this meeting is being conducted in compliance with the open public meetings act adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by advertisement in the cape M star and wave on the township website and posted on the bulle boards of township hall we request anyone wishing wishing to address Council
please wait for the mayor to recognize you please state your name and address for the record and please remember all comments must be kept to three minutes or less thank you please stand for pledge of ladance a moment of silence to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for it
stands one nation God indivisible all roll call please council member Conrad here council member Wham here council member Roy here Deputy Mayor here mayor s here okay we're going
to move down to the work session resolution number 202- one05 this is the introduction of the 2025 budget all right thank you we ask Mr lafy to please present the budget message to council uh thank you mayor I'm just going to read a
document that I have here mayor and Council have received copies of the proposed Municipal budget for 2025 the local tax rate will have an increase of 1.2 cents we were able to cut the increase down from 2.2 cents due to the
following factors our tax assessor office worked highly to increase our valuation by almost 36 million we were able to anticipate greater revenues in our occupancy tax and we added a new revenue for local taxes on cannabis
sales the biggest spending increase in this budget is salaries and wages we settled four Union contracts in 2024 so this budget is the First full year with negotiated increases moving forward this spending line will be more more level
Township completed 2024 with a surplus of 9.4 million our second highest year end fund balance of that balance 4.5 million is being applied to this year's budget these totals fall well within the
parameters of our fun balanced policy and projection show that Surplus will be replenished that year end the tax collection rate for 2024 was 99% this collection rate added almost 1.4 million to the Surplus while other
revenues contributed almost 2 million one cent on the tax rate equals $377,900 75% we're below the levy cap by $264,600 thank you Mr lafy at this time I'd like to ask Leon who's the township auditor
and Lauren the CFO to please uh provide your input sure thank you so as stated tonight's the introduction of the budget which means that we're really starting the process even though it's been going on now for four months so the this officially starts the process on April
7th is when we have the public hearing which about to address any comments from the public if there are any comments um one important factor in this one is that not only are just about every expenditure increased all throughout New Jersey as you know it's like $25 for a
pizza now I mean it's just Inc incredible how much prices have gone up all across the board you lost if you look at your sheet five on the budget document it's an important piece that's in here that affected all New Jersey towns some more than
others right in the middle of the page there was on sheet five 153,00 3336 cents worth of Revenue last year if you're look at a 25 column it's zero because the government did not fund
that appropriation this year and it's tied to the energy receipts tax you got 1,4 you got 153,000 from this item if you saw on the paper maybe 10 days ago upper gets 600 $6 million in energy
receipts tax and had 650,000 that they're losing this year so that's a half a cent of your one and a half cent increas is loss of Revenue and everything else is going up and there's there's no question about it um you are a budget driven by people um you it's
how many people you have how much you pay them what benefits they get uh nothing's G down and if it was profitable to do what you do some other company would be doing it you're left with everything that's not profitable you have to provide all these services that company X won't do because you
can't make money on it so all in all it's a very sound budget you address the fund balance by decreasing the amount that you're using so that you're not creating a hole as like mentioned you'll replace what you're putting in there uh we feel very confident about that that's not a problem at all and you're going to
be one of the smaller tax increases tomorrow at 10 o'cl will be introduced North wild which is probably going to be twice years as far as a rate increase u i shouldn't say exactly what it's going to be because it's up to them to say that um but there's going to be some fours out there a lot of twos so you're
doing great and on the 7th we'll address anything that needs to be addressed from the public okay Lauren sorry um I just wanted to say again it's a group effort and I just wanted to thank all the department heads and the manager for all their input and for
having put this budget together and I do think it's a sound and responsible budget so yeah and I kind of echo your compliments to the the manager department heads and yourself as a CFO Leon's always there on speed dial I want to thank you uh as as
the manager mentioned we started with two and a half cents a little while you know maybe about maybe two months ago and we get it down to a Cent and a half 1.5 which is which is good and I agree with you everything's going up nothing's going down nothing you know on our agenda tonight we're going to be passing
resolution we're actually going to vot in a resolution to um uh push back on the ly Electric in rate increases at 177% with another eight or % in the pipeline you know it's ridiculous okay everything's going up but uh um good job with this I want to thank you anybody
