##VIDEO ID:olxRfj0nHSU## e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e 5 chapter 231 Public Law 1975 this is to State for the record that adequate notice of this meeting has been provided to the public by posting and maintaining the annual notice of regular meetings on the bulletin board of the municipal building by mailing the annual notice of regular meetings for the year 2025 to the news record and Star Ledger in December of 2024 and by filing said notice in the office of the Township Clerk Mr daffis present Luca here Zangle here fman here mayor Adams here whereas chapter 231 public laws of 1975 commonly known as the open public meetings act requires at all meetings of public bodies be open to the public and whereas section 7A provides that the governing body has a discretion to permit prohibit or regulate the active participation of the public in any meeting and weire the governing body to comply with the provision this act same time to conductance business in an orderly and expeditious manner now therefore be resolved by the township committee Township mwood does hereby prohibit except to set forth in the formal agenda active participation in deliberations of the governing body by by the public except as otherwise ascribed by law those limit the public to the observations of the actions and discussions of the governing body at all of its regular and special meetings so moved second s daffis yes DeLuca yes fle yes Herman yes mayor Adams yes thank you please rise for salute to the flag I pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stand one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all good evening everyone and welcome to the January 21st meeting of the Maplewood Township committee tonight we have a promotion of a lieutenant so pretty soon the house will be empty after you're done so um once we're done with that presentation we'll move on to some reappointments in boards and committees including an appointment to the community new appointment to the community board on police for Ronnie Schwarz then we will have public comment for agenda items only then we will have an ordinance one two three ordinances on Final passage there are no introductions to ordinances tonight then we'll have reports from departments and then reports from elected officials in this order Committee Member daffis Committee Member Duca Committee Member Engel Deputy Mayor Herman and then my report we have several discussion items on for tonight uh we have a discussion item on the demographics of maplewoods boards and committees we have zoning changes in our commercial districts that Mr dafis will lead as part of code committee affordable housing fourth round obligation with Mr Duca will lead that site plan exempt code revision again Mr daffis and storm water utility credit policy which you've probably if you're paying attention you've been listening to us talk about for a while and then we'll have uh Mr warry uh for police off-duty rates after that we have the consent agenda um another public comment session on any topic and then we will adjourn so before we delay any further for the babies and children in the room we'll get moving so uh we have a resolution and um a swearing in to do um can I get a motion on Sebastian Alvarez Lieutenant promotion he I'm going to read the uh resolution in full yes go ahead resolution number 61-25 resolution appointing new police Lieutenant of Maplewood Police Department Sebastian Alvarez whereas a vacancy has occurred for the position of Lieutenant of the Maplewood police department and whereas Sebastian Alvarez has long served the Maplewood Police Department in many capacities and whereas Sebastian Alvarez possesses all the necessary qualifications to assume the duties of Lieutenant of the mwood police department now therefore be resolved by the township committee the township of mwood County of Essex state of New Jersey that effective January 21st Sebastian Alvarez be be and is hereby appointed as Lieutenant of the Maplewood Police Department can I get a motion Please Mr Duca I move the passage of this resolution 61-25 single I second that Mr daffis yes Mr DeLuca yes SLE yes M Herman yes mayor Adams yes congratulations get to Long we already met the junior Lieutenant earlier in Clos session so cute he's very smart he's yeah you put your hand on that unlike the last night who did not put his hand on anything well will govern does he have to sign something Miss britson might need both hands somebody hold the paper Lieutenant if you'd like to say a few words please do yeah right there hi um also want to thank the community of Maplewood as uh without them there'd be no reason to be here want to thank the administration of the police department and the Town Council for entrusting me with this position I also want to thank uh family that's guided me along the way uh members of the police department retired and current that have guided me along the way and uh just looking forward to settling into the role and doing the best I can and continuing to serve the the community thank thank you everyone's welcome to stay for the next two hours or you can go have fun somewhere they're like we're gonna go thanks anyway but we're gonna go did you get pictures did you want pictures oh okay oh sure e for yeah thank you right so cute there you go [Laughter] where's the party in case we get done early yeah [Laughter] really a you can take her anywhere she's so cute the girls are always more behaved than the boys no boys are simple they just want food and toys spoken like somebody who's never like well I have nieces and nephews so not the same not the [Laughter] same bless your heart bless your heart your heart I just think the girls are more evolved all right uh so we're gonna move on to boards and committees I don't want to interrupt give it a minute yeah you're not going to be able to hear anything are we gonna start with Community bom please I don't see her here I don't see Ronnie Ronnie's not here is she uh uh online she said she would she online right right um should we do the reappointments first or yeah it doesn't matter I just want to make sure she's on is is Ronnie Schwarz on the zoom yes okay no no no is the the appointment we're making to community board on police Ronnie Schwarz is she on Zoom watching okay uhuh we'll do her first and then we'll do the uh reappointments so you want to move her over deputy chief it's the chief the deputy chief yes and then the other Lieutenant that we last made yeah yeah it's okay you'll learn that yeah we don't either all right so when you have Miss Schwarz over you make her panelist you might want to tell her make sure she's paying attention we're reappointing Ronnie or appointing Ronnie yes mayor yeah okay so thank you mayor this evening we have a new appointment are we good we're good okay thank you mayor this evening we have a new appointment to the community board on police Maplewood resident Ronnie wartz who I believe has joined us online and we welcome her to say hello to us and to the public and to express her interest in serving the community in this important manner Ronnie hi hi everyone thank you so much for having me I'm sorry that I'm not able to be there in person this evening um I do look forward to um meeting all of the folks on the committee in person very soon um thank you for entrusting me um with this um appointment I am very much looking forward to serving the community and um and serving with uh the rest of the um Maplewood Community board on police um I've lived in town for 13 years and I spent my entire childhood growing up around police as both of my parents were in law enforcement um and I think are you able to hear me you're you're going in and out go ahead Ronnie okay hold on one sec is that not sure go ahead say something so we can see we can hear you okay okay um sorry that I'm not able to be there in person you can hear me now okay um I'm really looking forward to serving on the community board on police I'm not sure if you heard what I said a second ago I've lived in town for 13 years um and spent my entire entire childhood and um grew up with uh police because both of my parents were in law enforcement um and I've been very involved in the community the entire time I've lived here so I truly look forward to serving in this capacity and I appreciate um the appointment thank you very much um I think you would be an excellent member to our board and provide a unique perspective uh so with that I will move the uh appointment of Ronnie Schwarz on the community board on police for a term that would end um shoot I didn't do the math on this 27 27 I think or is it 28 27 okay 12312 7 right right I'll second it's up to you ncy seconds it second I just in here Mr daffis yes Mr DeLuca yes SLE yes Furman yes mayor Adams yes yes congratulations Ronnie and thank you for stepping up thank you very much congratulations thank you thank you stay warm all right now we're gonna move to some reappointments for some of our boards and committees and I'm going to start with Mr daas you had a couple I don't have the closed in front of me no worries mayor and thank you um I'm moving the reappointment of the following members uh from the Arts Council Serge espa Marcy Thompson Trisha tonale Brenda Presley and Catherine Porter okay do we need to vote on them yes okay second Mr daffis yes Mr DeLuca yes angle yes M her yes mayor Adams yes that's all you have Mr de um I actually have a couple more mayor and I promise that'll be it for my reappointments this evening uh I also move the reappointment of uh Robert also known as Bob Thompson our long-standing rent leveling board chair I'll second Mr daffis yes Luca yes SLE yes shman yes mayor Adams yes and lastly the reappointment of community board on police existing member Alexis carteron I move her reappointment second Mr daffis yes Luca yes angle yes yes mayor Adams yes all right when move to Deputy Mayor would you like to move yours I have some reappointments first for the recreation advisory committee I move to reappoint Dennis Kierney Brian Callahan and Michael lario I'll second Mr daffis yes Mr DeLuca yes SLE yes M Herman yes mayor Adams yes and then secondly for the pool advisory committee I move to reappoint three members Melissa reny Jennifer Coleman and Karen Harris I'll second Mr daffis yes Luca yes SLE yes M Herman yes mayor Adams yes do you have any others Noe no okay Miss angle you had for thank you yes I move to reappoint Robert McCoy to the environmental advisory committee second Mr daff yes mrca yes SLE yes M Herman yes mayor Adams yes did we cover all of them that's a lot no thank you all Oh I thought you had another one we were I same okay so now we move to public comment for agenda items only if anyone would like to speak to the township committee you're welcome to come up to the microphone and