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stands na indivisible andice be open public meetings act adver retrospect downstairs all official social media channels as for those of you who with us uh in person you please put your cell phones on
silence speak with somebody while business Please Mr here Mr wood here have thank you very much first it on the agenda evening is public portion of the meeting anyone from public Wish Come forward on top please forward state your name and address for the record 2011 St
James Avenue I just wanted to take a moment uh to thank you all for sharing why you're for or against the consumption loue um I particularly want to uh thank Mr perno and Mr M for highlighting that it is a public safety issue and that they don't want to be pigs I am however concerned that one of primary negative AR Arguments for the consumption Lounge is that you can retract the
uh approval I think uh retraction approval is Impractical because uh one skin sing invest thousands of dollars in their ventilation system and Licensing it's very unlikely that's going to happen uh the other thing is to me your argument and I think it is a primary argument for at least three of you that uh you can retracted is kind
of weak and for me it implies that you don't fully believe it's a good idea either um I think it's important that you as elected officials the public safety for profits as much as I know we want them to succeed I think to be well enough alone thank you for your time again
thanks stames um I just like to thank Carrie for her statement and I support her and what she said I too am very concerned about public safety for especially the children in our neighborhood and just the normalizing of
um something that is recently legal much as I want businesses to succeed in this town I also feel strongly that it is indeed Public Safety concern again especially for our youth and the example that we need to set for them and um I support not having a consumption Lounge at this time until at least until much further study uh could be warranted and examples looked at perhaps from across the state or other
parts of the country I know that you've done your homework and I was here for a presentation a couple of months ago I was unable to make the last council meeting um but I do feel very concerned for um our community and I I think the um topic deserves further consideration thank you
addition uh we'll move to the approval of minutes we have the council meeting from the uh 13th of January uh present at that meeting uh is see Mr Benjamin Mr mrno and Mr Fitzgerald can V on that by motion Mr fitzgeral first Mr second all in favor uh and then
the meeting 27 where all members pres motion Mr first Mr W the second all in favor oos thank you very much Council Engineers report Mr evening may all supp the year 2023 woodl a appears to be making through the chain for PM
so anticipate getting our Cent approvals forthcoming so we can get get that project closed out um Somerset contractors out to dressing punch list items as of last week they a couple of the concrete panels in the driveway a community center um I put a recommendation dep par payment below the contract re for some of the work
that's been done um also have we start assembling the T documents for to move that project forward and I will be provid for that and for the next phase of this home phase two um as well as to upgade Prior Street um one um the Tad uh project I know that there was recently a lot
in the news about the freezing of federal spending um certain programs that reviewed by the administration do you have any insight publicly that you can share about whether or not this falls under that whether there's an will be in some way I don't know what you hear I think I'm hearing the same this was just temporary hold money would be released appropriated through
law law so I think much do forward we put a whole lot of effort get too out this will res itself okay any other questions from Mr as
far as punch on Somerset are we close to being completed what's left yeah so the biggest one was the couple cracks in the driveways clean up there's rail so yes anything
else next agenda is correspondence so uh just the the only it response that we have is from C County congratulating Merchant Hill uh among a number of other communities for our sustainability JY certifications um and there will be
a virtual webinar um available Tuesday 2:18 at 10: a.m. um advising other municipalities in our area about how they may be able to earn points towards their sustain Jersey so congratulations Mar and all those involved making that happen thank you very much that's it thank your honor
uh from the sh tree they will be meeting this Thursday at 7M in Bur Hall from the Green Team our uh Maple tapping project is underway my understanding the last report I saw was they've boiled over 40 gallons of sa so far and they had another over 30 gallons uh remaining so that is a in
process hopefully we'll get some out of this that's all I to answer questions any questions all right startor the report uh January we have two virtual sessions one in person the court session last week this to the administrator uh four $ 4,644 turned
over and we had 192 cases added 256 exposed uh diversity committee was uh they had a reorganization meeting P month that did not go through they were supposed to meet again tonight to reorganize that that postp to next Monday um they are working on a new mission statement U that's one of the things been looking to put out there this year big thing that I've come across with is that they are in need
of memb members membership um BR again with two members uh there are no former former again they're formal bylaws in place recommendation I made that they look into uh um come up with a structure for officers me and things that nature as far as upcoming events from the adversity committee the MLK day service last month was posted weather and going move to they're going try and
