[Music] Aubrey, I just want to make sure that you can hear us. Yes, I can. Thank you. Perfect. Thank you. All right. Ready? All right. I like the call to order the April 23rd Longill Township meeting. Please rise for the
pledge of allegiance. 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.
Madame clerk, committeeman Lavender, present. Committee Riker Elign, present. And I will be in person in less than 10 minutes hopefully. Thank you. Thank you. Committee Verlesa, present. Deputy Mayor Persia, present. Mayor Dorsy, I'm here. All right. So, let's
start off. Um, we have uh some of the students from school that came uh because they submitted stuff to the state fire calendar. And I'm going to turn the meeting over to our fire marshal, uh, Don Huber. Don, just get the, uh, mic from Megan.
Right from here, if it's okay, we should get the mic though. Thank you. Uh good evening everybody. Uh Mayor Dorsy, distinguished members of the township committee, administrator Bar, thank you everybody for coming out tonight. Uh I appreciate the township
committee allowing me this opportunity uh to present some very special awards. Uh as you heard, my name is Don Yuber. I'm honored to be your fire marshal. I'm particularly honored tonight to be able to um present these awards which I'm going to talk about in just a minute and I'm going to bring up our award winners.
Uh but I but I do want to just say a little bit about what this program is about. What kind of awards are this? And and I will be brief. Um so back in 1938, okay, not really. Let's just just making sure they're paying attention.
So, the New Jersey State Division of Fire Safety, which is in the Department of Community Affairs, has an annual uh poster contest. It's a calendar. This is the 20125 version. There's some up here if anybody wants one on your way out. And what this calendar is is the product
of artwork from students around the state. And I emphasize around the state because it's a lot of students. And uh the locals get involved with the with the schools uh with the cooperation of our superintendent, our administrators, our
principles, the teachers, and we uh engage in a program where the students uh submit fire safety posters and there's a theme every year. It might be smoke alarms or it might be kitchen fires or have a uh an exit plan to get
out of your home in case of a fire. There's always a theme. And then the students uh submit their posters to the local uh judges, which happen to be our uh fire companies. And I'll just put in a word very quickly for them. If it wasn't for our fire companies, uh we
wouldn't even have this program off the ground because they they really get involved. They get engaged with the school. Uh, one one gentleman in particular, I'd be remiss not to mention, he's a he's a a long-term friend of mine, uh, Milbour firefighter, but he's also a Sterling firefighter,
Jeff Waker, who really gets his teeth into this, and without his help, I I doubt I we would be as successful as we were. So, none of those guys are here, but I hope that you appreciate their service because without them on a lot of levels, uh this municipality would would
have to uh face a lot of things that um thanks to their service, we we don't have to deal with. So, we put this program together. The students submit their artwork. The artwork is judged on a local level. certain uh they're all all the artwork is great, but the ones
that are chosen as the winners go to the county. They get judged by county judges and then they go to the state. Once they go to the state, if they if they succeed at that level, the top 12 get put into this calendar. And that's a pretty big honor because when you think about how
competitive that is, uh to get to the state level is quite an achievement. Quite honestly, even the local level is quite an achievement. And while we appreciate all of the poster submissions, we want to pay special recognition to our local winners tonight as well as one of our state winners. So,
so what I would like to do right now is um call up the award winners and hopefully if you're here, come forward. If you're not here, you don't have to come forward, but we'll catch up with you later. Um let's start with our Millington School uh winners. Uh Ariel
M. Hi, Ariel. Come on up. Why don't you stand right here, dear? Okay. Thank you. Uh Yu and [Applause] Mlennon, how you doing? Yan. Good to see
you, buddy. Okay. Uh Gabby Russo. Gabby, you're not here. Okay, we'll catch up with you. No problem. Um, okay. Central School, we have Addison [Applause]
Waker. Hi, Addison. Yeah, I know your dad really wanted to be here tonight. We're going to take some good pictures. Um, uh, Mera Laauo, Angela Yang, Dylan
Herring. Okay. I think that's uh, our our local winners is Asa Chang here tonight. Okay. All right. Very good. So, as I said, these are our local winners. And what we we are going to do right
now, I may have to put this down, but I can talk pretty loudly. Uh I think I can do this. We have uh some presentations we'd like to make. And these are again on behalf of the township committee. And thank you
for the honor of letting me present these on your behalf. We have uh some Amazon gift cards we'd like to present to you. So Ariel, you my dear.
[Applause] We're going to take a nice picture. Okay. Don with Ariel and the mayor. So if you want to do one and then the other. However you want to do it. Yeah. Let's do one and then we'll do one all together. Okay. Perfect.
Come up. Ready. One, two, three. Nice. [Applause] How do you say it? Don't cover your face. Ready? One, two, three.
Very nice. [Applause] Okay, [Applause] Addison over here with the mayor, please. I got Addison. Right. Ready? One, two,
three. Very nice. And then we're going to get one all together. You're [Laughter] ready. One, two, three. Nice job. Thank you guys.
[Applause] Again, thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you everybody. Really appreciate it. Last word. this, you know, fire safety is really everybody's responsibility, but it's great when the township committee will get behind the schools and get behind the fire
marshall's office and the emergency responders and help us get that message out because it really is something that we all they need to be. And I got to tell you, I've been doing this for almost 50 years, different things in the fire service, but the fire prevention
message is is really the best way to prevent fires in the home, in the workplace, and everywhere else. So we we really appreciate your support of this program and fire prevention message throughout the state. Thank you very much. Have a good night. Thank you.
[Applause] All right. She want to do this or not? Okay. Uh the next thing is a brief another presentation, but I don't see Mrs. Jean's here. Is anybody here from the uh Shade Tree Commission? All right. That's all right. I'll read the
proclamation. All right. So, it's a proclamation for Arbor Day. It says, "In 1872, Nebraska Board of Agriculture established a special day to set aside for planting trees. They called it Arbor Day." Um, it's now observed throughout the nation and the world. Um, trees can
be a solution to combating climate change by reducing erosion of our soil by wind and water, cutting heating and cooling cost, moderating the temperature, cleaning the air, producing life-giving oxygen, and providing habitat for wildlife. Uh trees are a renewable source resource giving us
paper, wood for our homes, fuel for our fires, and countless other wood products. And trees in our community increase property values, enhance the economic vitality of business areas, and beautify our community. And wherever they are planted, they are a source of joy and spiritual renewal. So therefore,
um I declare Longhill Township to hereby proclaim Friday, which is this Friday, April 25th, as Arbor Day. And I encourage all citizens to celebrate Arbor Day and support the efforts to protect our trees and woodlands. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Don't
need All right. So, the next order of business I'm I can assume why most people are here. So, we're going to jump the uh um schedule a little bit. So, it's on for discussion item. I believe and I could be wrong. Most of you are here to talk about the commercial vehicles. Some of you may have got
letters, some of you didn't. So, I will let everybody speak. Who wants to speak, you get three minutes. However, I'm just going to tell you upfront, this is the plan going forward, at least temporarily. There's going to be no summons issued anytime soon. Uh, there's no more letters going out. What we are doing is we are sending it to the planning board to get their feedback
because they just passed the master plan and this ordinance, I believe, is 30 years old. So, we want to get feedback from the planning board as we do other ordinances to see how this fits into the new master plan. They'll come back with some suggestions, maybe, maybe not. And then from there, then we'll go forward.