state your name and address you have three minutes to speak or if it's not agenda item you can come oh it isn't okay if you'd like to come up yeah so you don't have to wait I understand that I'm waving that for now yours enjoyed my time ction SCH there also very then first inv speaker first with nothing to do relen I to like yester you to and back no know okay we hear you and thank you for sharing those feelings the you know um I think if uh and I don't want to speak for my colleagues but I'm sure that wasn't intended by the organizers the Community Coalition on Race certainly and any of us who were in attendance um the speaker is from out of town came to speak was hired by the Community Coalition but we will definitely relay your your thoughts to the director of the Community Coalition I would suggest you write to them also so that I'm not speaking for you but I will let um them know that that that was heard and felt and I'm sorry you felt that way um as you know someone not of the Jewish faith I may not have heard it the way you heard it um but I did I I know exactly what you're talking about and um yeah and I'm sorry that that happened and that you felt that way because that's not it's certainly not the intention of a Day celebrating Martin Luther King Jr so um but I hear you and I would urge you to contact the Community Coalition and then I will also do the same just to follow up thank you thanks for coming out thanks Mr wary is there anyone online who would like to speak on agenda items there's any members of the public joining us via Zoom would like to speak on agenda items only please raise your hand sorry Miss pre I'm so used to saying mayor there are none none thank you all right we'll move on to um ordinances on Final passage um once yes mayor uh item number eight ordinance on Final passage Capital ordinance appropriating $176,000 from the general Capital CIF Capital Improvement fund to provide for rehabilitation of the sanitary sewer system on Maplewood Avenue between Highland place and Inwood place in and by the township of mwood County of Essex state of New Jersey Capital ordinance shall provide funding for the cleaning and select Rehabilitation of the sanity sanitary sewer system on Maplewood Avenue between Highland place and Inwood place this ordinance has been published copies posted on the bulletin board and mun municipal building and copies made available to the general public in accordance with the law is there anyone who would like to speak on this ordinance seeing no one in the house is there anyone online who would like to speak to this ordinance any members of the public joining us via Zoom if you have would like to speak regarding this ordinance please raise your hand I see none mayor thank you very much can I get a motion Mr Duca I move this ordinance be adopted as a whole and the clerk be directed to publish the same as a passed ordinance in the Maplewood South Orange News Record according to law a second Mr daus yes Mr DeLuca yes Miss angle yes Miss Herman yes mayor Adams yes next ordinance on Final uh yes mayor ordinance number 3140 d25 is ordinance to amend chapter 257 of the code of the township of Maplewood and titled vehicles and traffic with respect to 2hour parking on Raymond Terrace this ordinance will amend two-hour parking on Raymond Terrace between Milburn Avenue and the township border this ordinance has been published copies posted on the bulletin board in the municipal building and copies made available to the general public in accordance with the law can I get a motion Mr DeLuca you gonna do a hearing oh I forgot the hearing is there anyone on on Zoom who would like to speak to this any members of the public joining us via Zoom if you'd like to speak on this ordinance please raise your hand I see none me thank you Mr D I move this ordinance be adopted as a whole and the clerk be directed to publish the same as a passed ordinance in the Maplewood South Orange News Record according to law I second it Mr daffis yes Mr DeLuca yes Miss angle yes Herman yes mayor Adams yes thank you and the last ordinance on for final uh yes mayor ordinance 3141 d25 an ordinance amending ordinance 3138 d24 of the township of mwood establishing a storm water utility this ordinance will amend ordinance 31 38-24 of the township which established a storm water utility to lengthen the period of time in which a property owner May appeal a fee calculation this ordinance has been published copies posted on the bulletin board in the municipal building and copies made available to the general public in accordance with the law we open the hearing right now for this ordinance is there anyone on Zoom who would like to any members of the public joining us via Zoom if you'd like to speak on this ordinance please raise your hand I see none mayor thank you can I get a motion I move this ordinance be adopted as a whole and the clerk be directed to publish the same as a passed ordinance in the Maplewood South Orange News Record according to law second second Mr daffis yes Mr DeLuca yes Miss angle yes Herman yes mayor Adams yes thank you we have no ordinances on for introduction we'll have reports from departments Mr worry you yeah that's you thank you mayor last time I checked just uh two uh topics so the first regarding the cold weather that we're experiencing and is forecast to continue through the week the township um has uh engaged with our uh Consultants who reach out to homeless individuals and they are like they do all the time but with special attention this time on uh moving those individuals who are interested to uh warming shelters and to uh shelters generally and so they're out actually right right now um they're out tonight from 8:00 to 12:00 a.m. and again uh during the night on uh this coming Friday and so we'll be uh things specifically for that interest for anybody who's facing a heat related emergency they can contact our Police Department uh we can move them to the police department uh the courtroom in the public safety building as a temporary location and then we can open up a warming shelter if needed So for anybody who's experiencing a heat related emergency we um urge them to contact our Police Department's non-emergency number um and if you are if you know of anybody or or or if you see individuals who you think may need help you can also reach out to the non-emergency number the second topic is we have on the agenda tonight a few um can we make sure that that gets out on a SMS text or even a next we we have put out some prior we could put one out again tomorrow yeah absolutely and then uh the second is we have a few appointments of employees tonight so we have a technical assistant to the construction official Martha Banks who had served with us previously so we're excited to have her back uh fire inspector who is replacing a promotion that we have uh Steve zadco and a we have a need for temporary help in the finance department and one of our former employees has agreed to uh come back on a uh part-time temp basis so Carolina Rodriguez will be helping us in finance so we welcome those employees great that's all mayor thank you any questions for our administrators off nope okay Township attorney that's easy any questions for our legal nope okay Township Clerk oh I just one thing mayor uh an update on our uh 2025 commuter parking uh Jitney passes combos we began uh offering um those permits for December 15th uh we give a 3-week grace period and today was the end of the grace period so uh I'm assuming um you know most people have come in don't have to come in it's all done online now uh but enforcement has begun so um just uh give that information out here tonight to remind people okay dog thank you any questions for a clerk's office seeing none we'll move on to elected officials Mr Deus thanks mayor a couple quick items here uh from code there's a lot of activity and we'll uh wait till the discussion items to talk a little bit about some of that activity um from community board on police we're back we had our first meeting for the new year and I'm really pleased to report that I'll be working very closely with the board in reestablishing our restorative justice program uh which uh sort of fell apart after we lost a few volunteers including the person who was leading it and uh we think we're going to structure things a little bit differently this way this time around uh and in best practice models uh that we are looking at Across the Nation and right here in the county of Essex actually more on that soon I'm excited to also announce that we're moving closer to establish uh review guidelines for our use of force and IIA reviews and anou uh between uh the police department uh and the board in terms of uh data establishing some data benchmarks um so that we have reports that are automated and reg in a regular Cadence uh so that the board can more fulsomely report its activity um to the community in on a more regular basis and that will also in turn increase our community engagement which is uh something that we need to do with the board rent leveling board um tonight we reappointed our chair and we have a lot of work to do to rebuild this board uh we're not even sure how many units still apply under our rent leveling Ordinance one thing we are sure about is that it needs dusting off and revisions it's very old it's based on um old CPI um guidance that's the Consumer Price Index and again we're not even sure how many units are uh still under it and just a reminder for folks out there that it also does include our rent leveling ordinance does include a um a vacancy decontrol so that means that when someone passes on or moves out the unit is no longer controlled regulated so more on that as we rebuild and then lastly the Arts Council is excited to start um doing its magic in the new year uh they sort of lost some steam and their and their Direction when we lost our last arts and culture manager now we have a new one and they're excited to work alongside them and establish a very St strong sustainable uh relationship with our arts and culture manager uh and this evening um as you heard earlier we reappointed uh the majority of the board whose terms had expired that is my report mayor I'll take any questions okay so I don't have to ask anybody have any questions from Mr Baff except I just did great thank you Mr Duca thank you mayor I got five items uh black history months coming up next month and just want to tee up that on February 4th we'll do our Proclamation Township committee Proclamation um we have a a pretty robust program planned uh everything from fashion shows on Springfield Avenue to U uh a runway show at Columbia High School we have Duran heden um we have uh the Community Coalition on Race words bookstore uh and a bunch of things we we're doing music andart part uh we'll have um some of Justice will