Good evening. Welcome to the November 25th, 2025 special meeting of the Bquantonic Township convened as board of health. Miss Marsh, in accordance with the requirements of New Jerseys open public meetings act, notice of the special meeting was filed in the office of the township clerk, posted on the bulletin board of the municipal building
and on the township website and mailed to all persons requesting notice in accordance with township policy. 48 hour notice of this meeting was also transmitted via facts or emailed to the suburban trends and daily record newspapers. Notice of this meeting included a statement that the purpose of this meeting is to review the Quanic
Township Health Department annual report and that no formal action will be taken. Will the clerk please call the role? >> Mrs. Lawrence Lynch >> here. >> Mr. Cole >> here. >> Mrs. Russell >> here. >> Mr. Syracusa >> here. >> Mayor Drey is not here.
>> The item on this meeting's agenda are discussions of the health department's annual health report. Mr. Kenzano. >> Good evening. I appreciate having the opportunity to meet with everybody again for our annual meeting. Um uh I'm going to go through a summary of what you were
given. There's an annual report with statistics and an activity summary. So I'm going to briefly go through this um and then give you an opportunity to ask some questions. Uh I'm going to make it a little briefer than normal because we do have some um ordinances I'd like to discuss uh and and give you some ample
time to uh ask questions on that as well. So, um, anyway, so based on what you were given, um, the the chronic health department has a set of mandated activities by the state of New Jersey that we're required to enact every year. Um, and as usual, we have exceeded those
standards. Uh, our staff is has been dedicated to that principle of going a little bit beyond what the minimum standards are in order to more effectively protect the public uh from from the establishments and businesses we regulate, but also the complaint
investigations, environmental risks that that are present in the community and that we're we respond and thoroughly investigate above and beyond what the standards the minimum standards require. Uh so we we achieved that completely in 2024 and we're on track to do the same
for 2025. Um a list is included of all the mandated activities that you're quite familiar with over the years. We've gone through these lists of of the many things that were responsible to do on behalf of the public. Um uh in addition to that uh our disease
control and response activities um um every year it's pretty a complex responses that we have to be ready to provide and um and they entail u giving guidance and information uh to the to the uh public
enforcing state law but also local ordinances. So with the five municipalities that we are the health department for uh which include of course but also Floren Park, Riverdale, the town of Bhutin and Kennelon. So um
uh we have local ordinances in all five municipalities in addition to the state laws. Uh we also give guidance on on uh enacting ordinances. We propose ordinances. Uh we also give a lot of information to the public. Uh we have health education and a lot of other
things. So that there is an ongoing effort to make sure the public is apprised of the public health uh risks that might be present in the community. Um we conduct disease investigations and contact tracing. Uh we have mental health support services and information
that we can provide. Um we also um uh are mindful of the emerging threats and have to make sure that the public's informed but also that we're ready to respond to any emerging threats. And this year, uh, the emerging threats are
are are usually similar each year, but there's sometimes some different nuances, especially with influenza, but but this year again, there's concerns with RSV, uh, influenza, uh, COVID, uh, foodborne illness outbreaks, uh, food and consumer
recalls. Uh, and those all those things were we're constantly involved with on a on a weekly or monthly but sometimes weekly basis. Um, as far as uh influenza goes, the uh flu vaccine that you're all
familiar with, um, they formulate that 6 months before the flu season. They have to predict what they think is going to circulate, uh, during the flu season. They were pretty good, uh, this time with the four that they predicted. Uh but the one thing they didn't anticipate was the H3N2
which they did have vaccine for uh actually mutated to a to a it's called a subclaid K uh variant and that the vaccine is not does not specifically protect you for and that's the one that's going to be predominantly
circulating this flu season. Um because it it is H3N2 they still feel that the vaccine might take the edge off the symptoms. Uh so it's still valuable to get the flu vaccine. Uh but that's the main one that's going to be circulating and anticipating a pretty tough flu
season this year because of that um that mutation that occurred. >> They said that's pretty bad. >> Yeah. I was reading an article about it the other day. >> Yeah. Japan had a terrible, you know, outbreak season. The UK, Canada's experiencing a bad one. And now I think
there's five or nine states that it's it's circulating in and they expect it to be national very soon. So it's going to be a pretty rough flu season, but the vaccine still important. If nothing else, it might lessen the severity of the symptoms if you do get the flu. We got ours Monday. That's good. That's
