assessments are broken into the two components. You have the land value, the underlying land value, and then you have the contributory value of the improvements. That word contributory, that's probably

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what I should have underlined here. That's the important part of that sentence. It's not what uh it necessarily cost to do an improvement, and an improvement meaning whether it's a house or a pool, it's what that improvement adds to the underlying value

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of the property. So, uh kind of to think it through, let's say that you Let's say a developer purchased a lot for a half a million dollars. The underlying land value is is a half a million. They were able to construct the house and spend a million dollars, so they're only into it for a million five,

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but it sells for two million. Well, the land is 500,000 and the contributory value of the improvement is 1.5 million. Cuz that's what that structure added to the value of that property. And that could go the other way. Maybe it cost $150,000

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to build a pool, but if you were to resell the house, maybe you're only going to get an extra 70,000 upon a resale. So, it it it goes both ways, and the goal is to measure all of those factors uh every year uh you know, to at least to modify uh based on what's being

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observed in the market. >> [clears throat] >> Uh land modeling, it's obviously going to be based largely on the area that you're in and the lot size. Uh generally, the properties on the north side of town are less valuable than the south side of

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town because you have larger lots neighborhoods. And that doesn't It's not always the case, but generally the neighborhoods with larger lots and larger homes within that neighborhood are going to come command higher prices. Other variables, easements, wetlands,

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uh traffic, if, you know, you're right across from a gas station, that's going to have an impact. Within the modeling, the way that that would be addressed is the property, let's say everybody is is the same within what we call a value control sector or a neighborhood, uh

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except certain properties are on the busy street within that neighborhood or across from a gas station. The way that that would be addressed within the modeling is the property that is affected by that uh circumstance would have some sort of reduction, generally speaking,

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if there's uh you know, some value impact for that um that thing. Now, we have to be careful that it's not just well, one property that has that issue. Well, it's multiple properties. We have to be careful that everybody's being treated uniformly, and that's that's

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really the key to all of this, uniform treatment. Uh different property types, obviously residential, uh somewhat easy to to value residential properties uh on individual neighborhoods, but then that when you span that across an entire

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municipality where there's varying types of homes and town homes, uh you know, this all has to be built within a model, and then uh you know, carved up into uh whether it's it's different neighborhoods, and then analyzed even on, you know, different

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price points and uh similarities with respect to what are new homes doing, what are older homes doing, what are renovated homes doing, what are non-renovated homes doing. Uh there's there's there's a a need to address all of those

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questions when we're updating the modeling every year. And commercial properties, they're done they don't sell often, of course, so they're done based on an an income and expense um approach. So, we study the

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the leases and the uh expense ratios and uh vacancy rates and capitalization rates, and that's how we come to the values of uh the commercial properties. Uh condition and other factors, I kind of uh went through this. I'll just blow

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through it. All of these things are going to affect the the uh the assessment modeling because they're things that assess that affect the value of a property. Age, condition, quality, uh amenities, finishes, etc.

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Now, we update the model annually, which I said a few times here, and that may have been another question in um uh last week, but uh if it wasn't, I'm going to address that. Why do we do this annually? All right. So, first and foremost, it's

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uh we're required to do it. Uh we're in uh Monmouth County, which is under the assessment demonstration program, and uh we're required based on a 2013 uh order from the Director, Division of Taxation,

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uh connected to that assessment demonstration program, we're required to uh reassess all properties annually. And it's a good thing because it ensures that we're most fairly distributing the taxes uh possible.

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Think of it like uh if alternatively, if we didn't reassess, what you could have is uh you could have certain areas of town appreciating at different rates, and if the reassessment wasn't happening, then you wouldn't be

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addressing that in the distribution question. So, um my neighborhood, I live in Oakhurst, it's a good example because it's part of Ocean Township and the properties in Oakhurst and West Allenhurst and West Deal, all part of Ocean Township, are

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appreciating at much greater rates than other parts of Ocean, Wanamassa and Wayside. So, what happens in that picture is the assessor will increase the assessments in Oakhurst and West Deal and and West Allenhurst to a

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greater extent than what they're changing in Wayside, which will shift taxes off of Wayside onto me, unfortunately. But, that's the goal is to have it fair because if you ignore it, then what ends up happening is, especially for a long period of time,

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this happened in in Asbury Park and Jersey City, where you have areas that appreciate, especially due to redevelopment reasons, and the the corresponding tax distribution isn't changed accordingly. Now, putting thinking back to Holmdel,

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that happened here, not necessarily on a neighborhood level basis, but pre-COVID, there was a compression in the market where the lower-valued properties were appreciating at a much greater rates than the higher-valued properties. The large

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They used to Now, a million-dollar home isn't much, but at that time, million-dollar homes were barely moving. In some cases, they were actually going down in value in 2015, 16, 17, they were they were struggling in the market while the townhouses were going up at much greater

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rates. They were increasing. Post COVID, especially post 2022 when the interest rates started increasing, that trend reversed, and the lower-value where the higher-value properties are now, over the past few years, out pacing the lower-value properties.

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And these are things that need to be analyzed every year so that whatever the bill is, whether it's 90 million to 82 million dollars 10 years ago or 104 million dollars today, uh the goal of this is to distribute whatever that number is uh fairly based

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on the values relative to one another. Uh annually reassessing protects against large tax appeal refunds. Uh it lowers the overall cost of administration, believe it or not, even though I'm doing this every year. Uh well, I'm I'm working here as an employee anyway. It's

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just a task that is a I have to absorb uh every year uh at no additional pay, but we could talk about that, I suppose. Um and uh in the the old the traditional assessment model, the way that it works is a town would get ordered to do a

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revaluation by an outside company approximately once every 10 years. That would cost Holmdel between 120 and 100 and 200 dollars per property. So, that would cost about 800,000 to 1.2 million dollars to distribute the taxes

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uh as opposed to this ongoing inspection plan where it costs about 220,000 every 5 years. So, uh figure at $440,000 over a 10-year cycle uh versus 800,000 to 1.2. There's been some uh

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towns that are doing revaluations in the state now that are paying 180 to 200 dollars per property. That would be uh 1.2 million dollar cost to Holmdel. But, we don't have to absorb that because I do all the work every year and you guys are lucky

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for that. Um and uh it's an increasing practice statewide, especially as the values have changed so dramatically after COVID. Now, 20% roughly 20% of the municipalities throughout the state perform annual reassessments.