be doing uh their programs uh throughout the month so we will be getting uh we'll be kicking this off with a press release next week and our website our web page will be up for Black History Month 2025 uh the historic preservation commission it is uh you know our commission our municipality is a certified local go government Community which means that we're eligible for money money yes um so the way it works is that the state gets Federal money historic preservation money and 10% of that money has to go be given to local um certified local groups uh local government and um it's on an application basis and and the bottom line here is that our historic preservation commission would like to go for a grant so the process is they have to come before the township committee so we're planning when they come on February 3rd they're going to be making a presentation for their budget request because they made a budget request this year they will also be presenting to us um a short presentation on the grant request and asking for our authorization to do that so I just wanted to let you all know that first said no to an organization asking for a resolution to apply for a grant um you know what we may have we may have we certainly need we certainly want them to come and explain what they're asking right and maybe they needed a resolution from the governing body for the app it often is needed I just always wonder if any no yeah um I'm happy to announce on our agenda tonight on the consent agenda is 6525 resolution and that's the community host agreement with terce end so we'll be if we adopt that we'll be sending it to teras end for cross signatures with the mayor and get that uh moving I want to announce that this Saturday at 11:30 am at the Hilton branch of the library there will be lion dances as part of the lunar month um come out and see the lion dance at the Hilton Branch we'll miss that and lastly on Sunday at 11 o'clock uh I was asked uh just the other day by the ethical culture Society to speak on the election ironically 20 years ago I spoke on the election uh of George Bush over John kery and I'll be um talking again and the topic is agonize strategize and organize there you go so that's it wow any questions for Mr DeLuca I'm just drinking that in a little bit and I'm not gonna say anything else you're gonna have to come and listen mayor when is that again Sunday what Sunday 11 o' 11 o'clock yeah in the morning am well I figured how long are you speaking for want to know well if it's 28 minutes it would be about what you spoke very clever are there Bagels it's 11 o'clock I think you've eaten your breakfast before you got there not necessarily okay Committee Member angle follow that I don't know if I can but I'll start then with our awes some new public information officer who started who's been posting content on our Instagram at Maplewood TWP and she started a new series tip Tuesday which launched today so check it out and you can find um different fun things about Maplewood um youthnet had their monthly meeting and we talked a lot about their awesome internship programming so um they will be updating their um information for businesses who would like a summer intern and for students in high school who are interested in getting a summer intern um internship with businesses or government in Maplewood and South Orange um I know our clerk had a very successful intern last summer um and it's a really exciting program um to get involved and to be able to learn um things to get a job later on in life so I definitely recommend all you students look into it and business owners as well um the Soma Interfaith Holocaust remembrance service is coming up on March 23rd there will be a um uh event first at Spa Park and then we will March up to Beth L um so more coming on that I believe it starts at 3:00 in spota and then the service begins at 4:00 at bethl we hope to have Holocaust Survivors um attending again and um you can go to remember and.org for more information and to learn more about this event that's been going on for how many years Mr a a lot of many many many years it's a great group of people working on it um and then finally um the reach for Recovery mobile van will be returning to the Maplewood Community fridge tomorrow Wednesday January 22nd from 10: to 2 um and this is a really exciting program that our health department brings um the vanish for people who are looking for help with substance use um or for family members or friends who believe um somebody they loved is um is has substance use disorder um and you can get resources Naran distribution care coordination um lots of information so again the reach recovery van tomorrow Wednesday at the community fridge from 10: to 2 that's my report thank you any questions for Miss angle no all right Deputy Mayor Herman hi um I was looking through all my committees and they're all meeting next week so it's going to be good busy week we haven't met um pool Recreation CCR and youth um and the senior committee met and they were thank you for sharing about the code blue they were concerned about warm places and they were also looking for like a place where they could go walking indoors where it might be warm so we're we're talking about that um for the health and Community Services committee we heard um some budget reports from Health from Community Services pool arts and culture and we'll be talking about that in our budget workshops um and then additionally I have some exciting programming um to share and I exciting because the first thing on my list is puppy yoga so AKA doing yoga in my house with two dogs is pretty much puppy yoga but if you want to play with other puppies um and do yoga at the same time I think it's pretty much playing with puppies maybe some yoga I don't know but um this is the second time I think that we're offering it we did it before and I wish that I had gone so I'm definitely going this time but bring both your dogs no no you don't bring your dogs they have oh right and then you're supposed to to adopt yeah that's yeah they do they bring puppies and um I think it's dogs for adoption so it's it's really cool um so open registration is open for that right now and that will be on February 2nd there's a manifesting meditation series which is open um until Thursday to register there's only four spots left um cozy kitchen on nutrition which is the senior cooking class uh registration is open for this three-part series and then I just want to also Spotlight that girls spring softball registration is still going on it's a really great program so check that out and Camp registrations they opened it was very very busy but there are still some registrations open so please check that out there are limited spots available in maplecraft tennis camp dive Camp Creative Learning camps mapso SummerSlam basketball camp multisport camp and soccer camp Camp so lots of good options to check out all right any questions for Deputy Mayor Herman I heard that registration went really really well so just congratulations to um Miss manuso and the entire community services staff for doing such a great job with the kick 400,000 plus dollars but yeah so we offer a lot and um having some of these camps like the dive camp and the um like the swim the the um I think the mermaid one might have filled up already but some of these pool ones we typically don't have that registration open till later in the year so it's really great that um our rec department was able to open these up in the beginning of the year because it really helps parents plan so so that's taking feedback and actioning yeah that works that way sometimes all right thank you very much I just have a couple things our electric Jitney senior Jitney uh electric bus is going to be ready week from Thursday W correct all lettered and ready for us to cut a ribbon I'm sure it'll be like a snowstorm to mess it up or something will happen to delay it some more we'll work with the township committee on a date for an unveiling at a senior event just know that you have to if it's this cold you should plug your electric Jitney bus in overnight no yes right you lose a lot of power um and we've started planning for women's History Month uh and on March 4th I think is also February 4th and March 4th right yes yeah March 4th will be um our uh wear white for women photo along with our Proclamation where we invite uh previous and current elected women leaders in South Orange Maplewood to come and take part in that it's become a tradition it's a little long but it's I think fun really nice yeah so um that's I have so um you did the cold weather thing so we're good to move on to discussion items so we have several and we'll start with Mr DeLuca for demographics on maplewoods boards and committees thank you mayor and Mr weie I sent you you're going to be able to put it okay so uh since 2018 we've been doing an annual survey of the membership of our boards and committees and um we've been tracking that we present it now we'll we'll be presenting it tonight and you can put that up yeah I was just going to say are you going to share that yeah okay so here's the if you can make that larger we ask people to identify themselves by their race ethnicity and um you can see for you know we did this in December and we got an 83% resp response rate 75 out of 90 board and Committee Member surveyed which is about the same last year we got an 85% response rate um this year we added Mr daffis recommended that we um mimic the state uh demographics by adding Middle Eastern or North African so we added that category and we actually got 2% response um but you can see most of our members of boards and committees are identify as white and then uh 20% as black africanamerican Asian Hispanic Latino Middle Easterns all at 2% and then 2% put down other you go to the next slide this is the trend over time and in 2018 we were at 74% white and 14% black African-American um we had you know our and I should say that contrary to what we're hearing out of Washington we have always been committed to diversity inclusion and equity and um until we say differently we're going to continue to do that our Trend was to try to make our committees more diverse we were doing pretty well um we kind of bumped up this year this could be you know an outlier um but uh unfortunately we did um move up uh in the white po population this year and down in the black population so we've just got to continue you know one of the reasons we do this is to help guide us as we make appointments through the year so as we make you know we made some appointments tonight we'll be making more appointments through the years through the year rather and we just be cognizant of it and try to meet our goals can we go to the next slide um now this is quite interesting over the last uh you know year since 2018 we've actually