But until that happens, there's going to be no summones issued. There's going to be no more letters going out. And we try to just keep the status quo for now. But don't go parking garbage trucks in your front yard. Mr. Mayor, if I if I could go ahead respectfully just interject one thing. I I I think this body you've
served on the board of adjustment. I Scott currently serves. We've all served on the planning board of the board of adjustment. I and and and attorney uh councel Pigeon is a land use land use attorney. Maybe we can
wordsmith a little bit and send something to the uh planning board. My point is I don't want anybody here to think this is proceeding. Uh I mean I've lived in town for 31 years. I I've never received a complaint about a vehicle uh
being parked in someone's driveway. Um and some of you who are out there uh have done fabulous work where we live. Uh so I I I don't see it as an issue. It's an issue because the current
ordinance says it's an issue, but not because it in practicality has been an issue. I hope I was uh sufficiently obtuse there. So, I do think it needs to be worded differently. Otherwise, those letters are in fact
just following what the ordinance appears to say. Even the ordinances themselves are a little bit confusing. So, I I So, anyway, I'm I'm actually asking you, Mr. mayor and everybody else. Is it something we can ask Jack to
word smith the current ordinance a little bit to what we think reality is not what go to the planning board first. I don't know. But I I think we should hear from the Yeah. Everybody's here because I think this what I what I'm hoping for is an open dialogue, an open
conversation. Let's hear what you have to say. Um, and we could all talk about it and see what would be fair to people who want to park a commercial vehicle on their property and what's fair as far as, you know, keeping up with the in
with a certain look in your neighborhood where it doesn't start to look like a commercial parking lot and uh, you know, and listen, I'm most of you guys out here are my friends. So, the last thing I want to do is is lose any friends uh, and come across the wrong way. So I say
this respectfully, but I think that we need to come to a happy medium because I uh uh conversely to to GIA, I do hear some complaints about the commercial vehicles, and it's it's not necessarily for the it actually really isn't for the one commercial
vehicle parked in someone's driveway. Someone's on call, they have one commercial vehicle that they go back and forth to, you know, they for, you know, for work with. We're not talking about a large uh, you know, rotorooer truck. uh you know, we're talking about um you know, a Ford truck or a van, that kind
of thing. That's not the complaint. But the complaint does what I do hear and which I where I do agree is when there's more than one commercial vehicle parked on a residential property in a residential neighborhood when and especially if those vehicles are parked
in the street. Um so I'd like to again that's how I that that's how I feel. I'm I'm from Sterling. I know a lot of people are probably from Sterling. I'm not looking to alienate anybody, but I would certainly like to discuss that. So, thankfully, there's a different No
offense Vic, there's a difference between your Sterling and Lower Sterling where I'm from, but that's the way it is. Yes. So, if that's correct, if anybody wants to come up, you have three minutes. Mr. Lacata, come on up.
Mayor, committee, thank you uh for this opportunity to come speak to you. I am Al Lacata. I'm the president of the Barners Township Regional Chamber of Commerce. We have many members here in your town. We run programming here in town regularly. Um I also state for the record that I'm the former mayor of Burner Township and also the former head
of the New Jersey Mayor's Association. I'd like to talk about the parking. Um it's not an ordinance up for discussion right now, so I'm not going to ask you to table it, but I am going to ask a favor. Um, you do have an ordinance that prohibits uh multiple vehicles um and
the large vehicles on people's residential properties, the trailers, the dump trucks, and all those things. That's fine. We have no objection with that whatsoever. That keeps the integrity of the community intact. What we have an issue with is your zoning officer not going before you first and telling you that there could be some
ambiguity with your zoning law that's maybe a little outdated and could use some word smithing. As the honorable committeeman mentioned earlier, um you have to look at look at the as a young kid I lived in Mill uh up by the five corners up by the Episcopal Church. I
can't remember a time when there wasn't a uh a blueco collar truck on that street. Maybe several or maybe even more. Uh growing up in uh sports, these guys would come home from work and they'd be the ones that were coaching my sports teams and so on. So, what we're doing is we're talking about homebased
businesses where these vehicles are second vehicles to these families, whether they got to go answer the call in the middle of the night for pest control or you got a plumbing issue or a heating issue, especially in the middle of winter or when Sandy comes and everybody needs you around the clock. We're not looking to overreach. What
we're trying to do is say the character of Long Hill has always been one of bluecollar flavor. Um, look, I I'm going to tell you how old I am. I used to go to Orphan Annies. It was a great time, you know, even before I was late.
I loved the I loved Annie. Um but um you know, the flavor of the town is the flavor of the town. Uh of over the time more people have moved in. You've got uh a great assortment of housing here in the area. I know as all towns do and as the former head of the mayor's association, we are constantly fighting
with affordable housing. But in this one area, I think we could come together and word smmith your existing ordinance to make it more palatable and more clear for your zoning officials. At the same time, giving uh a lot of relief to a lot of these people in this room. I sat out in the hallway before I came in tonight.
All of them were echoing the same concern. They've been here 10, 20, 30 years. My uncle owned a barber shop here in town 40, 50 years ago. We used to laugh at him when he put the letters on the car about his his barber shop, you know, but you know, that's what what kids do. But that's the flavor. That's
blueco collar town, man. You got to accept it. And you got to make sure that these people are protected. They're they're obeying the law. They're not putting all of their vehicles on their property. Maybe some overreach and that's why you have a zoning officer and that's why you do enforce the code. But I would like to make my services
available to you. I believe the mayor's association, we did address this issue, homebased businesses some years ago. I would work, if you appointed a subcommittee, I would be glad to work with Mr. Pigeon, who I know is a very um capable uh planning attorney, um to help
Wordsmith and anyone else who you deem worthy to work with us on this project to do it in a voluntary uh way to help ease the tensions of the town, create an environment where people can use that second car. Look, people just got out of COVID. Four years of a disastrous
economy. Prices are exploding. You can't ask these people to park their car somewhere else and pay for that service again. That's an added expense to small business owners that they just can't handle right now. Um, on top of that, uh, you know, fuel costs and what are
they going to do? Uber to their car at the parking lot. I'm telling you, you know your people like I knew mine in town. They work for a living. They work hard. Uh, these cars aren't at their homes during the day. They're a homebased business, but the plumber is out plumbing. The carpenter is out doing
woodwork. The painter is out working all day. That car is not in the driveway. It's not creating the eyesore that people some people would like to overreach on. Do some people have an issue with it? Look, as elected officials, we all know we can't please everybody. So, um, we try to do our
best, but I do come here today to ask you to, uh, maybe take into consideration my offer to work with you to tailor a piece of legislation that you can send to your planning board that's consistent with your existing master plan, ease the tensions of the town, and move forward amicably. Thank you for your time. I appreciate it.