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And the numbers uh show the picture. So, the average ratio every year the director division of taxation does a study of ratios for every town comparing assessments to sale prices and the average assessment

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to sale price ratio in the state right now is 61.57% and actually this chart is splitting those the 564 towns out into two other groups. Groups that bless you. Groups that

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reassessed every year for the past 5 years. Those are the green ones. And then groups that have not have performed no assessment maintenance over the past 5 years. That group is at 55.12% The purpose of these ratios is to

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equalize the towns for the that county tax and for regional school purposes. So, uh a town a town that is not assessing a fair market value, they're for the for shared budgets, they get equalized based on these ratios. So, if you have a town

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that hasn't done anything in 5 years and they're the assessments are half of what they're supposed to be, if the town is appraised at $2 billion, they would get equalized to $4 billion in that that shared budget. Now, the ratio is not really

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it's kind of meaningless unless you understand what's the reliability of that ratio. The director division of taxation also does statistical studies for coefficient of of deviations. What that is is it's the average deviation from the average ratio

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expressed as a percentage if anyone followed that. But, to kind of put it in layman's terms, what that is is if you had a town that had 50 sales that were at 50% and 50 sales that were 150%. So, meaning the assessment to sale price

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ratio was 50% on 50 sales and the assessment to sale price ratio was 150% on 50 sales. Well, on the surface it would appear that that town is very fairly distributing their taxes uh and that their assessments are fair

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because the average ratio is 100. Well, in reality they're that's a terrible uh situation because the assessments are really all over the place in that picture. Uh so um really the lower the coefficient and that's what the this this is measuring.

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That would be a 50% coefficient of deviation in that example cuz it's the average uh we could calculate that in our heads because all of them are 50% off of the mark of the average. So, it'll be a 50% coefficient of deviation. A total extreme, but believe it or not there's

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actually some towns out there with coefficient of deviations that are uh 30% or or or more. Um so anyway, uh the reassessment municipalities, those 91 districts that reassessed every year,

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they're at a 10% coefficient versus the non-reassessment municipalities at a 17% coefficient um on on average. So, how does Holmdel square up to that? And you know, I have to mention there it is also uh some

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factors in that is obviously the the uh homogeneity of a town, the volatility of the market. All of these will fluctuate what these what the coefficient and the ratios will be. So anyway, the state average ratio is

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61.57. Our ratio 99.74. Coefficient statewide is 16.13 and Holmdel we're at uh just shy or uh lower than 8%. The lower the number, the better. And it's impossible to get a coefficient of zero, but um what this is

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representing is that statewide the average uh tax work our tax distribution is twice as accurate than the rest of the state. And there's more information at that link at the reassessment report. Those

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were 2025 numbers. I also included the past 10 years. I had one little blip in 2021 when the market got kind of volatile and we spiked up to a 10% coefficient. Um but uh generally speaking, we're hanging in the sixes and sevens on the coefficient and we're

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around 100% on the the ratio. And the ratio, it's a little bit of a complicated calculation. I won't bore you with it, but it it blends two years, but um it's it's not an exact uh it's not an exact um uh picture of the way the assessments

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are. It's it's a little bit of a delay. All right. So, um you know, other uh there's been a number of third parties that have analyzed what's being done in Monmouth County. And uh there's links here if anybody's interested to read more about

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it. Moody's Investor's Service, uh Harvard Kennedy School, the IAAO International Assessors uh Ass- Ass- Association of Assessing Officers, and Monmouth University all have done studies uh and produced either reports or uh

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issued uh awards towards uh this program in Monmouth County. And these links are on this this uh presentation. All right. Section two. Pilot agreements. First and foremost, what is a pilot? It's a payment in lieu of taxes.

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Uh what it is is it's a redevelopment financing tool that's authorized under New Jersey law that's used to encourage uh projects that wouldn't otherwise be financially feasible. >> [snorts] >> Uh it's typically used in areas that are

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in need of redevelopment like uh like the Bell Labs property uh or the Vonage property. Uh environment could be used for environmental cleanup uh affordable house to fulfill affordable house obligations

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and uh other major investment projects. Uh under a pilot I I think probably a lot of the room is familiar with this from the last presentation, but the the property will not pay typical conventional taxes. They'll be on the exempt tax list and they'll make a

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payment to the municipality uh based on an agreement. And typically that agreement is a number that's less than what conventional taxes would otherwise be because the whole point of it is that uh the it's an expression that this development

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could not happen without that pilot. It's a subsidy without the pilot subsidy. The township's $14.8 million tax levy, what it is is it's the shortfall between the town's revenue sources and the expenses. So the town has about $17

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million worth of $18 million worth of revenue sources and 30 This is as of 2025 $32 million worth of uh expenses. The shortfall, the number between that is what has to be raised on their taxes. It's not contrary to popular belief, it's not the

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assessments that are causing what the taxes are. It's expense verse uh revenue based. So township expense example or township revenue source examples are highlighted here. Uh what we're talking about is pie

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payment in lieu of taxes pilots. So again properties that have pilots, they are not included in the ratable base of the town. Instead, what they're doing is they're making a payment directly to the municipality that's used to reduce the municipal tax levy.

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Holmdel's collecting about $7.3 million of pilot revenue. If it weren't for the pilot revenue, the Holmdel municipal levy would be about $22 million, which would mean that the $98 million if you were not collecting the the 7.3,

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it'd be $7.3 million higher. Uh why municipalities use pilots? Again, encourage redevelopment of underutilized property, uh address environmental contamination, infrastructure costs, uh support affordable house uh

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obligations or creation, and attract private investment, new municipal revenue, revitalize neighborhoods, and uh help make projects that would otherwise be finan- um

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non-viable financially, help them be financially feasible. Developers seek pilots, obviously, for the same reasons. If you there's could be significant upfront costs to construct the property, environmental remediation, uh affordable house obligations,

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uh believe it or not, developers are not uh knocking down the door to build affordable housing out of the kindness of their hearts. Uh they're uh generally getting some sort of subsidy, whether it's on the state level or on the municipal level through uh payment in

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lieu of taxes. And uh there could be financing challenges. The the interest rate environment that we're in now is certainly not helpful towards development because to borrow, uh you're not going to build a $100 million project with $100 million cash.

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Generally, you'd you'd be borrowing 70 million of that. And if you're borrowing at a 3% versus 6%, it changes the uh the pro forma quite a bit. So, the the idea behind a pilot is to help stabilize long-term operating costs

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to improve the project feasibility. Here's the controversial slides. Do the pilot agreements negatively affect the school budget? And the answer to that question is no, it does not negatively affect the school budget.

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The school budget, the school tax levy, it's the same concept as a municipal levy. It's the shortfall between the school's expenses and their revenue sources. So, let's forget about the pilots for a moment and just talk about a scenario, a hypothetical scenario where you have a

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20, almost $23 million property that's paying conventional taxes right now at 1.539%. They're paying $350,000 of taxes. Of that, 69% of it is are considered so-called school taxes,

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$241,000. Let's say a church or charity buys that property, starts operating a nonprofit, and now it's exempt from taxes. What would happen to the school tax levy? Will it get $241,000 less? The answer is no. They still have

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to collect $67.8 million. So, it doesn't change the school tax levy. But something's got to be impacted, obviously. What would be impacted is you would lose a ratable, $22.75 million ratable, which would lower the

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value of the town. You would still have to collect $98 million. And what would happen is your tax rate, instead of being 1.539, it would be 1.544. So, it's really a question of not how it affects the

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school tax, the school budget, it's how it affects the property owners of the municipality. So, um under that hypothetical example, that $22.75 million dollar gets moved to the exempt list, what would happen is the

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average assessed value property, average assessed residential home in 2025 would uh have been $52 higher if you lost a 22 .75 million dollar property as a ratable. Now,

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just continuing this thought, well, what if that property it wasn't a church, it wasn't a charity that paid that that purchased it, it was a developer and they were authorized a pilot agreement uh that was going to result in $2 million of revenue towards

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the town. Well, then the picture's a little bit different. Uh that $14.8 million would change to $12.8 million. Uh you would still lose the ratable, but you wouldn't have to collect $98 million in taxes because that property

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is then contributing $2 million directly towards the municipality. Uh so, that picture would look like $96 million has to be raised in taxes divided by the 6.35 billion ratables. Uh tax levy or tax rate would be 1.512.

