more structure. I was like very structured 75. This is to state for the record that adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by the to the public by posting and maintaining the annual notice of regular meetings on the bulletin board of the municipal
whack. By mailing the annual notice move your move your mic closer. They can't hear you. All right. Could I ask for a quiet please? Thank you. Bulletin board by mailing the annual
notice of regular meetings for 2025 to the news record in Star Ledger in December 2024 and by filing said notice in the office of the township clerk. Mr. Dus present. Mr. Ducas here. Sangel
here. Here. Mayor Adams here. Chapter 231 public laws of 1975 commonly known as the open public meetings act requires all meets public appeal to the public public and whereas section 7A provides that the governing body has a discretion
to permit prohibit or regulate the active participation of the public at any meeting and where is the governing body to comply with the provision this acts ain't trying to conduct this business in an orderly and expeditious manner. Now therefore be resolved by the
township committee township Mapwood that it does hereby prohibit except to set forth in the formal agenda active participation in deliberations of the governing body by the public except as otherwise prescribed by law does limit the public to the observations of the actions and discussions of the governing
body at all of its regular and special meetings. Some of Mr. Daffis, yes. Luca, yes. Bengal, yes. Yes. Mayor Adams. Miss Pritzen, is your microphone on?
Yes, it is. Okay. You want to kill the I would just ask you to speak into it. It's free. Um, you want to keep the fans on? It's hard to hear you, but keep the fans on for now. Yes. When we if we have collective problems, we'll turn them off. Um, so I'd ask everyone to stand
for a salute to the flag to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, with liberty, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you all. Uh, welcome the Tuesday,
July 15th meeting of the Maplewood Township Committee. Um, we'll keep the fans on in the room, uh, as long as possible in order to because it gets pretty stuffy in here. So, uh, but sometimes it makes it difficult to hear. So, just let us know if that's a
problem. And I'd ask everyone to make sure they speak into their microphones. Um, so we have uh public comment. We have no um proclamations or anything tonight, but we have public comment right away for agenda items only. Uh
then we have an ordinance on final passage for uh employment positions and establishing salary ranges for employees. We have an introduction of one ordinance tonight. Uh it's a bond ordinance for uh the capital
improvements by the joint meeting which uh takes care of our sewers in um several towns together. Thus the joint meeting we have um reports from departments administrative reports Mr. Wary. Um Alson is uh we have uh township
attorney and township clerk. And then we have reports from elected officials. Committee member Duffis you'll lead off. Deputy mayor Herman committee member Duca committee member Angel. And then mine. We have a few discussion items on tonight. Most of them coming from Mr.
Daffis' subcommittee of code. Um the first is attached frontfacing garage setbacks and bulk requirements in the R15 R17 residential zones. We have parking requirements in the pedestrian retail business zone. We have EMS
billing. Mr. Duca will lead that discussion. We have a community benefit trust fund discussion by Deputy Mayor Herman. We have rent control ordinance vacancy deontrol provision repeal. Mr. Daffis will lead that and the following
one which is Maplewood Village Merchant Parking permit restrictions. I think Miss Fritzen you made these tongue twisters for me on purpose but I'll just pass. Uh then we will have uh we have the consent agenda but for resolutions
for approval but prior to the consent agenda we will have a resolution on the Parker Avenue bike lanes um for this evening. So that is an agenda item. So anyone here to speak on that issue can do so at the first public comment
session which is coming up momentarily. Um and then we will have after the consent agenda we will have our second public comment on any item and then we will adjourn. So with that I will move into public comment. So anyone here to
speak on any agenda items only I'd ask you to come up to the microphone. uh please state your name and at where you live and then uh you'll have this is an important part you have three minutes to speak and um I will try to give a
little leeway on that but really want to keep to that so that everybody has time to speak um so is that on Thank you Mr. Daffus if we have um after the people in the room
speak we will have people on Zoom able to speak. So um Mr. Weary I'd ask you to be very uh concise on the timing. So three minutes to speak and thank you so much for coming. Could you please state your name and address and then
Robert Marshall. I live on Parker Avenue. Okay. Go ahead. Uh yes. So, I wanted to uh take especially some of the discussion that's been online and really like lower the temperature. I feel like Maplewood specifically is somewhere where we're
about being together as opposed to being apart. So, let's let's cut down some of the division. I believe I believe many people including myself are pro bike lanes. That's a surprise to anybody? Let me know. I am pro biking. I am pro us
having a commitment to walking and to being a healthier town. I am also pro- action. I want us to get started and I want us to get started now in moving forward in this direction. So why am I here? Because I'm against
the location of the bike lanes. I happen to be fortunate enough to live uh on Parker Avenue near the burrow intersection. I'm not sure if any of you Well, I know that Deborah is uh very versant with the uh intersection. It's a
dangerous intersection. It's been an dangerous intersection for a while, and we got it turned uh last year on December 19th into a four-way stop with flashing lights, which is fantastic. I recom I I I thanked Deborah and all the team that did that. My challenge is that
still while I've been there, it took less than two months for the first accident. And I can seriously ask you, do you know when the last accident was on that intersection? Not off top of our head, I'm sure. Go ahead. It was Sunday at 8:45. I was sitting on
my porch. Someone ran through the stoplight, hit someone, and then did a hit and run and run off. I don't believe that the signs that you see in the people that you hear on Parker are wildly crazy or want something different randomly or are not in my backyard
people. The folks on Parker have very specific experience about living on Parker and we are telling you this road is dangerous. So whatever we're going to put into place, we will keep coming back. And I'm
not here to talk about snow or leaves or house prices. I'm here to talk about safety and what we can do to ensure the safety of bikers on a street that's plainly dangerous. On other streets where we have done updates, say Prospect, there were
accidents that happened and then further safety that was put into place. There's an abject lesson right there. We now drive past those bolards, what happened was two different kids on two different occasions got hurt. So my point to all
of you is before kids get hit, before they get hurt, what are we really going to focus on in terms of safety when we do this? That's it. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Just gonna Carmen. Yeah, Miss Morales. I just want you. Thank you. My time starts now, right, Mr. Duca? Yes. Okay. Uh, my name is Carmen Morales, a 30-year resident of Parker Avenue. I live one block up from the high school. First,
I'd like to address the language of the resolution where it is written that a petition was received by the township against bike lanes on Parker. It should be noted for the record that over 20 that 277 signatures appeared on that
petition and should be included in the count in paragraph number four and not all of them were from Parker Avenue. Taxpayers are paying for bike lanes that will be rarely used due to the nature of the street. As mentioned by the previous uh speaker, you have already heard from
many Parker and non-parker Avenue residents about the safety concerns and dangers of bike lanes on one of the most heavily trafficked streets in our town that sees vehicles of all sizes from cars to tractor trailers and buses. We know that from experience. This committee in order to accomplish a goal
is ignoring some valid community safety concerns and jeopardizing the safety of CHS students and bicyclists who will be inches away from a moving moving vehicle and in my area on a downhill slope. We know that bike lanes on Parker do not connect to town or the train station and
any future plans to extend them to Valley Street, Danell or Maplewood Avenue will require major road changes or state approval. Interestingly, one area near Irvington Avenue that has supermarket, food establishments, f pharmacy, and religious institution was
exempt from bike lanes and sharers are going to be in place. Bike lanes on Parker are going to require more frequent township services at taxpayer expense to collect leaves, plow snow, pick up Christmas trees, and pick up debris in order to clear the streets for bicyclists. Parking on the side street
will be greatly affected. Despite the plans for parid parking, I didn't move to Maplewood to now compete with fellow residents for parking during heavily used times of the year. When CHS has events, and we know that quite well, where will the attendees park if permit
parking is only for Parker Avenue residents? Maplewood residents are already complaining about poorly asphalted streets and the shape of roads in Maplewood. put that money to making road repairs, better signage for older adults to cross the street safely and not have to watch out for bikes and
cars. An open records request was made requesting all records issued by Dynamics who satiate this plan and none was provided. Why isn't that public information? Where is the report that says the bike lanes will be heavily used on Parker? Why weren't more studies done rather than rely on stats of one day in
April of 2024? Only hearsay was provided at these meetings by dynamics and interested party. Despite all the meetings had, this plan had not been well thought out by this committee and needs a closer look at how it will work before a vote is taken. Thank you very much.
Thank you. We'll move to the next speaker. Um, hi. Cataract surgery and I'm not quite custom. There we go. Okay, fine. You know, I I saw all of you
on uh on Zoom many times and it's nice to see you in person. Did you just for the record and the clerk? My name is Josh Zion. I'm at 41 Parker Avenue on the north side of the street between Academy and Prospect. Appreciate it. Thank you.
Uh first, I have three points I want to make. First, I know there's a feeling among some in the town that Parker Avenue residents are opposed to bike lanes because we don't want to lose parking. At the same time, Dynamic noted that
there isn't much parking west of Bdon where the ban will be in force. Uh, I just want to say that for some of us, especially those with adequate driveways, we don't park our cars on Parker because we don't think it's
particularly safe to do so. This brings me to my second point. I was surprised at the July 9 engineering committee meeting when Mr. Kitner made the following statement. An unsafe street is exactly where you want to put
a bike lane. That's a quote. I shared this with my daughter who lives in the Boston area, doesn't drive a car, relies on her bicycle all four seasons to go to work and get around town. She was amazed by this statement and told me that she's
never had an accident precisely because she avoids unsafe streets. believing that a stripe of paint on one of the only major connecting roads going east west is going to significantly
reduce speeds on Parker may sound forwardlooking and like the latest and best thinking, but if you just step back a minute and use common sense, it may strike you as
wishful thinking and dangerous. An unsafe street is exactly where you want to put a bike lane is not something that Maplewood should conduct as an experiment. And finally, the resolution makes it
sound like a majority in Maplewood support the bike lanes on Parker. It sites 36 in favor and 28 opposed at the community meetings. I hope that at least one of you in the interest of accuracy
will move to amend the resolution to record that the online petition cited there contains as of 5:00 p.m. today the signatures of 277 residents opposed to the bike lanes on Parker.
That is not an insignificant number. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Name, address, and you have three minutes. My name is Scott Barton. I live on Brier Cliff Court, which is a dead end off of Parker, uh, close to the intersection
with Bdon. Uh, I just wanted to take take the chance to talk directly to some of my neighbors before you vote tonight. A few weeks ago, I walked up and down Parker and knocked on the doors of some houses with those big red lawn signs just to ask in good faith why they
opposed the bike lane. And I heard genuine fears over the safety of this plan. Uh this debate has gotten pretty intense and uh I agree that we should lower the temperature a little. It was a it was a good reminder for me that both sides tonight are coming from a place of
neighborly concern. But even after hearing all their arguments over several months, I still believe that they are wrong. Their chief concern is the steepness of the hill between Prospect Street and Academy Street. In my four years of attending Columbia High School
and riding my bike down that hill every morning, I've seen absolutely nothing to suggest that cyclists don't know how to use their brakes when they need to. But more importantly than admire my classmates personal experience, we have the expert planning and recommendations
of Patrick Weary, Patrick Downey, and Paul Kitner on the plan safety. I've heard several people say that they simply don't believe it's safe while not presenting any evidence to the contrary. Now, I'm sure we can all think of recent examples in the news of the consequences
of not listening to experts. I've heard people say there's going to be a blood bath when people start biking on Parker. I do not think this is true. But putting aside the question of hypothetical future cyclists, people, well, excuse me, mostly young people who are under
reppresented at these meetings are biking on Parker today, lane or no lane. And if the township committee votes no on this proposal, will have missed a crucial opportunity to make Maplewood safer for its most vulnerable residents. Now, I ride on Parker almost every day
because I don't own a car. So, to anyone who thinks that these bike lanes are still unsafe for cyclists, my request to you is to look me in the eyes and tell me that I will be safer without a bike lane. I'll be sitting right here in the front row all night. And I've gone
around landscapers, delivery trucks, leaf and snow piles, construction workers in both rain and shine, and I am clearly still alive. But I guarantee everyone in here that you're going to see those exact same objections brought up again. Same as at every meeting on
this subject. But somehow the presence of bikes on Parker is the problem. Now I hope that all five of you vote in favor of this step forward from Maplewood. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Next speaker. Hi.