Thank you. Couldn't agree with you more. Yeah, good. Anyone else? Wow, that's a tough act to follow. There's Roy Roy Russen, 40 Milton Avenue in Gillette. And uh I'd like to thank Al
for mentioning the the pest control guy that goes out in the middle of the night for a yellow jacket nest that falls through the ceiling. Um you know, raccoon coming down the chimney. All sorts of crazy things happen in this
business at night. I'm 24/7. Um, and uh, I keep my truck very nice. It's 126 ft back off the street. No one could really even see it. And it's in a gully, so you could just see
the top. I also planted for this reason um some evergreen shrubs around the back of my driveway along with a white picket fence um to not hide it but you know make it
more pleasing to the eye. Um and it's not a an ugly truck at all. Um but I'm regulated by the D also to keep labels on it. And I think that was an issue that came up, you know, here. And they have to be a certain size, a certain
height, uh, yada yada yada. Um, so I do keep this truck there. U, and like Al said, all day it's out six days a week. Um, I'm working it. Um, so I just wanted to make that point. And, um, I don't run
a junkyard. My house is immaculate. Everything is manicured to a tea. Um, that's my point. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Thanks for seeing me. Appreciate. Oh, thank you. [Applause]
Yeah, I am. Should be out there. Evening. Frank Liberado, Heritage Road. Um, in regards to this topic, you know, having grown up in town, I concur what the two previous speakers had said, you know, and also being a small business owner myself, I understand the
difficulties with that. Have a question regarding uh, you know, all the data that was collected on this and how everyone was identified as far as, you know, the business owners that got uh, notices. What are the hours for the zoning officer? Is he just date uh, during the week, day and daytime?
Yeah, it's part-time during the daytime hours. Okay. So, it's like a couple days a week. Uh, five days a week. Oh, he is five days a week. Okay. Because most of these vehicles, I would assume, as the other gentleman said, are, you know, not in the driveway during the day. So, I'm
just wondering, you know, was uh was the data collected using the police department also since they're out on the road all the time to collect the the information for the letters that went out? the we had uh set up a meeting with uh
people that would be involved in this ordinance and I'll address a comment that was said earlier that somebody's disappointed in that the uh code enforcement officer in our case not the zoning officer uh hadn't informed the
committee uh of uh uh this ordinance and the consequences in this ordinance. We we fully had that meeting uh and uh the police department were was involved in this. Um we um tried to emphasize that uh maybe we
should look at this ordinance before taking action. Uh it was decided uh that we should move ahead. Oh, so the direction came from the committee to move ahead that was handling that. Is that what you're I'm just trying to follow you.
It was directed to me to move ahead. Okay. So, you report to the governing body. So, then I would assume that's where it came from. Um, I'm just surprised that you got the police department. The police department's, you know, doing that also. I mean, there's other things they need to tend to. I think the zoning officer, you know, if
this is his area really should be kept to him. But I guess my other question is in regards to the commercial vehicles and tweaking it. Uh, Mr. pigeon, you know, maybe it could be tailored, you know, to, you know, uh, Mr. Lesar's concern about the um type size of
vehicle maybe a GVW class you know vehicles under 20,000 lbs or something like that because I didn't read the ordinance completely but are there exemptions in the ordinance say for utility companies like if somebody from PSENG or or um you know JCPNL or Verizon
is on call and takes a truck home are they going to get caught up in this ordinance being enforced? There is not Frank. Uh, and I've traced this ordinance back to at least 1991. U, but it was adopted before then. That's just the earliest page I have in the old code
book was in 1991. So, so technically per the ordinance, everybody's in violation, even the utility. That's correct. So, even at the fire department or first aid, if we're taking a lettered vehicle home to be on call, you're saying there's no exemption even for the police or fire. That That's right. And if the committee decides to go ahead and revise
it, you know, that's the direction we would go is that that would be my concern too is I think certain way the word smith as they said previously I think is the focus. I think we probably start from scratch. Yeah I I I would think so because especially with the amount of small businesses in the community and some people that is their
only means of transportation is compensation from work you know even the water company you see the water company people take their cars home you know and they have to be on call. So, I think we have to be very careful, you know, and obviously you're, you know, you're not going to make everybody happy, but I think it's need
some due diligence and and I appreciate you not sending more letters and summones until this gets sorted out because it's concerning, you know, and I also think we got a lot of other issues still to work on here. And I I don't think this is, you know, something
that's, you know, got to get fixed immediately. I would just leave the status quo for now. when you do your due diligence to figure it out, I think I would just open it up to the public because as you see, this is just a small portion of residents that live here that work out of their
homes, you know, and they're not all big companies, you know, they're little companies and and and right now, you know, we need to help everybody and not, you know, add more to their plate. I think Thank you, Frank. I think the majority of us in this room would agree.
one commercial vehicle parked in your, you know, far, you know, forward far back in your driveway or in your garage if you can. If you don't have a garage, if you only have a, you know, if you don't have the ability to park it behind your house, if you're then fine, then you get Yeah, you don't want six vehicles parked. But there's there's
there's vehicles with trailers. There's uh people that have multiple vehicles parked on on one property. And I think that's the type of thing we're trying. I think the other gentleman said there's a separate ordinance to handle that. So, I think that would be code enforcement, not police, right? That'd be code enforcement, not have them going around
chasing that. Um, but I think I agree with you. I think if it gets tailored properly and you take the input and seeing with the residents, I think you can arrive at something that will work best for everyone. Frank, but to one point, I want to be clear with the mayor or maybe it's really Randy, there's a difference between a letter and a
summit. I don't think any summits is no summit. I just want to be clear. So, it's kind of like a warning. Nobody was. It's like a warning. I honestly didn't see the letter, but also actually just going to bring it up while we're talking about it. Is it was a certified letter that was sent? Correct. No. Okay. It's
just a V. It was a it's a violation of a code. That's what the letter is. And then does that normally come like is that normally notified to the committee and maybe we were notified and that's not something that we would normally have visibility to like if something like that was going out to all
businesses in the town. If something was going out to all the businesses in the town, probably you would probably get That's I wasn't saying. I was just asking. Okay. Yeah. If it's a oneoff, we don't they don't know what they do. We don't know police issue tickets either. So fair. Just trying to understand the process. And
then um question. Do we have a list I'm assuming of all businesses that are licensed like you know that are I guess registered here in Longill? Well, they're not necessarily the business is not registered here. Okay. It's just their vehicle is here. Park their vehicle. how they figured that out, right? If I
give an employee a pickup truck to take home and it says my company name on the side to go to work, be from South Orange or where, right? So, I'm my company's in counter work, but they could live here. So, that would be kind of hard to trace, but like I said, I figured they were doing their due diligence after hours to
figure out who had vehicles in their driveway because obviously we're all at work during the day. So, all right, but thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks, Frank. Good evening, committee. Hi, uh Paul White, 25 Dardi a Gillette. Um I can say this doesn't
affect me directly. Um of course I heard about it through my neighbors who uh have a lot of commercial vehicles, have small businesses, they live in the neighborhood, and they actually help a lot of people in my neighborhood. I had an instant incident one night myself. There's a plumber in my neighborhood. He actually didn't get a letter though, but he was a plumber in my neighborhood. My
water heater went out. I called up. It was great. He hopped in his van. He was over there in two minutes. If he had to park someplace else where there's no more parking, there's really is no more parking for these guys anymore. Berkeley Heights, a lot of the guys did park their vehicles there and they shut down that for the commercial parking. These guys would probably have to park all the way in Planefield or whatever. You'd
have to wait 2, three hours to get a service call. Um it obviously sounds like you guys are all willing to work this out and uh rewrite the ordinance, which would be great. Um that's pretty much why I came here tonight, hoping to that would be enforced. uh um that you guys would, you know, rewrite it and uh
help out my uh local my neighbors here. Um that's about it. Um and I hope uh you know, we can all work this out and uh everybody will be able to park in the driveway. Thank you. Thank you guys. [Applause] Anyone else?