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So, what ultimately happens is the average assessment average assessed residential home would pay $280 less uh in taxes. All right. We're almost done. So, we're going to do a hypothetical

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example here. Test what we learned. Let's assume P&C Bank Arts Center, which is currently exempt from taxes cuz it's owned by the Turnpike Authority. Let's say uh a private an owner an individual purchases it for $50 million

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property. You might want to get your calculators out for this question. $50 million, the tax rate is 1.5%. The school portion of taxes is 69% and we're going to do this Jeopardy style. Uh the answer is this is the amount

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of new property tax revenue the school gets. So, what would the property tax revenue What would the school get in new revenue from this property changing from exempt to taxable? $50 property, $1.5 million

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or 1.5 tax rate, and uh the school portion is 69%. Anybody that has a calculator out, I really want to ask somebody that has a calculator. Go ahead, Pat. Zero. You got it right. Thank you.

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I didn't see anybody with a calculator, so that's a good sign. I tried to trick you. All right. So, the better question again, how does it affect the property owners? And it depends. Uh you have to ask a variety of questions and it's on a case-by-case

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basis. So, first and foremost, the most important question is is the project financially feasible absent the pilot? Um Could the project be done under conventional taxes? If the answer to that question is yes, we shouldn't be asking any further questions. We should

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They should just pay conventional taxes. Of course, this is something This is an example of something that isn't developed right now, right? Uh they should just pay conventional taxes. That would be ideal. Uh but if the answer to that question is no, this This project cannot be developed uh under a

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conventional tax scenario, uh then you have to ask a number of follow-up questions. So, if it's not built, what would tax revenues be if the site remained undeveloped? Uh we have a case study on the next slide next couple slides about Bill the Bell Works property, and you'll see what the taxes

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were when that building was vacant. And Vonage is experiencing the same issue now. Uh how does the pro uh pilot revenue stream affect the township's budget and overall tax levy of the municipality? Would the existence of the project increase cost of the township? It's a

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fair question. Are you building a project that is is going to put in in this case would affect the school budget if you put 100 kids in the school, you right? Or if it's going to create a situation where you're going to need a significant amount of emergency services,

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you know, that roads being paved, you know, those kind of things those might be net net negatives financially from a new development coming in. Does the project advance key township goals revitalizing an area that's in

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need of redevelopment developing underutilized land, affordable housing, historic preservation, environmental remediation, all of those are questions that should be asked. Does it create a synergistic These These

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bottom two are overlooked often because it's very difficult to quantify, but what kind of synergistic effects occurred from Bell Works or other towns that have experienced redevelopment? Did it increase property values in that area? Did it spark other

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redevelopment? Did it support long-term economic activity, jobs, you know, other customers within the town? Those are all questions that really have to be asked with any sort of sort of development.

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So, the case study that we have here is the Bell Works which used to be Bell Labs and Lucent. >> [snorts] >> Back in its heyday in the '90s, that property used to pay about four $4 million of taxes which actually in 1990

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terms, that was a lot of money. That was actually 10 to 15% of the overall tax levy of the town that the residents were relying on that property to pay of the total tax levy. Well, turned the loose in and then

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it went it went downhill from there and the building eventually became vacant and the taxes as the value of that property dropped as an abandoned property the the taxes dropped. They were only paying about $500,000 so down from $4 million

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to $500,000 at a time when the total tax levy went from $30 million to $75 million. So they went from being a contributor of nearly a 15 13 14 15% of the tax levy the town's tax levy to

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less than 1%. And that persisted 2000 till 2014 Somerset purchased the property and came up with this redevelopment plan entered into the

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pilot agreement with the township and pretty much immediately 2015 there was a sudden jolt even in in property taxes because as part of the redevelopment they subdivided the property and sold a portion of it to Toll Brothers with approvals to build the town homes

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and build the 40 single-family houses. So instantly back then I remember it well in 2014 I increased the the assessment of that property I nearly doubled it because of that simply because that subdivision. So the township taxes on that property went

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from 558,000 to almost a million dollars overnight. That 500,000 extra came off of everybody else paying in instantly in 2015. From that period it got a lot more complicated because you had units in the

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Regency being built which are under pilot agreement and you have the building which increased occupancy and their pilot agreement is based on their revenue it's a percentage of their revenue. So the better they do, the better the township does. And then also you have the single-family homes

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built, which are under 40 homes under regular conventional taxes. So, went from contributing that property went from contributing 550 uh or from $4.5 million, excuse me, to uh 550,000.

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And then over the past 10 years now they're up to $8.5 million contributing towards the town. And that's a combination of the taxes from the single-family homes and the uh the PILOTs generated the PILOT revenues generated

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on the uh the Regency units and the um the Bellworks building. Had to put a fancy chart in here, but it's it's reiterating the same um the same information on the prior slide. Uh Bell Labs years, Lucent years, abandoned property value

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years, aban- abandoned property years. Uh starts gets subdivided, development starts, and uh stabilizes. Now we're we're around we're pretty much peaked out. Although the Regency will continue and even the Bellworks they'll continue to escalate up because the uh the way

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the PILOT agreement is structured is uh with Bellworks it's a percentage of the revenue, and that percentage changes over uh uncertain periods of time. Uh uh there's certain brackets like years 1 through 5 it was I don't know 11% and

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then years 5 through whatever it's 11 and 1/2%. I don't know the percentages off the top of my head, but you get higher percentages. Theoretically over the life of that agreement the revenue of Bellworks will increase, so you'll get a higher you'll get the percent of a higher revenue, so you'll you'll get

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increased numbers there. And then same thing with the the Regency. Uh that's structured in a way that the uh the PILOT payment actually increases at a rate that's greater than what taxes otherwise increase, uh, at least what they've increased in the

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past. I don't know about 6% now, but, uh, generally taxes were increasing at 2%. So, this was designed in a way that, uh, those those units were paying, uh, 4 to 5% uh, more per year and the the

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goal was to catch them up to conventional taxes. Also, resales trigger recalculations. So, those units will pay up to 90% of what conventional taxes would otherwise be uh, under a pile under their pilot. Uh, and then the Vantage, uh, property,

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I'm not going to get into the Vantage agreement here. There's a entire presentation on that. Um, but I just wanted to stress that that property is under the same situation that Bell Works was in or Bell Labs was in, uh, after Lucent left and, uh,

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Vantage used to pay $800,000 in taxes. Now that it's vacant, they're only paying $350,000. I guess where that, uh, that $400,000 or so came from. It came from your pockets. Like you're all paying the taxes that they used to pay, uh, when that was a vacant built when

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that was, uh, a occupied building. Now that it's vacant, um, you know, you're covering the taxes that they would they used to pay. And the goal through redevelopment is to get that property redeveloped and get that contributing, uh, at the same level or or going to be a

