##VIDEO ID:NYWkAGZIuzU## America the stands one nation god indiv with liy and justice for all good evening and welcome the December 17 2024 meeting of the Jackson Township Council will now come to order councilman barelli here councilman Bernstein here councilman Chisum here Council vice president sergeant and council president King here as Clerk of this meeting I here by public announced that in compliance with the provisions of the open public meetings act adequate notice of this meeting has been advertised in the manner prescribed by law move on to announcements for this evening council president thank you so councilman Chism if you'd like to just come up front with me the council has something that they'd like to present to you your Serv an your of [Applause] get a couple then one two three excellent thank you very much [Music] [Applause] I know I'm Sorry Miss Moss I can't hear you did you want me to make mention of the cancellation did you want to make the mention cancellation December 26 yes so the uh council meeting for December 26 will be canceled so that's why we rearranged it uh to have a council meeting today thank you ma' did you want me to read into the record the change for uh Council dates for 2025 if you like do should I is that have I'm just asking it unless it would you can or I can mention it when we uh do the consent okay thank you ma'am sure move on to opening comments from Count Council council president thank you Miss Moss as you can see the Jackson Police and Fire are having a toy drive um unfortunately they're about 30% under uh getting uh unwrapped toys and gifts they ask also were asking for anything that we could donate for senior citizens um I do it every year it's really a great event and then they have uh kids come and they can pick out their gifts so if there's anything that you could do we also forwarded it over to the Chamber of Commerce for any local businesses thank you clar for any local businesses that can come and help out I know that times are tough right now um if every if maybe one thing would be uh you know great for a kid to get or again don't forget about our seniors I wasn't aware of the senior so I will be dropping off stuff um to the senior center I I definitely was not aware of that so thank you for letting me know that this is Wood Lane Park oh thanks Christian we're just okay so this is the park it is finalized Administration Mr wall thank you so much for all of the work that you put into this working with DPW it was it's absolutely um amazing like I stopped when I went there I stopped there a couple times we had it you know um Mr balinsky just took the uh caution tape off until it was completely finalized it was finished today so kids can go out he did write a letter if I can uh if I have it yes I have it here um he was just saying that he was very excited good afternoon Woodland Park um installation is now complete and ready for your children to enjoy the contractor doing the install said that this is one-of aind built and should draw uh children from all over town the design is one of three installed in the entire country thank you again Mr Walt and it was it's amazing that this is only one of others I'm looking forward to other improvements in our parks to set place in the spring um I hope you guys would be able to spread the good news so it was really really great to see that so we're super congratulations to you and the community really mayor the council it's part as you can see it is ADA Compliant next I just wanted to go into unfortunately we're going from a high to a little bit of a low not too bad we have uh traffic studies we have Birmingham Drive uh speed limit is 25 miles an hour and we have 85 percentiles 37 again this is in flare it's not horrible but it is again 25 M hour daily volume um coming down Buckingham Drive between December 5th and 11th was 478 Vehicles average speed was 26 to 36 Birmingham Drive uh December 5th to 11th again going westbound was 33 miles an hour uh average speed the 85 percentile average speed was 27 average cars was 324 then you have Northbound 855 percentile was 31 miles an hour average car volumes was 184 uh secondly South bound 85 percentile was 28 miles an hour average volume was 282 these will be these um machines will be deployed next to Vermont AV and Wyoming so I will give you those reports once we have them they're anticipating uh they were sent down December 11th so once we have those at the next 2025 meeting I will be able to read you that secondly I've red this traffic safety as well as myself has received um I believe councilman Bernstein's going to hit on this South cooksbridge Ro the light complaints um Administration did approve so Jackson Township looked into it and request confir confirmed the insufficient lights provided adequate pedestrian safety therefore um we how many I think it was nine Cobra lights have been approved by Administration we're going to send that out to bid and move forward with that just so you know the JCP now wants everybody to understand that it is time it is a minimum of a year for this to be done so please understand that what your police and your elected officials Administration and stuff like that we are working on this and that's why I like to read you the reports so that you were aware it is in the pipeline but it is not you know it's not like you running your own business where you want it done and you can get it done tomorrow it took me two years to come to uh accept that but it just doesn't happen overnight so thank you so much and everybody um have a Merry Christmas a happy New Year and happy Hanukkah and I wish you all a blessed 2025 thank you Council vice president Sergeant good evening um I just like to extend uh a hearty thank you to Mr Chisum for spending all the time he has on the council it's a very difficult seat for anybody to fill and so thank you for that I certainly appreciate it I just want to wish everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year thank you thank you councilman BR thank than you clerk Moss um councilman chisen what can I say it's been an honor and pleasure to run with you for Council and serve alongs side of you the last four years and I look forward to continuing to uh work with you if not on the council in other ways to serve our town uh most of all I got to know you and Amar you and meet your beautiful family you are a true Testament to what an elected official should be always doing the right thing by um our fellow residents in your native Town your innate knowledge of history and your love and concern for town State and country is seen so clearly in your thoughtful public comments at every council meeting and yes I'll miss you busting my chops but always remember that I'm a little younger than you just to remind you but all kidding inside it's been a uh a real pleasure uh working with you and um I'm here for you brother and I will miss you up here on this deis my friend God bless you and your family um also I want to add there's still some time to apply to serve our town on a border Commission in 2025 the deadline to is by December 20th like to encourage residents to consider serving and apply by filling out a citizen leadership form on the Jackson Township website and submitting it in online our volunteers help make her Town run better and more efficiently and we appreciate them in closing I want to wish our fellow residents and Township staff a very merry Christmas happy Hanukkah in a wonderful and blessed New Year God bless Jackson and like my 92y old mother likes to say God Bless America take care and have a good evening thank you councilman bernin thank you Miss Moss um I also want to Echo the statements of my my colleagues thanking um councilman Chism for his service it was a pleasure working with you in the a little over a year that i' I've had the opportunity to serve and looking forward to seeing you continue to come to our meetings um I just wanted to update everyone if you can take a look at the screens I had the opportunity about two weeks ago to join commissioner um Jenny Haynes together with the park director from Ocean County Mary Jane bavius if I'm pronouncing her name right um beas um at um at the Patriots park off of Bowman um we took a tour we discussed some Concepts the county has approved and voted on a new