had that go inside on juneth uh they were supposed to do a flag raising this past Saturday I'm not sure if that happened um again with the be being postponed this month I'm not sure how far pay we got with that but I'll find out about that there are plans for women's History Month next month um The Pride event in June doesn't look like it's going to happen as a brain now looks like that was coordinated by the proprietor of the clothing store that left town um so
they don't have the resources to put that together again this year they do want to do a flag Rising uh first week of June Saturday in June and Memorial Day they want to work with the legion with the in uh they have some future goals that they're working out but again until they have
all questions thank you very much we'll make sure we put something Mr thank you honor start boed uh the board of vet did hold an emergency meeting on Friday um January 31st the reason for the meeting was the contract renewal for the CSA um Mr Scott Strong the board after long quite a
long meeting opted to not renew uh Mr Strong's contract so that will be ending in June um and they are currently planning on looking for a new CSA um they held their regular meeting uh Monday the 3D um which they interviewed uh candidates for the open physici and they voted on settled on their new member uh Mr Mitchell Larson so congrats to uh Department of Health will be meeting Thursday the 13th DPW um still getting by we're still dealing with some
uh vehicle maintenance issues but at the moment we have all the vehicles necessary to continue with um snow removal salting uh trash pickup but um they continue to be you know a struggle where we're doing our best to keep what we have going for as long as we possibly can um with the OEM I sent out an email to detective callway about setting up meetings and now there's uh uh the mayor kind of alluded to Federal funding issues
with the thema looking to be in the crosshairs I know that's something we're going to have to discuss to see if uh anything that we rely on what we might have to start bringing in house or or focusing on to to make up for any types of shortfalls there from the website um I stopped didn't see her backday unfortunately she's under the weather so I'm hoping to meet up with her later this week when she's back in to see um what's left to be done for the website what we can do to speed up getting it back up online again the Merchantville Business and Professional Association will be meeting on the 12th
this week um mayor Brian is set to attend that meeting as well um they have not put out an agenda for it yet public events uh the sort to love event took place uh last week it sounds like it was well attended I a bunch of sick children so I wasn't able to attend unfortunately but um from those I've spoken to everyone seem to enjoy it again this year the next public event we have up for is set for March 20th it's the community night out and that is all I have for this thank
you very much anything Mr Mr bville please for the month January uh we're involved in 1,243 incidents 91 of those would be the uh positive engagement with members of the community 82 incidents did involve parking enforcement there were nine
arrests in January and one arrest um the officers uh were ordered to continue the mandatory traffic enforcement in the area of chest and Center Street uh despite some of the fin I shared in last month's report and then on Personnel front um January 30th was officer M last day he resigned and pursued an opportunity over in Belmar uh we did uh we had basically one applicant for
that but it was a it was a good solid applicant gentan name is Bradley Moore who was I believe is now started with the department at this point will be training under the Tage of uh cway um in addition do regret to inform we are also received resonation of detective Maron okay so I believe his last Daye is some point near the end
of February and uh again it's uh it's very tough challenging Market out there right now for for officers Lieutenant Callaway and chief Gracia will be doing some ad hoc Duty little concern on the detective work that's required as well too so again the POS have been improved andone in the line
work questions we lose the detective to another department or Detective
couple little things uh vacon properties Noti went out so uh we be now handling that in house uh there are several items on the agenda tonight uh ordinances that we're to Mo forward everyone's whereare uh 25 of the fees the fees this is for houses that uh go through reinspection uh
moving the if they don't do reinspection at the time of closing for a transfer to house we setting a f of between $500 and $3,000 we've had a number of properties that were going through not doing the resale inspections and just kind of at some point for discussion with Council um we have ability
toire agents out there they would know and they should know what the rules are and going through the process so whether not that's might be way make we get a report the get a report all after it happens we can yeah we can go after violation and now you're
going after a new home owner because I think would have to be against this current home owner property always on the property I could go to the because it's part I
know you can bring right now exactly I know you I just discussion sry um then the other one I highlight was that the streets sidewalks identifying factors when and how sidewalk should be place um and then
the last thing is the bills for this month is 1 million and that's it oh yeah yeah yeah so um I saw the schedule that put out I Emil back
um but what I was looking for was actually do budg here the week the 10th do that so if you guys can let me know what your schedules are maybe the 10 this way it gives us a month Mon's notice so you guys can kind of schedule to get off or whatever you guys to do but i' like kind of you know push it to that so this way give us more time and not scramble so so thank very