actually flipped you can see here female is 60% male 39% non-binary 1% if you go down to the bottom there you can see back in 2018 males represented 53% of our boards and committees and females 45 and now that really has jumped up to 60% female and and 39% male so um I have so many comments running through that I'm not SC yeah yeah even even on this Township committee we can go to the next slide then that's a good thing right yeah it's terrific get stuff done um age is uh this has been pretty standard um you know the sweet spot for volunteerism is that 40 to 60 year old which makes you know I said it last time and makes me older too it it uh it's you know when people uh their kids are older they have a little more time they may be more established in their in their profession um so this is but that has been pretty consistent uh same thing with the chart on below you know we did say that we wanted to get more renters involved to make you know just to have another perspective and that has actually worked you know we went from 4% and 2018 we we're up to 8% now which I think is a good thing um next slide is uh up on top we have the LGBT qia plus uh um this is a bit of a disappointment we you know we've we've been going up over the years and we kind of dropped down this year so again that's something and I know we're we're working for recognition by um you know an outside rating group so we want to we really want to work on this a little bit more drop down to from what to what 6% last year to 3% this year it's a it's like an ey in 2018 we were at 4% so um you know again living in Maplewood the the majority lives here between seven and 15 and 20 years um we do have again a lot of people 21% have been here 30 years or more uh that actually has gone down a bit so I go to the next one is how many years you've been on your board or committee um this is good you know 39% we consistently have uh almost four and 10 are in their first year first or second year on the committee which is good because we're looking to bring new people on then if you look at you know the under five years it's over 50% almost it's you know 62% for 2024 so that's a little high and then again if you look at the piie chart the blue is they're in their first term and the yellow is in their second term or I'm sorry they've been uh on for once one reappointment so that's 6 0% are either in their first term or their second term and 40% are in terms longer than that and then lastly this is you know you're familiar with the Township Code most people are by far uh most people you know attend the meetings and either the last quarter or the last 30 days uh do we have active participation this has been consistent 11% of the respondents don't think that the township Committee Member is active I hope it's none of my committee and then uh again 89% of the people on the Committees feel that they're making progress towards their mission which is good question I mean you know those questions at the end have been pretty constant but at least it gives gives us a sense so again I think um this is this is meant as a tool for us to uh just be aware as we as we make these appointments that you know and and we do the recruitment we you know we talked about using the newsletter a little bit more to to try to reach folks and and and we do have a lot of people on our list we ought to look at that list that volunteer list and and dig down a little bit into that list by looking not some people identify their race or ethnicity but some people in their resumés you can see that they have experience that might be helpful on the on the committee so I would just urge us to be you know as deliberate as possible do we compare that to the overall population we don't I mean the overall population is nowhere near 72% so we're Way Way Beyond you know we're we're at a whack with the overall population on our boards and committees okay you know the the white po the white members of our boards and committees are much larger than the white members of our population and the black African-American members on our committee are way lower than the population okay and we talked about when using our newsletter to highlight like what it is that you actually do serving on a boarding committee what the time commitment is like what the role is to give a little bit of an idea so it's like oh I maybe I can actually do that it's right one meeting a month or one meeting a quarter like I can I can handle that and a couple emails it's really fun it's a great way to give back to your community so yeah and I think it I mean this thank you Committee Member DeLuca I mean this is really Illuminating I think it it boils down to our having to uh do more recruiting we have to come up with their recruiting plan and sometimes that's just going out there in a fun way and interactive way and just saying to people hey we have these boards and committees you can actually help shape some of the programming and even our policies get involved you know so we'll have to do some of that do we have our own table at the isn't there a volunteer Fair yesterday oh it was yesterday yeah at the king at the king no not that one isn't there another one uh uh in the spring at the wood l oh yes volunteer fair so maybe we want to have a table for boards and committees where we can have literature out what they are what the openings are some information great idea we have a table at all no no okay who runs who individual committees had table Two Towns Two Towns organized like senior advis seniors had a table Yeah but um yeah that's because the two towns for all ages runs that thing we put this I think that's those are all good ideas the newsletter that but those are when you look at who attends those they're not as representative as the groups we're trying to reach right we have to really go into the communities that we're trying to reach and uh get those folks yeah okay another um uh element of diversity in our community that it would be nice to also try and incorporate is the um like neurodiverse and disabled Community m M and I think that's something that we have talked about trying to incorporate through all access but um you know that could be something that we also take a look at good idea all right thank you Mr Duca Mr daffis we have zoning changes we do mayor and um I will try to get through this quickly I promise um in hindsight I should have also done a illustrate Show and Tell with a map and and perhaps uh if we adopt these tonight we can provide that information in that manner on our website we'll find the appropriate place for it so I did forward along some background information and you know our discussions in code committee to the rest of the township committee uh hopefully you had the chance to review that information and for the Public's edification I can go through some of these um the majority of them are pretty uh technical uh they're all recommended by the the m master plan our new master plan I keep saying new master plan um you know it's not so new anymore uh but yes these are all recommended by the master plan and it's an opportunity for us to in some ways if I may be a little bit corrective in terms of uh making some of the zones complement each other and and ensuring that some of the uses are permitted for instance the first zoning change that's recommended by the master plan and the co committee and the master plan implementation working group um and I want to say that with with each one don't don't worry no introductions um the is at 45 uh 1452 Springfield Avenue um the Z where we have the New Jersey Transit bus garage it's currently zoned as research office um and the proposed zoning change is uh to make it Highway business like uh a great chunk of Springfield Avenue and add public a bus garage as a permitted use um the second one is on the other side over on Milburn Avenue 2030 to 2048 Milburn Avenue by the Marie Place parking lot which is currently zoned as Highway business and the proposed zoning J change as Office business and this would reflect an accurate accessory use in the office business Zone um allowing for off street parking lots for Office Buildings since we have the Office Buildings there and nearby um 8 and nine and 10 Marie place and 22 through 24 Marie place um which is currently zoned for Highway business the proposed change is to Zone it uh residential R14 um which uh would uh allow which would be in in keeping with the single and attached housing um and consistent with the homes on the other side of Marie place and Broadview Broad viw Avenue um and then we also looked at um and proposed and uh recommend adopting changing the parking requirements for residential uh zones from two spaces per unit to one space per unit this is not such a controversial thing anymore um as you all know we have in recent years been reducing the two spaces to about one and a half and even less than that uh in keeping with uh the change in that regard uh everywhere that's also the number one uh change that our zoning board uh provides in terms of providing a variance um and then we also looked at um we looked at removing the uh parking requirements in The Pedestrian retail business Zone the prb as we call it and that is something that's highly recommended by our master plan the idea would be to uh a make it consistent with the uh the retail business Zone uh which doesn't have a parking requirement uh B to promote more active uh sidewalks and uses in the prb in The Pedestrian retail business Zone uh which is favored by our merchants and our uh business special improvement district managers um but you know we had some some discussion in code committee and there were a couple of concerns one of them being um if we didn't have the parking requirement there then we could um have the unintended consequence of pushing a lot of parking into the surrounding neighborhoods for some people that was okay those streets are public streets for other folks that was a real concern and we do get emails a lot of time uh when um our public streets are you know jammed with a lot of parking uh especially when someone's parking in front of your driveway and so on and so forth um and we also uh realized that if we were going to do this and which I'll be talking about in the next discussion item and also adopting our revised site plan uh exempt exemption ordinance um we would be creating a parking conflict and I'll explain that a little bit more when we get to the site plan review uh code but but these were essentially the zoning changes um nothing too sexy here uh or controversial in any way uh and we have uh reviewed these several times in code committee and discussed them pretty fulsomely and uh we recommend their adoption so the onsite parking requirement in the prb zone right that's the one you just highlighted and that's typically for new construction