Children's Park um which they're going to be replacing which is really state-ofthe-art I think there are three slides um it's close to million dollar upgrade to Patriots Park additionally they will be um they are working on the baseball fields over there which do need some um drainage they do have some drainage issues that they're working on over there so they are putting in so while our Administration is working on our local parks the county is working on upgrading and keeping our um County Parks up to date so we thank them for that um I also want to um just mention two other quick things um we had opportunity council president and myself joining some of fire districts in the past and I'm happy to see some of them here um to discuss the continuation of the consolidation process we're looking forward to continuing to hear a little bit of that update for the public stay engaged and again thank you to commiss um to Mr Rubio for coming down and really making sure that we were engaged and we were in the loop of what's going on in the fire district thank you to that um I also just want to give a quick update um it's not always as fast as we would like but I a couple weeks ago um we reached out to the County with regard to some of the safety and traffic issues in South M Prospect um um the county um there I guess three three three points that were brought up was um by two meetings ago was the amount of left arrows that really turn into nowhere um I think the number that was counted between one area was 12 and I think there's two left turns so the County's response to me in writing um is that they will they are reviewing that and they will get back to me in the next couple days that's with regard to that again I'm not happy with that answer but that was the answer with regard to um some of the um safety when the lanes narrowed and there were no areas for safe pedestrian walking they did put up temporarily in the first part by from county line to approximately Citadel a walking path because people were walking on there it was extremely dangerous and with regard to um some of the other concerns about the road sloping and um the county did not feel it was a safety issue but they said they were going to reexamine it and they felt it was more of a comfort issue at this time um we responded to them and we are awaiting their next response but they are continuing to be out there they did put more um more crosswalks out there for safe pedestrian Crossing and um we appreciate your feedback everyone have a wonderful evening thank you for coming out thank you councilman chis good evening everybody uh since this is my last opening monologue I fig I'll make the best of it councilman burelli if I had known you were going to have such nice words though and I would I would have got you a parting gift too maybe a watch or an alarm clock to make sure you're on time but um since that's not the last time I will bust your chops a friend of mine reminded me today that they were going to miss my monologues as well because they liked how I tie some of the past and to kind of what's relevant today and that's really no exception we should always be aware of our history it's one of the reasons why I support our libraries and our uh reading proclamations you need to break to your kids let them know what's going on in the past so that they can really relate to what's going on today because it's always so relevant your worldview and your knowledge of history is imperative to how you actually Act and the things that you support here in today's world Saturday the 14th was the 225th Anniversary of the death of George Washington our greatest president most people really kind of just let it pass didn't really think much of it right but we are currently living under the worst president in American history so it's entirely relevant when we get to February and you're talking about President's Day you're going to lump all of them together 40 some odd guys they are not all equal George Washington is Head and Shoulders Above the Rest you can go down to Lincoln and start categorizing them any way you want to but Biden is going to be at the bottom for many reasons you can start with this 1500 criminals he just pardoned last week shattering Obama's 300 people record just so you know King King Philip of course what would be a night if I didn't talk about King Phillip of course he just recently signed the freedom to read act again he hijacks the language it's not about freedom to read nobody was Banning books if pornography is not allowed for kidss why is it allowed in schools it's about relevance he says I am proud to amplify the voices of our past and our present what the heck is that Phillip for goodness sakes what our past anybody in the past would have been absurdly offended by what's going on to put these kind of things into a school it's disgraceful our federal and state governments are also aware of the drones that we're all hearing about it's everywhere they all know we all know how stupid are you they're telling us that it's just the Stars like we haven't looked up in the sky and seen Stars our entire lives and now suddenly in the last three weeks we don't know it's a drone right this could have gone away it's very simple this was like hey seriously hey guys it's National security it's top secret we can't tell you but we're aware done deal it dies what are we doing we're playing games well enough of the clowns after four plus years I would like to thank a lot of people very quickly I'm sure I will forget somebody I just made some notes like I always do on a piece of paper here I didn't really plan ahead but thank you to our fire our police our EMS those that keep us safe so that we can basically do what we do every single day it's been a pleasure to be up here to support you guys from behind theen scenes I appreciate you thank you to Christian and Anthony and it for supporting us and making us sort of look good because technology is not my thing Shan the entire DPW again great job out there on the streets look forward to continuing to work with you in our parks and Roa Sharon and Trish and the whole Finance team you guys make us look good our budgets are always easy to deal with you guys are phisically responsible and being a conservative that makes me look good Mr wall Mr MCU Mr pman thank you for your guidance along the way whenever needed appreciate that my current council members and team along with all the C the past council members Ken bressie Andy karna Alex swii samarra O'Neal and Marty Fleming and of course last but not least I couldn't help but work with our awesome clerk's office uh it's a shame that I've had to work with three clerks in a little over four and a half years but uh thank you for Janice kisty showing me the ropes Diane festino for kind of continuing that role and Miss Moss of course you and your entire team Jackie chasman and dearis you guys are professionals love you thanks everybody thanks everybody here at the town I'm proud of my record some people have said hey how come you guys didn't add ordinances and again with my conservative values I don't need to add to government creep it creeps on its own I do not want to expand the size of government feds in the state do that on their own I was here here to hold the line put my finger in the Dyke and I am proud to say that I did what I could as a civil servant I would remind my fellow council members to take both of those words very seriously in your role up here be civil and serve and I would just say that it's has been a great pleasure to serve the good people of Jackson so thank you all God bless [Applause] moving on to consideration of ordinances public hearing and final consideration we're going to have the presentation from the fire department that comes first gentlemen would you like to come up District Two they're going to give a quick presentation just to kind of go over their upcoming uh budget that is going to be held in February 17th yes um and it's from 12: to I believe they're going to try to extend the time to have it till 10 o'clock at night pardon oh 2 o'clock 2 to 10 so this is again District Two thank you gentlemen there comes Christian work [Music] thank you for having us I'm BR qush uh commissioner District 2 uh secretary Mr Rous Scott Rous register and our president of