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lot more than what it used to contribute based on the development that's going to happen there. It should be I think it was like $2.3 million of of pilot revenue uh, that that would contribute when it's all built out. And, uh, this slide uh, slide deck, it's on our website and throughout the

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presentation there's a number of links and I think I captured all of those links on the back end of this, uh, on the last slide here. So, feel free to visit our website on uh the assessor's page and you'll be able to uh do more

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exploring on these links. >> Eric, thank you very much. >> You got it. >> Appreciate it. Um all right, let's move on to the committee. Committee member Bontempo. >> Uh thank you. Uh information technology update. Um IT department the county dispatch

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migration progress. So, IT department continues to heavily support our the police department's migration to the county dispatch system. Key technical milestones completed this week including finalizing the complex forwarding of calls and configuring critical emergency call flows to ensure

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seamless community response. Enhanced after-hours security. To ensure uninterrupted administrative and emergency coverage during the transition, IT has successfully reconfigured and forwarded our Verkada intercom systems to handle

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office, excuse me, handle after-hours access to town hall building securely. Interdepartmental infrastructure updates. IT is working closely with Department of Public Works to coordinate physical security updates ensuring all facility door locks electronic access

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controls are fully integrated and functioning smoothly across uh all Holmdel Township buildings. End of June 2026 cybersecurity threat assessment. The NJCCIC, which is NJ Kick, issued the end of June

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cybersecurity bulletin this week which highlighted key points for New Jersey residents. Look out for unsolicited emails asking you to open or read an attachment in your desktop. A new hacking tactic targets users with emails prompting them

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to quote-unquote open on desktop or quote-unquote view on desktop. Opening these attachments bypasses standard security protocols, allowing hackers to install malware and take control of your computer.

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Action required. Never open or read unsolicited emails with these instructions. Watch out for fake Meta for Business emails. Cybercriminals are sending fake emails that look exactly like official

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notifications from Facebook or its parent company Meta. Claiming that someone wants to partner with your business. If you click on the link inside, it takes you to a counterfeit website designed to steal your passwords, credit card details, or personal information.

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To protect yourself, never click links in unexpected emails. Instead, log into your official Facebook account directly to check for updates. Change your passwords immediately if you think you've been tricked, or consider turning on multi-factor

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Excuse me, multi-factor authentication. As always, residents are encouraged to report malicious cyber activity directly to the NJCCIC via their official website, and exercise caution when interacting with emails

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from unsolicited senders. Thank you. Mr. Romano? >> Nothing to report from Community Development. From the Holmdel Library, we have three programs going on for children this month. We've got Wild Jersey, which is find a It's called Find a Fossil. It'll be held on Monday, July

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6th from 4:30 to 5:15 for kids grades K and up. We have the Dino Kids Rock Concert, which will be held on Wednesday, July 15th at 11:00 a.m. And then we have Stages Story Workshop, which will be held on Monday, July 27th from 3:00 to 3:45.

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The July Book Club We've got the Holmdel Book Club will be meeting on July 14th at 10:00 a.m. to discuss the book The Last 12 Miles by Erica Robuck. We've got uh an America 250 author event coming up on July 8th. Historian and author Rick Gefken will be speaking at

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the Holmdel Library. The topic of this presentation is all history is local, Battle of Monmouth Courthouse, 1778, before and after. This presentation will examine Monmouth County's role in the fight for independence. Gefken is the author of New Jersey's Revolutionary Rivalry about

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Cap- Captain Joshua Huddy and Colonel Tye. Seating will be limited for this event. Registration is highly recommended. From public works, brush collection has ended. So, June brush collection is over. Residents should no longer put piles of brush out on the roadways.

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The next and final brush collection of the year will occur in September. And the next large item drop-off event will be held on Saturday, July 11th in the red and blue lots of Bell Works. Residents should enter through the American Way entrance.

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Thank you, Mr. Van Der Heem. >> Thank you, Mayor. Holmdel Heritage Committee, save the date, the 2026 Holmdel Heritage Day will take place on Sunday, December 13th. That's at the high school from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. The Heritage Committee is in the process of recruiting

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restaurants and cultural representatives to host tables, and this list will be shared with the public soon. Residents who are interested in volunteering, becoming a sponsor, or making a donation to support the event are encouraged to contact the Holmdel Heritage Committee at heritagecommittee@holmdel.gov.

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The Holmdel Green Team, the Green Team thanks members of the public for for reviewing and commenting on the final community energy plan, which was approved by the TC earlier tonight. Uh the next Green Team meeting is Monday, July 6th at 7:00 p.m. in Town Hall. Interested residents are invited to

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attend or to contact the Green Team at greenteam@holmdel.gov with sustainability questions or suggestions for Holmdel Township. Thank you. Deputy Mayor, I think you've hung up. I think you put him to sleep, Eric. >> [laughter]

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>> So, tonight I'd like to recognize and celebrate the upcoming retirement of long-time employee Loretta Kashia. Uh for over 20 years, Loretta has been a pillar of our municipal government, dedicating her career to serving our Township and its residents with professionalism and care. Loretta began her career supporting the

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zoning board, eventually took on the vital work of the Holmdel Environmental Commission, and ultimately worked her way up to become the office manager for the Department of Community Development. To the hundreds of residents, applicants, and board members Loretta has guided and supported over the last two decades, she has been the helpful,

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reassuring face of Town Hall. Loretta, thank you for your years of exceptional service to Holmdel. We wish you a wonderful and very well-deserved retirement. Uh as as was reported in the Star-Ledger last week, realtor.com rated Holmdel Township as the number 46th hottest

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housing market in all of America. This report evaluated the nation's fastest-moving real estate markets where rising home prices and strong buyer demand continue to drive competition. Holmdel's placement on this list underscores what our residents already know. Our Township offers an exceptional quality of life, outstanding schools,

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beautiful open spaces, thriving local businesses, and convenient access to major transportation corridors. So, we're pleased to be ranked as highly on that. The fire department from the fire department, the annual fund drive uh mailing was sent out a few weeks ago. Please consider making a donation to

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your volunteer firefighters. The department relies on the generosity of our residents to help them continue delivering the high level of service you expect and deserve. The fire department congratulates three of our members for graduating from the Firefighter 1 Academy. Uh Abdullah Al

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Alhway graduated from the Middlesex County Fire Academy on June 2nd. Eclin Ryan graduated from the Mammoth County Fire Academy on June 9th. And Colton Klobuchar graduated from the Middletown Fire Academy on June 13th. With 4th of July coming up and everyone

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preparing to celebrate, the fire department warns wants to warn residents of the dangers of fireworks. In 2023, fireworks started an estimated 32,000 fires, including 3,760 structure fires, 849 vehicle fires, and

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27,252 outside fires. Those fires caused an estimated 15 civilian deaths and 9,700 fireworks-related injuries. Please exercise caution and preferably attend one of the many professional firework displays throughout the county or state

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instead of attempting to use fireworks at home. And that is all I have. Wendy, we can move on to public comment. >> Okay. Next is public comment portion. And in accordance with the Open Public Meetings Act, this is a public comment period for public comments on any governmental