I am Walter Freriedman, 50 Parker Avenue. And unfortunately I need to put on my glasses. Um uh let me start by saying it was articulated a little bit earlier that I think pretty much everyone
in both camps in this is in favor of bike lanes in general and in favor of the complete the concept of complete streets initiative. I'm equally certain that if the probike lanes on park or population were given were given input
on which streets the project should start with almost no one and probably none of them would have selected Parker Avenue because it's too dangerous too steep has no destinations along the way other than the high school doesn't go to
the pool to the town or to any parks other than Bordon which is not a very popular destination so why did the engineers choose Parker Avenue. The closest we've gotten as a response to this question is one, it's a
major thoroughfare, and two, it's a street in need of calming, which bike lanes have been shown to contribute to. Um, I'm I'm not I'm a little dubious about that for for Parker Avenue, but even if we grant that point. So, ironically, the reasons given for
engineering chineers choosing Parker Avenue are the same reasons that a anti-Parker Avenue group have for not choosing Parker. It's a major thoroughfare that that uh leads it being a major thoroughfare leads to it
numerous large commercial vehicles, emergency vehicles, buses, and a lot of non-residents who are just passing through quickly with no stake in in the safety. The addition of bike lanes will not change any of that. Do the engineers and decision makers really want to make
cyclists a tool for street calming? We appreciate that the engineers, planners and towns have ch taken steps in response to this these safety concerns. However, none of the steps the additional signage and crosswalks address the root problem because they
cannot because a root problem is the street itself. And unfortunately, rather than making a hard step and admitting that the initial uh initial decision was misguided, everyone has doubled down on on the on
the choice with cosmetic changes. I live on Parker near Prospect Street, one of the steepest areas of the street. In the last few weeks, I've seen an increase of bicycles on Parker Avenue. So clearly, the Pro Bike Lanes group has been encouraging that. But that said, I
would say that 80% of the bicycles I've seen riding have been riding downhill. Very few ride uphill because it's so steep. I know, you know, I'm sure plenty of hip h uh fit high school kids can do it and and bicycle enthusiasts can do
it, but for the ordinary person, it's it's it's pretty challenging. So, at the same time, in the last week, I've seen two 18-wheelers, a giant oil truck, tour buses, and the usual ambulances and police cars again
as a result of it arc being a major thorough affair. I have to ask you to wrap up is your time's up. It's okay. Okay. So, I actually did want to bring up one point that I had. Go ahead. I I think in in this no one wants to go back to square one with this. I think
everyone wants something to get done. So, I I had a suggestion that perhaps we could u perhaps the funds could be um earmarked but without it necessarily going to Parker Avenue.
um particularly because in in the I I think according to the plan the park the um the structure construction was supposed to begin would begin soon and it wouldn't complete till end near the end of the fall which is when it's cold and nobody's going to ride their bike
anyway. So I thought maybe if we could pass a general passage of it pause it for six months and let further research be done and discussion. So thank thank you. Thank you very much. Next speaker.
Hi. Give your name and address. Good evening. Rosemary Biddings, 95 Parker Avenue, Maplewood, New Jersey. Good evening. Good evening. Today before I came here, I saw a beautiful site. I saw those bikers with
their children for the first time in I don't even know how many years. And it was really nice to see it because we don't see bikers on Parker Avenue mainly because it is so dangerous. But I was right behind them as was other traffic.
And the first thing I noticed was that the five feet that we are going to be allowing for the bike lane when it came to the kids, especially in their biking um equipment,
it was well over the five feet. And that really bothered me because we're only allowing that for bikers. And clearly we could see with our own eyes this evening that they were well over that trying to stay as close to the curb as they could.
That clearly says that we are absolutely inviting an accident unless we go ahead and increase that width if we do decide to go ahead with the bike lanes.
But God being good like he is, I'm glad we did see that. I'm glad I witness this and some of the other people who came here tonight to speak because the one thing we're concerned about on Parker Avenue is safety. Almost anybody that
travels down Parker Avenue and you don't have to live there says the street is too narrow. We have done our own measurements. We're not engineers, but we know how to use a measuring stick. And we find that if you're going to get
five feet and the big vehicles that come down Parker Avenue, like the buses and the big trucks, then you have a collision with the bikers and these big vehicles who travel down there more than the bikers do meeting each other. And
that's without the actual dividers that we have suggested by looking at studies in other cities. And someone said that we don't have statistic. Yes, we do. We've looked at the the studies in Jersey City and Brook and Brooklyn and
Pennsylvania and other places. One of the things we've noticed that most of them are big cities and so their streets are a little bit wider than than Maplewood and certainly Parker Avenue. But we've seen them say about the fatalities. We've seen them say they wanted the bike lanes taken out because
it was causing accidents. And nobody wants to see accidents. I certainly don't. I'm the person that was hit by an illegal biker. And I'm not holding all the bikers against that. I'm just simply saying that it will be very difficult
for them to stay within that five feet that you have regulated and be safe. And we saw this tonight. I was so happy to see them. Want to see more of them. I would love to see them register at least 250 people who will say if this is
passed that they will absolutely bike down Parker Avenue because we don't want to waste money, spend $275,000 for a bike lanes that people are not going to use. And today was the first time in many years that I've seen that
many of them come down Parker Avenue. Thank you very much. Hi, please. Hi, General Borick from 96 Parker Avenue. I have a whole bunch of things. Um, is the school parking lot are the bicycle holders going to be rebuilt at the uh
the the actual parking lot? Is that going to be rebuilt that the kids can actually have a drop off point? Because there is no drop off point right now. The big problem is you don't have a drop off point. Um also, we were told there
are about 100 bikers. There's only about 30 bikers coming that we found. We actually sat and counted the kids coming past our house and it wanted to be about 30 kids. Most of the letters and signs on Parker
Avenue, we don't want we don't want Parker Avenue to be a bike lane system. The whole I mean, if you look down on the whole area, there's signs everywhere and people are paying for those signs. Those signs aren't free.
Um, how about how come how come the people from South Orange are get were getting letters for the bike lane on Parker Avenue even before we ever even we never even got them cuz we check our mail
every day anyway? Um, why why were the engineers all set to go with everything ready to go before we were even ready? I mean, you guys knew where the signs were going to go before we even accepted it. Um, also, nobody's
said anything about the ins and outs, like what when are the kids going to come in? When are the kids going to go out the the lanes uh of people's houses? The stop sign that's been put up has
slowed the area down tremendously. It's not just a little bit. Parker Avenue just doesn't have the size that we need to put bike lanes up. Uh 95% of the people from our area are in favor not in
favor of the bike lanes because they are not being affected by it. Are our taxes going to be going down considering how much we are losing when people can't park? And that's not true that people don't park. People park every day in
front of their houses. Uh, I'm spending about 10 grand a year just to upkeep my property. And apparently that's not even happening because they're going to be parking around the corner. That's not that I don't see that happening. Uh,
school has to put up a bicycle locking device um because you're going to have all these extra bicycles and now you're going to have to have extra bicycle locks just for kids during the day. There should be a survey done just to
see if this is what's possible. Right now, we we don't know that it's possible. Everything that was possible was has been said by you guys on the board. This is not true. Two police officers.
I just need you to wrap up because three minutes is up. I'll wrap it up. It's okay. Oh, you could say one more thing if you'd like. Okay. Thank you. Next speaker. Hi. Hi there. Um, I don't know how you're doing this in jackets. I'm dying. Um,
Rob, uh, live on Richmond, a few blocks off of Parker. Um, I don't just support bike lanes on Parker. I want to see the whole bike network, and this is a great first first step. This is a piece of traffic calming. It's not the whole project despite the fact that we keep
calling it Parker bike lanes. They're also new crosswalks and signage and stuff like that. Um, it's all really good. Uh, I ride on Parker every day taking my infant to daycare. Uh, it's it could be better. Um, I manage the hills
just fine. Ebikes, I recommend them. Uh, this project is a small step forward uh to living up to the like familyfriendly, progressive, and environmentally friendly town that we claim to be. So, vote in favor for it. Thank you for considering this. and let's build the
rest of it after. Thank you so much. Hey, Kelly. Hi, I'm Kelly Quirk. I live on Parker Avenue. I am very much for the entire resolution, including bike lanes on Parker Avenue. Um, I am, as everyone
else is, aware of the challenges with Parker Avenue. I did want to just take my time though to thank all of you. It is unusual for a government body to have as many meetings as you have had publicly to reach out and I know people feel that they were not reached out to.
I'm letting you know this is incredibly proactive and also you know I work in a space of affordable housing, supportive housing for folks with disabilities. I'm I'm very used to people saying we very much support your cause, but
um I am saying though I very much support this cause in my front yard. I personally am okay with it. I know others aren't. There are folks on Parker who are okay with this plan and who feel that it is a gift to the community. So I'd ask you to consider that. Thank you
so much. And my kids don't want to talk, but they're there. Thanks. Thank you. Hi. Hi. Uh, my name is Liam Kohler. I live on uh Midland just off of Parker. Um, I would like to first say that in in some
senses I I do agree with um uh the statement that a lot of the people who are not in favor of the bike lanes say that um Parker is not the greatest place to to bike. And I would agree. I bike on it nearly every day. Um I only have the
car sell them. So, uh, I I I know that it's not honestly the most comfortable place to use um for a cyclist. However, I would really, um, deeply urge uh, these bike lanes to be put in place because while it's not the the best
place to be put in, I I truly believe that Parker is a necessity for bike lanes to exist. Um, uh, yeah, I I Thank you. Thank you. Hi, my name is Matt Clawson. I live on
116 Oakland near Maplerrest. Um, I want to bike everywhere in town. I want to bike as much as I can. And I'd like to remind folks that the more people who get on their bikes for local trips, the better it is for the folks that want to drive by car. Um, I believe it was Scott
articulated a lot of uh the things that I wanted to say much better than I will be able to. Um, so thank you. Uh, and I just really hope that the decisions the decisions that are made tonight are based on facts and evidence and not just
best guesses or anecdata. Um, and you know, I totally understand where the folks that are against the bike lanes are coming from. If I believe the things that they believed, then maybe I would think this is a bad decision. But there is a lot of evidence that suggests that this is a good idea and we need to keep
going. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, I'm Susie McCarthy. I live on 30 Avenue. Right. Thank you. Sorry. I'm Susie McCarthy. Um I live right off of Parker
on uh 30 Hudson Avenue. Um and I wanted to also say, so I'm speaking to you as a mom of a three-year-old. Um my husband just put him down and it was a tough time. So I that's my that's his sacrifice. So he's with me in spirit. Um, I wanted to share again as someone who's recently moved here, why I moved here, right? We all care about property
value, that's just a way of life. So, I want to share a little bit about that and about the other parents in the daycare that I'm with again who recently moved to Maplewood. They are paying higher value for their for their houses right now. We all we all seen, you know, the value of houses go up. Um, I moved here because I was uh drawn to the
intentional and inclusive nature of our community. We are known this is a multigenerational project that we've put together in Maplewood. We don't always get it right. We engage with each other. That's what's so amazing about these meetings. We're all engaging in the civic debate. Many suburbs won't even touch this issue for this type of
reason. That's why we moved here. That's why people move here. Um, as I speak with uh parents of fellow young children, they all say the same thing, right? We move from these different communities for this type of engagement, for these types of projects, for this type of bravery to engage on them. Um,
however, uh, you know, one of the challenges, my biggest awakening when I moved in was how I was treated as a pedestrian and and a cyclist. I've moved I've lived previously in New York City. I've lived in Jersey City. I cycle in those areas. I walk in those areas. I have had more close calls in Maplewood
than I have in those areas. That's wild. Including small New York streets. We all know them. They're not all huge, right? Um, and I really think a huge bit is people don't expect me to be there. They expect to see cars in New York and Jersey City. And I I will say I was in New York in 2010. I would not have biked
at that point. The bike lanes have shifted the culture in New York City. And yes, are they still fine-tuning them? Absolutely. Absolutely. We we need to fine-tune them. We need the data after this. However, I want to say that a lane like Parker, a street like Parker, which goes east to west, a major
thoroughfare where there have been accidents, that is exactly where you want a bike lane because this is about changing the larger culture. It's about saying we want to live in this future. What can Maplewood be? Just like we're doing that in other areas, what is our city? We can create this interconnected
space. We can challenge people to only have one car, right? we can challenge them to make a space where they can move here and have that type of lifestyle. And again, I speak as someone who would be drawn to that. I speak with other people, new residents, right? This is what we're looking for. Um, so the last
thing I want to say is, you know, it's not just about bike lanes. It's the culture of change that goes handinhand with making this very brave, bold decision. I will be back here advocating for the next step. Absolutely. And I do want to challenge us all, right, to take that step. And again, I I hear from my
fellow residents, and I do understand the fear. It is really scary. Um, I will say as a cyclist, I have my three-year-old on the back of my bike. I would not put him there. I mean, I I sweated laboring over him, right? I'm not going to put him on the back of my bike if I believe he's in danger.
We all sweated on those labors. Thank you so much. Um, hi. Come on up. Name and look. Hi there. Thanks. Um, thank you so much. I'm Mark McGis. um over on Hugh Street in Maplewood. Um
I wish I could echo what Susan said, but she uh really said it quite eloquently. Um I relocated my family here from Texas uh about 3 years ago. Uh we have young children and we were drawn to Maplewood because of uh the diversity here, the
walkability compared to Texas. Um and really the progressive attitude. I'm seeing the conversations here about bike lanes is something I'm not really used to. So, it's really welcome and uh I'd love to see it. Um I know it's it's quite a contentious um uh talk in the
town right now. But uh I do uh stand here in favor of the bike lanes and um not only just in favor, but to further the uh complete streets and uh traffic calming narrative in our town. um and really to give future generations as as
uh Susan was saying to uh this space and this avenue to start things like a bike network and um giving more access to things like this that I didn't have um and a lot of us probably didn't have growing up. So, um yes, thank you again for uh for everything you guys are doing
for this. Thank you. Next speaker. Hi. Hi. Uh Aaron Curts. I live at 125 Tuscan Road. Um, it's my first meeting. I'm really excited to be here. I've seen you all in other things and I just want to
thank you all for too, right? Thank you for your service and thanks for listening to all of us. Um, I am here in favor of the bike lanes. Uh, I didn't come here with anything uh really to say, but as I come here, I hear there's a issue about
garages. There's an issue about parking downtown. A lot of we're in a car culture and as was eloquently said a second ago, bike lanes are shifting the culture. It is something as a resident of Tuscan Road where I see people
on that street which is also a dangerous street, a very dangerous street. Um, people already use that street. They bike on it all the time. And I kind of cringe when I see people do it. I would love to see bike lanes by all of the schools. I would love to see one on
Tuskin. I would love to see one on Bdon. I would love to see one on Baker Avenue. And this is the way that kids get to school, you know, this way they get around. Um, uh, I came into this bike community
through the bike bus and there were 300 kids riding bike buses every Friday. That's a lot of kids that can't be here to speak today. Maybe some of them have in the past, but I this is their way of getting around.