good. Yeah, it takes about 2 weeks to take full effect of your system. So the sooner you get it, the better. It's it's a good time right now to get it. Uh same thing with co the omocron variants been with us now for a couple of years but there's so many subvariants and it's
very hard for them to make a vaccine to the specific subvariants. So um uh while it might help take the edge off of co uh symptoms u it's very hard for them to actually get a vaccine specific to
what's circulating at the moment. Um whether that's going to improve only time will tell. As far as foodborne outbreaks are concerned, uh we we haven't had many this year, but uh there's been a major recall that we were involved in and it involved infant uh formula and that formula was actually
being sold in some of the retailers within our public health jurisdiction. So, we worked with the FDA and the state authorities. Our inspectors went out on site and we did actually find product on the shelves. Uh this stuff was removed from the shelves. It's gone to reclamation and it's been reported to
the state. So, we were successful in making sure that didn't get into the hands of the public. It was it involved bachelor, a bachelor operator. >> Yeah. >> Um and lastly, um we uh the almost 700,000
in grant money we've collected since 2022. The last of it has been spent in June. all the projects are completed and it was it was very successful. We were able to uh not only enhance our public health infrastructure but the township infrastructure across multiple
departments um and it strengthened our emergency response capacity for really any type of emergency that might emerge including public health. So that that worked out um very well. Uh there's a risk that we wouldn't get the money. As you remember, there was a freeze on the
money reaching uh the recipients of these grants, but we uh I'd like to think it was my crafty uh approach that got us the money. >> I'm glad to hear that you got it spent. >> Yes. Yeah.
>> Every penny we got. So, it has gone. There's nothing to give. So, uh and then lastly, we expanded our health education services. We are in addition to skin cancer screenings, we're also doing, believe it or not, pediatry screenings now because um uh it's something people
don't typically go to the doctor for, but you can see other health issues through your feet and and healthy feet is can can affect your health overall. And we have a physician through Atlantic Health and they uh we have two different
physicians who've done it. Um and uh we did three of them and they were completely booked. So, it's very popular. Just like the skin cancer screenings, they're built right to, you know, every appointment's taken and we have waiting lists for it. So, those are the two I think we're going to focus on. Most of the other prevention clinics
that we used to do traditionally, uh, the Affordable Care Act really covers that. So, people go to their physicians and we don't want to set, you know, get in between the public and their physicians. They really should go to their physicians for those kinds of preventive measures if they're covered
by insurance especially. And that's um that's just with these two in particular, people don't tend to visit uh dermatologists or podiatrists that much. So when it's a free clinic, at least they they can get those services. Um and that's the generally the
highlights of what's been going on this year. And then you have all the numbers, statistics that show you the high volume of work that we've been doing throughout the year. And that's pretty much it for our annual report. if you have any questions pertaining to that. If not, you let me
know. We can discuss these ordinance uh issues. >> I just wanted to ask um looking at some of the numbers, would we would we as a town benefit at all if we can increase some of the health education or presentations that we do or do you feel like one a year is enough? Um
looking at some of >> No, we actually we're doing um we're circulating around all five towns. So, we want to hit all the all five towns, but we have uh like between the clinics and and the CHC clinic and the education, it's actually more even though it says one, there's actually at
least four or five opportunities for the health educator to engage with the public. >> All right. So, there's a lot more going on. >> Yeah, there's more more going on. >> Like that particular health education event, was that just like the health fair that they do at >> in addition to the health fair? Actually, this was this was actually uh
with DISC 55. Yeah. We we we go to their meeting, right? And and talk to them about um I think the last one of them was uh with the winter coming, how to avoid slips and falls and different things. Uh and then before that was communical diseases, respiratory things
like that that they have to watch out for, especially in the older people. >> They're definitely engaged. >> Oh, yeah. Yeah. They're And where we can expand it, we do. We we're kind of hopping around the the region. Um who who's that wellness credit for it with? Is it just um
>> It's actually for for kids. That's for uh uninsured or underinsured families to have wellness visits for their children. >> Okay. >> And they and they also get vaccinations there and the physician. We have a pediatrician there. >> What about the podiatrist and stuff like that?