like mixed use correct because it's not like exist in buildings don't no it is existing buildings it is existing buildings okay so I would a change of use it becomes a under the standards of the parking of the new parking right could we just take a step back and could you just explain The Pedestrian retail business so which areas of town would that fall under like we should have had the map up can you show the map it's only Springfield it's just Springfield Avenue right yeah and so my question is about the Park I have a I have another question not about any changes which I'll bring up in a second but my question about the parking is Do Re retail business they don't have parking lots right now anywh right do they go do they have to go get a variance each of them goes in front and gets a variance I am for eliminating parking requirements on retail businesses I'll just say that right out I've always been for it I'll always be for it so we are but we the the issue is if you have for example um we had a restaurant that changed from a restaurant that had off street parking in the corner of Yale a quarter of Springfield and ruter so if you change that you could you could build and eliminate all the off off street parking for that restaurant and that exactly what Mr daffa says it pushes all that parking into the neighborhood so you have to figure away building bigger possibly and you can make that building bigger and take the whole site you still have to provide parking for residents but you could say I'm not par not providing any parking so we have to figure out I think we all agree that we should eliminate parking for retail businesses the question is can we do it for retail businesses and then still have um restaurants maybe a doctor's office have some off strike off are those considered retail right now in our no they're separate different yeah that's that's the the way I think we can we can address this is by going back and looking at the definitions and then bringing that back into the body and saying retail as defined in the ordinance right which is what you think retail is I know our right well our ordinance is a little broader in the retail definition than some other municipalities it's it's goods and services yeah yeah so we can so it's not off the table for not off the table it was just that we have to by far manua a little bit figure out so that if it's a big resturant with Eden that they are still requ an unintended consequence that's the problem right right my my second note Mr daff was just it's not even one of the changes but in the in the permitted uses um 1A it says um retail businesses not including thrift shops pawn shops and check cashing establishments and I was curious about thrift shops especially because on the other discuss discussion item you're going to have pedestrian retail business PP Zone that bullet point is different not including pawn shops and check cashing establishments jump in yeah yeah we talked about go ahead yeah no no please go ahead just defined differently and you know so not like a a consignment or a vintage store doesn't fall under thr right and that's another thing where we have to go in and redefined not defin we should read I I believe we should redefine because we want to be promoting secondhand and reuse of clothing right yeah okay so I'm just that will be also fixed in in this yes agreed and we'll take this back to code as well and we we did flag that as you said mayor in our discussions at code as something that needs to be tweaked as well to bring this together yeah those are my only questions are the only the really hard part about this is is just what we were just talking about with regard to parking and trying to uh rely Less on cars and and promote The Pedestrian aspect and make it more activity on the sidewalks but um to Mr point we need to we need to do some more defining to figure out how to do that without I think we can I think we just have to go back to the definitions all right of some of the other zones but do we have are there any other questions by the way yeah was just about what was proposed thus far I mean we I think what youve proposed so far is I move I move that we adopt the zoning changes in well we got to do it have we have to do it as an ordinance oh right right that's right yeah what am I saying we can if we agree we can instruct our attorney to start working on it correct got that attorney okay going to fast here have it done in by the time we end the meeting yeah yes the time I want to move it yeah it's so uncomplicated so go ahead yeah all right so we're good with that one and then we'll move on to the other thing for your next discussion item okay sure no no I mean after we'll go to Affordable we'll give give it a little break on who's talking separated separated affordable housing fourth round obligation and set aside Mr Dua thank you mayor so um as we all know we received the um report from the Department of Community Affairs setting uh up maplewood's obligation in What's called the fourth round of affable housing um this all stems from a lawsuit that's called the Mount Laurel lawsuit and there's been three rounds before Maplewood has always met its obligation in the first three rounds our new requirements are 20 rehabilitations and 216 new units and um just in the last uh in our third round we had an obligation of 400 over 400 units so our I think the recognition that we've provided units in the past and maybe some other um calculations have have brought that down and this is for a 10-year period this is through 2025 so uh one of the things that a municipality has to do before the end of this month January 31st is to let uh e is to accept these numbers or fight these numbers essentially you let the either the courts or the DCA know that you're not accepting these numbers and you're going to challenge them we hired a consultant from Harbor Consultants group Michael mrea the affordable housing board met with him on the 13th of January we discussed um whether or not the uh numbers that the DCA put forth are sound and valid he thinks they are he thinks that even if we were to um calculate any possible uh you know discrepancy to what DC a says versus what we find we might be able to bring those numbers down to 214 it isn't worth it um so and I think Maplewood has uh and I and I think the affordable housing board felt this that Maplewood has always as I said lived up to its responsibilities it's been a leader in this and we feel that 216 units over the next 10 years is a goal we can work for there will be some uh amend there'll be some adjustments to that number based on how much land land we actually have to build um and what what projects are coming up so uh but that's the number that we would expect to uh to work for work toward rather and what we have to do there's a resolution on the agenda 40-25 that basically says that we accept these numbers and we're prepared to move forward and that we do have a right to adjust these based on vacant land adjustments and surveys of available land what's developable over time things like that so the affordable housing board recommends that the township committee uh adopt the DCA numbers how how long after the this adoption of the resolution when does that um survey of vacant land adjustment and all those adjustments immediately after good question the so we have to by the end of January uh let DCA know if we're going to accept these or not and then we have to f a fair share housing housing element and fair share plan by June or in June June 30th I guess yeah so we have uh you know five more months to get this together so that's what we'll be working with Mr Musta about in the affordable housing board do we have any idea of what um kind of a vacant land adjustment we might get we don't um in the past we were able to make the case that we didn't have a lot of land we didn't see a lot of land coming up so that's one of the reasons why we did an overlay Zone on the golf course we'll probably have to do that again so that says if the golf course is ever sold that we would permit a higher density development there um for an exchange of more affordable housing um we would also just survey what's coming up we know some some buildings are coming up um some developments coming up we talked about Maplewood theater Redevelopment we have a development on Springfield Avenue so they'll they'll all be rolled into our fourth round um and then and then of course what we're doing with ingr so those are all the um the numbers so we'll look at all those numbers what's possible what do we think's going to happen and then he'll come up with some kind of number working with us does the um environmental uh issues with any of the land make it unavailable for housing I'm not sure I think we have to he has to look into that I think it's the it's the significance of the contamination what step it's in things like that well because certain level of contamination you can't have housing on correct yes and that's taken into account when they do the vacant land adjustment if it's undevelopable for residential housing for any reason then it won't be counted toward your vacant land adjustment um it depends on the on the contamination if it's groundwater you can cap it if it's soil it's a little more difficult because if you have to dig into the soil to do foundations and footing then that becomes a problem but if you can cap it um and we've had developments the the development on Yale corners on an old Amo site right condos there so one thing with the vacant land adjustment um as you said there's not a lot of vacant land in Maplewood and the way that the new law was written will make it so that um they put a a cap basically you can't go below a 25% so 25% of your obligation is the lowest that it'll come down using the vacant land adjustment right and so I just want to make sure that this is a very important thing um and I really uh Committee Member Duca our chair of our affordable housing board if you don't mind you already covered all of this in your comments but just to sort of make it very clear that this 216 number if we adopt our resolution on the agenda tonight is What's called the pro prospective need but that isn't going to be when we submit our plan that isn't going to be the the number at the end of the day based on vacant land adjustment also it depends on what kind of developments we put in you get credits for um affordable housing that also includes Supportive Services element and there's all kinds of ways that that number will be reduced and so we don't want people to think to walk away from this that oh my God where are they going to put put 216 units in Maplewood in the next 10 years yeah yeah and this is you know one the the main way that we have accomplished this in the past is through set asdes and we have you know we'll