They're going to do it whether we want them to or not. We need to do what we can to protect them. You know, it does it make things safe? No. Does it make things safer? Probably. And so I would just like to
speak on their behalf and on the behalf of uh what I hope is the first step in a larger project to unify and shift the culture in our city. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Thank you very much, Max.
Hi. Hello. Hello, township committee. I'm Max Kravitz. I live on Broadview Avenue. As some of you in this room may know, earlier this year, I had the privilege of running for the township committee in the Democratic primary. And throughout my two-month campaign, I had the chance to speak to hundreds of Maplewood
residents, each having a unique perspective on the future we want to build together for Maplewood. Throughout these conversations, I had in our community, which I know you all also have had to probably many more times than I, there were two values which
consistently stood out to me. Safety and agency. Cars are expensive, unsustainable, and most importantly, dangerous. The push for bike lanes is not about wanting is about not wanting the way that we move around the world, the way that we exercise our autonomy to
be limited to give choice to our residents. To the members of the township committee, I ask you to consider the precedent for safety, agency, and progress that today's vote will mark in Maplewood and vote yes on Parker Avenue bike lanes. Thank you.
Thank you. Hello. Hi, Township Committee. Hi, Martin Seperly. I live on Parker Avenue, 152. And as a Parker Avenue resident, I'm thrilled that the TC is addressing the safety of our street where we've witnessed years of unsafe driving and
dangerous conditions for people walking, biking, and driving. These are issues I've been speaking to you about for several years. Last weekend, we saw Maplewood come together at Maple Woodstock. Even with Oakview Avenue closed, I didn't hear one complaint about lack of parking because
the events about bringing people together. We saw people biking, people walking, people car pooling, people using public transit to visit Maplewood. Driving is but one of many ways to navigate our small, dense town of less than four square miles.
I'd like to speak about the future. The spike lane as proposed is not going to be perfect and we'll need to continue to work together to make it as safe and as useful to the community as we can. We need to look at our streets not in isolation but as an interconnected system. Our streets are for moving
people, people walking, people biking, people driving. We need to take the learnings from this Parker Avenue redesign and apply them to improve the town's processes going forward for all of our major roads through the complete streets framework. Working together, we
can systematically identify easy wins and safety improvements throughout our town. The community dialogue we've undergone is healthy and useful because we're talking about important issues here. There's no easy fixes. This is a process that is just beginning with the
vote tonight. And I look forward to working with the town and working with our community so that we can make Maplewood an even more desirable place to live and raise a family. And lastly, I'd like to thank the township committee for your work over
the last year plus um on this Parker Avenue redesign. And of course, I'm going to urge you to vote yes on the redesign. And I'm going to say when it gets assuming it gets introduced, let's approach it with an attitude of continuous learning and improvement. Thank you.
Thank you. Next speaker. Okay, my name is Cynthia Medina. I live on the corner of Parker and Orchard and this is Cece Spec. And we weren't going to talk tonight, but it's just she was compelled to say something. I have
something quick to say. Everyone has said it better than me. I just I think we have an amazing opportunity right now to move this community into the future. And I hope that we can all continue to be passionate. And this is everyone every I've never seen so many people at
these meetings. So obviously people are passionate about this. So I hope that you know with this vote um that people can continue to show up for safer streets for everyone um because we need this not just for bikers but pedestrians
and for everyone in the community. And I think you have something to say. Hi guys. Um, I just wanted to say that at the beginning of this debate or something, I thought that all of the people against it were all like on the
same thing. But then at the end of this, now I realize that you can't get all the people opposing and just throw them into one bucket. They all have unique responses. And I think some of those might be more reasonable than others.
Um, and also I think that maybe it'd be safer for high schoolers to ride down Parker to get to high school and maybe they can have their own bike line, I mean bike bus. Um, and also for the last
thing I want to say is that every time I bike to school, I get this always nervous thing that I'm going to get hit by a car. And I think if we have more bike lanes, I think I'd be safer biking and I would have to worry less.
Thank you. What's your name? CeCe. Thank you. Thank you so much. I know it's not you. Don't worry. What's your name? My name's Nora.
I live on Parker Avenue and I'm four bike lanes. Nora, while you're thinking of what you want to say, I just want to tell you that as long as I've been up here, I remember you before you were born. After you were born,
coming to our meetings. That's right. Before you were born, you came here. So, if you have anything else you'd like to say, you're more than welcome to say it. Nope. Nora, Nora might have been the youngest uh township committee speaker ever at
There you go. Thank you, Nora. Hi. Hey, everyone. Uh Fab McN. I don't actually live anywhere near Parker. I live on Ridgewood, but uh I'm very pro bike everything. Um, and you know,
actually Martin is my inspiration on all this stuff. Um, but one thing I wanted to say was just that, you know, one thing I find, I guess, interesting or fascinating about this issue is that I've lived in Maplewood for 5 years now. I moved here from Brooklyn like so many others. And
one of the thing, my biggest pain point in Maplewood is I have three kids. in the mornings. I've got three different drop off locations between daycare, other daycare uh pre and uh Seth Bdon. And um one of the things I really love this year was seeing the different bike
buses develop at the schools. My daughter who goes to Seth Bdon, she wasn't on the bike bus. She was part of the busing program. But something I see parents around this town, these towns complain about is like, oh, like my kid gets placed at this school and so far and I have to go and like I'm at that awkward distance where it's not long
enough for the bus, but it's too long for a walk. And I just feel like taking a step forward on a biking plan, letting this be step one and building something greater. Those are sort of the steps towards developing a community where you're able to eliminate those types of issues because kids grow up in an environment where they feel safe biking
to school even on their own. And then that sort of relieves some of the pressure on the educational system. And so I just think that this is just a huge, you know, opportunity for a huge net positive. Um I was literally at home about to go to the grocery store. I remembered that this was happening.
Drove over here, didn't bike. Um just wanted to say this and now I'm headed to Whole Foods. But go to the grocery store. Yeah. Your chores, son. Yeah. Yeah. We can all relate. Thank you so much. Is there anyone else in the room who would like to speak on any agenda item tonight?
Mr. Rar, your turn to host. If anyone on Zoom would like to speak on agenda items, please raise your hand. Now, moving over Kia Zeers to public portion. I'd prefer people on Zoom put on their
camera if you're able. That would just be helpful. It makes it easier to hear you for some reason. We got John Molry on public portion. Welcome John. You may address the committee. Hello guys. Uh I'm from Ridgewood, New
Jersey. Uh I was a fourth generation born and brought in Ridgewood. My family uh is seventh generation born and raised in New Jersey. I uh I just really like this issue. Uh so I attend these meetings all over the country
through Doom. It's fantastic. Uh your guys town is so nice. Like you guys are how pleasant this meeting has been. All the comments like how well you work together is just amazing to me. And the thing I would
like to say is nothing is ever perfect. Nothing is ever built perfect. If we waited for something to be 100% perfect, we would never build anything. So everything is a work in progress as are humans. And I
would just I would suggest maybe adding some mo modal filters. So uh like little flex post. You can add them like every 10 or 15 feet. Don't block any driveway access or anything. And that might uh help a lot of people with their concerns who do have concerns about this because
it really gives drivers a uh something to see on the road to identify it's a bike lane besides paint. It's not real protection, but it it's cheap. Uh it's easy to repair, quick build. So, yeah, that was that was
my only comment. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Now, moving Danielle Morales to public portion. Welcome Danielle. you may unmute yourself and address the committee. Hello. Um, okay. I think I figured this
out. Um, I'm very inspired by hearing everyone in this meeting in support of the backlink and even the opponents have um their own reasons as
those uh kids mentioned. So, it's been a very inspiring um process. I am in favor of the bike lanes and I am in favor for a variety of reasons. Uh one of them is
for um calming down our streets. I believe they should be uh 10 uh foot wide travel lanes and as one participant mentioned just didn't think the uh the 5 foot bike lane will be enough. I think
they should be as wide as possible. The travel lane should be 10 and any lef over space should be given over to the bike lens. Also, I hope that there's connectivity throughout the entire bike lane to be
uninterrupted so that when you're in a bike lane and you have to and you see a break in the back lane, you don't have to go over to the driver lane and possibly be hit behind.
And that is um one topic I would like to discuss. I am dead. So having a bike lane is equitable for someone like me who might not hear what's behind me. So,
a bike lane is the right decision for Parker Avenue in addition to the entire neighborhood um bike network and also it might inspire to connect over to South Orange and all
of our neighboring towns. It is a sustainable mode of getting people around. it is efficient and I think that everyone else kind of really proved my point. Um
that's it. Um I support the back. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Now moving Brian Herrick to public comment. Welcome, Brian. You may unmute yourself and address the committee.
Hi, Patrick. Hi, committee. Um, it is such a pleasure to be here. I'm so glad that we're at the end of this incredibly diligent and thorough and thoughtful process. We are so close to taking such an amazing first step together as a community, as a town, um, towards making
our streets a little bit safer, to make our town a little bit more accessible to everyone. I rode up Parker yesterday on the way home from the new library. It's amazing and I can't wait for the next time when it's going to be on a bike lane. So, I want to thank everyone for their input. This process has been, as I
said, incredibly thorough and um I'm looking forward to its conclusion. So, thanks everyone. Can't wait for the bike lanes. Thank you. Anyone else? Mr. Wor, moving Kia Zeers to public comment. Welcome, Kia. You may unmute yourself
and address the committee. Hi, thank you for um having me speak tonight. Um I have been in this uh discussion from probably the beginning with a lot of people that live on Parker. Um, a couple of things that, you
know, before we conclude all all of this tonight that I'd like to point out is that many of the people that you've heard from in many of these meetings who are in favor of these bike lanes do not live on Parker. Many of the people that
you've heard from that are opposed to the bike lanes live on Parker. We're opposed because we're there every single day driving up and down to and from work, to and from dropping our kids
off to school, and we see the traffic. We see the unsafe nature of this street for bikers. and we know. Okay. So, in all seriousness, you know, we've presented
many reasons why this plan needs re-evaluating. We've raised many questions, some which have not been answered satisfactor satisfactorily about the safety of this plan. Right? despite the lofty ideas that everybody
has, we're, you know, listen, if you're talking about somebody who's about progressiveness and moving forward, that's me. I'm the one that's always telling my friends, try something new. But I'm also a pragmatist. And I believe that if you're going to be putting people's lives on the line, sanctioning
and recommending a street for bike riding as a mode of transportation that you need to hold very serious that vote and that decision you're making for when and if hopefully not
then inev the thing that everyone who is opposed to it feels inevitably will happen which is someone either getting hit or losing their lives. The same reason that one of the um speakers originally said New York, you know, is
always improving and thinking about their bike lanes, New York and many other cities have started to remove bike lanes on certain streets because they have proven to be unsafe despite the wish and the hope that it would do what
you thought it would do. So, everybody that's taking that vote tonight needs to think about that very carefully because the consequence of that decision will be in your hands.
That's it. Okay. Thank you. Now moving Jesse Pepper to public comment. Okay. Worry how many more on No, no. I see we have somebody in front. Welcome, Jesse. You may unmute yourself
and address the committee. Okay. Okay. We I'm here with my two kiddos. This is Elena and this is Llaya. Um, we live on Parker Avenue and we are pro
bike lanes. And Elena wanted to show you something. Go ahead. Hello. My name's Elena and I want to have bike lanes because me and my dad go biking everywhere
and we want bike lanes. Okay. Anything else? No, we used to everything else. Do you want to say something about the bike lane? Definitely. Do you want bike lanes? No. We didn't plan that.
Okay. Go ahead. Okay. You live on Parker Avenue and past my fourth birthday. And now I get my my other birthday than my birthday.
and and and um we are pro bike lane. We've lived here for 11 years. Um along Wells to Clinton School, we are outside on our front lawn pretty much every day. And um we see people biking every day to and
from school. And my husband bikes, he's not here at the moment. Um he is also pro bike and um our opinion is people are biking already. Let's make the road safer for
all involved. Um and uh we're proycling. Anything else? I have lighter glasses. She's got lighter. Thank you so much for taking the time to uh listen to Thank you. I don't know, Mr. Wary. Maybe we should
encourage no cameras. No. Now moving Nick Bardo to public comment. Sorry. Welcome Nick. You may address the committee. All right. Can you guys hear me? We can.