from Council want to comment on this at all Lauren I know the hours you put in on this thank you I also want to put out the tax collector that is they don't get the recognition they deserve at 99% I
know all the Departments kick in but those two really Mike drives things but you I show up there you are I drive past think the tax collection percentage when I first started was in the high
eights 80s like 89 something 88 something every year been coming up even during Co she they kept that high all right thank you uh anybody from the public want to comment on this resolution even though we're only introducing in the budget this point
close the public portion is there a motion to move forward with this resolution motion second council member Conrad yes council member Wham yes council member Roy yes Deputy Mayor yes mayor yes ow I just
want to add one more thing the um the budgets will be available on our website tomorrow okay all right thank you we we'll take a two-minute break so you guys can exit the building thank you you when to hang out I got a game coach no see all right be safe Le thanks good luck
tonight [Music] thanks agenda uh anybody on Council want to comment on thec agenda no comment I I do want to kind of comment on two different items um one as I kind
of just mentioned there's a resolution on the agenda for 2025 d116 opposing link electric 17.3 23% increase uh that's pended right now uh you know I I don't know what they're doing up there but we have to push back
on this uh I'm hoping all Council approves this resolution tonight not not only we have a 17.23% increase right now they're applying for another 8% increase it's going to be considered in April 2025 that's the whole premise of this
resolution to push forward to oppose this uh rate increase and if you look at paragraph five the township Council hereby authorize the Township Clerk of L to S cop's resolution to the Congress from Van drew the governor of state of New Jersey New Jersey Board of Public
Utilities the office New Jersey legislative district one Senator Testa s Simonson and mclen so uh we ask the clerk if this is approved to make sure they gets forwarded those those address Hees please um the second one I want to
kind of just touch on it's thec agenda is the ordinance 20 25 that 09 that's addressing it's amending our ordinance when it comes to fees is actually addressing our summer camp uh we're projecting to have this summer and uh I want to thank the manager and the
recreation department for sitting down put this together they come up with the fees last week and after doing research throughout most of the towns in Kem County it looks like this will be the most affordable summer camp in Kate May County uh which I'm was happy to hear because we want to make sure as many
families as possible possible and get their kids in the camp um it'll be 98 hours a week 368 hours for 4 day for four we camp rather uh with a $10 per fee per day for drop off late pickup so uh good job with that uh we're going
to uh I won't get too far ahead of us here because the recreation depam is going to put some more guidance out pretty soon but the bottom line it's going to be an affordable camp for us maybe two camps this summer so that's all I have anybody from the public want to comment on the Cent agenda
I close the public portion approval of the minutes February 19th 2025 resolutions 20251 06 through 2025 1220 ordinance number 20258 and ordinance amending chapter 500 Property
Maintenance of the code of the township of loward to establish regulations for swimming pools and ordinance 20259 an ordinance amending chapter 475 Parks and Recreation areas Article 4 fees and reimbursements of the code of
the township of lower to enact registration fees associated with the Summer with the youth summer camp hosted by the lower Township Recreation Department this is the first reading of ordinances 20258 and 09 the second reading of
public hearings are scheduled for April 7th 2025 is there a motion Mo I'll make a motion a second a motion council member Conrad yes council member warham yes yes council member Roy yes Deputy Mayor yes mayor SE yes ordinance
number 20255 an ordinance amending chapter 583 streets and sidewalks article one excavation of streets of the code of the township of lower this is the second reading and public hearing of this ordinance this ordinance has been posted published and made available to the
public thank you any Council comments on this second read anybody from the public want to comment on this ordinance close the public portion I'll make a motion to move us forward second council member Conrad yes council member Wham yes council member Roy yes
Deputy Mayor yes mayor s yes Mr lefy you have a couple things you want to put out to the council uh yes yes mayor I'd like to try and uh discuss real quickly you know we're we're in the process of um working on our outfall project along Delware Bay and and
another one is um Beach raking that we kind of looked at as well so originally we were going to replace or uh extend 10 outfalls but because of the permitting that we uh applied for and uh it's good for 10 years we added 15 total outfalls
that may um even though all 15 don't have to be replaced we originally targeted 10 of those uh with five of them being the worst that we have to extend sooner than later um and as as money comes in we'll we'll do the others