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issue of public concern. In accordance with Resolution 2022-17, public commenters are asked to raise their hand and wait to be recognized by the mayor before coming forward and making public comments. Commenters are asked to state their full name and address before commenting. Public

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commenters are limited to one comment not to exceed 3 minutes. Comments should be directed to the mayor and township committee, and if appropriate, the mayor may direct and recognize a staff employee or professional to respond to comments either at this meeting or in

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writing after this meeting. >> Thank you, Wendy. >> You're welcome. >> Public comment? Ma'am? >> I'm Betsy Shelton, 21 Herald Hills Drive. I'm part of the Holmdel Green Team. Um to address the resident that had questions on expenses from the Green

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Team. Is he still here? Um, any expenses that the Green Team, um, have, and including the production of that, um, community energy plan are covered by grants. So, to the committee, I'd like to thank you all for, uh, approving our community

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energy plan, um, resolution 2026-148 tonight. Uh, as you know, the plan covers, um, outlines specific energy initiatives that Holmdel will be pursuing in the next 3 to 5 years. Uh, it covers transportation, energy

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efficiency, renewable energy, and affordability of clean energy for both, uh, the township and our residents. The Green Team's excited to have an approved work plan defining, uh, the Green Team's activities for the next several years.

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That being said, we'd like to invite any Holmdel resident that would like to learn more, and to help us implement these, uh, initiatives of the net over the next several years, to check out our, um, the Green Team page on the township

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website. We'd want to thank all the municipal, uh, employees that have helped us make this plan. Um, they provided extremely, uh, important information, and will continue to do so as we implement it. So, thank you, Chris, and to the staff. And again, thank you to the township committee, uh,

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for your continued support of the Green Team and your effort, and in our efforts to, uh, create a more sustainable Holmdel. >> Thank you, Betsy. >> Yeah. >> Yes, sir. >> My name is Dr. Abraham. I live in 1 Buttercup Lane, Holmdel. I have important,

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very serious issue. Yeah, my name is Dr. Abraham. I am talking about very important issue in our neighbor. I live in one Buttercup Lane, Holmdel, about Oak Hill um farm.

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It the ha- it is really amazing how we are living in Holmdel and in our neighbor there is a major construction major alternation of everything, car

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parking everywhere, noises everywhere animal which is smell and we need something to be done about this issue. It's very serious issue. I came and I spoke with the administration and they say there is

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legal um about this I don't know how they get this uh changing from one violation to the other. Every day there is many construction and we don't know it's like nine houses or 12 houses the

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same around this farm. And there they have eating places inside the farm. There is many animal, there is many uh construction like sh- shade and and

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light and we don't know what it is. There is also golf many golf places for the kids and the people walking in the street with no side street. Car parking everywhere and there is no I we need the township to do something

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about this issue. I don't know if anybody here around us knows about that issue or not. >> The if uh when when you finish, sir, I'm going to ask uh council to address the matter as it is in litigation at this

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point. Um but we understand your concerns, absolutely. And uh once you're done and you have a seat, Mike will address the status of the situation. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thanks, Mayor. Um as the Mayor referenced, there is active

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litigation involving uh the Oakhill Farm matter uh currently pending in Superior Court. So, uh the Township really can't comment on it. Uh what I will tell you is what's uh know what you can note from the public

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court filings is that the Township did file a three-count complaint against the property owner uh alleging violations of the uniform construction code, the uniform fire code, and the municipal land use law. Uh

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there is an order to show cause hearing that is currently scheduled in uh Superior Court in Freehold for this Friday at 2:30 p.m. Uh where the matter will be addressed further by a judge. Thank you. Yes, ma'am.

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Uh of course, come up to the microphone. Just your name and address, please. >> Hi, my name is Katherine Eng, and I live on 93 Stillwell Road in Holmdel. I've been a resident of Holmdel for 32 years. I represent my parents. They're the homeowners. They're busy. They can't come right now.

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And um my major concern about Oakhill Farms, I love the farm. There's nothing wrong with that, except the problem is that it's a public safety issue because there's no sidewalks where up to where I live, at least, and there's a lot of families that actually walk on the road

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where it's a double solid line, and it's very concerning because there's pedestrians walking with kids. There're toddlers, baby strollers, like all the time. And I'm the driver. I'm sure there's a lot of drivers that live around that area, too, that have a concern when there's no sidewalks and

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there's pedestrians walking along like families. And that's a major public safety and concern that I have that I just want to address to everyone and also the board here. So, if there could be something that could be done,

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just hopefully something could be done about this. That's all. Thank you. >> Thank you. And so, you know, as stated by Mike here, you know, we we can't get into further depth on the situation, but we are again in active litigation. What I will

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say though, just for to make sure that we're um to be factually accurate, Oakhill Farm is not a farm. It's in the name, but it's not technically a farm. Am I I'm pretty sure I'm right about that, Mike. >> I I in terms of the classification of

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the property, um I think the the farm has raised certain legal arguments that we will be addressing in court papers that we file, um in which the township's position is that the municipal land use law zoning applies and that there is no right to

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farm act protection that applies, but we'll address that in court. Thank you. >> Anyone else public comment? Yes, ma'am. >> Hello, my name is Rachel Kanapka. I am not a resident of Holmdel. I live at 25 Blue Jay Court in Middletown.

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I am here because I am co-president of RAGE, Residents Against Giant Electric, and I was for the 2-plus years of the grassroots community fight against JCP&L's 2016 to 2018 attempt to install high voltage power lines over the New Jersey Transit tracks for 10

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plus miles through five towns including Holmdel. I'm here tonight to respond to the comment made by Mayor Impreveduto on the record at the June 9th meeting saying that I and RAGE leadership somehow gave permission or approval for the current large monopoles being installed in

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Holmdel now in 2026. That comment is absolutely incorrect and I am here to set the record straight. I was shocked to hear my name said aloud on the live stream of that meeting. The next morning I sent an email to Mayor Impreveduto to introduce myself and to

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defend myself and RAGE with a thorough telling of facts. It would take me much longer than 3 minutes to read that email, but if anybody here would like to read it, we posted it to the RAGE 2016 Facebook page. At the end of that email, I asked that he respond and publicly correct the

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comment he made. The next day, June 11th, I sent the email to the full Township Committee. As of today, I have gotten only one The Township Committee already knows everything I have to say on this matter because they got my email. I'm actually here tonight to directly address you

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guys, the people of Holmdel. >> ma'am. Sorry, you have to address us. >> Okay. Well, you can listen to me. I'm here to address the people of Holmdel and well, I can't believe I'm saying this to clear my and RAGE's name. I did not approve or negotiate anything

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with JCP&L. The other RAGE leaders did not approve or negotiate anything. We never would have done that. Anybody who was involved and paying attention during those two years, and I am sure there are still a lot of you here in Holmdel, can attest to how hard

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I and RAGE worked to keep those giant dangerous poles out of our communities. We raised $500,000 to join the legal proceedings as a grassroots community group. We hired a lawyer and expert witnesses that formed the crux of the case that led to the judge and the BPU

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siding with us and denying that project. I and other RAGE leaders spent thousands of hours over two years to fight this and protect our towns from the giant poles and high-voltage transmission lines, and we won. The last time I was in this room, it was

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with the other RAGE leaders to receive a commendation from the Township of Holmdel for our efforts. To be here now in the same room to respond to a public accusation by Holmdel that I and RAGE somehow sold Holmdel out and are the ones responsible

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for the installation of the giant poles that we spent years fighting absolutely blows my mind. It is completely false, and it is extremely insulting. I don't know who told you, Mayor Impreveduto, that I or RAGE was responsible for this. I can only assume it was JCP&L.