All right. I apologize in advance. My camera isn't working. I was actually open to me in person, but uh yeah, stuff happens. But um anyways, I am also a Parker Avenue resident. Um I am asking that you vote no on this
bill. Um a lot of people have already come through, said a lot about um the unsafe nature of the bike lanes, about whether or not Parker Avenue is a very bikable street. I don't want to bore you guys reciting what you've
already heard. Um I'm generally in agreement with them. And the other point I just wanted to bring up um a lot of people have rightly brought up hard numbers as something that we should be taking a look at and really putting at
the forefront for what we should for our considerations. And the number hasn't come up in a few meetings. I think it was actually during one of the meetings in March where I heard the number. But the hard numbers right now suggest that not a whole lot of people are riding
bikes down up and down Parker Avenue. And I think that for this plan to pay off, you know, figuratively and literally, it's almost $300,000 for it. Um, there would have to be some
real metric that suggests that way more people are going to actually use Parker Avenue as a biking route. is some I'm I mean I'd like to ask, but me personally, I do not think that putting some paint
down on the road is going to convince tons of people to ride their bike to the grocery store or to the 7-Eleven in Irvington. I think that there are certain places and applications where having bike lanes in Maplewood would
make sense, like going to the pool or on very heavily trafficked streets around elementary schools or going to Memorial Park. But the reality is is that Parker Avenue is very complicated. And honestly, I just I think that many of my
neighbors as well as myself seriously doubt that these bike lanes are going to see a huge increase in use over what we already have and I think that that is something that should be taken into account. Thank you.
Thank you. Anyone else online? Now moving Johanna Karf to public comment. Welcome Joanna. You may unmute yourself and address the committee.
Hi. Um I live on Parker. I um urge you to uh vote no. I'm a biker. I would love to see a bike lane on Elmwood and Oakland or any of the other streets that go from Prospect to the park. I
would love to be able to bike from the park to the pool that will connect, you know, so many people to town. Um it will allow actually people from the other side of the tracks to bike to the pool.
Um I think um using um bikers to um slow down traffic. It's a little bit irresponsible. And um
again, I would love to see a bike lane on Elmwood. I I would be very happy about that. Um and um that's it. Thank you. Thank you. Now moving David A to public comment
coming on. He declined to be promoted. So there are no other hands. Mayor. Okay, I know we had another person or two in the room who wanted to speak. So, it's agenda items only. I come on up to the mic,
identify yourself, and you have three minutes to speak. I'm I'm Rob Basta. I live in Hilton, Maplewood. Um, and I'm supporting this bill or this project. Um, I've been following the project. I also understand that this is
one piece of a much larger project which is the Maplewood uh bike network and the bike network when that's done over many years will make the lanes useful that that will make biking a viable form of
transportation. It all has to happen together. And I guess I worry that if you guys don't vote yes tonight, it's going to really be a major setback for the bigger picture of making cycling a viable form of transportation in
Maplewood. So I hope that um this is a first step and I I hope that the folks who are more hesitant about um this understand that people are already biking and allowed to bike on every street of this town. Uh so having
increased uh infrastructure makes it safer for those people. Um and um I guess at the risk of making people cringe, I'll also say that I lived in New York for a long time. I commuted um
the whole time I lived there uh when I started working in my career in 2008 back when there were very few bike lanes there. And then I saw the rapid um expansion of bike lanes happen there over that 10 to 15 years. And not only
did I feel safer commuting, I also noticed by experience a dramatic increase in the amount of people. That's because of the network of bike lanes that were connecting routes and making a dynamic system for people to use. And
that's not just an impression that I have, but there's New York City Department of Transportation reports that have the statistics that you can look up if you want to. So, I hope that happens here. I think it will um people have already said how much useful it would uh or how much easier it would be
on parents, taking kids to school, etc., etc. Uh I'm all for it. Please have the courage to vote yes. Thank you. Is there anyone else who'd like to speak on agenda items only? Let's not forget the timer, please. The timer
wasn't on last time. Hi. That's okay. Go ahead. Uh my name is Sophie Breen. Um I live right there um on Oak View. And I just want to um respond to a couple of the things that I've heard. I'm pro bike lanes. Um I would love a bike lane on
Oak View. If you're going to do that one next, please. That'd be great. Um but I've heard some arguments that I don't really think make sense if people think about it. People have said, you know, I don't see bikes on Parker. Parker is so dangerous. Like, let's put two together. People aren't biking on Parker because
it's dangerous. If it is safer, people will bike there. Um, I think that makes a lot of sense. Um, I bike with my little kids. I bike all over the place. I drop them off at daycare on the bike. I would love to bike more. Um, any
parent who has kids that are little understands that putting two kids Star seeds will take a year off your life and add 10 great pairs. Biking is amazing because you don't have to do that and they love it. It's fun. We connect. Um we get to chat. We get to see our
neighbors. Um it's really part of what makes smalltown living so special and why we decided to move here. Um I also moved from a pro biking community that's not New York. Um, I lived in Massachusetts up um in Arlington, Massachusetts outside of Cambridge,
which is like biking. Everywhere you go, kids laughing. You see parents chatting with other parents. It really is like a if you build it, they will come. And I think here, um, people see biking as this leisure activity. You know, guys, I could do it on the weekends, but it's
really about like being more sustainable. It's about spending more time with your loved ones. Um, the way of life and I think that we have a bike lane infrastructure please prospect next. Um I think that we'll see an explosion in biking and I'd love for
this committee to understand that and build for our future. Thank you. Thank you. Is there one more online? Okay. Where is Mayor? Moving Susan Msby to public comment. Welcome Susan. You may unmute yourself
and address the committee. Don't forget to reset the clock much for um taking these comments. Um I've listened in a couple of meetings and I wasn't actually going to speak at this one because I I've spoken before. Um but I just want to say that I've heard a lot of people say that Parker
residents themselves don't want bike lanes and I live on the corner of Parker and Ball and I want to say that we hardly support bike lanes and we know a lot of our neighbors do as well. Um, I feel like you do see a lot of signs on Parker, but all the houses that don't have signs are potentially proike lanes.
Um, and I know a lot of us are really excited about them coming. Um, even if we're not always as loud as the anti-ikelane folks. Um, we're also not a biking family, but we hope to be. Um, I'd just love to see it feel a bit safer
and then we will gladly um, join the biking brigade. Um, and I think it could go a long way. I feel like um sometimes you have cynicism about change as a whole, as a as a community, but I think that, you know, the science is right and I've seen all the positives that have come from our four-way stop sign, which
we are so thankful um was installed and so I know that these changes will be really positive and um a wonderful addition to our community. So, thank you. Thank you very much. Anyone else online? No, mayor. Okay. Anyone else in the room like to
speak on this or any other agenda item? Going once. Okay, then we will move on to our agenda. What time is it? Okay, one hour later. Mayor, is it possible to to move this up so we could this so people can go home?
That's a great idea. So, this resolution right now sits on the agenda after several discussion items and I agree with Mr. Duca that we could move this one up and start our discussion on it. Mr. Duca is chair of engineering public works and who has been leading the bike
lane discussions. Why don't you open up our discussion on this resolution or do you want to move it first? I would move it. Okay. Do we have a second? Second. And then I have some comments. Yes. Yes. I'm going to give everybody a chance just, you know, because I am the
uh the record keeper here. We had 28 speakers tonight. Um, I have 20 in favor, nine against. 28. Okay. Okay. I have 19 and n I I didn't count all the little kids as separate. Okay.
Uh, I have 19 and nine. 19 in favor. I know they count, but we're bundling them. Uh, just like uh 19 in favor of, nine opposed. I had So, um, so I'm going to just I have some remarks that I'm going to give. Yes, please. So, I'm going to be voting
yes on this resolution. Uh, but for me, this was a journey um to get to a yes vote. I first heard about this, my initial thought was about the impact on the residents um who would be prevented from parking
on their street. And I'm sensitive to that because I've heard from other residents in town who can't park on their streets because we give preference to um commuters, school employees or business owners. So I understand people
saying, you know, we never get a chance to park on their street. So I spent a lot of time on Parker. I went up and down. Don't live there, but rode around one end to the other different times day and night, all days of the week.
And the reality is I did not see a lot of on street parking um except on the eastern end from Bdon to Irvington Avenue. And though in it is still a concern of mine about the parking, but I think we've come up with a plan that gives
Parker residents and their guests the ability to park on nearby side streets when they need to do so. And I think the bike lane plan also takes a common sense approach to short-term deliveries, snow
plowing, and leaf removal. Like many decisions on the township committee, we try to strike a balance. We take all our all views into consideration. We heard a lot of opinions on this issue. We discussed it for more than 150
days. It was a very deliberate process and we heard some people talking about that tonight. We wanted to listen and refine our thinking. We sponsored four virtual community meetings, heard comments at various public meetings, and received numerous emails for and
against, and a petition with over 200 signatures. One thing that seemed to be consistent with both those in favor and against, and we heard it again tonight, was the generic support for bike lanes.
Even those on Parker who live on Parker said that they are not against bike lanes, just not on Parker. And we heard it again. Many offered Elmwood as an option, although I'm not sure who spoke to anyone on Elmwood about that.
I think bike lanes are an important factor and fa and a fab piece of fabric of our community. Maplewood and the state of New Jersey have adopted a complete streets approach, making sure we provide
opportunities for walkers, bike bikers, and automobile drivers to safely use our roadways. The 2023 master plan calls for the township committee to renew and strengthen our commitment to complete
streets policymaking. Now, we heard it again tonight. There's a lot of concern about safety, rightly so. And safety has been a paramount concern of our professional engineers. We've talked to them about it again and again. And we've developed a plan
with travel lanes that are 10 ft and 11 ft and a bicycle lane that's 5T. That plan comports with complete street standards and the manual on uniform traffic control devices, things that we are guided by. Additionally, the
Maplewood Police Department has stepped up its enforcement on and around Parker. In June of 2025, the police did 40 moving violations and radar stops in the area as opposed to 10 in 2024. 333%
increase in 2025 from 2024 because of our attention to Parker. We will continue to maintain police presence on and surrounding Parker. And this plan is not just about bikes.
All current crosswalks will be refreshed with striping and if needed, pedestrian crossing signs will be put up on Parker. The plan will add three new crosswalks across Parker and three other crosswalks on side streets. Additionally, the
current crosswalks at Columbia High School at Kensington Terrace and North Terrace will have new highintensity beacons on on those pedestrian cross faces. And we should say that we've been in communication with the principal of
Columbia High School and the superintendent of schools about the bike plan and about a new uh drop off and pickup plan that we're going to be rolling out in September. We're going to be talking about that a little later. So, why Parker Avenue? That came up
again tonight. So, it's a street that connects the east and west side of towns on Maplewood's north border. Columbia High School and Clinton School are on or just off Parker. Bordon Park is on Parker. Maplewood Memorial Park is a block away. Train
commuters use Parker to get to the station. It provides access to shopping destinations on Irvington Avenue, Valley Street, and even Maplewood Village. The people who will use bicycles on Parker are using it for transportation
just like the people who drive on Parker. They are going somewhere and with these designated bike lanes, we are giving them place to do that. I want to thank everybody for their comments and for sticking up for what you believe in. I
know it wasn't easy. Many of you have been to one, two, three, four of the meetings and uh you know, we started this on March 3rd. So, we appreciate your stamina if nothing else. But in the end, each township committee
member must decide on this issue, making the best decision that she or he can do after considering the facts, the professional recommendations, and the opinions expressed. After all that and on
balance, I think installing bicycle lanes on Parker Avenue is sound public policy. and I will be will be voting yes on resolutions 2042-25. Thank you. Who would like to speak with their comments next? M.
Thank you, mayor. Um, I just wanted to start by reading a paragraph from our master plan which um had a lot of community engagement and which should be guiding our township policies. Um it's on the circulation and mobility section and the very first sentence is bolded
and says implement a policy shift to prioritize walking, bicycling, public transportation, and micromobility over automobile parking and throughput. Maplewood has the opportunity to respond to the community's desire for safe, convenient, and equitable alternatives
to automobile travel. At the same time, residents and visitors alike depend on cars and parking to take advantage of the township's many attractions and amenities. Ultimately, policy decisions must reflect an earnest move toward non-auto travel to address safety,
environmental, and social goals while addressing but deemphasizing auto demand. This master plan can establish and/or advance numerous efforts to create a more holistic approach to mobility in the township. I enthusiastically support bike lanes in
Maplewood because I think we need to think towards the future. I support alternative transportation networks like bike lanes, like increasing public transportation because we need to create policies and initiatives to decrease our reliance on cars. We need to make it
safer for people to move around in ways besides their automobiles in order to make that cultural shift. As mentioned from one of our speakers, if we don't start building it, people aren't going to change. And to help climate change, to help infrastructure, we need to start
getting off of our car centric culture. And so I believe that this is the very first step for Maplewood to make it easier for people in our town, hopefully in South Orange, to start moving around without the reliance of cars, to make it safer for all of us to move around.
Thank you so much. Thank you. Who else like to speak next? Mr. Davis. I'm happy to jump in, mayor. Thank you. I too will be voting in favor of our resolution this evening. I won't repeat the things that were said. I think
committee member Duca who has been spearheading this and leading the effort and managing it thoughtfully I might add throughout this process of significant civic engagement on the issue answered a lot of the questions that people seem to
still have about this current plan. The plan that we have before us this evening is a better plan than we had back in March when we started this process. And that's because of all of you. You
here in person this evening, you online, and those of you who have taken the time out to email us. The civic engagement has made this plan better, and the process itself more collaborative and thoughtful. Moreover,
this is not the end. This is just the start. the start of building a bike network in our township. And as Susan McCarthy, I hope I got your last name correct, said this evening, her comment
really resonating with me in particular among all the great comments we received this evening, pro and against, "We are building a new culture. If you don't build it, they will not come. We already know that there are cyclists on Parker
Avenue. We want to make it safer for them, especially for our students who are cycling on Parker Avenue to and from school. We would never say, by the way, we would never ever say, by the way,
that even if there were just five or 10 pedestrians on a road that was unsafe, that we would not do everything that we need to do to make it safer for those pedestrians. So why are we discounting cyclists?