continue to do that and that's going to be the next topic but um right now we have a 15% set aside so anybody who builds knows that they have to do at least 15% of the housing so that's how we've gotten you know a lot of housing built uh that you know that's affordable that way um and that's probably how we're going to get the majority of these units and again it's over 10 years um didn't want to talk about the rehab units you know that's that's also over 10 years so that's you know average of two per year in the past we um used to put in our capital budget uh money to do this um every year we put in $60,000 to to cover this so it's might be something we want to think about out it allows us to do this uh in a in a planned growth way um to do a couple of units each year we we part of it is that you know the minimum at least the old RS and I don't know about the new RS but the old R said you had to do at least $10,000 in rehab and you just can't get things done so we have a our policy was 20,000 um so if we were to do that you know if we if we put aside 50,000 a year in our our cap budget we'd be able to do two units um you know 20,000 and then some administrative cost on top of that okay you wanted to talk about the settis still um I I think I first wanted to see if if we're okay with um well the resolution is at 4025 if anyone has any if no questions then we'll just be adopting the resolution in consent okay right and what what's uh South Orange's obligation South Orange's obligation is um 170 something right 163 is their prospective need and they have also have a 20 Rehabilitation present need Milburn they have a 555 present a prospective need well that's because they haven't been doing right and Livingston has 461 prospective need they have land though they have land yeah they have malls they can lot of these towns I mean to the credit of past Township committees and current there we've been we've been doing it doing it Y at least 15% as long as I've been on the planning board yep and then um more I mean I mean West Orange has their rehab is 49 and their prospective need is 660 well they have 12 and a half square miles yeah so they're big and they have space and you know they've been doing it but you're getting pushed back yeah it's okay I'm more worried about our infrastructure and the traffic that is already way greater given the number of projects being done one after the other in our neighboring town of South Orange without um any pause to wait and see what the impact of this development is there another one another one um so that's a concern of mine so anyway set aside set aside is as I said before we have 15% and we would like to um consider moving up to 20% as part of our fourth round application I think it makes sense to do that uh often times by the way the 15% you have to round up so it does does become 20% a lot but I think we require and we have required 20% for four sale units and 15% for rehabs and what um the affordable housing board is recommending is that we change both to 20% um and that as we talk to uh new developers such as the Maplewood theater that we talk to them about 20% and that we when we adopt our plan on in June that that 20% figure be the figure that we use for set of signs right and while we used to worry in the past that maybe 20% would scare developers away when we did our RFP and we said 20% we still got like over 10 100% you know yes and we got over 10 applications so so yeah yeah okay so that'll be something that we'll be bringing up as part of our plan that's all I have Okie do Mr daffis site plan revision thank you mayor I'm so excited about that pable housing stuff um just so excited really excited to move that forward okay so site plan exempt this is um providing an exemption to a a site plan review which means going to the planning board to get an approval right and our master plan highly recommends and we have all discussed this and seen this especially those of us on the planning board that um often times um we require because of the way our exemption was written is currently written until we change it um that even in circumstances of change in use from permitted to permitted um we require people to go to the planning board which is um onerous expensive it adds another layer of unnecessary review so it's not very small business friendly right and we have so many examples of of of retail uses that changed from permitted to permitted and we required people to go and we actually looked at some data here we didn't just anecdotally decide this in fact we've been talking about this for months and I want to take a moment to highlight and Spotlight the U the tremendous effort that went into this um by administrator warry and Community Development director dealma in particular a lot of drafting and redrafting and redrafting and redrafting and a lot of talking that we did so um so the idea here is to not do that to folks and and like I said we have data that shows that a lot of people walked away from retail uh applications uh when they found out they had to go to the planning board they couldn't afford it it's very expensive yeah English wasn't their first language um we sat through a review the mayor and I and the planning board with such business owner and it was painful she didn't you know the the committee the board was asking questions relevant questions that anyway so get the idea so so what we what we propose to do is to add the following language to our uh exemption or site plan exemption code um in particular numbers two and three which are new new language uh number two says and again we'll put this out there on the website for the public Certification Number Two says that interior building alterations that comply with all other requirements of our code including in parking right and that makes a lot of sense because the examples that we were just talking about were of interior alterations they were not exterior alterations they were not expanding the building in those instances you're still going to have to go first sight plan review by the planning board right but interior building alterations that otherwise comply with other requirements including parking requirements should be exempt and that's what we're proposing and then Committee Member Duca and his wisdom as per usual um recommended that we add number three the following language again we'll put this up on the website for the public any commercial space in a Redevelopment plan within five years of the planning board's resolution approving the plan why are we doing that what does that mean well if you're in a Redevelopment Zone and uh you used was already uh your commercial space use was already approved then you should also be exempt from site plan review by the planning board because we already did that at least once um for that particular use um and we just put in within five years of the planning board's resolution approving the plan to make it a little bit more specific that it's not forever um and and that is the proposed language in our site plan exemption questions discussion no you covered it really well and we've been talking about it for a long a lot we've been talking about it for months for years because I think we were talking about it when I was on that committee two years ago two years ago yeah I mean I'm for these and I appreciate that added one I never understood why if you're moving into a brand new building why the business has to go through all the St ruls that the developer just went through so yeah I appreciate that one so um again if we're all uh in favor of approving this we will do the necessary drafting to um move it as a an amended ordinance can I ask another question about this document that you send around a little earlier and in G it says um all off street parking areas shall be paved with a by Tous concrete or cement binder pavement and I'm just wondering if we could update that language since we're talking about storm water utility and drainage and stuff that maybe we want to make amends to what kind of surfacing where is where are you looking at I'm sorry I didn't catch you of that document g under drainage then was surfacing H4 this is the document uh explaining the prb Zone the proposed 2 71-70 Zone requirement g g g huh and then because we're talking about storm water and making improvements and we even have credit in our credit manual that we're going to talk about we talk about if you're making improvements to your impropriate surfaces so I'm just wondering if you want to update that language maybe there's something we can do in there to to promote using more eco-friendly or impr or whatever the right langu pervious why don't we ask Mr kitner to take a look at this and give us his recommendation yeah but good eye on that that's out you know good eye yeah because we should be holistic about this right in light of everything that we're trying to do very good eye member angle anything else on this discussion item yeah I think we were also going to change the definition of um uh the definitions of definition uh of the eat in and take out restaurants we were going to eliminate the requirement to go for a site plan review that's right I did miss the 271 D3 definitions right we say uh an eaan restaurant must go for site plan and then takeout rment let's go for a site plan we were talking about eliminating that how does that work with like waste and oil and all that stuff does that not isn't that stuff like where your garbage is going to go on site plan or that's just done to the health department yeah that'll all be addressed by the health getting the permits from the health getting the permits but just when you're going through site planning some of those issues are brought up and you have to plan for it so if you're already opening and getting your last inspections done and then it's a little bit too late to plan for Waste yeah that's thought of where it says all that these applicant have to comply with all other aspects of the code so we already describe in our code things like what your hours can be how you can store your um Solid Waste what kind of pickup you have to have and so it will it'll fall to those departments to ensure compliance with our code in its entirety which we have sections that cover the things you're talking about so we have like reader friendly versions that are business owners who are going to be like want if I'm just thinking because sometimes you go to these departments and you don't really get those kind of answers or you don't really understand the literature yeah so as as part of this consideration we've talked about moving this from a land use application to an administrative application and how we're doing this in part to be business friendly and that application process the administrative review should be business friendly as well and so we should develop