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>> Sorry, ma'am. It's 3 minutes. >> But that misinformation being spread and a grassroots community group being blamed on the record by an elected official in an official public forum without proper validation is wrong. >> Excuse me. That's 3 minutes. Thank you.

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>> Good luck. >> [applause] >> You could finish reading the script, Ken, if you want. Mr. J. >> Ken G. Ace Street. This is the continuation of the comment by Rachel. This one? >> No. >> Ken G. Ace Street. Um this is a

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continuation of the public comment by Rachel Kanapka. Um I don't know who told Mayor Impreveduto that I or RAGE Who responsible for this. I can only assume it was JCP&L. But that misinformation being spread and a

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grassroots community group being blamed on the record by elected official in an official public forum without proper validation is wrong and reckless. Homedale residents, JCP&L is trying to gaslight you and your

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Township Committee. Don't let um Don't let them do that. Ask them when the original 2019 project to add wires to existing wooden poles changed to installing much bigger laminate and metal poles. Ask if JCP&L

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was supposed to notify all residents within 200 ft with a certified letter like they had to do with the train track proposal. Ask why they are now offering settlement money to residents if this project is fully above board as they claim. JCP&L

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are the ones to blame, not RAGE. I want that on record. Thank you. Thank you. I also, if I may, uh since I think I have a a minute and 30 seconds, um Eric, tax assessor, thank you very much again for a very informative um

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presentation. But I do want to point out two things. One is the You showed the pilot for the Bell Works and it looks very impressive. And again, everybody and I totally agree that it was very successful uh redevelopment. However, I think it's a little bit misleading because we do have

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um two developments there for 225 units and specifically 185 units are on the pilot program. So, I don't remember the exact taxes uh the the pilot uh payment for that, but at a minimum I believe that 185 units added something

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to a close to 2.6 or 3 million dollars to it. So, that number you had there, if you really were truly adjusted for the commercial building back before the redevelopment for that, I think you're going to see that it's some some numbers a little bit different. Second is a strong point again that um

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while the calculation of the taxes and then so on is very uh educational, it we should point out that because pilot payments, 95% of that goes to the Township Committee, that far exceeds the normal it used to be around 15 or 17% of the share that

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they get. So, in fact, it really is a if you will, a hidden uh I I don't want to use the right word um tax levy that is not a tax levy, if you will. So, then in effect, the uh the amount that the funding they got has

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tremendously gone up. Thank you. >> I made it at the buzzer. Any other public comment? Yes, sir. >> How you doing? Franco Roussel. I am a resident. [clears throat] I live at 16 Spring Valley Drive. I'm also the

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owner of Oak Hill Farm, 177 Stillwell Road. Um I do understand some of my uh neighbors' concerns, but there's no sidewalk in front of City Hall or in front of a lot of the houses where kids got to walk to school soon,

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so the sidewalk issue, I understand. As far as whether it was a farm or not, when I bought it, it looked like a farm, smelled like a farm, and acted like a farm. So, I think what I was looking for was a little a cooperation or understanding from the

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town as to what I could or could have not done there. I didn't ask for any pilot programs to build donkey structures and goat structures and put some sidewalks on my property and fencing. So, yes, we will

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resolve those items in court on Friday, hopefully, but if the community or the public or anybody ever wants to speak to me, I'm very accessible. And uh I'll be happy to share with them what I did and didn't do. And what I

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will continue to do is keep that a farm because uh I think it said farm when I bought it. And I think the people who lived around it, it was always a farm, so uh that's it. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Yes, ma'am.

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I I was going that way, but whichever however you guys want to work it out is fine. >> Can you hear me? >> Yep. >> So, my name is Fatin. Uh Fatin Hafiz. I live in Homedale. Uh also uh Dr. Ibrahim is my husband.

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And um I want to thank you very much for being here and explaining uh your position. >> you need to face and address the mayor. >> Okay. So, no, I just wanted to say that. So, at the beginning uh this was a a bed and breakfast. Uh

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I've been here in Homedale for 28 years. I moved 1998. It was um a bed and breakfast. That's the history of that place. And it was also there was um it was like completely abandoned. Okay? So, it was not a farm. My understanding So,

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when I was here in '98, it was not a farm. It was a bed and breakfast, and that was completely abandoned for many, many, many years. That I reme- remember that very well. I'm not saying that it is bad to have that farm. It's actually I mean my grandkids, they go there and

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they enjoy it. Our concern is the expansion. Okay? There's so many sheds, so many activities. There's an open eatery there and there is no place for cars to park. Like today,

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cars were actually parking on the on the lawn there. And sometime you see some cars, the strange cars would come and park in my street and it is so far. I'm not saying that it is bad. I'm saying it's good, but as long but when

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it was 1/4 of it is right now, it was good. But the expansion, so just think that it it stretched in the backyard of almost six homes on Stewart Road and three homes on the um

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Buttercup Lane. So we're talking about nine homes there that has been stretched, okay? It was good when it was small. But it was stretched. So now it becomes a bother to us and I'm not saying that I want him out of business and I'm not saying that I want him I do

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not want him in my neighborhood. I still want this farm in my neighborhood, but on a smaller scale. For the safety of everyone, okay? Like there's no sidewalks, people are in and out, noises. So

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imagine that I was usually I like to read at night because of the nature of my job and I I read a lot and I research and I publish. And 3:00 a.m. And I'm not joking.

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3:00 a.m. I would hear birds, goats, and I know you're going to laugh at this, but a donkey. 3:00 a.m. This happened and I heard it. Okay? And I am on Buttercup Lane. I appreciate having it, but as long as

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the activities are, you know, at a smaller scale and it's not expanded as it is. >> Thank you, ma'am. Uh the young lady in the back and then sir, we'll get to you. >> Hello, my name is Olena and I live on 6 Buttercup Lane. >> [snorts]

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>> I never had experience in such meetings, but um that's really I'm the one who really experienced that odor that bothering because my backyard is right neighboring the farm. I have 9-years-old daughter. We enjoyed the farm before. We were there like

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every day. It was nothing like that. We have two large horses. We have more ponies, I believe three or four. We have like more animals. It's not just a shed for the goats. And again, um now we used to those horses and those animals really

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like it, but we cannot enjoy coffee on the porch anymore. It's really a strong odor. And if it's clean well, I'm fine, but when there was it was not much event. I remember one event where I was surprised. I believe it was a hunting. I was unable to get out of the street at

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all because the people could get into the street and the the cars were parked on the both lines regardless of hydrants or any like safety issues. Let's say if I would have emergency, no way that someone will I'm sorry. I'm anxious a little bit. >> It's okay.