Because we do not have a culture. We do not have a culture. And this is a national problem. It is not just a Maplewood problem. But here in Maplewood, in keeping with our values and in keeping with our previous votes on this issue, including policymaking
decisions from this governing body in favor of complete streets years ago before it became popular and recently, as committee member Angel noted in our master plan, which is already two years old and we're behind
the curve, this is the right decision in this moment of time. Let's do it and let's continue. By the way, it's not the end, it's the beginning. Let's do it and keep collaborating together to make it the best plan that we can. Thank you.
Thank you, Deputy Mayor Herman. Thank you. I support complete streets in Maplewood. Complete streets are streets that are engineered to serve all modes of transportation from pedestrians and cyclists to cars. And I believe that
complete streets and other measures to enhance pedestrian and cyclist safety in our town are critically important, especially along routes to and from our schools. Studies show that adding narrowed streets and bike lanes slows
traffic. Our current situation of kids riding on sidewalks or on Parker Avenue without bike lanes is unacceptable. Like Mr. Duca said earlier, this plan comes with challenges for those who live on Parker and I hear and I appreciate those
concerns particularly around parking and the unsafe CHS drop off situation and I am pleased with the ways in which we have addressed those issues. The resolution before us is not perfect. I would rather see bike lanes for the
entire length of Parker and I would rather see it have a bit more protection. I think we can hopefully look at some things like daylighting to um uh enhance that protection at the intersections. Um but the point I want
to make is that we can't let perfection get in the way of progress and that's what this resolution represents, progress. So I want to thank everyone who's been involved in this process. Um someone emailed me and said, "What would I think
if the bike lanes were on my street? How would I feel then?" And I well well well this is very interesting because my street is on the map for the larger bike network. And so um I'll answer that question now and say I would be
delighted. Let's do this. I can't wait. Thank you. Well obviously I'll hear we have um four out of five votes and like Mr. Duca, mine was a bit of a journey. Um the first time we do something is always the hardest. Uh we we look at
things, man. I I talked to other elected officials or in other towns or um even just internally with our our administrator and others about how far we reach into the community to get input. I challenge you to find another
township that takes so much time to listen to everyone. And that's all of our time. That's not just those of us elected. That's our staff. That's our engineer. That's our consulting engineers. Um it's it's all of you
residents who take the time to come and and advocate for or against something. So this is really really important and I think um I I commend Mr. Duca as chair of engineering public works for um very carefully and very thoroughly carrying
that process forward with regard to public comment and public input and the opportunity for public input. So to those who say it was predetermined, I was not predetermined. I was listening
to all the hours of uh engineering reports to counts. I've asked questions. I've looked at the different plans and I have um listened to everyone for and against to those on Parker. I understand
I live on Harvard. I've lived there a long time and it's I get a lot of people parking and pulling up or parking right near my driveway when I have to get out of get out of my driveway to go to work. But what we need to get used to is when we pull out of our driveways, we not
only look for other cars, we have to look for pedestrians. That's something I experience every day if I happen to be leaving when school, Tuscan school is opening up, but also we need to get used to looking for bicycles as well. So I I
don't think that um maybe some of us had wanted this from the beginning but not all of us did and certainly not a majority. I think we have all listened and I give you know not to pat ourselves on the back but I think you know we
spent a lot of time hearing you and considering not only what you say but what our consulting engineers say and believe me I don't always Mr. will tell you, Mr. Kitner will tell you, I do not always agree with our engineer. And
being married to an engineer, I know I don't always agree with engineers, but I do listen to them because they are they are following rules, right? and their advice may sometimes need to be taken with a grain of salt and it should be
because they're our professionals but our job is to be the residents of this community and take their input and combine it with what we experience in our daily lives and then come to a decision that makes sense for our
community. So I wasn't a yes before in the very beginning. I wanted to hear all about it. I questioned why it wouldn't be Elmwood. I think about all the different streets it should be. And after living here this long, 36 years, I
have come to the conclusion that I think this is the right thing to do and it's a great place to start. And I think it will improve safety on Parker Avenue, not make it more dangerous. And I think as others have said, the more we
created, and I agree with Mr. is Susan, I agree with your comment. We have to create that culture because it's not existing right now. It's and when people say there aren't that many bikes on Parker, you know, maybe there will be
now and maybe we'll find from this where we have to go next. What's the next com next logical step? And we will take all of the time we need to take to make that decision as well. So, we have a motion and we have a second. Miss Fritzen, will
you please call the role? Mr. Davis, yes. Mr. Duca, yes. Miss Angel, yes. Yes. Mayor Adams, yes. Thank you. Thank you everyone for coming out. You can stay for the whole meeting.
As I said, you can stay for the whole meeting if you like or you can go on to some air conditioning. Um, since we're not uh bring the fans back right now, could we put the fans back? Yes, please. Thank you. Thank you.
Got to bring my fan. All right. Why don't we take like a twominut break to let everyone leave and use the rest? Thank you. Thank you. It was a hard even for you.
This B will tell Thank you for your indulgence to get a very rowdy crowd. Um, it was good out of the room. Right. So, we're going to move back into our meeting and we have ordinances on final passage. Um, Miss Fritzen. Yes, mayor.
Uh, we're at number six now. 6A, ordinance number 3161-25 is an ordinance to amend classification of employment positions within the township of Maplewood and to establish
salary ranges for employees. Yes, this ordinance is on for final passage. So, it has been published. Copies posted on the bulletin board of the municipal building. copies made available to the general public in accordance with the law. Is there anyone
here who would like to speak to this ordinance? As I open up the hearing, Mr. Weary, is there anyone online who wants to speak to this? If anyone on Zoom would like to speak on this ordinance, please raise your hand. I see no hands, mayor.
Okay. Then I move this ordinance be adopted as a whole. The clerk be directed to publish the same as a past ordinance in the Maplewood South Orange News record according to law. I have a second. Miss Herman, I second. Mr. Davis, yes. Zuca, yes. Zangel, yes.
Herman, yes. Mayor Adams, yes. Thank you. We have an ordinance on for introduction 3163-25. Uh, yes, Mayor. Item number seven, bond ordinance providing for township's
allocable share of the 200 2025 capital improvement program of the joint meeting of Essex and Union counties in by the township Mapwood in the county of Essex, New Jersey, appropriating $900,000
therefore and authorizing the issuance of 855,000 bonds or notes to the township to finance part of the cost thereof. This ordinance appropriates $900,000
for the township share of the 2025 capital improvement program of the joint meeting of Essex and Union counties and authorizes the issuance of $855,000 in bonds or notes to finance part of the
cost. Thank you, Mr. Ray. Would you um please just tell us all about borrowing from ourselves 0% interest that you let us know about just for the public's benefit? Sure. The township is part of the joint
meeting of Essex Union County which collects our sanitary sewer waste and treats it. As part of that, residents receive an annual bill and and we pay the uh the joint meeting. In addition to annual costs, the joint
meeting assesses us capital costs. Not every year, usually every few years. So, they notified us early in this year that uh they would have a capital request that the township was uh was to pay for about $900,000. They gave us options. We
could finance through them uh through the I bank or we could pay the 900,000 ourselves. They don't really care how we do that. Uh we had uh given the township committee a few options. The recommended option was the one the township committee went with which is to
self-fund the $900,000 now and then raise the amount to pay back the loan to ourselves with an assessment to all uh rateayers over the next three years. And so this is the the first step in that process. And this is a capital ordinance
that loans ourselves the money for money we already have in cash. Loans it to oursel for this purpose. Okay. I move the passage of this ordinance on first reading its publication according to law in the Maplewood South Orange News record and a hearing to be held on August 5th. Mr.
Herman, can I get a second? Mr. Davis? Yes. Mr. Duca? Yes. Zangel? Yes. Sherman? Yes. Mayor Adams? Yes. Thank you. Now we move to reports from department's administrative report.
Mr. Wary, thank you. Mayor, one item tonight, American Classic continues to film in town and they have submitted what they expect will be their final request for waiverss for the balance of their
filming. Uh this will take us to August 13th filming. And so, uh, we provided to you an Excel spreadsheet that shows all of their film requests for, uh, until August 13th. Maybe we take the the
easier ones, uh, first because there's a few groups of waivers. They're looking for some on Claremont, some on Deart, some in the village, and some at the Burgdorf Theater. So, if you if you're okay with that, I'll we'll take a moment. Yeah, just proceed. So, so
Burgdorf Theater generally has had low impact. We have received um some uh complaints from from one resident in the area, two sometimes two depending on if they're running air conditioning in the area that we've been so far able to
address to an extent that you know we think that the film company's done a good job of addressing resident complaints in that area. So, um I would recommend that the township committee continue to uh provide waiverss for uh
filming at the Burgdorf Theater. The second one is on Deart Road. They frequently uh shoot on Deart until early into the morning and so this request is until 3:00 a.m. which is after our 10 p.m. ordinance wrap time, which is why
they require a waiver. We they have done a good job on Deart Road of keeping the uh the residents there happy with their production. We understand that there is an impact to it, but um they received the waiverss that they need so far and have done a good job there. So, they're
requesting that they film until 3:00 a.m. in uh Maplewood Village. This is a little bit more extensive. Um, and there's a map associated with what they are requesting. They have met with uh
myself, other members of the administrative staff, with the police department, and with the executive director of the Maplewood Village Alliance to review this plan. So, there's kind of three areas to this. The first one is down near the intersection
of Baker and Maplewood A. Their request is to close off completely the section of Maplewood A between Baker and Highland Place during their shooting. And this is the the shooting is going to be on a Monday in this area. It would
start their setup about 500 a.m. And they would uh stage some trucks in the New Jersey Transit lot. They would be filming uh actors walking down Maplewood Avenue out of some of the storefronts. They're working with a lot of the stores
in the area to use their facilities. So actors walking out of the storefronts carrying chairs and walking down Maplewood Avenue. This is one of their the big scenes in the show. So full closure of Maplewood Avenue. The other areas where you see the red X's,
those are um intermittent traffic control. And so those areas would be closed off to traffic for the three to five minutes when they do a scene, when they're actively filming. And then when they finish filming and clear the street, the next, you know, anywhere
from 5 to 20 minutes, that street would be open to traffic. So there is an impact to on street parking. Um, and there will be an impact to traffic, but they'll maintain access to both of the downtown parking lots that are in the area. They'll have flaggers that allow
people to come in and out and they'll require a lot of police on this day in order to uh to manage the traffic which again will be um remain open when they're not actively filming. When they're finished there, they'll move up in front of the theater in Rickleton
Square. This will be intermittent traffic control. No complete closures in this area of Maplewood Avenue. They will take up street park front of the theater all the way from Inwood Place to Durant Road. And this they'll be in this area from 9:00 a.m.
to 2:00 p.m. And then the last place they'll be is on Durand Road. They're looking to again similar to to the last section of Maplewood A have intermittent traffic control on Durand Road. So, it will be closed during filming sequences
and they'll take up the the parking along that whole section of Durand Road from Woodland Road into Maplewood Avenue. The times for that are 100 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. That is filming in the village. And then
the last is on 12 Claremont. They have propo they need two additional days of filming on Claremont. They have given four dates. their schedule isn't final yet. When it is final, you know, we'll require them to get sign off from the uh
those immediately impacted, but they, you know, they're they're still fine-tuning those days. All of the days they've requested to shoot until 12:00 a.m., which is what we had permitted previously. That goes past our ordinance, which has
a 10 p.m. wrap time. And so they would require a uh waiver from the township committee uh for those two dates that they want to shoot. I will note that we had uh provided them with a waiver last Friday or shoot until 12 a.m. that was
same as the request they have here and they vacated the street at 12:45 a.m. after what we had permitted which I've discussed with the film crew and they have committed to you know providing more effort to uh clear the street this
time but it is an area of concern. Those are. And then the last one on the list, Maywood train station. They they're hoping for August 11th. Aren't entirely sure. That will likely fall within our permitted times of 7:00
a.m. to 12 or excuse me to 10 p.m. for filming. They may take up some on street parking. As long as it's minimal, we likely won't come back with a uh a request for a waiver from the committee at that point. What day of the week is the 11th? Do we know? On Monday.