V Rubio so thank you for having us um look forward to going through everything here uh District Two um want to go through we Encompass um we can forward on the when you what next slide just say just be very casual just let it out there go to the map Christian yep next slide we're going to go to the next slide next slide please there you go so you can see District Two we have a large swath we're Consolidated we're originally district one merged with two together and part of our goal is to consolidate and what you're looking for you can see the area that we have up here it's it is a large section of Jackson predominantly rural our nature here um and uh but districts three and four are located from there next slide um District Two has two primary sections cville and Whitesville from that section running up from basically the outlets down to the Border Manchester rid liquers and then out towards um uh towards uh Jackson Crossings our overall budget is aimed at prepare and execute the consolidation of District Two with District three to be fiscally responsible for our taxpayers our primary focus is on the adjustment of salaries and benefits to complete the consolidation process the amount that we're looking to raise by taxation this year is 2.8 million um this year for 2025 our budget does not look to Levy any additional funds by referendum uh we're maintaining our adherence to the state guidelines the budget is looking to raise the tax rate to 07 from .18 to 1.25 or $100 assessed this is increase is compliant with the guidelines we did use our unrestricted funds m in the amount of 12557 to reduce the tax rate this allowed us to uh M be compliant with the guidelines so we didn't have to go to referendum we're really trying to do everything we can do to stay within compliance uh for the process um we also in addition to that we are able to obtain a grant a grant from the rescue plan for $30,000 um next slide please um we've seen in District 2 overall growth uh dramatically we've also seen unfortunately a decline in the volunteers um as far as Manpower and membership um this decline has resulted in us the need to expand our career staff to cover the weekend shifts in conjunction with District 3 so that's something we've taken on and these actions have resulted in over time being required uh the increase in the care staff and over time caused the district to increase General wages and benefits um we saw over last year 177% increase in benefits a 17 additional on due to the hours so these are are challenges that we've been dealing with and trying to manage the maintain budget and what provides you know services for for uh the district so our Solutions next slide please are to consolidate with District 3 U up there that'll give us a you know a much larger pool of career staff or more firefighters um what this will bring is a streamline of services streamline of equipment uh streamline of uh Legal Services apparatus and consistency when we go out to bid makes it a much more efficient process uh reduces the amount of overtime and the ability to provide 247 paid protection in the areas that have limited volunteer response the consolidation brings the wage increase too for 247 sub coverage down to 5% so that's a great impact so so 12% decrease correct yeah okay yeah so next slide so the vote will be yeah what we're looking for is February is on February 15th Miller or Miller fire Avenue Firehouse is from 12 until 2:00 until 10 so that's just for District Two everybody the only place that you could vote for District Two District Two is Miller yep Miller for just okay so if anybody's in that District they're here asking for your support um what questions can we answer for you guys any council members please yeah if you don't mind yes so um just a curiosity for the increase in general wages and benefits you saw wages go up 17% but benefits were 27% can you kind of elaborate on that just a little bit that has to do with um the state every year gives us what they health benefits are going to be they of course increased up and that's based on what they gave us with our uh work towards the consolidation we're looking to uh create right now there's two separate contracts we're trying to work with them to create a new contract which will help uh that's where those decreases are coming in because currently currently we're operating overtime on the weekends we're we're sharing weekends we're alternating terms to help keep those costs down but the benefits are that's what we get from the state when they uh give us our numbers every year I'm just going to piggyback on that what percentage do you guys pay into your own benefits [Music] oh right as far as the new contract goes they're paying in our new our new contract is not settled yet okay um but that the new contract is going to be District Two and Three combined will be the new that's correct that's where the reduction yeah currently in your contract what do you pay towards benefits so it depends on the firefighter uh and so our contract is set up so that it's a a single firefighter no family just single bless you is pays 5% of their salary and then it's on a sliding scale down from there I'm sorry up from no I'm sorry it's 5% for a family and a sliding scale down to single I think it's 1.2% for single for single yes and then I think single and single with children it's not it's not considered family I think that's like 3% and then family is 5% okay so then the new contract would probably be a little bit more it's going to be it's the same it's pretty much the same it's going to St the same yes ma'am okay it's going to be an increase in uh it's going to be an increase in actual monies because they're getting an increase in salary okay and the reason they're getting an increase in salary because of the amount of hours where it's kind of complex but the the amount of hours work now because we're going to a 2472 schedule we're gonna have a a 24-hour truck there's going to be a truck on every day 24 hours a day okay and with that schedule and going to 12 hour schedules for the rest of the firefighters in our district our combined districts um they are not going to be working a standard 280 hours and going to be working more okay so there was a change in their salaries to reflect that in the consolidation when do you anticipate well we're hoping that once we get the union stuff settled we're going to apply to the local Finance board in January we're hoping by the end of January to apply to the local Finance board and we should hopefully be Consolidated upon approval of course by July no I believe with the apparatus it's not really viable to sell it correct because it's it's you're not gonna it's not gonna because you guys are going to have a lot of equipment when you can consolidate correct we will um but we still are Manning three different or four different firehouses five different firehouses so you'll have equipment in all different areas per se and it'll be you know okay yeah we and what we've been doing is keeping it there until we've been getting rid of it through attrition essentially we have sold some equipment when we replaced it but if if there's something we don't need we're just not going to replace it got it my last question is EMS or is everybody on board to take EMS on after the consolidation that's our next on the list okay I just wanted to make sure that's still in the future and that's still on the drawing board to take EMS on when you're building absolutely okay because we do need EMS we need firemen we need all First Responders police firemen but you know it's it's EMS is very important to uh the community that's all I have if any other council members one more question if you don't mind um so I know the turnout is always pretty low for the fire districts unfortunately is it possible to do I'm not sure for that particular election can they do absentee ballots since we do have a lot of uh folks so that'd probably be good when you advertise we do have a lot of snowbirds as you know and you know obviously some of those voters are active voting all the time so if they know that they can participate and get an absentee ballot it' be probably good to make everybody aware of that because I don't know that they are aware we a huge amount of right in ballots that I'm sorry absentee