Come on up now. Hi. Hi. Thank you very much. Uh my name is Nora Basilian. I live on Essex Street in Sterling and I am a small business owner. Um, I want to say first, thank you so much for taking a step back on this, taking time to consider the input that you're
getting before you make a final decision. Mayor Dorsy, I appreciate your comments about living in a different Sterling. It is the Sterling I grew up in and have lived here most of my life other than 20 years. Um, I I hope that you realize it.
First of all, this doesn't impact me the same way it does other people. I have a commercial spot that I rent and my trucks can be parked there. So, that's fine. But I hope that you realize the optics on this. It seems kind of discriminatory or it can be taken that way. You're talking about people who
work. They carry a tool bag. They dress in work clothes. They're not dressing in suits and ties. They're not attorneys. They're not planners. Whatever your the case may be. And you're this rule discriminates against those people. It
puts a burden on them that the guy who hops on a train into New York. Well, maybe that's not a good al good uh comparison, but this guy who works with his hands and maybe makes $20 an hour. Now you're telling him you need to find a place to park your truck and pay to do that. And
then you need to have a means of transportation back and forth to the truck every day, which you may not he may not have or she may not have. I should be sure I say she also as I'm standing up here. Um, and I just think it's very unfair. I think that taking
the weight class of the vehicle into consideration is probably the thing that should be at the top of the list because that eliminates the trailers. It eliminates somebody parking a dump truck at their house or something else. Start with that and work from there. As someone else said, if you have a
commercially registered vehicle, by law, it has to be lettered. So, you can't we can't say, "Okay, well, I'll have a commercial plate, but I won't letter my truck." Then we get pulled over, we get tickets, we get summones, and that's another expense. Um, I just think that
this, first of all, this ordinance, as you've said, has been on the books 40, 50 years, 30, 40 years. It has never been enforced. That sets a precedent. Now, all of a sudden, we're going to enforce it and put this burden on people at a time when small businesses are
struggling. So, I agree that we need to take a step back, look at the ordinance, and say, "How can we make this work for the most people? No one's going to be 100% happy." That's okay. Compromise is what it's all about. That's what we need to do. So, I appreciate if you will do
that and hopefully we'll come to a conclusion that helps most people. Thank you. I and I can assure you that there's no discrimination of of of any kind here or or or targeting. I even though you might feel that way, I promise you. And speaking for myself, those are the
optics. Yes. My my father was a plumber by trade. Retired police officer, but a plumber by trade. I was a plumber's apprentice growing up. So please I if I came across the wrong way that it was Oh, no. Not at all. Was not intended. I think that when this ordinance was drawn up, it was a different time, right? And
things have changed and I think the ordinance needs to adapt. I think but from what I think from what I'm hearing I think the vast majority of us are in agreement here. Good. That that's that's what I'm getting. I I think we all have an issue with it be it a certain size
truck. Nobody wants to see it be a trailer attached. Right. Um you know if it's you know one vehicle parked uh is is in your driveway if you can if you in your driveway or in your garage. Great. We want to avoid on the on, you know, multiple multiple vehicles, vehicles on
the streets, vehicles with trails. And that's reasonable. And I think that that we're all pretty much on the same page there. That's good to hear. And I hope that you're all willing to work with the community and the business owners because, you know, I see a work truck in front of somebody's house or in their driveway or whatever, and I think, hey, that person is employed. They have a
job. Good for them. They're making a living. They're supporting their household, whatever that may be. And if they are the business owner, even more. Good for them. they have a successful small business which is getting harder and harder to do every single day and I've been in business for 23 years. I
hope to see other people be able to reach that same milestone and do it successfully. So, thanks again. Thank you for coming. Thank you. [Applause] Anyone else from the audience on this topic only? Yeah, I'd like to say a few
things. Go ahead. Well, Chuck, come on. Was there anybody online by the way? Okay. So, we'll do Chuck. Two people online then you. Then we'll move on. Charles West with Millington. Two topics related to this issue.
You as a township committee need to take the necessary steps to ensure something like this doesn't happen again and get the residents upset like the people behind me. Whatever action
that is, you need to take. Number two, from my experience serving on the planning board and working with our professionals, I've told our professionals many times, your job is to advise us what we
need to work on, what we need to change because we're not aware of these things. So my second point is if we have outdated ordinances, who should be accountable for notifying of that? We have a number
of professionals that we pay a lot of money to and we get in situations like this. So whoseever professional is responsible for these ordinances that are 30, 40, 50 years outdated, they need
to get corrected now. And you need to take accountability and responsibility for that. And don't sit there and agree with all the residences. Take the action to stop this and correct the ordinances.
Thank you for your time and looking forward to seeing your actions. Thank you. Thank you. Online we got on the internet. Anybody on Zoom would like to make a public comment, please raise your hand now. I don't see anyone. Mayor, thank
you. Scott, you had something to say on this, then we'll move on. So, in the master plan, Sterling Village is referred to as a workman's village, and the workmen are here. And no one ever complained about this in the
past, and I don't understand why any complaint was raised. Now, me myself, I'm ashamed if this committee has put any kind of burden on your back. and we're going to fix this. I didn't know this was happening.
I went through and I looked at these ordinances. This ordinance is ridiculous. If you have an F4 250, it's a commercial vehicle. Really? Even if you're a private citizen and using it for fishing, it's a commercial vehicle according to the
ordinance. Has to be fixed. Gross vehicle weight. Yeah, we all agree we don't want dump trucks and back hoes, but that's not what we have. You guys are smart enough. You know that. So, we have to make it a priority
to fix this. And quite frankly, the stuff in here about the signage on the trucks is ridiculous. It's ridiculous. Of course, they're going to have signs in their trucks. Of course, by law. By law. So, every once in a while, these kind of
things come out of the woodwork and completely surprise us. And we're sorry that you had to take the brunt of this, but we're going to fix it. So, I just want to leave you with that. Sleep easy tonight. I also can I add on to that? Like, thank you, Scott,
for saying that. Oh, yeah. Sorry. Clap. Show me some love. Sorry. Sorry. I was turning. He's star for attention. Thank you, Scott. Good job. Um, I also want to add on to that and I am sorry and I'm thankful that everyone came out
to speak and I know some um had spoken at least to me prior to this meeting also and it takes effort to do that. So, I appreciate that and I'd love to see more voices coming up on this topic and any topics as we go forward. So, I just want to thank everybody that came and and spoke tonight um or other ways.
Thank you for that. I also um believe it's important. I feel that because people came to speak to me, there were certain things that I didn't even know about. And I think this committee will attest that I read everything just up here. So, but there
were certain parts of it like the certified letter part, things like that that I didn't even know was occurring. Um and I was a little disappointed in that. So, I would like to identify, you know, not right here, but how we navigate better communication um across the board because some of this probably could have been prevented ahead
of time. So, that's something that I will work on and these guys know. I will work on it because it goes on my little iPad list and then I just keep asking ignore it and you'll ignore it and I'll keep asking. All right. Well, then thank you everybody for coming. This is how things are supposed to work. We're going
to refer this to the planning board. they'll probably get it back to us hopefully before the next meeting and we'll have some better news for everybody. So, thank you all for coming. Thank you for your input. Thank you for being prepared and having a normal conversation. Everybody got along well, so that's how it's supposed to work. So,
if you want to stay for the rest, be my guest. Otherwise, you're excused. Thank you. No, no, you're welcome. No. Can I go too? We'll be quick. I hope. Take me with you. All right. you.