>> Well, that's through Atlantic Health, uh who's our with our health educator. She actually arranges physicians to set up the clinics with us and then we find the location. We set up the appointments. No, it's open to government. Anybody in town can come and even if we
hold it in Buden or Pquonic or or Kinolan, the whole region's invited. Any you can go to any of those locations. So, we have probably about four between skin cancer and pediatry, we're having four or five a year and everybody's welcome to go to any one of them,
wherever they're located. >> Okay. Okay. So, uh the next thing is we have u some ordinances that we have proposed because of uh as society is changing there's always new threats to public health and um uh the two that we
identified uh well actually one that we're focusing on for this meeting is massage therapy establishments. Um, this these kinds of establishments eb and flow. They're popular for a while and then they kind of disappear for a
while then they come back. And massage establishments that aren't associated with day spas or chains like Massage Envy or Hand and Stone or uh some of them, not all of them, but some of these independent ones um have people who are
not trained. They're not educated in sanitation. They don't have the right credentials. you could actually injure somebody in in in the act of doing the massage therapy. Uh there's also opportunity for illegal activity in some of these establishments and um they're
on the rise again. About 15 16 years ago, there were a lot of establishments. I was I was able to put some legislation together for Wayne Township and out of the 12 massage therapy, it turned out eight were illegitimate. And by 2 years
after the legislation was passed, they were all revoked. All their licenses were revoked. They were removed from from the town. And um it got very quiet for about a dozen years after that. I'm not sure what's going on there now, but I suspect there's a resurgence just like in our towns. Um a lot of these
independent ones that are involved in illegal activity are more predatory in nature. And what I mean by that, they try to find communities, towns that have no local legislation or regulation and uh and where there's a glut of office
space and retail space where the prices are pretty low, they can take advantage of both those things. And uh and I think having this kind of legislation in place will will discourage um these types of
businesses from from coming to town. Um, a lot of them there's three of the five towns in our region have them and we're having a lot of difficulty with them right now. Um, and some of the things that we're seeing is very disturbing and it's not safe for the public. So, I'd
like to get ahead of it here. >> I'm glad to see that you're working on >> and uh I think it'll go a long way to prevent some of the issues we're seeing in the other towns. >> It's amazing the community operates. Oh, it's I suspect these places will be here long
after we're gone. They've been here for forever. So, um the other uh ordinances that uh or there's another uh legislation that's more encompassing of the existing ordinances. Um I went through all the
ordinances uh that related to public health and we're updating some. We're refining some of the ordinances. Some of them have to do with our our um um license renewal late fees we want to enact because they're just delinquent with getting their licenses renewed. A lot of these businesses that we
regulate, whether it's body art, recreational bathing, retail, food, um and it's become really a cost to the town. So, we want to enact a $50 late fee. We have uh reinspection fees, which helps our enforcement activity. That's
another thing we'd like to enact in the existing ordinance. the reinspection fees basically would be uh equal to the license fee if they get a failure. If they fail an inspection, they would have to pay for a reinspection fee. And that's something I've enacted in other towns to great success. It it it really
helps us to keep the establishments more in line and more safe for the public u showing more initiative so they can avoid those reinspection fees. Um uh there's a certified food manager requirement that we'd like to enact
where every every shift should have someone trained in food safety on shift. That's something that well we presented it but um we didn't enact it. There was something where there was a frontline retail food handlers course, very short
2-hour course that the health department became responsible to give and the turnover for help is so rapid that you teach people and 2 months later they're not there anymore, right? >> And and so we ended up managing all these businesses by training their staff. They're responsible to train