ballots that come or mail in ballots that come we send about 800 mailin ballots out a year okay great okay thank you that's just our that's just our district yep okay council president C following up on councilman chism's question has there been any talks or moves on moving your election to November or is that too many elections on a ballot that that has to do with the district fire district lines do not line up with the voting district lines so we if we if we we have one fire district in town yeah we'd be able to move to November which we would love to be able to move to November because of the low turnouts that we get right in February um but as as uh administrator Rous just mentioned our districts we have four fire districts well we have three fire districts I'm sorry and maybe soon two and those lines the voting district lines do not line up they make no correspondence whatsoever with right the standard voting districts so and it's not I Honestly by the time we we we we just had some some of these discussions with some of our group meetings with the fire chiefs and everybody else and uh for us to apply for that and try to make some changes of some of those lines by the time we do that we'll probably all consol okay thank you I understand just one more question your the proposed budget how will that affect say the average assess home and Jackson regarding their tax rate well they they didn't fail a I mean right the average assessment was 330,000 like approximately how much it say 100 it said $100 per 100,000 right per thousand it's a 12 and a25 per 100 so like on average assessed home like 330,000 I believe 332,000 according to the budget Mr wall I guess it's like 332,000 so what would taxes go up for example on a far approximate I know you can't to the scent but I think the option here is to not fail their budget yeah it's on a $33,000 residence what is was it 12 I think it's like a $400 increase why don't why don't we get the specific and I don't want to I don't want to speculate on the record um I'm GNA we'll we'll revisit that if you can have your accountant or anybody that could yeah 286 it's director Public Safety says $26 $26 Joe's a math guy so thank you director appreciate Commissioners I want to thank you for coming out and and doing a presentation if there's any questions that come about I will make sure that I get them uh sent to you for answering of any residents that come into during open comments appreciate it thank you very much thank you of course thank you for your service Miss Moss consideration ordinances public hearing and final consideration this is the second reading of ordinance 33-24 entitled in ordinance of the township of Jackson County of ocean state of New Jersey amending and supplementing the municipal code of the township of Jackson so as to amend chapter 244 entitled land use and development regulations so as to revise residential density standards in the highway commercial mixed use Zone this ordinance was introduced on October 8 2024 I need a motion to open the public hearing motion second all in favor I I if any member of the public has any comments to make please please address the council at the microphone state your name and address clearly for the record you will have five minutes and may only speak once good evening hello you don't please just have to state your name oh okay thought I just one I'm sorry that's okay excuse me good evening my name is Ian Bardon I am the President of professional Design Services at Lakewood I'm a licensed professional planner and more importantly I've been a resident of Jackson for more than 20 years so regarding ordinance 33-24 as the council's aware the ordinance is related to the HCM U Zone which is the highway commercial mix U Zone which is located on Route 537 between 195 and Six Flags uh currently the ordinance has a uh it's a mix use own that allows a mixture of commercial industrial and residential uses the density the residential density aspect is 4 units per gross acre uh the ordinance obviously proposes it's a single sentence ordinance that proposes to change it to four units per acre dedicated to residential use I have three basic uh points that I'm I'm here to make uh the first one is the vagueness of the ordinance uh when you describe it is four units per area dedicated to residential use the zone is a mixed use Zone the whole concept of the zone is to have a mixture including of the different uses in the same building of residential and Commercial so how does one determine the area quote dedicated end quote to residential use Does it include environmentally constrained areas that could be utilized as passive Recreation as part of the recreational or the residential use uh one interpretation of the ordinance from my perspective as a design professional would be that this ordinance would encourage the lessening of the mixed use and more singular residential use uh because again how do you apply this ordinance when you have a mixed use project when you have a single building that has both residential and Commercial what is the area dedicated to residential use in furtherance of the vagueness I want to talk about U the municipal L use law because Municipal L use law under 4055 d67 specifically requires the establishment of Standards uh by Under the discretionary Authority that this this Council has in zoning to be quote of sufficient certainty and definiteness end quote as a valid exercise of your discretionary powers and I want to remind the Council of a court case that goes back about 10 years ago the Jackson Holdings case wherein the Township in trying to limit residential development in that case and that was in the regional growth zone of pine lands actually opposed their own ordinance standard not the same standard that we're talking about today but another ordinance standard and in that case the township argued with the court that that ordinance was impermissibly vague um and the finding of the court in that case and I quote stated uh neither the purpose Clause nor the body of the ordinance sets forth any objective standards by which it can be measured classified and applied to each proposed use and in that case the court agreed with the township and found that ordinance impermissibly vague and my my uh my first comment today is that that this ordinance does not even contain a purpose Clause there's not a single purpose clause in this ordinance never seen that before and I've been doing this for 40 years um so that the vague language of this ordinance in my opinion not not an attorney but I am a planner renders it impermissibly vague since there are no objective standards to measure the density sorry I should have had a glass of water uh my second point is uh and it's kind of an expansion of the objectivity of the ordinance and the determination of Standards is to Analyze This propos ordinance in the context of other ordinances in town that have residential densities attached to them and there's three categories of that I want to discuss one is you have different zones in town the mobile home park ordinance the PRC ordinance which is retirement community and the multif family zones all three of those zones have similar standards that regulate both gross and net density they have empirical standards of gross and net density very empirical very easy to calculate secondly we have regional growth zones and pin lands that simply contain maximum gross densities again similar actually to the HMU Zone as it's currently written again very empirical very easy to calculate the Zone in town that most closely approximates the HMU zone is the muc Zone which is the mixed use Zone Jackson 21 area s your time's up but I'm gonna can you add an additional two minutes onto the clock to give the speaker in additional time thank you thank you I appreciate that no worries I'll speak quickly then the HCM Zone contains much more empirical and clear density standards more applicable to a mix use zone that zone does not have a density standard it simply states that in the uh mu C Zone you're allowed 2500 units what's interesting is is that when you break down that zone that zone contains 450 acres that density is 5.5 that's 5.5 units per gross acre in the MU C zone so the the ordinance in 3324 is unlike any other uh Zone in the township uh both in the method