You too. Thank you. Oh, okay. All right. That's fine. All right. Moving along. Here we go. You ready, Megan? Ordinance 568-25. Yes.
Yes. Ignored for now. Yes. Nothing. You're not going to get any summons issued. You're okay. Thank you for asking. All right. Pone. Get Pone out, please.
Pepe, get him out, please. Thank you. With his back to us. All right. All right. We're getting back to the agenda because I got stuff to do. All right. Ordinance 568-25. First reading, introduction, amending chapter 17 of fire prevention. Jack used to explain that to us briefly. Yeah, Don
Yuber, our fire official, just cleaned up the ordinance with some language changes. Okay, so uh I ask for a motion to move this for a So move, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. Second. Second, Madame Clerk. Committeeman Lavender. Yes. Committeewoman Riker Align. Yes.
Committee Verza. Yes. Deputy Mayor Persia. Yes. Mayor, yes. Next. 565-25. Second reading for adoption. This is an example of something we sent to the planning board for revision and it came back. Correct. I Oh, they submitted uh they submitted a letter to
the uh municipal clerk. Uh dear Miss Phillips and township committee in accordance with section 171.8F of the township ordinance. The planning board has reviewed the proposed ordinances 565-25 and
566-25 and voted at the April 8th, 2024 meeting that they are not inconsistent with the master plan. All right. So, Jack, so anything for Should we have a public hearing? I'm going to open the meeting to the public. Anybody wants to speak about the fence ordinance, come on
up. Hey, Matt. Yes. Can I make a comment? Yeah, go ahead. And really, it's on behalf of the planning board. Yeah, that's fine. And so there was one catch last night. It doesn't change this letter. Uh and it has to do with the
pool fences, which is um D3. Private residential swimming pool shall be constructed surrounded by a fence at least 54 in in height, but no more than 6 feet in height with the self-latching gate. What they want to do
is to substitute in in conformance with the universal con universal construction code the UCCC uniform right which is a state thing so that we're not freewheing on our own and potentially in conflict with that. No, I think for liability
issues you have to be consistent with the UCCC otherwise something happens. So we're taking out the specific references to 54 in and 6 feet. Correct. So, we're just saying a private residential swimming pool should be surrounded by a fence that conforms to the uniform construction code. Yeah. Okay. With a
self-latching gate. With a self-latching gate. I I think we can make that change on the fly tonight. Yep. Okay. Good. Yeah, because UCC has those height requirements in place right now. All right. So, it's changed currently. So, we don't, but if UCC does, we're still in
compliance. Absolutely. Makes sense. All right. Anybody from the public want to speak on this exciting topic? Can we make Can we Can we uh make a request that if the planning board does have a edit to the ordinances that are going
for master plan consistency review that it's included in the letters that come back to us just so we have that everyone has visibility on it prior to the township committee meeting and and quite honestly it should nothing against you Mr. Lavender, but uh you know, you're only one member of the planning board.
Yeah. So, it it should come from either the attorney or the secretary to the board. So, just for future reference, we we talked about this with Steve yesterday and he recommended this path. Tom is here. He can talk to it as well if he wants. No, I don't. No need, Tom.
We believe that that's accurate. Not a controversial change. No. Um, anybody from the public want to speak on the fence ordinance? No. Anybody online? Anybody on Zoom would like to make a public comment, please raise your hand. I don't see anyone. Motion to approve ordinance 565-25. Second reading.
Second. Committee Lavender. Yes. Committeewoman Reker. Yes. Committee Blesa. Yes. Mayor Mayor. Yes. All right. Next. 566-25. Second reading for adoption. Uh change the land use ordinance regarding ground and wall signs pertaining to
residential home office uses. Uh, let's see. The township committee received the ordinance from the planning board, went back to plan for master plan consistency review, and I assume that they're cool with it. Or can I ask Jack what was tweaked again? The size of the size for
home offices. I think it went from four or eight square feet to four square feet, I think. Okay. That's the max though, right? Yeah. Okay. All right. And and Scott, obviously the planning board talked about this at some point in time. Yep. Okay. All right. So, this originated from the community from the
appointment. That's correct. So, anybody in the public wants to comment about the new residential sign uses? Anybody online? Anybody on Zoom would like to make a public comment, please raise your hand now. Don't see anyone there. Motion to approve
ordinance 566-25. Second reading. Second. Just just before you vote. It's reducing four square feet to two square feet. Okay. So, what? Say that again, Jack. It's reducing it from four square feet. I thought it was four. That's what confused me. All right. No, I knew when I said it I was wrong. All right. Committeeman Lavender. Yes.
Committeewoman Riker Align. Yes. Committeeman Verza. Yes. Deputy Mayor Sergey. Mayor Dorsy. Yes. And the final one is ordinance 567-25 limiting the position of public safety director and amending the code uh the administrative code. Anybody in the
public want to discuss this? No. Online. Anybody on Zoom would like to make a public comment? Please raise your hand. Now we don't see anyone. Mayor motion to approve ordinance 567-25 second reading. Second. Like the efficiency. Committee Lavender. Yes. Committeewoman Riker Eline. Yes.
Committee member. Yes. Deputy Mayor Purchia. Yes. All right. Consent agenda resolutions. Anybody have anything in here that they need to abstain from or want to discuss? Uh is this on the agenda, Megan? Well, we need to add a banner approval for the mental health
awareness month for May. Okay. It's 25-127. We're adding to have a banner hung basically where the the um state fair one is hung right now. Correct. Got it. All right. Aside from that, we're good to go. So, can I have a res motion
to pass these uh whatever 10 items to 127. So, moved as Megan stated. Second. Uh is anybody recusing themselves from I am because Yeah. Yes. for my mental health. No, I'm I'm um involved in helping to
get that through. So, no, I cannot I'm not going to vote for resolution 127. Right. Deputy Mayor Peria, you moved it. Second. Committeeman Lavender. Yes. Committee Riker Align. Abstaining. We're not
obaining. That's the one, but everything else correct. Sorry. So, yes. Yep. Commission. Yes. Deputy Mayor Purch. Yes. Mayor Dorsey. Yes. All right. Now, we have committee reports. We'll start on the right this time because they have usually less to say. Scott, you got
anything? Yeah, I'll give something uh from Board of Health. Um there is going to be a diabetes prevention and detection management um presentation Monday, May 12th at 5:40 p.m. at the Bernard's Township Library at 32 South
Maple Avenue, Basking Ridge. uh Silpa Gad Gadiraju MD an endocrinologist from Summit Health is going to provide an informative uh session focused on understanding diabetes uh what it is who's at risk and how to take control.
Uh you'll learn about key risk factors, practical prevention strategies, early detection methods, and effective uh ways to manage the condition. There's a flyer that's going to be up on the website uh in our uh board of health uh section. You can
go there and register. Uh but I would encourage anybody who has an interest in this. Uh it's probably one of the biggest health crises in the in the country. And thank you for mentioning the website. Sorry, just to jump in because I think the our website links to all of these different offerings like
the one that um Scott mentioned and there's a bunch of others that are on there. So, I really would advise or offer um to the community to take advantage of all the different offerings that are out there for free. Like there are some teen mental health um seminars that are coming up also as we go into
May. So, lots of things to take advantage of and they're all on the website. So, which is a nice easy tool. So, thank you. All right, I'll pass the ball to the left to my office. I know you have a bunch of announcements that you'll go. So, if you miss any, I'll I'll join in later. So, back to you, Mr.