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>> So again, I'm not here to fight anyone. I was very peaceful. I I work as a community nurse. >> [laughter] >> I never had an issue like that, but um safety, a lot of people um those uh space that they they made for

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kids. When kids were playing there, it's really really noisy. So even if I put the fans on my yard, when I'm on the porch, I have no privacy. So, like just like that. Thank you. >> Understood. Thank you, ma'am. Sure. >> Hi, how are you? My name's Joe Pike. I

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live at 101 Stillwell Road. Um my property actually abuts on two sides of Oak Hill Farm. Um but before I get into that, thank you, Eric. >> That was incredible. That was an amazing presentation. I learned a lot. And I

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have a big meeting tomorrow and I wish you were there speaking instead of me. That That was really impressive. Um back to business. I just want to say that um I bought my house in 2018 and when I bought the house,

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the land was vacant. It was a 6-acre piece of land and I asked, "What is this zone for?" And I was told I was told, so it's hearsay. I didn't see anything in writing, that it was residential farm. I was like, "Great." So, when

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Rich and Carla came in and purchased it, they did a pretty good job of developing the land. We love it. We went there. The new owners have done an amazing job. They they've made that place so beautiful and they're very accessible. I spoke to them a couple times. I had some

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issues. They resolved it. I I like what they're doing. My only concern is this. There's there's four pieces to this. One, the owners abide by the law, right? Like we all do. And if that doesn't happen, the township

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enforces the zoning laws, right? So, we all live in peace. Um my other concern is is that you have across the street, um you have the Almost Home uh Deli. And this has nothing to do with the new

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owners of the farm. This was going on previously. All the people that come and visit the farm, they go across the street diagonally on that busy road and it's Crawford's Corner Everett and it's confusing. I don't know where Crawford's Corner ends and Everett

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picks up, but nevertheless, they they walk across the street and somebody's going to die. I mean, it's bad every at least once a month, twice a month, there's car accidents because on Stillwell when you make the left to to

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go on Everett Road, you cannot see the oncoming cars that are, I guess, coming from um Thompson Park and they're they're doing in excess 50-60 mph. And I live right there. I It's a very distinctive sound and it just,

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you know, I've been on the scene, first one on the scene many times and I'm I'm holding my breath cuz you don't know what you're going to walk up to. So, I'm I'm just wondering if it's possible to put some sort of traffic control device up there, a crosswalk, something before

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something more tragic happens. And that that's very important to me. So. >> Thank you. We appreciate that. >> Yeah, thank you guys so much for letting me speak. >> Yes, sir. >> Uh my name is Michael Tow >> Just bring the mic closer, sir, if you

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don't mind. >> Uh yeah, my name is Michael Tow and living in the Four Buttercup Lane. I will have been Holmdel almost 20 years. Can you hear me? Hello. >> There you go. >> Okay. All right. I get closer to mic. Uh once again, my name is Michael and

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living in the Four Buttercup Lane. And uh good evening first mayor and the members of township community. All right. Uh I'm standing here tonight to fully thanks the township uh community and our town attorney

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for taking uh whatever the actions efforts to uh deal this matter. Uh as we uh talk about all those things like my neighbors. Uh the new owner has constructed

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multiple new structures including like uh >> Sir, would you mind speaking? Thank you. >> including the stable and uh barns and sheds. Uh ran from my uh

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just about 25 ft to 70 ft from my property line and probably other neighbors property lines, too. Not a single structure confirms the Homedale strict 100-ft agriculture setback as I know.

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And also the livestock population continues to expand. Now it has uh two donkeys. May may not be accurate, but the number I observed. Six horses, three cattle, and two yaks.

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Bringing the total at least 13 large vertical animals. Due to the overcrowding, it's not like uh animal lover, all right? It's uh overcrowding for the environment. The animal creates excessive breathing and ammonia during the early morning hours

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and a nuisance all around. Worse that uh worse yet, these 13 heavy animals are kept within several feet of our shared property line, which consists of a storm creek easement and the state

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regulated freshwater wetland buffers. As a result, mounts of livestock waste could be washed directly into the Homedale public stormwater management infrastructure. Now, I just want to say again, all

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right, I'm not trying to interfere the owner's business operation. In fact In fact, I had a brief talk with Mr. Franco. And I showed I actually respect the I'm a farm lover.

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I respect the farm business, if it is farm. But, the problem is we are not asking any extraordinary measures. We are basically simply asking for the same rules to apply to everyone.

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If a new resident can choose to disregard our shared zoning protection >> Sure. >> and compromise >> Okay. We understand. But, thank you. We We We understand our our statement from before stands and we understand your position. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Any other public comment?

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Sir, I would Sorry, we already got you, sir. Yes, ma'am. >> Ann Bontempo, 22 Grandview Drive. I have nothing to do. I have a question concerning the budget and specifically or a comment on the Board of Health increase

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of a 67.5 05% in 1 year. Um I've gone over the records back to 1984 with my numbers. And we didn't start paying taxes to the county until about 2012, I think, when we went

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from a local Board into a County Board of Health. Uh and over the past 10 years, I'm seeing from 2016, our Board of Health taxes decreased almost every year. And 2016, it was 222,000 and change

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down to last year, 2025, it was 186 552. And now all of a sudden we're dropping We're jumping up to the highest it's ever been to 311 628 dollars. I'm wondering why this is occurring. Why

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is such a large jump when classically over a decade it has been decreasing every year then now we are going up over 67%. Uh what's attributing to that? Also the fact that I don't know I just have to take into consideration

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people on the pilot program do not pay into Board of Health taxes, library taxes, open space taxes. Then 95% of what they negotiated tax rate is goes to the town and 5% goes to the county which I I don't think covers

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the use of the library, Board of Health, and the other services that they also have use of. So is this like an accumulative catch-up because pilot program hasn't paid towards Board of Health, library, or any of the other

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taxes? Or is this because of other reasons? I I I can't fathom why 67% increase in 1 year when over 10 years it's been going down. Can anyone I know it this is my comment.

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>> Okay. Thank you. >> I don't know why it's going up. >> Thank you. Chris, do you have any insight into that? If not we can get it for you. >> I think that was the first time I heard it tonight too from uh Eric. So I think we will will have to find out. I I do

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know that the health officer for the uh county did step down so he's no longer there. So I don't know if there's changes coming but I'm not not sure but I'll I'll I'll look into it absolutely. >> Let's reach out and just see if we can get it clarified. >> Absolutely. Yeah, that's the first I heard of it so. >> Thank you. >> It's going to affect me too but

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>> Yes, ma'am. >> Kristen Solera 5 Hopbrook Lane. So, I'd just like to point out a couple trends I'm seeing tonight. So, number one is folks are concerned about the expansion at Hopbrook sorry Oak Hill Farms and I I'm concerned about the expansion at Bon

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Age which is we're renovating the building then you're building 60 additional units then you're building a three-story building then you're building a parking garage then you're building another three-story building. So, if we're talking about concerns about expansion let's let's be inclusive

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and talk about them all. >> [clears throat] >> Also, if we're talking about you know safety of people on the streets let's talk about the safety of the children walking to school now. And finally, we can talk about spreading rumors up there on the dais and decorum

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and spreading rumors is the exact antithesis of decorum. I'll leave you with that. Thank you. >> Thank you. Any other public comment? Mr. Loopy part two. >> Lance Loopy Line Road. Um so, there were still some outstanding

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questions. Have we done a cost-benefit analysis on the shared services agreements both ways? Right? Things that we like court um versus agreements we have with other towns are we actually gaining from that or losing?