Okay. So, they the film crew has been trying to like when they know they're taking up a lot of parking both in the in the village and in this one on at the train station try to do it on days when we have the fewest amount of commuters. Right. Any questions from my colleagues on any
of these requests for waiverss? But you have a recommendation right on the Claremont one at least. Yeah, I mean on all of Yeah. The only one where I have concerns over their ability to adhere to what we've laid out is on Claremont where they had gone to
12:45 a.m. last Friday. We were very specific. I know there was a lengthy conversation from the committee about it being 12 I their original request was 3:00 a.m. So, I do have concerns there. As we've discussed, Claremont has seen a lot of filming over the last few years and they are experiencing very real
fatigue. And so I think that is an area where the township committee may may want to give consideration. I just wanted to add why why did they go over because my understanding is that the entire shoot was done before 12 and all the actors and filming and
everything was out before 12 but there was some broken down something with regard to electricians who were there till 12:45. They had my un what they relayed to me they had used some equipment in order to minimize impact to other residents. that equipment failed at some point. It
caused things to go later. What they were still working on after the uh the 12:00 p.m. deadline was wrapping up some of their electrical electrical equipment. So, they still had electrical lines running and some electrical trucks there. All of that weren't cleared off
the street until 12:45. We did get a a complaint because of it, you know, because you're still loading trucks and there is a noise impact there. Um, so in your memo to us, you suggested maybe we allow 11:00. If if the township committee was
sensitive to that, which I am, I think that that would be reasonable. Now, they were 45 minutes over. If you want to say 11:15 and and you know, they go over 45 minutes, we cut them 45 minutes. I think I like 11. So my concern with the earlier hour and I would like to grant
them till 12 for the one night and then if they exceed it deduct that amount of time for the second night. That would be my preference. And the only reason being if this was in the middle of winter when it gets dark at 5:00. So these are dark of night shots that they can't even
start until after 9:00 p.m. Yeah. So to 11 it just I I just think it impedes it really badly. in on. So that's just my suggestion that we do it allow 1 till till 12:00 and then if they don't if they screw that up then we go
back to 11 or whatever time. I and I discussed a 11 p.m. call time with the production company today. They do have concerns because to your point they have night scenes which are harder to shoot in the summer and so you know
there's a very real impact that this would have to them which I'm sympathetic to. Um I have to balance that at least of course I just want everybody to be aware of that as well. Is there like a penalty if they exceed the time that we grant them a waiver? They're supposed to finish by midnight
but they finish at 12:45. So it's not just like oh we finished late. Let's have a talk about fixing it next time. Like what? Yeah. there is there the ordinance allows um a penalty of up to $1,000 and 90 days in jail. So, we will discuss
that internally and and that's something that doesn't require township committee approval, but um that I I expect we will uh pursue. So, just for the record, on August 11th, 2025, sunset is at 8:00 p.m.
So, it gets increasingly dark. Yeah. But it doesn't get dark dark when you're trying to do it in the dark until it's dark. Well, even if sunset is at 8, it's still not dark enough till 8:30. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Right. Yeah.
So, to clarify, it's two days of filming. Uh 11, August 11th, 12th, 13th, and 14th. It'll be two of those days. That's right. Yeah. Right. Because those those are weekdays. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Yep. In summer though. in summer, but if any
of us lived there, we'd have those early morning meetings that week. That's why they're on Zoom. Anyway, so what do you do you want uh two separate motions like one for or do you want it all? I think Mr. Daffus might want to say
something. Did you No, I think I agree with the mayor. I I I see where you're going, mayor. I think we should have two separate motions, one for Claremont and one for the other areas because I do think that um I'm comfortable I don't know about the
rest of the committee with the other areas there there uh a little less impact on the residents and from my own experience I was there uh on a couple of the occasions that they were filming in Maplewood Village. It was in and out minimal disruption. the merchants were
alerted successfully and some merchants were even compensated accordingly. And on a Monday, we have a lot of merchants that are not open. Right. So, I'm okay with the village. I'm okay with Burgdorf. Um, but I do think the mayor was about to take us in this direction.
Yeah. To have two separate motions. Fair enough. Yep. Okay. So, with that, since Mr. D was talking, can you mayor uh articulate again your suggestion? I kind of liked on the Claremont. Well, why don't we
move the other ones first? Do you want to move the other location? Okay. Yeah. Smart. Yes. I I'll move uh I I move that we grant um waiver the requ the waiver request for Maplewood Village and the Burgdorf and the other locations.
The Heart Road was the last and train station. The train station. I got a second. Second, Mr. Davis. Yes. Mr. Duca. Yes. Sangel. Yes, Sherman. Yes, Mayor Adams.
Yes. So, the other uh to clarify was um to allow them until midnight on the 1st, which is what? The 12th? 11th. No, they don't know. So, it Yeah,
August 11th is the first potential date through August 14th is the final, but only two of those days are until midnight. That's right. Okay. So I don't know only two of those days are necessary at all. Okay, got it. When will they figure out what days?
They don't know yet. As much as as weather might they have a the majority needed of signatures from residents to go until midnight. Yeah, that's right. And so we, you know, our ordinance doesn't specify a majority. I think there was some
discussion from the town we said 90%. So for this shoot right now they have eight out of 10 waiverss um that are that we had sought or they had sought they have typically been getting nine out of 10. So they expect um or excuse me yeah they
have eight out of the 10 that they expect and that's what we've been getting 10 out of 11 total. Right. Sorry to confuse. So those are waiverss to film until 12. So my thought was that because of what happened that Friday night, which wasn't planned, the rest of their
operation was shut down properly, um that if they go till 12:00 on the one the first date of the two days that they be permitted to do 12:00 the next time. If they go past 12:00, then they go till
either 11 or if they go P or the amount of time they went, you know, if they go 45 minutes past 12:00, then they get 45 minutes deducted the next night. But I feel like that's just allowing them to go past the waiver that we're granting. And while you're saying it was just one time last Friday, we've heard
from residents voicing their concerns about these late night shoots on Claremont. Yeah. I'm just My one concern is just the precedent. Like we keep saying, "Yeah, waiver. Yeah, waiver. Yeah, waiver." But like I just don't want to minimize what
these residents are saying. Like you're supposed to shut that at noon at midnight, but oh, but where they're still there? Like I don't know. Do we enforce that the penalty? Like what happens? Otherwise, it's just like, oh, they let it go last time. We're just going to do it again. I don't really feel like there's any accountability.
But administrator Wary did say that they're discussing penalties, right? Yes. So, I I do think there'll be something because the other concern is we talked about this last time and here we go again talking about this a lot. Yeah.
Um, you know, if they don't get what they need in that very little darkness window, then they possibly extend the filming in town. And I don't think anybody wants that at this point, certainly not the residents on Claremont.
So, you know, it could be the right tradeoff with penalties that we explicitly, you know, make clear and with sort of this offer to say, okay, you could do it on the first night on that Monday night, but you can't do it
the night after. That's what I would be willing to do and then it would be over. I I even when I talked to when we met with them, I said, "Get all your outdoor shots now because if the season if the series gets picked up, they'll be doing it on the interiors in a sound stage, right? They're not
going to come and do all this stuff. So, they'll replicate the interior of the house and do it that way." But, um, I Yeah, I just think, you know, I know they tried hard. I know it's rough, but frankly, I didn't hear too from too many Claremont residents from last Friday. It was last
Friday. Yes, last Friday. I didn't hear any. These are week nights. I know. And they're weekdays. School is out. It's summer. A lot of people travel. I think it's the least impact. So, I would be in favor of what I suggested. So, I'll move that.
I'll second that. Mr. Dus, yes. Mr. Luca, no. Miss Engel, no. Sherman, yes. Mayor Adams. Yes. Passes.
Okay. Thank you. Uh, anything else for Mr. Wary? Do you have anything else for us? That is all, Mayor. Thank you. Any questions for our administrator? I just uh I think the front door was locked. Can somebody have the person unlock it? Oh, there's someone down there trying to
get in. She locked it. Oh. Oh, okay. It's a substitute building intended tonight. All right. So, we have no questions for administration. We'll go to legal, our township attorney. Go ahead. Yeah. No report. No report.
No report. Okay. Any questions for legal counsel? Okay. Seeing none. There you go. And we'll go to our clerk, Miss Pritzen. Uh yes, mayor. Just a couple things. So,
um I just wanted to uh tell the township committee that um our officers started preparing to publish legal notices on the township website with the passage of um state senate bill and the assembly
bill. And we've created a dedicated page for all future legal notices. and we're working with our web hosts to update the homepage so that the page is clearly highlighted um just as the bill
requires. So um progress um on that for uh March 1st of next year uh we'll be ready to uh hit the ground on what the requirements are.
Uh my other item is to remind everybody that at the next township committee meeting, August 5th, you'll be starting an hour later due to National Night Out, which means the uh closed session, if you have one,
will be at 8:00 p.m. And the regular township committee meeting starts at 8:30 an hour. 8 and 8:30. I'm glad we're not doing bike lanes on August 5th.
Um, any questions for our township clerk? Seeing none, can I get a motion to move past to go extend the meeting past 9:30? I move to extend the meeting past 9:30 p.m. Second. Mr. Davis, yes.
Mr. Duca, yes. Sangel, yes. Sherman, yes. Mayor Adams, yes. I don't think we'll get through all of our discussion items that quickly. So, with that, we'll move on to our elected official reports. Mr. Dus,
thank you, Mayor. Uh, we're going to start with um let's see. Oh, elected official reports. I'm I'm moving forward to discussion items. Okay, two quick items. Um, and they're both about surveys. So, the Maplewood Village Alliance will be putting out a survey in
the coming days. that will go uh communitywide and uh regional survey um asking folks to uh let us know what they love about Maplewood Village, what they don't love about Maplewood Village,
which businesses they patronize, which they wish they could patronize if we had them, and so on and so forth. The survey is not issue specific. Uh it doesn't have an agenda. The only agenda is to solicit um some community uh input on
the strength of Maplewood Village. And um it's very similar to an effort that we uh did back in 2018. Committee member Duca probably remembers this uh when the state came in, state planners came in and did a uh strategic revisioning plan
for Maplewood Village. And um through that we surveyed the community then about similar things. So look out for that. Uh we will be sharing it uh through the township um socials and
individually and Maplewood Village Alliance will be getting it out there to folks as well. The second survey will be coming from our arts council. I'm I reported about this before. The arts council is trying to get feedback from
the community about the events that we have in town. Uh they want to hear from everyone. They want to hear from residents and they want to hear from artists. Um do we have sufficient cultural heritage celebrations? Do we have sufficient artistic events? What do
we think about our arts and culture in Maplewood? Um, that's also an exciting survey that will be uh blasted in the next week or two, if not earlier than that in the coming days. Um, I owe the arts council some demographic
information. Um, and Mr. Weary, I'll be looking to you for a little bit of assistance on best practices and asking some of those household questions. And of course, these surveys are volunteer folks and you can do it anonymously, too. So, that's my report. for mayor.
I'll be talking enough during the discussion items. Thank you. Any have anyone have any questions for Mr. Daff? Okay, we'll move on to Deputy Mayor Herman. Thank you, Mayor. Um, I have some updates from our health and community services and arts and culture committee.
Um, we discussed some of the concerns that residents have raised about the community fridge and we have a small working group that will be meeting on that. I just want the residents to know that we hear you and we are u working on that and um to please reach out if you
um uh want to um connect on that. Um from arts and culture, I have some exciting news. Um we're going to we have a couple of things planned for Hispanic Heritage Month which is coming up that runs from September 15 to October 15.
And you may think that's a little odd because it's a midmon to a midmon instead of an entire month, but it's it's there it's important. The reason is that September 15th is an important date in the Latino community. Um it's when Mexico gets their independence. So um
that's the reason why the dates are like that. And we're going to be celebrating this year for the first time Salsa Night at the Woodland September 20. Get ready to shake some hips. And we've got the Latinx exhibition coming up at the 1978
gallery. There is a call for um entering that is out on socials, so look for that. And I also want to announce uh this is a um a favorite in town. Mapso Fali's auditions are going to be September 24th. So put that on your
calendar. And the show is taking place on October 23rd, which is my birthday. So, that's very exciting. Are you auditioning? Um, think about it. Um, so we've got um from community services, we've got five
new summer pickle ball sessions starting this week, which is very exciting. Um, I want to announce our adult novice swim lessons. They just started last weekend. They run on Saturdays and Sundays at 9:00 am, and there's still time to join. There's a couple of spots, so please go
to reces. Um, we also have some other fun things happening at the pool. Tomorrow night will be live music. Um, at 6:30 PM, the David Eastston Band next week on July 23rd will be live music featuring Swing Town. Um, that's
Maplewood's own 20piece big band at 6:30 p.m. We have another movie night in the park coming up. That'll be on August 2nd at Maplerrest Park. I don't know the movie, so uh, stay tuned for that. And we've got some really fun senior events
coming up. Sign up for adult water fitness. Um, and the seniors are getting a special tour of our brand new amazing library. Yes, I'm going to put amazing in the title of library from now on. Um, that'll be on July 23rd with lunch to
follow in the village. And there is a uh group getting together to go see Clue at the Hunter Hills Playhouse on August 6. You can register on Reces. That is open to all. And Clue was actually adapted into a play by a Maplewood resident. So,
little extra special there. And that's my report. Okay. Any questions for Deputy Mayor Herman? Nope. Mr. Duca? Three quick three things. Number one, I just want to thank everybody for July 4th. Uh we had a great Independence Day
celebration here in Maplewood and really want to thank um our police department, Department of Public Works, and of course the Department of Community Services for all that they did to make that day a complete success and all our volunteers from running the the running
club and the Rotary Club and um our judges for the pet show and everything. So it was a great night. Pretty busy, but a great day. Um, and then the next day we had a terrific opening over at the library. So, um, you know, over a thousand people came to our ceremony,
listened to us laugh for about 30 minutes, and then over 4,000 people went through that building that Saturday. So, yeah, it was great. It was great. And then the last thing, if I could just take a moment to um raise a a I don't know what you call it, a concern or or what have you, but you
know, we talk a lot about affordability uh in Maplewood. And this week, a house on Hilton Avenue was put up for sale for $1.1 million. Wow. Um this is a lot that's 50 by 100. Um,
it's not unlike other Hilton neighborhood houses and I don't know what we can do as a government, but this is outrageous. It we have it on the books 684,000
and uh, you know, that's what it's assessed at and now we're talking 1.1. And if you go online and you look at comps, all the comps are are sales in College Hill and down in this area around
um town hall. So um you know, we're pricing ourselves out and I and I and I speak to the reality community and just folks who are selling, you know, think about what's happening here that folks
just can't come and live here anymore unless you have a lot of money. and we're going to be losing a lot of the economic diversity that we're, you know, we talk a lot about diversity and being welcoming, but uh if you don't have the dollars, you're not welcomed
here. Yeah. So, it's just something I want to raise. I I never thought I'd see it. And so, you know, once one happens, it just kind of goes more and more and more. Yeah. Well, I couldn't afford my house now that I bought in '89. And it is an
issue. not know that there's anything we can do, but I don't know. Anybody has We may need to use the bully puppet a little bit more. Okay, fair enough. Use the what? Bully Pulpit. Get out there and speak about this stuff. Yeah, we, you know, just to let the F, you know, the market do what it does.