Mayor. All right, Aubrey, go. All right, so I'll do the library. Are we going to do SLI? Okay, I just want to make sure we're catching up here. Great picture. Library is looking forward to lots of fun in the weeks ahead. We will be out of the building with books and talks at Millington School, Lounsbury Meadow, and WHS. Is
that Watching Hills? So, watching Hills Regional High School. I was like, "Yeah, well, no, I know that, but it wasn't spelled like that on here, and I was like, is this something different I should learn about as a committee member?" Got it clear. Please find here the adult schedule for the week. Kids continue to have a story time every morning at 10:30 a.m. and either an art
or a science project each afternoon at 4 pm. Excellent. We show movies every week. Wednesday at 2 pm, Thursday at 1 p.m. for adults. This week, we also have a family movie showing on Tuesday evening. I guess that's the week coming up. This Friday, the library is celebrating 20 years at the in the
Valley Road location, which is super exciting. So, this Friday, April 25th, 5:00 p.m., cake and games. And Saturday, April 26, the Hickory Tree concert at 11:30 and cupcake decorating will be happening. And everyone is welcome to celebrate. The historical society has provided some photos and documents and
we hope to celebrate all who had the foresight to create and support our great space. Super exciting. Tomorrow we have a number of things going on. A representative from New Jersey Division of Taxation will be talking about a new combined filing option for seniors. We have an adult art
class at 3:45. On Zoom, we have an author talk, a New Jersey Civil War talk, and a program from the Paint Diva about interior paint choices. Register online for Zoom links, and feel free to walk in on in-person events. Next Tuesday, April 29th, we have an
in-person talk about New Jersey owls. All are welcome. No registration is needed. And we have had this naturalist before, and he is informative and engaging. So, very exciting. And as we turn the page into May, they're also going to have a special section since I just learned about this on mental health
um books for kids and adults. So going with that theme as we start. Thank you. Thank you. Vic. All right. Our April 23rd wreck update is as follows. Saturday, April 19th, we held
our annual spring egg hunt. This is our largest event and the weather was perfect to find several thousand eggs. Thank you to our recreation advisory committee, local Girl Scout troops who helped before the event and during the event, the Longheld Chamber of Commerce,
LNB Audio, our DPW, LHFAS, and LHPD. LHTV was on site and both their video of the event and Charles Aent Arenttowitz's photos from the event are linked to our
website under community/photo albums. Please check it out. Tuesday was the official Earth Day, but we always like to say make every day Earth Day. Let's keep Oscar the Grouch
at bay. Please pick up your trash. Slide three. Don't forget to register for our car care ed class on Saturday, May 17th at 10:30 a.m. at the town hall parking lot. Learn some car basics from a licensed mechanic so you you are
prepared for the road so you are prepared on the road for life's curve balls. Registration is on community pass and the cost is $45. Registration on it. It was
illegal. It was my joke, man. Registration is open on Community Pass for Sterling Lake. Registration by 5:31 for early bird pricing. Pricing goes up on June 1st. Sterling Lake opens on Saturday, May
24th. Red Cross classes will be held in May. Get registered now because these classes will not be offered again until the [Applause] fall. May 14th is first aid. May 22nd is
CPR/ AED. Register on community pass. The cost is $35 per participant. Sterling Lake Dance open to Long Hill residents in grades five through seven. $5 at the gate registration fee plus must have signed
permission slip. We need chaperones. Please call us if you can help. We should all chap. I'm good with it. I've done it before. Could be a group bonding. Slide number seven. Click, click, click. Snap those photos
of what spring and long looks like to you and send them in. Free entry in the for Long Hill residents into our photography contest. Winners will be announced in June. Register by 5:31 for summer camps.
And don't miss out on all the fun. And finally, slides 9 and 10. If you'd like to join our recreation advisory committee, please contact us. We are always looking for new members. Remember to keep our parks clean and
while visiting our parks, take nothing but pictures, kill nothing but time, and leave behind nothing but footprints. And that concludes my recreation update. Thank you. Well done. Thank you. All right. Administrator report.
Yeah, Mayor. Um, a couple things uh that are going on in town. Um, everybody sitting, everybody prepared. uh work on Northfield uh Avenue started this week. Uh there will be about two to three weeks of of con
what they call concrete and and curving work. Um and we're going to be working uh with the police department, the school uh for the date for the milling and paving, but everything should be wrapped up uh during the month of May. That's big news. Um we have uh several
other projects going on but with New Jersey American Water which everybody is aware of. Uh they are in areas of uh that they needed D permitting. They it took them a while to get the D permitting. They finally have it. So
they are working in the easements in various locations of the town. Uh doing the uh cleaning then um sending cameras through the pipes and doing either repairs or slip lining of the sewer lines. Uh so that work is ongoing. Uh we
have uh several grants that we're uh working with. Um we the Morris County Preservation uh Trust that we applied for a grant uh to do repairs on the old schoolhouse. Uh we have a site visit on
Tuesday, May 20th and a presentation date on June 9th, which I and the architects will be at up in Morristown. Uh we also are working with as you guys are aware working with the grant for the
trails at Central Park. Um so that's that's uh being worked on. We also have a grant through the county for the CDBG for a senior uh bus replacement of our old bus and uh that's in in constantly
in need of repairs. So um we're hoping to get uh some some of those grants. So that's it, ma'am. All right. Then under discussion, this is probably going to go right back. Discussion. It's going to right back to you. Um there's an update on the security New Jersey Transit
security cameras. Yeah, we do have to talk to New Jersey Transit. Uh but uh I was out there with uh officer uh Langbach and and um uh somebody from um our camera company um AVS Technologies.
They gave us a quote back. I'm going through it right now. I just got it this week. Um, but doing all the lots, um, having cameras on the platforms where they can see, uh, 360 degrees, uh, having access not only to our police
headquarters, but to New Jersey Transit. Um, and and the the, um, golden package, if you will, is is pricey. It's it's around $90,000. Um, we're still going I'm still going through it to see where uh you know where everything is and how
the pricing is coming in. Um, however, I will say this uh by by putting cameras that view the platforms, we would be eligible for some grants from Homeland Security. So, we're going to pursue those also. Okay. Uh, so, you know, we'll we're going to make the best of
this. Um, and I think uh I think we can make um our commuters in every parking lot uh much safer and and have camera coverage in all three parking lots and the platforms, which is key. Thank you
very much. All right. Any old or new business anybody wants to discuss? Seeing none. I want Well, I wanted to Sorry. I wanted to bring up and it kind of goes with the discussions that we've been having is um a suggestion and um
Jack can be better about probably the specifics of it is before we bring an ordinance up that in the meetings before that happens that we have an o an open discussion where members of the public can come and offer ideas or suggestions or input or comments prior to it going
to ordinance form kind of I'm probably not doing a very good job of explaining how it used to be um but I thought that was a suggestion that would leave it more like open for ideas and suggestions and call outs prior to us creating an ordinance. Give us an example.