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Um pickleball $1,800 the gun running $17,000 >> What Sorry, Lance. What was that? The $17,000? >> gun running >> What? >> There's two separate charges 6415 and

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10,400 approximate those numbers are approximate. Uh mirror installation for $1,200 uh you know, I don't remember this now because it's been a while. Uh there's something T&M $575,000. T-Mobile

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for iPads for $2,200. And a comment on the loan, $4 to $500,000 that we was that was the topic earlier. There's a note in there that the interest currently is 4.04% and that can be adjusted monthly

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for the term of the loan. Throwing that out there. Holmdel Road it was paved recently. I guess that's a county road. So, was that county? >> Yeah. >> So, they paved right in front of Vanage. We're going to put a force main in there. We're going to rip up the road

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that we just that the county just paved. So, why why did we not say, "Hey, wait. Let's stop here until that work is done"? Cuz now we're going to rip up the road that was just paid for with our tax dollars.

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You could say it's county, but 14% of our tax dollars go where? Or what's the number whatever the number is that goes to the county is ours, right? So, we just wasted money on paving a road that's going to get torn up to put in this force main.

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Would that be an accurate statement? Likely. >> I'll answer when you're done but >> Okay. That's it. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh let's we'll get to the to Holmdel Road, Chris. The pickleball you said you're going to look into, right? >> the pickleball. I found that. So,

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pickleball and I believe that's that's recreation. That's money in money out. So, people pay for it and then it goes back out to pay for the the the program. So, um we're pulling from the trust. So, what we're looking at is when you're looking at accounts that say T on them, they're trust accounts. Means the money comes in

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and goes back out from other sources. So, it's we're not that's not taxpayer money. >> Okay. The $575,000 was that the uh I I recall what that was going towards. >> Again, I >> You got a bunch of things on there. >> Yeah, I'm I'm again, I have to look back

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and see what he where he's pulling that from. >> Okay. Maybe after the meeting you guys >> I I I I always answer the next day. So, as soon as I have them, I I look it up and I answer them. >> All right. T-Mobile and mirror installation. >> Mirror installation, I'm not sure. It could be something from one of our

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bathrooms that were replaced maybe at the swim club, but again, I don't know. And the T-Mobile, uh we use SDL, which is our construction program. We've had it for I think 6 years. The iPads that our inspectors use are no longer being supported. So, those are replacements

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for our inspectors. >> Yeah, and the and so the and then the answer with Holmdel Road and and Chris, you can jump in to correct me if I misrepresent, but or haven't uh not speaking to it properly. The uh the county puts their roads on a list in

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terms of what needs to be done. We've had a number of complaints about Holmdel Road over the years, and the Vantage property is in development. We you know, it didn't make sense given the length and the and the breadth of Holmdel Road to stop the paving of it. While a portion of it, yes, will get dug up for the force main,

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um to hold off another, whatever it's going to be, 2 years didn't make sense. It made sense to solve the larger problem, you know, and let and allow them to repave it. From my vantage point, Chris, I don't know if you want to >> Well, we we have no idea if we're digging anything up. I mean, >> Well, that's a good point. >> These These are These are plastic um

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plastic pipes that go in. They're not the old-fashioned cast iron. So, they can actually put pilots in and just bur- burrow them in the ground. So, um if if there is something that comes up about that, that'll be part of the project. That's already worked into some of the numbers, and they would be a pave

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curb-to-curb repavement. It would not be just left the way it is. So. >> Thank you. Any other public comments? Mr. Inella. >> Jay Inella. will be at the library drive. Um Eric, I'm wondering how many tax appeals are there a year roughly and

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how many are successful? >> What we're going to follow up >> Eric, but Jay, just ask me. >> I didn't It's been a busy week for me. I didn't read the ordinance you passed tonight. Mayor Imperato, I think this makes you look really small doing this. Um cutting not allowing a dynamic

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conversation, cutting a woman off who is basically saying you said something on the public record multiple times that was 100% false. Um I really think you guys should reconsider this. I think this makes you look really small.

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Um Chris, since I'm going to list things home I can't even look to Chris. >> You got to address me and then I'll defer to Chris or address the mayor. >> bad. Um Mayor Imperato, um Middletown Road is in horrible shape. The edges of it I literally witnessed

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someone get a chopped up tire. I made statements in the past that the engineering firm should be held to some standard for how these roads hold up. I'm wondering when will Middletown Road be remediated? And when will the potholes that Chris Prior said would be

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addressed on Holmdel Road, when will they be raised because they're in bad shape? And um that's it. >> Thank you. >> Am I supposed to sit down? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Wow.

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>> Eric, how many tax appeals ballpark every year and how many are successful? >> Um it varies from year to year, but generally the county tax board will have 60, 70 appeals filed. Um and then some at the state tax court.

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Very few at the state tax court are granted any reductions. They generally are withdrawn. And then the ones at the county tax board, many of those are filed because uh a disagreement with the data on the property record card after the assessments have already been set. Uh

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for example, if somebody has a finished it doesn't have a finished basement, they're being assessed with a finished basement. The only way to address that after the assessment is set is to have an appeal filed and uh and make the the change through the appeal process. So, uh to answer that

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question, it's a little bit complicated because if things are being changed that I would agree with, um those I'm not sure if that constitutes as the reduction that you're you're speaking of or if you're speaking about the ones that go in front and present

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their argument to the county tax board and uh see if they're granted relief there. So, um it really depends uh and you know, I would say overall maybe half are granted relief, uh but many of that half are ones that I agree with because

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the data is is needs to be repaired on the record. >> Thank you. And Chris, uh any updates on Middletown Road or the potholes mentioned for Holmdel Road based on our well, Holmdel Road is a >> I believe it was manholes that were were sinking on. That's that's yeah, so the

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manholes we're fighting with uh the county on because the county is saying that they're uh utility manholes. So, we we do what we are aware of them. We're working trying to find out who's responsible for them. We are no, we aren't responsible for them. Now, when it comes to Middletown Road, uh we are

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establishing our 2026 uh road program. So, um Jay, I promise you I will get um that looked at to see if we can get it fitted into this year coming up. And then, um you know, ultimately and I wanted to mention one other thing, Ely Road, I know there's an

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issue there. We actually I think solved that issue. It's going to be torn up. Um they're going to go all the way down, rip the base out of it, and put piping under it so So don't get any more heaving in the middle of it. So, I figured I'd add that in cuz I know that was an issue as well. Um but we had uh actually engineer work

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done on that. So >> And that was we thought it was an American Water issue, was it not? >> Well, we think it's an American Water issue. American Water still doesn't want to take the blame for it. So once we we're we're we're prepared to do what we think it is. If it's on our end, if it's theirs, we'll know right away as soon as we put a machine in the ground.

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>> All right. Thank you. Any other public comment? You already did one. Any other public comment? Anybody else? All right. Motion to adjourn?