the types of materials you're talking about and something that we've considered as part of this conversation thank you right and the last thing I want to add because if you're still awake out there and you're following this discussion you might ask yourself so what replaces the what would have been a site plan review well as Mr warry just said an administrative review conducted inhouse by the Buildings Department inclusive of an expanded thorough zoning review alongside the application of our other codes in regulation for instance health inspection for food use grease traps odors waste disposal town code already regulating noise Recycling and other relevant um inquiries or concerns that have been dealt with by the planning board in these site plan uh review uh hearings so uh this administrative review this expanded administrative review would replace the the site plan review and and and we wanted to make sure that we had all of that in place before we went ahead and adopted uh this revised exemption and we certainly do have all of that in place so who is doing the administrative review Buildings Department zoning officer and their team good well I'm always good when a business owner doesn't have to hire like an architect and a planner to come to and pay a lot of money to do a meeting I just want to make sure that they're aware of the code and different things that need to get done before the inspections come yeah somebody has a project they check to see if it's zoned appropriately and then they get the proper paperwork and depending on what they're going to do then they get told whether or not they go before the planning board yeah and there's other zoning changes that we're looking at And discussing we also uh I know not everyone is ready for this yet but I think we're going to get there as we continue discussing things we will also eventually have a meeting of the Minds on on expanding permitted uses in the commercial industrial and special light industrial uh zones you know uh where things are already happening and they're getting variances anyway so uh we will get there as well so I'm really pleased um we're all really proud of this to this is a an effort um the mayor's input here and insight has been tremendous because of her planning board experience and experience as a special improvement district manager in several special Improvement districts um and I think uh I'm really proud of our moving in this direction great really am thanks all right we'll move on to Mr Duca and then Mr deavas doesn't have any more discussion I'm done so uh we we said we were going to have one more look at the storm order management uh fee um credit and adjustment policy manual um right I uh so people have questions I did send out some revisions to the rain barrel uh language just to make sure that it and I really copied this out of the Pittsburgh um it's a it's a onetime $20 credit for an installed rain barrel of at least 50 gallons that captures and detains roof runoff on the property one rain barrel per per parcel will be allowed a credit again it's a one-time credit of $20 I also took the Pittsburgh uh application and just amended it a bit but U make it very simple all you have to do is fill this application uh you know property where you know where's the rain barrel located the product name size of the barrel and just attach a picture to it and it is very simple to get the rain barrel I think most people most residents will uh Avail themselves of this credit as opposed to some of the more detailed credit although you never know but all the credits are in here and um or I I I know I did have one question of other than the rain barrel all the other credits are annual credits so you get them every year but the rain barrel is a one- Time credit right I had a question for um under application process 3.1.2 it says you completed credit applications can be dropped off at or mailed to can you not email it or do it online anyway you have to actually bring it in person or mail it did talk about this and I don't remember why is there anything they can't no submit that can be scanned and sent in no we could it could be emailed too okay so can we update that section yeah um I just had a question about the rain barrels like is that a program we can do through DPW where we can like make it easy for people to buy them or recommend or something because it'll be easy on both ends you're buying it from DPW it's approved maybe they deliver it I don't know it might be a lot but no some kind of why would we do that why would we or why would why would we well I mean the I mean we because we want to promote better management of storm water I know but maybe we could make county has a program like that and we that Essex County has a program to sell rain barrels and I think we I know we participate in their program for compost barrels where once or twice a year they'll come and set up in the mun parking lot U Town Hall parking lot and they'll sell rain so yeah public so we can maybe add on to that rain barrels as well yeah take a look I I would I I think if the Count's doing it that's fine I would you know I'd hate to incur a lot of money to buy barrels hoping that we're going to resell them no I don't want to do that either I don't want to do that either but but if it's we have order because there's there's power iners purchasing together and also it help on the application process because if we know they're getting the DPW approved one because they've done it through us a little bit easier to yeah do the rebate orever run that on engineering Public Works and planning and make sure that's something yeah and I'll talk to the county you can okay but just so just there is no all it has to do is me for meet this credit is that be a 50 gallon yeah Barrel so it doesn't need we say that having an auto dispensing drip irrigation technology is recommended but it's not required so you just have to need a 55 or 50 gallon but is it recommended for a reason like it's good to have I mean it just it just empties it out it empties the water out so that rain water can get in some what happens is people or use the water they don't empty the barrels so that the rain water comes in it just flops and goes to the side so but you know it's very expensive to get those irrigation I see it's a pressure thing so we do this through the county already so the county offers to our res for pickup here in Maplewood uh 55 gallon rain barrels you can purchase them for $74 95 there you go we'll give you great so let's promote it and include it and run it we do usually uh promote this but I think U like in our Wednesday email blast I think we have an opportunity now with the uh storm water utility to do a little bit more around High it all together and those clean water posts she's doing is tied into sheer and the thing I think there needs to be I think I said this once before somewhere that uh information when the when the sewer bill and the new storm water there should be I have an insert in there fq sheet in there yeah that can go in the insert and I know it's on the agenda for the environmental advisory committee meeting tomorrow to talk about that literature and how they can help as well another question yes go ahead so I just was wondering so credit types like some of these make sense but then we get to like Sands vegetative filters filter strips and I didn't know if we wanted to just like like what is that maybe we wanted to add a sentence in it to say like what it is or I don't know maybe it's one of those like I don't know what it is or provide like pictures or something yeah I think someone who's going to do it knows what it is I mean these These are this is not like you're not going to do this in your backyard you're oh yeah no most people can't afford to do all that come on yeah no and it's well for the general reader just a little clarification to save I had to use Google I didn't Google that one because I was just again we do say that if you have if you have if you have questions you can you can contact Mr kitner I know Mr kitner gets a lot of emails and has a lot on his plate so I'm trying to avoid more and then I guess my other stupid question is like what is a 10year storm event that's what it says right everything says 10e storm event yeah 10e storm what in your storm event everything says that used to be a it's now it's like an annual storm event I don't know what that is and it's it's all of these are described as must be a must a 10e storm event C standard yeah standards for a 100e storm event 10 year storm event 5e storm event but like the mayor said now somebody somebody wanting to do this will we talk to somebody who knows exactly what a 10 year 25 100 years I don't think anybody knows they have it written down in the engineering office probably some because people might want to get rid of some of their long driveway and do something if Mr kitner has a a definition we can put in the definitions 10e storm event thank you I had one question um I read several but so I see that there's a November 1st 2025 deadline for applicants uh to have that what they do be retroactive to this year's fee and I was wondering if going forward we might have a date that we could tell people like if you do your you know if you have your application in by this date or approved by this date that they could expect to have it count for that Year's fee like just to give people a sense I know it says like it's rolling but um because I was kind of doing the math of how long you know based on like 60 days or 90 days to get it approved like maybe like February 1 you know like we could kind of just tell people you know if you apply submit by February 1st it you know could be applied to that year you miss that deadline it it may not you're not guaranteed to get it applied for that year something like that well I think the problem is you don't know when you're going to you don't know when you're going to adopt one of these and put it in so if you have you had that's the reason I think we wanted to be reviewed and that we were going to re once it come it's on a rolling basis and once it comes in 60 days that we get to review it we can get do 30 days more um but no nothing's going to take more than 90 days so I think the idea is to be flexible to let things come in as people adopt these during the course of the year and not have a deadline so that if if it was February 1st and someone adopted it in June they would not be eligible this way if they adopt it in June we can make it eligible and either give them a credit for this year or next year and we'd have to I guess it would have to be for next year because the bills go out in June so well right well it says like for the first year you do it by November 1st then it's retroactive but then after that there's no deadlines so well it would be Pro it would be