of calculation and vagueness uh and my third point is that uh this ordinance was undertaking while everybody is aware that the the new master plan is being written the planning board is engaged every week in meetings and addressing the master plan and this ordinance is moving forward regardless of that Master Plan being done that was questioned by one of the council members at the October meeting where it was introduced and summarily dismissed so I think that's inappropriate in a planning exercise to do this type of ordinance in the cusp and in the beginning of a new master plan thank you thank you feto cardali developer Millstone Township I guess I I I want to make it real clear that I'm not sure why this council's being asked to rezone a property that the master plan was designed for on this caror this is not in the middle of town this is next to Six Flags Great Adventure so I'm not sure why you were asked by the council president to vote on this why would the council be asked uh to quickly expedite a change with the planning board has that happened before did you submit something to the planning board and quickly ask to be addressed has that happened do that frequently happen or has it just happened in this case because I opened that paperwor why would the council be asked to remove the opportunity to fix the affordable housing problem that's occurring in Jackson you're short on affordable housing our project with 1150 apartments and units will address that by bringing over 15 50 affordable housing units to this project and by the way 125 of them are in negotiation with tunnel for towers of veterans I'm building one in Bayville and I'm going to build one in Jackson that's what you're voting on you also know that I have 3,000 people with Ms at Center State named after my wife's MS Center the affordable housing in Jackson will house Ms patients along with veterans like we built in man alipin does the council know that did the president of the council tell you that why would the council be asked to vote on something that's owned by two residents not a corporation a resident that lives in Jackson has committed to Jackson for many years many generations and I in Millstone a neighbor this is who you're trying to change a project owned by two individuals Americans not some foreign corporation why would the council be asked to submit a plan to change his Zone on a property that I bet you don't even know what I submitted two of you have come to visit me and had no idea what the plan was you were asked to vote on something that you hadn't even seen the plan two of you visited me can you two of you have seen it okay I just want you to just who visited you I just want you to announce the councilman that visited you I'm I'm sure my my attorney you'll get back to you that okay thank you I don't understand why the Council was asked to do all these things but every time something like this happens in this town do you realize that you've lost the case when a developer had to Sue I believe you've lost seven cases and the taxpayers paid for it so if for any reason I have to turn around and fight this which I don't believe I have to because I'm deemed complete you're trying to rezone a property that's only zoned in one spot mine next to Six Flags now let me tell you what my opinion is I predict that the 1150 units that I want to build to make my project work to help me with my Ms to help me with my medical school oh yeah and by the way private medical school a affiliated with a college and affiliated with a medical school anybody like to see that report you're welcome to it I paid $100,000 to get it to show you that it works but what I'm really concerned about is that you've all been asked to vote on this because you're going to hear that I predict that your council president will be running for mayor of Jackson and that as long as you all agree with voting on this project that can't be voted on because it's already approved you could vote but you can't override it because I'm going to sue you and if I sue you and all of a sudden your 450 units get approved there'll be six bedroom units they won't be two bedroom merss with students in them thank you sir I'm gonna answer thank you ma'am I've paid you millions of dollars in taxes and millions of dollars in fees your three minutes means nothing it's five I predict that you will all find out that the citizens of Jackson will uncover you if you vote on this and go with this the town people will figure out why you did it and they will ask you to leave this town I hope you leave this state move into the Yandex but you I hope that you leave the United States of America cuz you are not Americans you are trying to take away land from citizens who are building a project to help people with special needs and Veterans and thousands of kids who are going to enjoy being there I hope you leave this country you are not Americans thank you sir I'd like to respond on June 13th you put this property out to bid looking for millions and millions and multiple millions of dollars you marketed it as 1,200 single family homes you Market it as hotels you Market it as a a whole Epic Center sir sit down I I'm speaking it's my turn you had your minutes I would like to speak sir I would ask you to please let me speak oh sure okay secondly let's go into November first when you sent the Oprah that you just discussed that you had sent you threatened to sue if we didn't back down from you you threatened to sue for $120 million this was received along with your opr saying that if we didn't stop with this ordinance you were going to sue you then submitted plans now you're saying that you have 15,50 apartment units correct sir 150 1150 units apartment units I wrote it down apartment units units okay part of Apartments part of tow houses units they are so why did you submit plans to our Township did you submit plans to Jackson Township 450 tow houses and 700 Apartments 400 did you see the plan I did when today you saw the plan today yes I did 450 sir I'm speaking I'm not going to get in a tit tip I'm speaking you have 459 homes 3,22 square feet town homes and there three floors three levels a,2 feet each level then also you've submitted other plans and you're talking about which I think it's great the veterans and low income and you had said that you have 1 15 units going towards that why would you submit plans Ian your PDS planner that's here right you have them here so he's a professional of yours right you entrust him why did he submit plans for phase three and four of all the commercial to be wiped out and removed and for you to put in 459 residential Town Homes along with 46 special needs affordable housing units that's what's on the in compliance with the highway commercial mixed use ordinance requirements 24452 D2 and close please find the plans for your review we are allowed to build 10% units you're going to get, that's not what you just said sir under the record you said that you were going to have 1150 Apartments 150 units and then you said 125 Tunnels for Towers now those original those apartments that are usually usually 400 to 500 you're saying that a veteran that is a disabled veteran is going to be able to go up three flights of stores and is going to and have a 3,000 sir that's what you said I'm repeating I wrote it down no you have not seen the plan what council members were out here that you told them this I've asked you many times to see a plan you want to see the plan you never asked me to see the plan sir I saw the plans and there is nothing that you're talking about is on those plans stop lying have a great night I'm not here debate you I'm just telling you a fact you are trying to take a project of 450 units you want to change property that's zoned to two owners thank you sir have a great night from gross to net try it see what happens in this state in this country when somebody gets away with doing what you want to do we took that group out there's a new group coming in in January good evening Don Adelman will appoint Drive Jackson New Jersey um I want to start by saying I have no plans to physically disrupt this meeting so therefore your statute will not no longer apply but I think everybody in this room everybody who's watching on YouTube all you guys know what this is for I don't have the grace