Um, we're going to just watch this town change. Well, and it's a fair point to use the bully pulpit because we're we're through some of the discussion items tonight. We're trying to address, you know, uh, the flippers, taking a house, buying it,
gutting it, making it bigger, making it five bedrooms, five baths, whatever it is, and try to, um, well, I'll wait for the discussion item, but I mean, just to try to minimize that kind of impact because
it's it's impacting neighbors, it's impacting all of us, I think. So, um, yeah, I also think we can look at diversifying housing. I mean, I'm one of the people that probably can't afford to stay in Maplewood. And to your point, like I mean, even if I sold my house, which I'm considering, I can't afford to buy in Maplewood. And what the main reason I'm
not running for Township Committee again is because I just can't afford it. I think it is an important conversation that we need to be having. So, I appreciate you bringing it up, Mr. Dicka. Right. And I I think it's a shame that so many towns I mean we keep talking about affordable housing and and requiring 20% set aside in multifamily
but the single family homes or or two family homes are becoming out of reach as well. So um yeah thank you. Any questions for Mr. Duca? Okay Miss Engle you're Thank you. Um as Mr. Duca mentioned um
we met with the superintendent and CHS principal this past week and we also had some of our um friends in South Orange join us since the CHS drop off um process will be on the border of South Orange and we share a school district. So at the start of the school year on
September 2nd, Maplewood will be implementing a new traffic pattern for drop offs and pickups at Columbia High School. Parents will no longer be able to discharge students on Parker Avenue. Instead, four dropoff zones have been created and for a short period of time
during CHS drop off and pickup, Academy Street, North Terrace, Kensington Terrace, and Beach Street will be one-way streets. These changes are being proposed to improve the safety of our children, reduce congestion along Parker Avenue, and to make drop offs easier for
the parents. The traffic plan will begin the first day of school. Again, that's on September 2nd. And we will do a trial run for about six weeks, making adjustments as needed. We expect to finalize this plan by the end of October and then more information about what time of day those streets will be closed
will be um forthcoming and anybody on the affected streets or anybody who has any questions can feel free to contact u me or Mr. Duca. He's saying me to talk about it. Contact Miss I'm sure they'll contact us all. Yeah. Really? Anybody? Anything else?
Um oh I have one more thing. So I just got word that the Makos um won their swim meet again tonight. So they are still undefeated for the season. So congrats Makos. And we've had a lot of um records broken at the pool as well. So it's very exciting. Very nice. Any questions for Miss Angle?
Seeing none, um I just have one uh very brief thing and that is to thank uh the organizers, the volunteers who put on Maple Woodstock this past weekend. I think it might have been one of the best ones in a long time and this is their
20th anniversary. Um, it it was just the weather held. It was hot as it's always, but at least it didn't get rained out at the end and the all the acts went uh like clockwork. Um, and the rearrangement of the vendors and the
beer garden and the um uh food vendors seemed to work out really well as well. So, just um a big thank you to um the organizers of Maple Woodstock, including my ex-husband who works on that and started um started this event years ago
with uh friends really just to get a gig, right? They created a gig for themselves and it turned out to become a signature Maplewood event. So, thanks to all of those who went out and all those who organized and worked on it. So, it's a lot of work. So, I appreciate that.
And mayor, I think a lot of people have remarked how much and I enjoyed the separate eating area by the food vendor. Oh yeah, they had the long tent. The long table tent the square thing where they had the art exhib exhibition, right, and the tables and the fans.
I really like that. That was a good feature. Yeah, I ate there as well. Deputy Mayor and I ate there. Yeah. Well, I wasn't invited to your little meeting, but Yeah, I wasn't invited either. And people also appreciated the sensory zone that was far away on the baseball field away from the action so you can go take
a break if you needed it. Yeah. Yeah. It was to combat the heat as long as well as the spritzer system the Oh yes, that also was Yeah. So you know it grows and it it's really popular and we adapt every year. So all good. No questions for me. We'll
move into discussion items. Uh, the first is the attached front-facing garage setbacks and bulk requirements in R15, R17 residential zones. Mr. Daffis, thank you, Mayor. Time to get to business. Get serious here. Uh, okay.
So, attached front-facing garages. uh we're seeing some of these pop up uh recently and as we do with everything else we're trying to get ahead of it so that we don't see too much of it going forward. The proposal here after a very
long process of uh considering how we could sort of regulate and not also regulate design which is not possible. Um, we have come up with the following solution. In terms of setbacks, front-facing attached garages would be
set back 2 feet behind the main front facade. And in terms of uh regulating bulk um these street facing attached garages uh would be limited to a single story
though um you know cosmetics like dormers are permitted on them. Um this uh would not affect existing structures. uh it would only affect new construction. And um as I stated, the
proposal addresses or attempts to address community concerns about flat untextured appearances of homes with front attached garages. So um that's all I got. Let's open it up. Yes.
Yes. I know most of you were at code during these discussions. So, uh, but committee member Angel, you didn't have the opportunity to listen to all of that that we've done before. So, I I You're welcome to. I'm good. You're good. Okay. Thank you. And I'm sorry, Mayor. That's
No, I was just going to say that that's what we've been talking about for a year and a half, I think. Maybe maybe just a year. But it's just to kind of uh have existing houses since we can't um really legislate design too. Well,
instead of having people just build as much as they can cram on, we have zoning restrictions like setbacks and other things. And so um this will hopefully make some houses that are pretty much new kind of fit better with the
neighboring houses and not be too, you know, intrusive. So, I'm in favor. Been a long haul. So, long haul. I don't So, anyone else, if we're all in favor? I think everybody's in favor. So, you want to um have it ready for
introduction on the ordinance for the August 5th meeting. And I think the draft ordinance we have is ready to go. I don't think there's any more work to be done. I did speak with township attorney Credidio about it right before the meeting tonight, unlike some of the other ordinances that we're talking about in discussion. may
need a little extra work. Okay. Next is yours too, Mr. Dis parking requirements in the pedestrian retail zone. Right. So, back to the master plan. Uh we were just talking about bike lanes. The master plan also addresses this issue, the issue of uh further reducing
non-residential parking requirements in our PRB. Peter, Robert, Bob, our pedestrian retail business zone in town. We have it uh in Maplewood Village and we have it along stretches of
Springfield Avenue of course. Um and we have taken some actions recently this governing body to reduce those parking requirements and this takes us a little bit further and I think will make us a little bit more comfortable I hope anyway um based on our last discussion
and last action on this issue. So uh according to this proposal again I uh circulated a draft to everyone and we discussed it thoroughly at code committee. Um this would uh create an exemption for
the first 3500 square ft from non-residential parking requirements. Any space over 35 square ft would require one parking space per 300 square ft.
The compromise uh it is a compromise that addresses concerns about imposing parking requirements on existing tenant spaces. Um it aligns with other business zones and redevelopment areas like Maplewood Village does not have currently. Uh
those these parking requirements that we see on Springfield Avenue. Uh, and a concern that was discussed during code, it helps protect neighborhoods from parking overflow while not overburdening small businesses. So, uh, I know that
the attached ordinance that I circulated for your consideration, township committee, and that we talked about at code had the exemption at 3,000 square ft, but our discussion of code led us to 35 3500. So, we'll need to further amend
that to move it forward, open it up for discussion. I'm very excited about you um eliminating parking requirements for small businesses. I would go less than 3,000 ft. I'm happy with less than 3500 square f feet. So, yes, yes, yes, yes,
yes, yes, yes. Thank you. And and we were thinking of you uh when we were discussing this because I know you were a big advocate in this. So this goes to I was talking earlier about the balance and this is the balance of helping um small business
people open up but also not uh dump cars in the neighborhoods which is a problem. So I think we've we've come up with this solution because this will affect some of the larger pieces of property which we don't want to have un uh unintended consequences with the development. So I
think this is a good move. Agreed. Yes. I just wanted to clarify. Um, so for the first 300 uh 3,500 square foot, does that mean that if you were at like 3,800 that you would all of a sudden
have to have 12 spots or one spot? One spot. One spot. One spot per 300 square. That's what That's what I thought. I just wanted to make sure. Yeah. Um I think this is a a great um compromise. I've watched these discussions go for a very long time and
um there certainly were a lot of considerations especially with cars in the neighborhoods and making it um easier for small businesses um and then also keeping in mind the existing businesses. So um yeah, sounds good. Yeah, and I really want to shout out um
this has been a collaborative effort. We we do not discuss these things in a vacuum in our little subcommittees. Uh we did hear from planning board members uh and we also heard from our SID manager on Springfield Avenue uh Nicole Wallace who you know really fought hard
for this um because as committee member Angel uh said we don't want to uh burden our small businesses while also balancing any unintended consequences as committee member uh Duca mentioned. So, um,
so, excuse me. Can we I want to retract my one spot. I think it might mean uh 12 or whatever the whatever 300 into 3500. I would suggest um we ask our attorney to give us her opinion on
that number and do it before we introduce it so that we're clear about what what that entails because the you know she has to read the language and the plain language I think is that if it's over 3500 you have to have one spot per 300 square feet
right 300 feet. So that would mean dividing that 3500 by 300 and multiplying that by you know so what's our intention what's what that that so that for example if the quick check got developed they would have to maintain uh let's 12 parking
yeah 12 spots right so let's let's just get that cl that clarity from right and we have a good draft to start from and uh community development director Palma and township attorney Credidia have been drafting this and
working on it together. So, yes. See, I'm not sure I uh Oh, this may have to go back to code again. But I mean, I'm not sure I agree with that because if it's up to 3500, they don't have to provide any. I feel like it should be
one for 300 from then on, not not all of a sudden jumping from zero to 12. So, and this goes to a lot of the points with I mean in downtowns there's often a parking requirement yet most of the buildings don't have their own parking
in most downtowns, right? They have public parking areas and so they can't provide parking. So, it it gets a little that's why we talk about these things at Nauseium because of that. So, I'm not sure I would jump from zero to 12 over
3500. That doesn't make sense to me. So, I guess it's because of the unintended consequences that Mr. Duca is concerned about, right? The reason why you jump to 3500 from 3,000 is because you don't want the if you don't want the cars parking in the I'm not saying I'm for it. The thing is if you don't want the cars parking to the neighborhood, if you
have a space that's 3500 feet or 4,000, you only have to have one parking spot. Everyone's going to be parking in the neighborhood. It's not compromising the situation. I think I feel like I need to uh talk about this more and let's let's put we'll bring it back to code. Sorry.
Because I don't think it's as simple as that. And not everything is going to be a quick check that needs 1,200 square feet. No. And that's why we made it 3500. Right. So, right. I know. But it's the ones that are big that require the parking. Everything else is under that 3500 threshold. So,
you don't have to worry about it. But then you capture the the four or five properties that are larger or could be potentially larger like the Avenue Pub. Well, so but if we increase our bike networks, then we don't need as much parking. There you go. So like So what are we doing here? Are we going
back to code with this? Yeah, cuz here's an example in the downtown, right? What's what's the green? What what's the grocery store? It's not in a pedestrian retail zone. No, I know that. I know that. I'm just saying. But it's the same kind of thing like that's got 6,000. What? 8,000
square ft, right? Yeah. And doesn't have to provide any parking. They're not in a pedestrian retail. I know, but they're in a downtown. But suppose suppose a paint parking suppose a paint store went out and you all of a sudden you got 5,000 square feet and you put a supermarket there. You're not going to You're not going to put First of all,
it's not logical. But it to that use wouldn't be How do you know it's not logical? I don't know what. Yes, I do. I do have some experience with this. Give you scenarios about the supermarket. I can give you scenarios about the paint store. Okay. You don't know what a Dollar General could go in there, right? That's a That's
We have Dollar General, right? Or could move. Good move, right? Okay. Could move. So, you're saying no parking for that? No, you're not saying that. I don't know what I don't know. I think we need to talk about more. All right. So, it's going back to co I thought Well, that's why we have the subcommittee so we don't have these
kinds of discussions here where we're thinking out loud. So, fair enough. Mr. Duke and I have never disagreed before. Okay. Yeah. Uh, Mr. Duga EMS building billing. So, uh, the public safety committee
recommends that we, uh, change the billing for our EMS service. Currently, on a a base, uh, emergency charge, we charge insurance companies $1,50. Suggested charge is $1,350.