as need it um but we secured the cafer permit but because of the uh the length of our extension at each outall we required a army US Army Corps approval as well and they've reached out to several other entities for approval as
well so it took a little little longer for us to get those approvals um we're almost at the finish line with that approval uh with the one being um I think we received we we received uh approval for
the ones that we wanted to replace uh but there was one particular outfall that had an emergency situation and that's at the Delaware Bay Pump Station that's near Ohio Avenue so we did get approval to extend that one sooner than
later um so we had some Dune damage because the outfall so blocked that uh it was back filling along the parallel to the Dune and was damaging the Dune so we got approval to do that we have a pre construction meeting this Thursday and
apparently that project will start as soon as March 10th um and then soon as we get final approvals for the others uh I think there's one more entity that has to approve that that's from section 103 and tribal approval which looks pacing
once that's approved we can start on the others and put them out to bid as well and those four that we're going to add sooner than later are the outfall at St John's Avenue Ocean Avenue Francis Avenue and Woodland Avenue they're the four that are the worst at this point
that we're going to extend sooner than later once we get that final approval which should happen very soon but nevertheless we will fix the one on uh U by the Delaware pump Delaware a Delaware Bay Pump Station uh starting next
week also um you know with the more people using our Delaware Bay beaches there's a lot of sea debris that comes up on those um areas in um typic particularly in the North End of uh villis uh from say Bayside Village all
the way down to Miami Avenue so there are areas uh we got approval uh with a modification request for our existing Beach maintenance permit from of the D to um rake certain areas of the beach as
long as we uh are outside of the beach restrictions for Environmental Protections and those areas that were allowed to rake at this Point are from Shadeland Avenue to Wildwood Avenue from Spruce Avenue to Ridgewood Avenue and from New York Avenue to Ocean Avenue
there are areas that we're able to rake uh at this point to try and get rid of some of the debris that kind of stacks up there and uh the tide usually doesn't bring that stuff out so we're going to clean it with some raking as well as um our clean communities project with volunteers and and staff to go in uh in
the other areas to try and um clean those beaches that were not able to race so we're going to uh start that relatively soon as well do you have any questions on that no I'm sure councilman comrad does CU that's W one territory yeah and I know
those areas CU they rope them off very early on the areas you can't get to State comes down and you want to clean it but you're not allowed there I uh I and and and this year we definitely took a beating with uh a lot of the high
winds that we have in the western winds have taken a real beating on our beach paths a lot of them there's several that are closed off right now and our public works department and Recreation Department will work very quickly when we think the right time is to go in there and restore those Beach paths as
soon as possible to get ready for the summer season we can work on them any time correct because they don't go down to the beach yeah okay and those areas that's we're going to rake is that's Township property not owned by the state so the areas not part of that yeah I
know there's a lot of private beaches down that way but it's a I think it's a good initiative uh on behalf of the manager and the Public Works to go down there and help make it a nicer place I I met with Gary Douglas today at Public Works to discuss the um the timeline and
getting ready for the the beach clean up okay good all right thank you we go to public comments anybody from the public want to come up to the microphone yes sir if you can go up to the microphone just give us your name and address for the record and well do have to say hello everyone uh
Paul will 704 Scott Avenue North Kate May and I just had a question is there a uh is there a volunteer website we can go on to help keep uh help keep the beaches clean uh you can contact our Recreation Department um and we also we also have a
grant program for our clean communities project we have several different Civic groups that would come and and and and do Beach cleanups in certain areas and we provide the equipment from Public Works gloves uh cleanup materials trash
bags and things like that so that's another Avenue you can take as a Civic group to to to come in there and we make a grant that Grant will also make a donation to that Civic group for their efforts as well see okay because there's me and there's several others that would really enjoy helping out great can you
double that number you can contact my office don't we don't we already have a date already established for the beats clean up I saw a date the the the healthy youth Coalition does a cleanup about a week before the escape the cape
and the date it's a week before that I I did see a date out there somewhere I think it might be May 31st you may be right but theyd see a date recently sat there ready though but always use the help sir thank you thank you now anybody else from the public want to
come up to council or deum address Council nobody going once sure going twice we'll close the public portion and we'll go to council comments we'll start with councilman Conrad I find it ironic that