of our first Speaker I don't have the passion of Mr Carr now because well he's invested a significant amount of money but I'm just the POR schmuck that wants to move into one of those apartments condos Town whatever they may be when they're built now everyone in town knows that this is politically motivated we're not stupid and to sit there in a peas people when this town has a major housing crisis I know that some people see that there's a uh Crux of overdevelopment in Jackson that is most definitely not the case there is a Crux of wrong types of homes being built we need tow houses we need Apartments we don't need more single family homes people who grew up and live around here we born in the area grew up in the area want to move here want to be able to start their lives in the area they can't because well when you just get out of college and you're making 40 $50,000 a year you're not going to be able to buy a $900,000 six-bedroom house the houses that are over in Brookwood that 15 20 years ago AG go we're selling for $300,000 and now going for six s $800,000 there's no reason that we need to sit there and that guy over because you want to sit there and tout to your constituents that you're stopping overdevelopment he's right it is a small portion of Jackson is not in the middle of Jackson we're not taking a major land project and wiping out a whole area that land has been essentially fallow for years when it was a paintball course there some use for it there used to be a taco stand and an ice cream stand and everything else but you know what it is and I think I know you think it's funny but don't worry I may get to other I may get to other wording later when we get to other things but there's no reason for it you I'm not sure who on the council was around or part of the government when his plans were approved I can't I'm not going to point figes because I honestly do not know but you have a right and you have the opportunity right here right now to stop a mistake from happening I've been telling you for the last year and a half two years since I've been coming to these things on a regular basis Jackson is notorious for sitting there they'd rather settle lawsuits than just do the right thing to begin with there's no reason for it you could sit there instead of tting on your all your uh Flyers that you send out when it comes time to vote about stopping overd development being more trump-like and everything else like that you could sit there and say hey we saved the town millions of dollars by not getting sued so many times as it is right now I know that there's several lawsuits lined up and when he starts around $120 million I can almost guarantee you without being an attorney just spending enough time courtrooms with case like this those super10 million end up getting $300 million there you've already to close a school your school is your school district is way the Hell in the in the red because they don't have the money and we're doing things like buying open space face you know doing everything else like that when we have an opportunity of bringing uh taxable units somebody's going be paying property taxes on that the the development there it's going to bring people to shop in Jackson and everything else like that and to screw the guy over because of a political motivation this way you could say I stopped over development is not right I could understand if the guy was trying to build you know a 50 story highrise right across the street from this place he's not that's it fix it don't do it and you this opportunity to sit there and take the time and say this isn't the best idea all right I mean it's going a come up tonight it's going a come up in a few other meetings but I believe Mr mcgucken should take this opportunity and say hey guys this is a bad idea let's not do it this is why it's a bad idea let's not do it I know that it'll look great for your campaigns but whoever it was whether it was some of you all of you or none of you authorize that approve that thing to be built let him build it as it is right now we have Jackson 21 that I remember for years seeing that guy uh the guy from the man who wrote lamancha about building a place for friendly people where the hell is it it's being held up for years and years and years by the town I'm sure that there's other issues involved but most of that comes down to fighting with the town and he's right every time that there's a developer who brings a suit you guys lose you think you'd learn by now and I'm not saying let him build rampantly but especially something that's already been preapproved this is a no-brainer Let It Go through thank you sir have a great night seeing no one come forward make a motion to close public comment second council president for the record are there any residential approvals um out there already aren yes there are motion comment roll roll all in favor I I I aren't there existing residential approvals yes okay for how many units about 400 already okay 460 so this wouldn't take away from that no okay if I could just comment what I believe is what is being removed is all the ratables which is the um highrises and the hotels and everything that the residents of Jackson have been promised for the last 10 years that is wiping it all away and it is going to town homes that are uh 3,000 square over 3,000 square feet so that is I counil not to discuss particular further as we had threat thank you certainly can discuss the ordinance and vote on the ordinance what's there now may there am I allowed to discuss of why the ordinance came about so that there's explanation so in the letter that I had R read on the marketing of this property on June 13th once it came to my attention the marketing was to pretty much go to 1,200 homes as you had just heard they had 400 plus approved they were trying to wipe that out continue to do all the hotels in the infastructure I met with uh individuals pertaining to this and asking their opinion and I was told that the infin structure absolutely could not handle this car kind of um build so therefore that is where the ordinance had come from it was not going to as it was said you know if he had his approval so this is just to make sure that nothing else happens that's all I have Mr mcgucken yes sir question sir so I would agree with the resident there Donnie um so here here's an opportunity for you to make any recommendations did this not go to the planning board and did their attorney look at this the planning board broke back and indicated that the ordinance is not inconsistent with the master plan which is what the law would require if they found it inconsistent um council could still go forward with a two3 vote however in this case they determined that it was not inconsistent and there Council and if it ches move forward the ordinance with a simple majority okay so therefore we are still in compliance with our current master plan they saw nothing in their attorney review and you've looked at this do you have any concerns from a legal standpoint sir I'm a plan board attorney and I'm not a okay tell you that the ordinance um that is proposed is permitted the governing body has the right to determine zoning in any particular portion of the municipality and that is what this ordinance does okay so then um Mr bordon had raised two questions um about not having a purpose listed in the ordinance and some ambiguities as he kind of referred to them is there something we should do to clean this up prior to taking a vote on it because obviously rather than going back and fixing it I would personally prefer to have it be clean so from a legal standpoint do you see anything that we should do to fix the wording not necessarily the ordinance because if we all are in agreement that we want less housing more commercial more ratables as was originally promised and designed if there changed only the density it did not change any standards which would apply in his Z so disagree with Mr B's legal opinion in my opinion as to what he was suggesting and there's no requirement for a quote purpose in any or any ordinance that and there are numerous ordinances we've adopted over the years that do not have a purpose and in fact many legal council advise against putting such language in okay thank you for your clarification roll call this is the