going forward right see I I like that it said that that this for this year because we're just rolling it out I hear what your Malia say Miss Herman saying though is that it because if you if you're going to want the credit and you have to like is there you have to you have to get it approved before the bills go out right every other year well I I would say no because while the bills go out in May typically and are due in June it's an annual bill so you would have to be approved the year prior prior to June 1 cuz we want the Improvement in the ground on January 1st in order for you to get the credit for what ends up being a bill you pay in June so then we're talking calendar year we're talking calendar year and any my my expectation I guess would be that any credit you receive is applied to your next year's right assessment because again the bill's due in June but it's for January to December so why don't we just make that clear that yeah just some clarification because I I you know for people to know based on when they do their action and get their their approval when it would um qualify okay pleas said just to clarify that so if you submit if you do your work and it's done by like March 2026 that credit wouldn't be applied till 2027 let us talk about that and that out okay anything else on that okay good Mr warry I'm sorry I had one more question okay okay and this one comes from the senior advisory committee so I'm sharing it on their behalf so if you were to do like for example the driveway um one where you you you take a per an impermeable surface and you make it permeable then would that change the calculation of what your fee would be so again it it has to do with the amount of square footage of impervious surface so the the uh I don't remember when I responded to you what the boundaries of the of the uh impervious surface but the difference between a credit and the conditions right right and that was what the question was one you would you would you would reduce the amount of impervious surface so if you reduced it enough to move to a lower category yes let me just get this you'd have to reduce it a lot you have to reduce a lot so the a one a one unit is going to be from like 2400 Square ft to 4,000 squ ft that's one unit oh wow yeah so if you if you're at 4,000 and you reduce it by 500 it does anything you reduce it by 1500 you're probably not ever going to park your car there again because you don't have a driveway right so unless you park on the so the to get from one to another is is quite quite large yeah and we have mostly small Lots so yeah I I don't think I don't think that's G to happen it's it's possible but you know and if that happened if they if they it's fact specific so if they actually reduce the square footage yes you'd go in and look at that you say and so now you're in a different you're in a lower classification so instead of paying 70 you pay 35 in addition if you have adopted the the drainage underneath you would get a credit for that on top of okay I'm going to thank you so much for for for explaining that really helpful all right so you've got your uh yeah it's we're going to introduce it at the next meeting okay it's very exciting thank you everyone for your hard work on this yeah lot of work Mr worry last discussion item is yours thank you may how much do we want to pay the police for off-duty work yes so I had circulated a proposed resolution establishing rates for off-duty employment and the this would update what was established by resolution back in uh 2023 so we typically update annually the police off duty rates we didn't last year because they didn't receive a uh an increase they being the police department didn't receive an increase last year because we were out of contract but now we've established rates uh for all of our police officers um and so I'd proposed uh new rates if you look at what I'd shared with you we established rates for um General Maplewood events public events that receive permits and support from the township and the South Orange Maplewood School District rates um those are uh directly calculated on the um the overtime rate or the the rate I should say of the highest paid patrol officer and so for General rates that's if they're working psng jobs or other usually it's utility work um they get paid that officer's the highest officer's overtime rate if it's a public event they get that officer's straight rate so their their regular hourly rate and if it is a school district event they get that uh they get the highest paid officers regular rate so those are um the rates to be established for Maplewood we also do quite a bit of work in Milbourne and when we do General and Road Road jobs in Milburn they pay us our officers regular overtime rate calculated on the highest paid patrol officer but Milbourne has has negotiated rates for their school district the sh Hills Mall and paper mill Playhouse Milburn sets the rates and if we want to work there we have to adopt those rates and so what is and that's been done historically in mwood so I'd proposed what are currently milburn's rates for again their school district Short Hills mall and paper Mall Playhouse I have proposed an increase to the uh hourly rate for police cars we currently charge $12 an hour I propose that we increase it to $15 an hour the state law um says that it can't be any higher than the actual cost or what is established in the FEMA schedule of equipment rates and so $15 is below that FEMA rate so it's uh within our right to set the U the car rate to $15 an hour the resolution previously had also established um who was eligible for those public events rates because it's at a discounted amount whereas instead of paying an overtime rate they're paying a straight time rate and um similar to last year or to previous years we have any event by the Maplewood Municipal Alliance Springfield Avenue partnership mwood Village Alliance Columbia High School coolers booster club um in previous years we had uh named by an example a nonprofit in town who has an annual event I I had proposed that that be removed uh in this year's version because we hadn't applied that rate to all nonprofits and um it's my recommendation that uh we treat everybody uniformly so if there was an interest in a nonprofit rate we could have a discussion about setting that uh but that we shouldn't be singling out any one nonprofit or or for that matter any one group individually to receive a lower rate than any others the township doesn't benefit much from that distinction uh because we are only collecting 10% on their phas so the difference between their regular rate and their overtime rate is $30 so we you know it's a difference of $3 an hour but um so I make the recommendation just so that we have some uniformity in how we treat nonprofits any questions or discussion on it does everyone agree I I agree with the last part about eliminating that group but I did have a question going and this has always bothered me about Papermill Playhouse and the Short Hills mall so when the rent party had their concerts at at the Woodland because they had they were serving liquor we required at least one police officer there and I believe they were charged at the general rate yeah let's assume that they would charge the general rate which be under your numbers would be $95 yeah if the the paper mill Playhouse had something going over there and we assigned an officer there we would only charge $80 MH so and I know when I did this back in whenever it was 2015 or so um and put these rates in so I was told the same thing so explain to us again why we are giving a discount to the paper mill Playhouse because Milbourne does is the shortest answer right so Milbourne has negotiated rates with uh both Hills Mall and paper mill Playhouse and Milbourne has set the rate so if our officers want to work in Milbourne and they do you know and if we want to provide them opportunities uh to work overtime if they want to at these for these off-duty jobs we either um adopt the rates that has established with these entities or generally our officers aren't going to so are do our officers only work in Milburn as an outside Community do they ever work in Irvington or Union yeah absolutely they could and they could what would they get paid there they would get paid the general rate so that the overtime rate which is you know would be 958 so our officers to your point I mean I agree I don't like the idea of it um but our officers would work at Short Hills and at paper Mall Playhouse for a fee lower than we would work for like Municipal right but the question is either either we adopt these rates or they they aren't going to work those jobs um with with the uh so the new general rate will be 100 nearly $105 10470 cents that's right um if they and with with going to the the Outsourcing do you think the 10% fee will go higher I would hope it goes lower low I have an expectation that it'll be slightly under okay and and I I have that based on what other municipalities have secured um going out to competitive Contracting like we're doing okay would we would we still so let's say it came in at 7% would we still charge 10% and then us take 3% we would do an evaluation of it but yes there there are still cost to us in terms of scheduling and we issue checks oh no they issue checks we issue checks yeah so so there there's that that payroll process to it and you know as with anything while you know they're out there doing work the other entities paying for them just having officers cost us something and so um you know we have to be reasonable in the amount that we charge but yes I would expect that we would still collect some amount above what that uh company would collect does anyone else have any questions or anything I'm fine with it okay do you need to do it for next meeting it'll be on for the next meeting okay um unless we can get everything done in the next three minutes I have a motion to go past 9:30 I move we go past 9:30 if we have to if we have to second daffis yes Mr DeLuca yes single yes serman yes mayor Adams yes and can I get a motion on the consent agenda I'll move it the consent agenda second dfus yesca yes SLE yes yes mayor Adams yes thank you this moves us to our any subject matter public comments seeing no one in the house m per is there anyone on Zoom who would like to any members of the public joining us on Zoom if you'd like to comment uh during uh any items on the agenda you may uh raise your hand now on agenda non agenda yeah um any anything anything almost I see none great can I get a motion to adjourn I move we adjourn second s d yes Luca yes zle yes Thurman yes mayor Adams yes thank you good night everyone we'll see you uh our budget hearings if you're 9 1:30 yeah it's Sol it yeah yeah we're done they're G to start coming in you got promoted I said maybe we didn't