their staff. They have to have the knowledgeable people on site to train their staff. So every shift should have somebody that's a certified food manager. That's more of an eight hour course, eight hour credential. And we'd like to enact that for the saf. >> Yes. So there's a cottage food law. And
that cottage food law, which we resisted in a lot of ways because what that means is people can open up a business in their home, make non-hazardous foods and and have revenue stream of up to $50,000 and not be regulated at all. But even non-hazardous foods, there could be
chemical contamination and other risks. But now it's allowed. So if you want to open up a cottage food business out of your kitchen in your home, you can do that as long as the revenue is 50,000 or less and it's non-hazardous foods. Uh unfortunately, we don't have a lot of authority over those operations. If
there's a complaint, we would contact the state. They give us guidance how to proceed if there was some kind of a complaint, but >> Yeah. So the complaint would come from the public who had bought something from them. Yes. Yeah, that's how that's how it would work. Yeah. Um, so that's
generally what we're looking to do with the the uh existing ordinances is clean them up, update them, and then add some of those additional regulations. We want to uh the definitions of certain food establishments. We want to clarify uh farmers market and seasonal events. We
want to make sure that they're licensed in a fair and equitable way, that the fees are not userous, that they're, you know, reasonable. um and and uh but at the same time encourages people to come and get licensed uh and not so we put
those ordinances on for a regular council meeting and we approve them there or >> Yes. So I so we were would propose it here at the board but then as the council you would enact this legislation through the >> held on tonight for introduction. >> Yes. So, so you'll have one that clears
up a bunch of things in the existing ordinances and then you'll have one for the massage establishment for introduction. >> So, those will be an ongoing thing. Other ones that might >> There's another one that we're uh in February I'm going to be proposing
another one that is in regard to u vape electronic smoking psychoactive substances. And so, that's uh I think right after the new year we're going to pick >> THAT'S GREAT. >> YEAH. AND I I WILL say this, it's a it's a kind of a lengthy ordinance for the
massage therapy, but what you have here is um um experience with attorneys defending these establishments, the loopholes they use, and ways that they can sidestep the law. And so when I wrote this, I took it from the
legislation I had written previously. I looked at other towns ordinances and then I glued them all together, the best parts of everything. And so in court, these should stand up pretty well. >> And then of course we have our legal review that's that's done here as well.
>> Great. Sound good? >> Yeah, I was going to say it's great to be on top of all this. >> Yeah, it's important. The world changes very rapidly and you have to kind of keep up with the risks that are present at the time. And >> I guess we're doing okay with our food
trucks and stuff. >> Oh, yeah. Absolutely. No. >> No, that's worked out very well. As a matter of fact, the seasonal event um piece that we we're correcting in the ordinances, we allow them to get licensed um for the year like for late Tuesdays and things like that. They can
get one license and then they can come over to that instead of every seven events they got to get another license. And it's very cumbersome and it's hard to manage that administratively and even for their cost and everything. Doesn't make a lot of sense that every seven weeks we got to inspect them again and
issue license again. So for that we worked out a seasonal license and we've worked out much better and that concludes my uh dissertation. Great. >> Thank you. Great. >> Thank you. I appreciate it. Any
questions from council? Next on the agenda is public comment. If anyone wishes to address the council, please wait to be recognized to come to the microphone and provide your name and address for the record. >> Is this for the health department meeting?
>> Okay. Nope. We're not there yet. >> Yeah, we're not we're not at a regular council meeting yet. >> Okay. There being no further business, is there a motion to adjurnn? I'll take that motion. Second. All in favor? Opposed. Meeting adjourned at 655.