third reading of orance 33 24 entitled an ordinance of the township of Jackson County of ocean state of New Jersey amending and supplementing the municipal code of the township of Jackson so as to amend chapter 244 entitled land use and development regulations so as to revise residential density standards in the highway commercial mixed use Zone I in a motion to adopt on third and final reading and advertise according to law so moved second councilman barelli clerk boss um ordinance 33-24 it reinforces our commitment as residents elected representatives on this Council to protect Jackson as best as possible from overdevelopment with this ordinance we're just reducing the uh density and um want to try to help keep our town a suburban community development in our town no matter where it's being proposed is a big issue and concern we continually hear about from any residents who we work for we owe it to them let me end with that we need more of the commercial than residential yes I vote Yes on this ordinance thank you councilman Bernstein yes councilman Chisum just to clarify none of us was here or voted for this project at the time that it was first approved none of us was here long enough sadly uh obviously it seems it's my last night there is nothing political about this and I would say based on not just what I've seen driving over there the traffic is insane I would love to see the hotels that I've been promised for 40 plus years of my life and I would like to see more commercial ratables as a member of the Chamber of Commerce and as a business owner here in town so based on Mr McGuckin's uh clarifications I'm going to vote Yes Council vice president Sergeant so rarely do I uh agree with the man with the dog but on this case I do um I may not necessarily like uh Mr Cardell as a human being however I cannot with good conscience Vote for This ordinance as I just feel well I feel like it's unamerican as somebody already put it and um I I believe that there's ambiguous language in here that that just doesn't make any sense at all and from what I heard from Miss c a second ago um kind of reinfor for what I felt which is she started to go into the idea of of the ordinance and and how it would be positive for Jackson Township and it sounded an awful lot like the council would be um would be targeting for lack of better terms um Mr Cardinal's project and and I I don't believe that that's something that I want to be involved with so I'm G to vote no council president yes thank you this is the second reading of ordinance 36-24 intitled an ordinance of the township Council for the township of Jackson County of oan state of New Jersey amending chapter 3- 153 of the township cod with respect to advisory boards committees and commissions this ordinance was introduced on November 26 2024 I need a motion to open the public hearing so move second all in favor I I I if any member of the public has any comments to make please address the council at the microphone and state your name and address clearly for the record you will have five minutes and may only speak once d G Willow Point Drive um I I just have a question can somebody clarify what this is because like a lot of things that have come through here it just seems rather ambiguous so I don't know if I should be for it or against it but if somebody could maybe explain it to us in a little bit more plain language I think we would appreciate it I'm I'm sorry sir I can't really understand your question well can you this ordinance that's proposed can you explain it in plain English right because this this just seems yeah absolutely yeah absolutely please the RO forms advisory committee does not have a method to select the chairman so this is to correct that and allows the council to appoint chairman would it be only for that roow of for RO a Farms committee or would be for all like Town committees thank you thank you sir seeing no one come forward and make a motion to close public comment second all in favor I I this is the third reading of ordinance 36-24 entitled in ordinance of the township Council of the township of Jackson County of ocean state of New Jersey amending chapter 3-13 of the Township Code with respect to advisory boards committees and commissions I need a motion to adopt on third and final reading and advertise according to law so move second councilman barelli yes councilman bery yes councilman Chisum abstain again please Council vice president Sergeant yes and council president Q thank you Miss Moss I just wanted to give you a little bit of clarity to this this came after working with councilman Schism over the last year on Roa farms and seeing the dedication on that and I know that this is his last year on Council so we wanted to make sure that hopefully next year the council um is in agreements in appointing him the chairperson of the Roa Farms thank you I vote yes thank you we Mo move to bills and claim and a motion to approve or hold motion second councilman barelli I'll be abstaining on vendor number uh D l01 NJ d04 NJ m06 NJ s04 st76 and TR E12 yes to the rest on there thank you thank you councilman Bernstein yes councilman Chisum I'm stay on br18 yes to the rest Council vice president sergeant yes and council president Q just want to clarify just want to go over a couple um I want to thank our Administration for the PE cards this is going to make it easier for our DPW our police and other department heads to move forward and get education and purchase things that they need currently I believe we did it in old school I'm not going to get into it but super excited to see that that's resolution 403 and again I I truly trly appreciate that the next one is again um 405 is the grant program we have a grant writer uh we've already been making tons of Headway working with Administration and Council and department heads to um speak hopefully on a on a very rapid once a week if that maybe once a month and go over grants to bring um additional Parks and Recreations and and funds into the town so that we could purchase more stuff through grant money next um again Administration thank you for the grant and working on it with um re Parks and Recreations for pickle ball um we have moved it from the Justice complex due to Pinelands to woodlean park uh they are working on that DPW has already submit they're submitting plans and stuff like that so again I wanted to just thank all of that and thank you and everybody have a blessed and happy holiday have a great night yes everything else or yes to everything bills bills oh oh bills and cleans oh I went a little far abstained from rcs2 and yes to the rest and yes to the rest thank you very much thank council president we move on to the consent agenda uh there may I make a mention of resolution 4 2324 the amended date of of the 2025 council meeting um originally when it was posted on Friday uh there was a slight change SE it is now for September 22nd of 2025 which is the fourth Monday um it's been changed to September 26 which is the 4th Thursday and the October 14th meeting is now October 16th which is the 3D Thursday um also to mention the the verbage um for resolution 427 yes um this has to this is entitled resolution of the township Jackson County of oan state of New Jersey authorizing colar engineering and design to submit certain Grant applications on behalf of Jackson Township some of the verbes have been amended it's just tweet yes but the resolution is consistent yes ma'am thank you so now I need a motion to approve the listed resolutions under consent agenda please motion second councilman barelli yes councilman Bernstein um yes and just thank you to council president to the clerk's office for working so diligently to make that correction once that was noticed um and also special shout out to r427 d24 looking forward to working with Administration and Colliers and getting some of these grants and more parks and other other vital services to our town thank you yes everything thank you councilman Chisum yes Council vice president Sergeant yes and council president C yes thank you we move on to public comments on any topic I need a motion to open the public portion of meeting for all comments so moved second all in favor I I I at this time if any member of the public has any comments to make please address the council at the