A mileage charge per uh, mile, we're going from recommending from $20 to $25. three on the scene without a transport. We're recommending going from $275 to $300. This is per incident. And this is something that we bill the insurance
companies for. And this is um the going rate as per our ambulance billing company. That's our subcontractor with uh South Essex Fire Department. Um this is since this is our service only. This has to be an ordinance by Maplewood. We
will notify South Essex Fire Department uh of this change and make sure they're aware of it. But um if no one has any objection, we can authorize our attorney to draft up the ordinance. No objection. Anyone have any objections? No objection. No. Thank you.
Okay. Community benefit trust fund. Miss Herman. Thank you. So, the Community Benefit Trust Fund is also known as the Maplewood Cares Trust Fund, and it was first established in 2019 as a place to collect and distribute small monetary
donations that the town receives from individuals and community groups. So, um when people give us money that they may have raised at a bake sale or whatnot, um it it adds up and we had So, this is a place where it goes. Um it's now grown
to be in the thousands and um health officer Davenport has recommended that we update the ordinance specifically because it currently only allows the welfare director to disperse the funds and we no longer have that position. So um we discussed this at our last health
and community services and art and culture community meeting on July 7th. That's last week and we agreed um to recommend the following updates. Um so number one removing the welfare director as the person administering this account
um and replacing that with health officer or designate. After discussion during the committee meeting we decided not to set a cap on the amount of money that can be distributed per person or per family. Um we would leave that at the discretion of the health officer in
consultation with township administration. However, receip recipients could only get help from the fund once a year. So, it would not be ongoing help. It's intended to be for one-time emergencies only. And some
examples of this might be um you know, if there is a um you know, like a a fire or a flood and somebody needs help for that one time, there may be maybe their car broke down um and and therefore because the car broke down, they can't get the kids to daycare. They can't get
to work. Um the idea is we want to help these one-time emergency situations before they cascade into bigger problems. Um so the recipients must be um a Maplewood resident, show proof or an individual identified in Maplewood.
Um payments must be made directly to the service provider, vendor, landlord, etc. Uh not just to the person. Um, and finally, the health officer would provide an annual report to the board of health, that's all of us, on how the
money is being spent, and that would be an annual report so we can um keep track of that. Does anyone have any questions? Nope. No, I think it's good that we update. I I I do think we should have a look at the language, let our attorneys do that.
Uh I don't think that all of those terms that you mentioned are explicitly in the draft that we have have looked at. Yeah. Yeah. Uh so we have a draft that I circulated and um I've had conversations with our
health officer and we're going to get these points that she and I discussed today so that we can get the draft to where it needs to be uh for the next meeting. Yes. Okay. Anything else on that? Great.
We'll move on to rent control ordinance, vacancy deontrol provision, repeal. Tongue twister, Mr. Def. Thank you, Mayor. Uh, we just talked about the affordability crisis in Maplewood. Well, guess what? The last remaining
affordable housing in Maplewood are any rental units that are still subject to our very outdated rent control ordinance. Maplewood is one of 123 municipalities
in New Jersey, only 123 out of 564 that has a rent control ordinance. That ordinance is very old and needs to be updated. And um we're working on updating the ordinance, but in the meantime, oh, the the ordinance, like
many rent control ordinances, um has a provision that deregulates any units that are subject to rent control once a tenant moves out or dies. That's called vacancy deontrol. The unit is
deontrolled because there's a vacancy. That means that the new tenant is subject to market re rent and therefore market rent increases. The cap in our rent control ordinance or the equation
in our rent control rent control ordinance that governs rent increases no longer applies. It's market rent. So what we are looking to do here, what's been suggested to us in the meantime while we look to fashion a new ordinance
is to repeal the vacancy deontrol provision of our ordinance. We are uh working on determining how many units in town may still be subject to our rent control. We don't think it's very many. But in the meantime, if we could repeal
this provision, it would save any such units from deontrol. Um, that's that's the proposal. What do we think? Great. Now, I did have a a conversation about this with our attorney earlier,
and I do think that um we're ready to move forward if this governing body, it appears that everybody's okay with it. thumbs up. Um, but we want to um work on the drafting of of what that looks like.
It may not be as easy as just repealing that provision. We may have to add any uh additional language in there to make it clear as to what we're doing. And attorney Cordidio, I think, um, can share her thoughts with you about that
when when you guys connect. Any other Sounds good. Sounds good. Nope. Okay. Last discussion item, Mr. Daffus. Maplewood Village merchant parking permit restrictions. Right. So, you learned something new in
this job every damn day. Um, and one of the things that we learned recently that no one really understood where it came from, uh, or why it was still being applied, but currently under our ordinance, also a very outdated
ordinance, um, has arbitrary caps on merchant permits. So, the township, just for context, the township allows merchants to apply for a merchant parking permit for their employees. The
idea behind that obviously is so that their employees do not take up parking from consumers, right? And we want to encourage our merchants to do that. And some of our merchants are great in doing that. They apply for these permits. And
by the way, the permits are very um accessible. They only cost $25 per year. Um and uh but but we re we recently discovered as some of our merchants were asking for many
permits. You know, think about your restaurants, your salons, hair salons, nail salons. They're going to have more employees that require these things than say your smaller merchant who may not need merchant parking at all. that there are caps anywhere between three to nine
per business caps. The clerk's office, which administers and oversees these permits, as well as all parking permits throughout the township, has verified that she and her colleagues have no idea where this came from, and that we have
sufficient merchant parking spaces for all of our merchants in Maplewood Village. Even if all of them applied for these things, we have a 100 merchants in Maplewood Village. That's right, a hundred. So, the idea here is to um to
get rid of this arbitrary cap from long ago that we don't know why it is that it was uh but we know we don't need it and we want to encourage our merchants to do the right thing and not take away parking from consumers and not penalize those that do that. Um and then again
also to ensure that what we're trying to do is not happening in a vacuum here in this room. We have heard from merchants about this overwhelmingly in favor of eliminating the caps. Uh and that feedback has been gathered by our
Maplewood Village uh executive director Aaron Rose Baldry and we thank her for her for her work on that. So I I have a question. I actually know why it was like that because we didn't have dedicated merchant parking and so the idea was to cap it because the the permit was going to let them stay beyond
the parking limitations and so the idea was to cap it to not take up too much consumer parking but we do now have dedicated employee parking right so do we I don't know where the clerk's office like where are those 100 merchant spot I'm supporting of right I don't know where throughout the whole
it's throughout the village right gives them a pass to park at a regular spot for beyond the two or three hour parking So the reason why was to not take up too many parking spots from customers coming to park because they allow they get allowed to be um parked there longer. So
that was the reason why the limits were done. Yeah. So the gap it goes back 40 years, right? Um so unless you were here 40 years ago, but yes, I mean that is I was on a parking committee a number of years ago as a Right. I was on that parking committee with you and that is a reasonable
explanation to the cap. But uh let's eliminate it. Yeah, I'm just saying but I was just curious. So where we don't have dedicated spots but just the merchants would be parking in any spots in the village. Correct. Yeah. So um I I invite the clerk though, clerk
Fritzen to just opine really quickly just verify that what I said is correct on the record. Oh Mr. Davis, absolutely. What you said is correct. Um there is in the ordinance a cap per uh
how many employees you have and how many permits um would that business be eligible for? And we have uh larger um merchants who ask for more uh permits
for their employees, but with the cap that's in the ordinance, it's cut off at a certain number, right? But you you think that we have sufficient merchant parking throughout the village to accommodate? Absolutely. But it's not I'm just We have a sufficient parking in the village to
accommodate merchant parking. We don't have dedicated merchant parking in the village. We have zones for merchant parking, do we not? Mhm. Right. So that that is what I'm trying to clarify. Where where are those zones? Can you just clarify? We have it's it's on street parking, but
not all on street parking is merchant parking. So it's on street parking. Some of it is merchant parking. So when we when we get rid of the cap, I just think that we need an education plan so merchants know where they park because I also hear from residents like, "Oh, this
this business's van is parked here all day long, right? And we want to be able to make sure that customers can park and leave and visit our businesses without getting frustrated." So I just think that when we do lift the caps, we just need to let the merchants know exactly where their employees can park, what's approved and what's not.
Yeah. and wayfinding is an issue that we uh are also trying to address in Maplewood Village for all kinds of parking. Um but but yeah, I'm in favor of eliminating the caps. Same. Great.
Okay. So, we'll move forward with uh doing so. Okay. So, we already dealt with resolution number 242-25 about the Parker Avenue bike lanes. So, I'd take a motion for the consent agenda. I move the consent agenda.
Second. Mr. Davis, yes. Mr. Luca, yes. Zangel, yes. Miss Herman, yes. Mayor Adams, yes. Thank you. Um, this takes us to our last public comment section on any subject matter. If anyone would like to
address the township committee on any subject, please come up to the microphone, state your name, address, and you'll have three minutes to speak. You have documents. Oh my guys.
Okay. Please introduce yourself and Hi. Hi. Uh my name is Lisa Cohen. Nice to see you all. I'm a Maplewood resident, 74 Park Avenue. Um and I'm also the co-founder of the Maplewood Film Society. Uh last night we delivered via
email um our petition. It had 1,662 signatures and over 735 heartfelt comments. Um, so today I'm bringing you hard copies so you can have some nice reading material. I'll sit at your desk or
around. Um, sorry for the trees. Um, and I also have a copy for the town clerk as well. So for each one of you. Um, so I'm I'm here to ask that you please read it. Please consider it. Read those comments.
See what the town's saying about our town. Um you'll be surprised at how many people say that Maplewood is a artsy town. We need to have a theater in our town. Save the theater. Um and also the
um architectural preservation as well. Very important. And you could read everybody's comments here. Um so um please read it when you do consider the redevelopment plan. And I'm here to ask um a couple questions as well. Um when will the township committee meet to
discuss and or vote on the redevelopment plan? When and how will the public be notified of the meeting? And will there be an opportunity for further public comment? So I it's so interesting because literally five minutes ago I emailed um
our administrator, our planner, and a couple other of our professionals about that because I want to get that moving forward. Um we had been waiting on some um legal advice with regard to um the
Mwood Village Alliance and the Historic Preservation Commission's roles with regard to design and demolition and all that stuff. So we needed some guidance and that guidance is being provided to our planner. Um so my email was to say
our planner needs to start working on this incorporating the things that were still being worked on by our comm the HPC and other uh village alliance everything I just said and then we can take it we will have one more community meeting which I would like to try to do
in September. Okay. So that would be after that then it becomes a part of the regular process. So, there's several more just like the bike lanes, there's several more opportunities as uh the redevelopment plan gets introduced.
Okay. Before the planning board and then back to the township committee for passage. So, for explaining that to me. It's good to know the timeline. Yeah. All right. Great. And Lisa, would you just for the record tell folks out there who may be still
watching us maybe at this point what your petition is about? We obviously know what it's about. Sure. Yes. Hello world. Um this petition is about um the redevelopment plan and we wanted to guarantee a community
cultural space. Um we want to implement oversight by the historic preservation commission and we want to increase transparency in the process with respect to building plans, developer incentives incentives and community benefits. So it's mostly about those three things.
Um, I'm from the Maplewood Film Society. I represent that group. And we would like to see a theater there. Saving the marquee alone, we feel would be disingenuous to our town. It would be meaningless. We would like to have a
theater. You walk under the marquee and you're in a theater. Um, that to me is meaningful. And, um, it was built 93 years with our town and across all of New Jersey. If you're interested in preserving our culture of New Jersey, this was these theaters cropped up in
all of the towns that helped build all of our towns and they're going away. Like in Milbour, you walk through that marquee to a Charles Schwab. And you know, I don't think that's would represent Maplewood very well if we walked under a marquee into a bank. Okay? And we're trying to say that we want to
be diverse here. Many people think of us as a culturalminded town. Um, and we are. we could support this. An independent nonprofit movie theater um is allowed to have a liquor license. Um and if if you look at Culture Today, you look at who won the Oscars, they were
all indie indie films or winning all of the Oscars, swept the Oscars this year, and we didn't get a chance to go see them. So, you can go to mountainside and see the blockbuster Marvel films, but where are you going to see all those films that are actually winning the awards? The culturally relevant films. Okay. I don't want to get box. We've been here
for a long time, but um Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate you giving us reading materials. Sometimes we all get tired of looking at our screens, so I very much appreciate that. If you can leave them with um Miss Fritzen, then she'll get them to us for sure.
I'm a lawyer. I love paper. Hi, I'm Bailey. I was a member of uh volunteers from the Maplewood Film Society who walked around the periphery of Maple Woodstock this past weekend and
talked to many many people uh and almost every single person expressed either a desire to see the movie theater, memories about the movie theater that they missed and uh you can see that all in the uh
petition. you will see how how important the movie theater is to it's really important to myself and my husband as well. So, thank you very much. Thank you. Appreciate it. Will anyone else like to speak to the township
committee on any subject matter? Mr. Weary, is there anyone online? If anyone on Zoom would like to speak in public comment, please raise your hand. Now, Miss Bob Bro, did you want to speak? No. Okay.
I see no hands. Mayor. Okay. Well, with that, I'll take a motion to adjurnn. I move we adjourn. Second. Second. Thank you, Mr. Motion. Every time to adjurnn. Yes. Yes, we adjourn. Mr. Duca, yes. Sangel. Yes. Sherman.
Yes. Mayor Adams. Yes. Thank you. Uh have a good evening everyone and we'll see you