Well, no, I I I do agree. I mean, certain ordinances have a time factor that they have to be adopted quickly. But I think in most cases it would be better if we schedule an ordinance for discussion and then don't introduce it until the following meeting. I I think that would cut out a lot of the
amendments. people would know ahead of time. discussion is what we're doing uh what we're looking everyone would understand it before it's introduced so I think and and the background and the right so there would be a discussion then it would be on the first reading and then second discussion on the second right and and I would have a draft ready
for the discussion so and that would be for everything or just certain things and it's not necessar like it's yes it's a discussion but it's also to to to garner ideas or different angles that we might not be thinking about or why this is proposed or things like that to kind of troubleshoot it ahead of going into do a full-blown ordinance. I I guess
some ordinances are so routine we wouldn't need to do that. But and as I said, other ordinances have time is of the essence, you know, we couldn't do that. And tonight was a good example, I think. Yes. Yes, I agree with you. That could have been done 40 years ago. So, so if that's okay with all of you, you
know, when I submit ordinances in the future to Megan, I'll ask it just be put on for discussion for that meeting. I don't care. Can I ask a question? Yes. Who makes the determination if it's timesensitive or not? Is it the mayor during agenda review? Well, what we could do is put it on for discussion and
possible introduction. I'm sorry. We could we could put it on for discussion and possible introduction. I mean, however, that we had the one that was with the the housing from January. We didn't have time to do that because that had to be Didn't you have to have something submitted by January 31st? Yes. But I like what you just said. So, we we could
discuss it. Yes. If for any reason it appears we need to carry it we need to carry it to to a uh uh introduction we can just uh move it to the next meeting. Right. Okay. Most ordinances Aubrey won't will probably end up exactly like
Jack said discuss not it'll go first reading that night but but a lot of them if they have any substance or any changes and in fairness one of one of the nuances that changed and I honestly don't know when it changed. We used to have uh open public uh comments after first after intro first first reading
right I'm even saying before it's even intro like if it's a topic we have to go you know whatever it is that we're about to you know I I think it would be better to have that public discussion the meeting before intro. Yeah because intro is really just an administrative thing
to publish when the public hearing is going to be. I got you. All right. The the goal of that is again just to have make sure all viewpoints are considered and then build it and I'll be more comfortable knowing you
know what's in the ordinance before you introduce it. Yes, please. All right. So, we can try that going forward. All right. Next, uh announcements. Let's see. This Friday, 20 year anniversary party for the library being in this building 5:00 open to everybody. I think
Aubrey addressed it. They're going to have some entertainment, buy some food. It's going to be a good time. Next Saturday, senior white elephant sale Saturday at the senior center from 9:00 to 3. Go down there and check it out. The Sterling Street Fair is Sunday. Busy weekend, 10 to 5 on Main Avenue in
Sterling. May 10th, the Sterling Elks Craft Day, 10 to 3. The Friends of the Library Shredded Day, May 10th, 10:00 a.m. Right out here. Memorial Day parade on Memorial Day at 9:30 a.m. We have the Millington Sterling wet down of the new
trucks on May 31st. And uh if you need mulch, you want mulch, call DPW to set up a delivery. Any other announcements? I have one. Go ahead. Boy Scout flower sale 256 is having their annual flower sale uh May 2nd, 3rd, and 4th at the
Valley Mall. Look for the tents. A lot of hanging baskets, a lot of uh uh annuals, perennials, you name it, they got it. And the pricing is really good. Very, very good. And get there early because the stuff goes quick. Get there
early because the stuff goes high. Amazing. Great. So that would be uh Friday, Saturday, Sunday next week. But I assure you, if you get there on Friday, you'll have the you'll have the good pickings. All right. And just one one shout out to the police department,
PBA 322. They had their 27th 27th fishing derby. They had it already, but I just want to thank them. Uh it was a nice turnout. Matt, you were there. I was there. A lot of people there. A lot of people were there. And and also our condolences to the Gallow family. Correct. Absolutely. One other thing
that people probably didn't realize, there was a death in town this week of a woman 110 years old lived on Essex Street. Nobody even knew she was there. Maria Rick Ricky lived on Essex Street. I right around the corner. 110. She was going to be 111 like in a very recently
and she up until she passed away she was still mentally with it. So we had somebody sitting in town could probably one of the oldest people alive in the state or the country and nobody even knew about it. So I send my condolences to family but Miss Ricky congratulations. God bless you. Say something about that water and lower
sterling put put in a good word for us up there. Yeah I'll see you in 60 years. Did you have a commercial vehicle? Oh she had her driver's in the back. All right. Now, anybody have any comments, questions for the committee? Come on up, sir. Three
minutes. Thank you for waiting. Thank you. Uh Scott Zerolo, Dy Avenue for Vic. I got a good question for you and no one else. You said several people brought it to your attention about vehicles parked commercial vehicles. Where are they? Did
they all die or disappear? There's not one person in No, there's not one person in the room that opposed it. You said several people. Not one. You said you didn't say if it was a man or lady, but several people brought it to your attention and that's came here to oppose it. Where are they? Over the years, it is not uncommon for me to hear that as a
complaint, especially over the past six, then I've been on the township committee. No, no, no. I understand. But where are they? If you have a complaint, I if I was going to complain, right, I'd come here and show up and say, "Hey, listen to the town. What's your opinion?" Everybody in the room was here for it. not one of these people that you
said brought to your attention, but that doesn't but I I understand what you're saying, but I don't think that necessarily means that they're not they don't want to see, you know, you got Milton, Gillette, Myersville, not one person in the entire town along Hill, thousands of people came up to oppose
it. But one you said, you said not any other committee member here said it. You said several people and you should give those people's names to each one of these committee members. Let them know where are they? Are you trying to infer that I'm making it up or No, not at all. No, but maybe maybe how do you know someone All right, hypothetically I'm a
contractor and I have my own yard. I got money hypothetically and I'm going to put my competition out of business and they park their trucks there. Hey Vic, this guy parks his commercial vehicles there. You go to town, you get them thrown out, boom, I'm just saying hypothetically, but if I was going to make a ma'am, if
you have a complaint, if you're do something, you come here, I would show my face. If I have a disagreement about anything, if anything in the world, I would at least show my face and say voice. No one did it. You said it to everybody and not one person in the town showed up. Another thing is I don't believe that I don't believe that people
other than the people that got the summones or you know like the notices rather not the notice were aware of it. It's on the long hill website. People know about it. I knew about it. I didn't receive a notice and I knew about it. Everybody Millington, Sterling, Gillette, Myersville, four towns knew
about it. Maybe we'll do a mass thing around town to get everybody's opinion and then we can get them. No, but I mean they you're the only one that said they they didn't call any other committee member. They brought it to you. So, I mean, you must know these people. I do. Where are they? But I think you might know something. Where are they? I know, but where are they? It's not raining or
snowing outside. I don't see any of them. But anyway, it would be an interest mayor. Would it be simple? You do Berkeley Heights and New Providence. Other towns have it. I That's not us. But you put one commercial vehicle, GVW, 17,000 lbs max. So, there's no CDL.