we're doing a resolution opposing uh Atlantic City Electric's rate increase with the BPU as the state government is telling us to rely more and more on electricity for everything don't get me wrong I have solar at my house I have a hybrid
why are you going to sit there and say rely on this form of get rid of the gas get rid of this and raise the price of um you're electric my gas water heater saved me all kinds of money with my kids growing up and you have to put out what's there
what's best financially you have to do what's best for your family and in this case they just keep raising the electric up and up and up it's pushing people away but they want you to push away from gas and natural gas and everything else and wouldn't they try to lower the price
so people would try to go to it that's all I have for tonight emplo C some where no I just want to wish um our local high school teams playing in a state tournament game tonight against a nationally ranked team
I I want to wish him the best of luck and we have some uh resident students that go to w Catholic that they're also playing in a state tournament game and uh as some of you know as you go through high school it's going to be their last game that some of them may ever play so I just want to wish them the best very
good C Roy anything uh just to make note that the U bathrooms down there at Lincoln Boulevard they had been U graffitied pretty severely and uh I understand they've been cleaned through Township ever so good job on that um it's important we try to keep them clean
and presentable at all times so good job and Roland I want to comment on that I was uh out the um this past week and uh patrolman were out doing a good job asking for surveillance cameras and everything like that so it wasn't taken lightly they were going into businesses
and restaurants and they're actively uh still you know doing a good job following up on that so if I can add to that um councilman um our Public Works and Recreation Department uh did a good job of cleaning there but without a
doubt we have volunteers that just showed up unannounced unsolicited that came in there and worked getting them clean too and I wanted to just say hat off to the few volunteers that came in there to remove that greedy with some chemicals that we uh that they brought with them to to remove the graffiti so
it was a you know Cooperative effort between a group of a small group of volunteers and and and staff at lower Township wreck and Public Works they did good job thank you deputy mayor uh yeah uh councilman Roy
took my thunder there because I was going to mention the same thing but also I'll add to that is is there manager lafy is there a uh future uh is it in the future that we might have cameras there for so it doesn't happen again we had an issue with connectivity down
there with cameras and that's one of the areas we didn't put cameras at this point but with the the potential renovation at David Douglas Park that we're doing which is a a very big project that we're actually in the permitting phase right now um once we secure those permits we'll probably go
out to bid and start that project in light of that we would probably try and camer that entire area because that'll be a huge investment along the Bayfront um not only by lower Township and another grant that we got from Ada but the Open Spaces board uh had secur well
it's at least we think we're getting a a line share of that money from the Open Spaces board and the D drba is also pitching in for for reestablishing and and widening that road to go into the park as well so it's probably about a two-year project but we'll try and get
cameras up at that location as quickly as we can yeah I would expect that the Douglas Park you would definitely need some cameras there with with the new improvements going with the memorial and all that kind of stuff so um I was thinking that that would probably be the case too once you do that you'll probably do that once we get utilities
down there cuz right now we're very limited in utilities down at dougas Park but uh this project will definitely enhance the utilities that we have at the park and as well as along that road as we're going in can you reach out to Verizon few years ago I don't know how
many they came to a meeting and said they were going to put little boosters for their system throughout the township this might be a good place for them to start okay just an idea I don't they might not be doing it they may stopped but they were talking they came to a meeting to tell us all about it and
we had people hey can they do it for this I'm like it's their telephone polls they they're not going to give their competitor stuff but okay okay anything else just one thing to add I I on councilman warhams uh Co tells there
wishing the high school um basketball team good luck I wanted to congratulate and wish uh the wrestlers of lower Cap May um got a couple of them that advanced at State this week and uh our Chase Hansen won his third uh region
title and he's uh hopefully he'll uh win States this week so very good we've had him in here last couple years yep I just have a couple things one is that the township sponsoring a blood drive on March 25th from 10: to
300 p.m. right here at Town Hall uh also the Memorial School located behind us they have a preschool registrations now open if uh you want to look at registrations to visit the school behind us or call 6 9884
9430 uh and that's all I have is there a motion to adjourn motion second favor I thank you everybody for coming out hi Bill