much okay um Co the only thing that I have your honor is that February 24 just to remind we're going to photo before council at 6:30 iail out and I have everybody's time frame if they were going to get a single photo so I'll send that out to letting you know that that's
what weathers and approving the banner application for school yeah so we have h two repeat customers here that we've done in previous years first is from virtu school it's the banner that they hang up U at just Center reminding all those parents with prek and kindgarten kids that
it's now time to register and join the wonderful world of school the other one is uh from D Sher excuse me and this is her cus program um it is basically the same schedule uh same facility the community center tennis support for both uh Camp lessons and perhaps two tournaments during the year so very similar I know we had a prettyy discussion about it last year
any question at the same time everyone all right that collectively Mr Benjamin yes Mr Mr M yes
Mr Mr yes Mr yes and then the motion Mr Benjamin yes Mr M yes Mr perno yes Mr just before I just like to comment I'm fine with her having access I think we've got a
number of emails even for recently about the extreme extent to which T courts are occupied almost half of some weekends so I just can't vote I think it's unfair for other residents that you know yes um next we have the resolutions uh
by agenda 243 agenda separately there any other me separately I'll read the resolution agenda resolution 2524 authorizing shared service AG County recy on resolution 2528 author Shar Serv signation maintenance resolution
2529 establish payment claims claim signature of payment position 2530 authorization to apply for Grant to DCA for recreation approvement resolution 2531 license strike resolution 253 coun Alliance 2531 approve LIC women's
depu 2532 approve 5050 LIC resolution 2533 payment number oneu firster second benj yes Mr yes Mr
yes Mr with the first Mr uh the second discuss um can we put hour restrictions on this letter authorization that se there speaking talk putting some guards especially R so I did reach out to you J saying one of the actually there was
a couple of things that kind of me ourselves the difficulty of that um one of which the the primary one is if we set those SCH that schedule um it conflicts with the fact that there are days where school is not in session summertime um school is obviously not in session so are we hindering their ability to operate that business terain those periods when there's not that period of time when it's operating if we limit the window we're asking them then to bring in workers during a set period
of time tell them they have to stop we now have a situation where we asking them to tell people to leave the premises and then come back again are we asking them to do is have operating hours of the loue and then shut down before school so people are C again care about the safy okay I I think we should restrict it or something this just
a do sum ear the other the other reason why I wasn't exactly pressed for that either is again we brought this up a bunch of times right next door there's public drinking right on the front porch of another building so if we're concerned about the safety of people where we're not we're not if we're concerned about that are we going to tell the Blue Monkey they're no longer allowed to operate during those hours and they're not allowed to have people drinking in public we're also going to tell that too puts Brewery which also allows people to
drink in public during those exact same hours we're telling them that they're not allowed to have somebody in a building under watch that they can't consume it's again I understand that but they operating under the walls Regulatory Commission State New Jersey which is one of the most indries just
libertarian argument Falls prettyat my two sense is that I I don't think help us a lot by restricting the hours the children are more likely to be near the facility after school hours than discuss to
there's children that are being let out um sports activities afterwards past those hours my daughter played field hockey well past 4:00 um and again if if we're looking for that then it would be the exact flip of we would want them to be operating while all the kids are in school not when they're at so that's again and I don't see what it's accomplishing my big concern was that we held this off because it wasn't
publicly advertised the agenda that we posted does not have this listed this discussion for tonight that talk about it now for five straight Council meetings Anthony not I'm not disagreeing with you that the public wasn't made aware we were discussing tonight ttif on people who have been thoroughly focused on it but that wasn't the general and I just feel
as if it looks like we're trying toing there's a motion in the second know if the individual that has the motion on the table is interested in a friendly amendment to consider anything you brought up doesn't sound like discussion Mr Benjamin
yes Mr Fitzgerald yes Mr M no Mr Kel no Mr spazza yes Mr W yes okay Council we have four ordinances uh set for intruction this evening as Council okay with me doing this
as record uh ordinance 252 amend chapter 5 25 fees ordinance 25 3 amending chap 62 Property Maintenance ordinance 254 amending chapter 29 fire prevention and ordinance 2505 73 Street side Mr first Mr second these or
will be considered for adoption public and public hearing to be held on March 10 call yesal M yes yes yes yes thank you very much Financial reports resoltion motion
mrno second Mr discussion Mr Mr M yes Mr yes Mr yes yes thank you much um announcements pictures s
I was
early morning if you