Can't be a dump truck in your driveway. Problem solved. I I actually think that tonight was extremely helpful. I think everybody I heard what you said and you're right. You said you didn't like your for the idea. You didn't want multiple vehicles in a in a truck. It was fine. But I was just curious that people came to me. If I were you, I'd be
mad at these people. Hey, I got your back. I brought it to the committee. Not one of them even showed up. That doesn't that doesn't sound right. Just to let you know. It doesn't sound makes you look bad. It does. If I complain to I don't feel bad but if I you sir if I complained to you if I complained to you
I personally would come at least show up and have the respect to show it to you as a class moral person I would I'll be honest with you I didn't for me I would do that for you just and I hear you and I understand where you're coming but I didn't call anybody I don't have a lot of people these people's phone numbers
so it wasn't like hey you know you have your chance on town they called you you have your you have a chance to you know come voice your concern turns. But thank you. But the 17,000 lbs that's it eliminates dump trucks, CDL, tractor trailers, wouldn't one just one vehicle
in your driveway. It's basically would be vans or pickups. No harm. Agreed. And I don't think I just feel bad that those people brought to they didn't even have the class to show up in open court when everybody else did. Thank you. All right. No, thank you for the weight class. We'll consider that. Thank you
for coming, sir. Anybody else? Mr. Break. Oh. Oh, it's not me. I thought it was me. Come on up, sir. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, Council. Thank you for everything you guys do. Chris Porter, 344 Morris Street, Sterling. 16
years ago, I moved in town with my beautiful wife over there, Joanna Florio, or Porter now. Um, you guys put together a beautifification committee, didn't you, to beautify the town? Okay. going
forward. You're trying to do that, correct? Absolutely. All right. You just recently within the past couple years got a grant writer for the town, right? Starting to get grants and everything like that. Okay. Very good.
My street was paved two years ago. All right. Thank you very much. Curbing was not put in. Okay. You have a street fair coming up this weekend. Multiple of my neighbors parked their trucks in their front yard of their
properties, okay, up and down my street. One neighbor pave from property line to property line. Now, what I think the problem is here that you have officials, zoning officers, and so forth that are not 100% doing their job. Okay? They're
not driving the municipality. They're waiting for phone calls to come in. are not seeing the eyes around the community and everything like that. I'm not here to go against anybody in the community, but we all invest into the community. I invested into the community. I invested
into my property. We raised our children here and I pay a lot in taxes. When I came here, I was 5,900. I'm close to 14,000. Okay? And you have a street fair coming. You lost over 350 feet of parking on my street alone for that
street fair. Is that fair to me? Is that fair to other residents because people are using the front of their property as parking lots for that one event though? Right. No, not for that one event. Every single day that they come home, they park their properties in their front yard. Now, if your neighbor across the
street from you, not put it on their grass, they took stone and ashall and everything like that and paved their front yard. Is that legal? I don't know. But if they paved my street and they put Belgium block in, every property has to have a drop curve. I believe it's 12 to
15 feet of a drop curve to enter their property. For the record, I requested that the Belgian block be put in those years ago. But they didn't do it because I couldn't afford it. Okay. It works out to be $8 a month, $15 a month a household. There's roughly 1,600 window
feet of Belgian block that would had to have got installed on my property. If you factored in $30 a foot, which is a little high, you're probably around 45 to 50,000. Over 15 years, that's about $18 a month a household to do Belgian
Bach and you're supposed to be putting a beautifification committee together to beautify the neighborhood. I think going forward when you do projects you need to think and do the projects 100% just like if you would on your own household or I would on mine. That would solve a lot of
the problem of people parking in their front yard. It's not just on my street. It's all on the wall we're barreling of the of uh of u you know sterling and parts of mill and I I think in the near future we're going to address it. Just
I'm just bringing up another thing that you say the ordinances are over 30 40 years old. Why don't you bring up that every 3 years you have to go through the ordinances and make sure to up to compliant for doing that as the things change. I've been a work I've been a
workingass guy my entire life. Okay. I've been in construction. I have a van. I beautified my neighborhood. My van's parked behind my house just like the one gentleman that was a pesticide guy. He invested in bushes, everything. I'm not here. I help my neighbors out. I do
everything. I'm not here to hurt nobody. But if this topic is going to go forward, I'm just bringing some concerns to you. One, if you're going to redo streets, think about edging the streets. Belgium block lasts for 60, 70, 100 years. We did it on Oaks Road. Okay.
Did it on Oak. We should do it. That'll solve a lot of people parking in their So, I want to make sure on on Mars when when you count Mars, right? We redid it three years ago, right? Two years ago, right? Two, three years ago when it was paved. We We didn't put Belgian block
in. Correct. And I don't know why I was told it wasn't feasible at the time, but now you got a grant writer. And I pushed for a grant writer. I came to town and I pushed for a grant writer. I said, "You guys really thinking about doing this? You have a park going across the street? I've been here 16 years. We haven't even
touched the flooding yet in this town. We haven't even talked about that. We haven't even tried to rectify a little bit, nothing. We just keep kicking the can. Listen, I come from the whole community, one mile by three mile. I dealt with the Snake River my whole life. When I moved down here, my mother
said, "How is it?" I said, "It's like I never left, Mom. I got River. I got Main Street. I got a shop right that she did 30 years with." And your town was Pake and I grew up in P. We wanted to make you feel at home. So, exactly. So, I'm not Listen, I understand. I appreciate
everything you do, your time, your volunteer, your time, everything. I volunteered 12 years on the fire department, my family, everything. So, I get it. But we need to put a little more thought and we need to get our people that are representing you guys, the
officials, out on the street and start driving around instead of waiting for I wasn't laughing at what you said, but you just said you run the fire company for for 12 years. Nothing to the Sterling is definitely going to be calling you. My family did over a hundred years of volunteer tour.
All right. But I just want to thank you all for your time. But thank you. If you're gonna think about the commercial, think about people parking in the front of your property. Yeah. I think I think we can refer that to the planning board along with the commercial. The chairman of the planning board's right there. I'm sure he took them out. I think there might have been some discussions about
that already. No, there have been. All right. Anybody else from the public? Wouldn't be a meeting without you coming up. No, I wasn't here. I know you're not getting six minutes. Do I get six? No. Okay, I This is not going to take long.
Charles Rena with Millington. Early in the meeting, we had requested more voices, more input. Not only this meeting, but in prior meetings. One of these opportunities for more input was eliminated years back by the
planning board who at the leadership at the time. I'm going to ask for your help and reinstituting a period of public discussion and public comment at the
planning board meetings that had been eliminated. When I served on the planning board for three and a half to four years, we had public comment open period of public comment at the end of the meeting. I would encourage you to get the current
planning board to adopt this and reinstate that policy. Chuck, can I just ask Jack to answer that question? My understanding is, and I was on the planning board forever, I I don't think this committee has any authority to dictate to the planning board. We we
can't force them to have a public right session. We can maybe mention it and the chair is here and we have a planning board member here. They've heard you. Well, could you could you recommend it to them? I you you appoint some of the members to the planning board, do you not? Yes. So, can you recommend that we
reinstitute a period for public comment so you can hear more voices in this town as Aubrey would like to hear and others? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks, Jeff. Anybody online? Anybody on Zoom would like to make a public comment, please raise your hand
now. I don't see anyone there. Thank you. I will move to return into exact session with no further action. Correct. Possible further. Possible. All right. So move that I'm not Thank you. All in favor. Thank you everybody. Have a great week. Correct. Matt, we have to we have
to do that because we never know what all these five people will do. Guy guy. Oh, sorry. The township committee is taking no further action at the
423 2025 township committee meeting. It is 9:22. Thanks. Good night.