microphone please state your name and address clearly for the record you will have five minutes and may only speak once hello again Donnie Adelman will Appo Drive um um well here we are again because this dude right here is causing more problems so I have a question um reading some stuff in the paper as I'm sure all you saw what came out over the past week or so uh the I'm not sure what to be best call it a suit a motion arbitration or what but whatever Chief Coons did who paid for that did it come from the taxpayers or did he pay for it out of his own pocket number one we have no idea didn't come from the town did it come from the township cool all right so that makes things a little bit easier now that you have residents who have said that there's a problem with this guy the chief has said that he is causing problems with the police department and well there's nothing that's going to come with having him employed as the Police director except cost his money cost this town a lot of money and lawsuits why are we entertain the fact that he's a police director see the problem we have in Jackson is that the police department has cancer and rather than treating the cancer and getting rid of the cancer you promote it you sweep it under the rug or you don't do anything about it I wrote an email to the board specifically stating that this guy was stopping all over my civil rights as a journalist to well expose the fact that Jackson police officers are breaking the law they're stealing and they're not following Motor Vehicle Laws he came out barking at me all right I told you that was a problem the very next day he sends over four Boons to give me four more citations all right this is a problem he Jackson actual like licens authorized on Duty Officers some of them are bad enough I'm not saying all of them by all means certainly I'm not saying every cop in Jackson is bad all right but there's enough of them that learned toxic behaviors and well no one seems to care about it you know you haven't experienced it yet but well I got a feeling that a couple of you are gonna start to feel what it what it's like to be persecuted randomly for seemingly no reason and I'm gonna enjoy watching it because I'm G be sitting there with a bucket of popcorn but this guy here he needs to be fired he needs to be fired immediately and really if it was legal I'd say taking them out back to the Woodshed all right I'll gladly do that if no one else wants to because he ain't a cop no more so you got that um as far as the access around the police department again because of what director candido did as far as I could tell in fact let me ask you a question Mr McGuckin uh in the past oh God two months have you got any correspondence in regards to changing the signs and access over at the Justice complex so any Communications I have with the township or attorney Cent privilege and I'm not free to still have any such commun okay so that's uh probably yes well okay I'd like to demand that under the Ada in title two and title four and so forth like that that all those signs that this guy decided that he was going to put into the police depart the police complex after the fact because he has like his officers being caught doing wrong that they be taken down and put back to where it was because I went and I got the actual plans from when that place was built in the 90s and it says that it wants Chief sh Drive open and open to the public to promote transparency among the residents of Jackson and its Police Department yet you guys allowed this guy to S and take it away all right we have freedoms you know what if there if it was a problem I am going to C um I received your email today certainly familiar with the case all you said it goes beyond however when it's directed at a particular individual as opposed to Municipal policy for the mun itself all right well I I I completely disagree please keep your comments to disagree policies threatening individuals or commenting about individual employees um wouldn't be in fact not subject to First M protection in the public meeting I I disagree and see that's here's the problem all right we have we have ill-informed employees that are working on the various boards and committees and so forth like that and rather than just you know maybe say take a second and say you know maybe he's right maybe it's something that I don't deal with every day so rather than interject my feelings I'm G to take a second and look it up no you make it you make a unilateral decision and you end up getting sued over the fact that you made a stupid unilateral decision all right cancer is cancer get rid of the cancer open up Chief sha Drive there's no reason for thank you sir have a great night get home [Music] safe Jim slackia not gonna talk about South in the prospect I'm gonna talk about one word transparency every government part everybody that's been in government has said we're going to be transparent the next government that official that's transparent will be the first why do I say that tonight Mr Chisum asked the attorney if the planning board had received um the request for the the ordinance that was passed and yes they did receive it and they passed it back to you correctly as you stated but they also said they wanted to recommend to the council that they hold off on voting on on it until the new master plan was completed did anybody know that so if nobody knew that they also included that how are we who made that decision that we're going to exclude what what the recommendation was from the planning board well the recommendation planning board and the Lang law they only role in that process is to determine if it's inconsistent with the master plan and their determination that it was not any any other comments they make respectfully are not part of the governing body's decision as to whether move forward with the ordinance under the m l they said they had the op they had the right to provide recommendations to the council to consider and their recommendation was that we hold off until the new master plan was completed so that we can make sure that the ORD can make a recommendation every day of the week and every meeting if they like but the question on this ordinance is under the municip law whether it's inconsistent with the master plan and they determined it was not and that's what the governing body needed to know and if the board found that it was not if it was uh excuse me it was inconsistent with the master plan then in that case the council could still move forward but they would need a two-third vote four out of five instead of three out of five so their ability to provide recommendations really doesn't exist thank you thank you sir seeing no one else come forward make motions president I just brief comment if I may yes thank you very much I just wanted to extend on behalf of uh Mayor Michael Reena and art the administration the staff that's here uh extending uh a warm uh congratulations and wishing you all the best and a merry Christmas and all wonderful things to councilman Chisum you've always been uh a uh a stable Earnest voice thoughtful in your deliberations in your discussions with staff since since I I first met met you um and an honest and thoughtful person I wanted to share that with you is very much a pleasure working with you and uh so in in these situations I'm also the voice of the staff and I know that they want to share well wishes to you and wish you all the best so on behalf of uh myself Administration mayor aren I want to wish you uh uh a fantastic Journey forward uh as you as you go on to the next the next chapter of life I appreciate it and for all the staff that I didn't thank thank them for me thank you now thank you and if I may I just wanted to share my first amendment is live and well but public safety director candido has always been tremendously professional as a chief administrative officer we've had uh uh a positive working relationship and I just wanted to share my opinion professionally that uh uh conduct your your your uh Your Role with uh with uh cander and professionalism I thank you for that I appreciate you allowing me to share those comments thank you Mr wall I make my motion again to close public comment second all in favor iose motion to close motion second all in favor I I have a good night