e you need them the shorter you are the more you need them [Laughter] phone off Ah that's good okay on
should I get you a where e good evening this is the Ridgewood Village Council public Workshop the date is September 25th 2024 the time is 7:30 adequate notice of this meeting has been provided by a posting on the bulletin
board in Village Hall by mail to the Ridgewood news the record and by submission to all persons entitled the same is provided by law of a schedule including the date and time of this meeting roll call Deputy Mayor parin here council member Reynolds here
council member whites here council member windrad here mayor Banos here will you all please join us in a salute to our flag I pledge Al to the flag of the United States of America and to the rep for it
stands Nation godis andice for all uh we're going to take things a little out of order tonight it's on the revised agenda um as I'm sure everyone knows there was um an issue with
Ridgewood water this weekend and we're certain that there are lots of questions associated with it so we want to get that information out to everyone as quickly and efficiently as possible so we are going to hear from the staff of Richwood water and begin our meeting
with that so ladies and gentlemen for Rood water if you'll please join us thank you all so much much tonight for being here um we know that you've been working throughout the weekend um long
nights long days uh a lot going on so rich will you take a moment and please introduce your staff thank you mayor uh good evening Council um with me tonight I have Justin popek Justin heads up to customer
service division of Richard water uh seated next to him is Jill Fano our senior engineer next is Neil galone who heads up the information system or otherwise known as geographic information system division of rigid water myself Richard calby
director for rid water uh to my right is William bewas he's the superintendent of water and the licensed operator for the system and last is Michael Kors the business manager for rid water thank you so much and Rich I know that there's something you'd like to say before we
begin the discussion thank you mayor so the emergency event that occurred this weekend was an unfortunate circumstance and one that Ridgewood takes Ridgewood water and the village Ridgewood take very seriously we apologize to the affected customers for any
inconvenience the rid staff worked through the weekend to ensure that the ban could be lifted in 24 hours and before the start of work and school of this week as we work to evaluate immediate and long-term Solutions we ask
for operation and patience thank you thank you so there was a boil water advisory this weekend for parts of Ridgewood Midland Park and woff can you tell us what happened so
this past Friday the water pressure in our system fell below 20 psi that's pounds per square inch for several hours on Friday morning do you know why this happened yes there was excessive lawn
watering in the area of our of that service in violation of local ordinances mostly in Midland Park how do you know it was caused by excessive lawn watering our readings showed that it
occurred during the hours of 3:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m. in the morning time when sprinklers typically are running and I have come to learn that there was also a broken valve involved is that correct that's
correct was this the cause of the problem the broken valve no but it exacerbated the problem um caused by the excessive watering has the Val has the valve been fixed yes and how long did this drop in water
pressure Last by 7: a.m. the water pressure was restored above 20 psi so the the drop in water pressure went from 3:00 a.m to 6:00 a.m or thereabouts but by 7: am. it had resolved
correct did the drop in water pressure below 20 psi occur at any other time during this weekend no why is a drop in water pressure below 20 psi a problem when the the water
falls below 20 lbs per square inch 20 psi there's the potential d danger that water could become stagnant and bacteria could enter into the pipe does it create any other issues uh it re it puts Fire Protection
in Jeopardy got it so firefighters will have trouble fighting fire when water when our water pressure drops when there's inadequate pressure correct got it yes is that why you had the boiled water Alert in effect the boil water
alert was in effect um because of the drop in pressure mandated by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection but in please explain to us how that relates to the bacteria forming it it's necessary to take those precautions to ensure that the public is
prepared and and taking those precautions to protect themselves in case any bacteria did get into the water after the reduction in pressure and if there were bacteria in the water what is the boiled water um alert do the advisory recommended that for portable
use customers boil their bring their water to ro rolling boil for at least one minute for for safe use that one minute of a rolling boil removes the bacteria in the water got it so then it would be safe at that point to drink correct great um did you actually test
for bacteria yes we took 17 samples throughout the area why did you test it uh the information that I have is that the D required you to test it nine times that's correct you tested it 17
times why did you do that we took extra precautions to make sure the water was safe and did the testing re actually reveal any bacteria in the water no all tests taken were negative for bacteria so the boiled water alert turned out to
be precautionary that's correct and when was the boiled water alert lifted we lifted on Sunday afternoon approximately 400 p.m. how many homes were notified of the boiled water
alert uh 6,147 now that's how many were notified how many homes were actually affected by the drop in water pressure so just back up there was
6,147 services so that could be a combination of homes businesses schools Etc right but our best estimates that the truly affected average was 35 to 100 service connections I'm sorry 35 to 100 service con 35 to 100 I thought you said
3,500 from no 35 to 100 so it was less than a we believe it was less than a 100 homes based on our estimates right yes got it if there were if we believe there were a 100 homes and businesses or less
why did we notify over 6,100 100 uh locations it's our job to take every possible precaution necessary to protect the public and it was necessary to do that to protect that entire Zone and provide that precautionary notice in
case bacteria indeed was in the water and had spread and it's my understanding that you did this in concert with recommendations from the D that's correct so you were in contact with the D this entire time correct correct great so there were there were actually two
major problems one was the boiled water uh alert because of the PSI uh dropping below 20 but then there was a serious Communications breakdown how did we notify the 6100 homes and businesses of the low pressure
problem so we contacted the customers in the area using the reverse 911 system that we have set up for the utility we also contacted the residents um via our website um and social media
uh platforms but it turns out that the reverse 911 system was both inadequate and inaccurate that's correct why was that because the system is a sign in opt
in so it doesn't contain your address or your phone number if you don't opt in um it requires residents to voluntarily sign up so we don't just have everyone's phone number in our 911 system that's
correct so if somebody does not opt in they don't get notified of any emergency in the village correct got it approximately how many of our residents percentage wise are signed up for the
911 our estimates are anywhere between 50 to 60% but that's total rigid water customers got it what steps because this is so inadequate what steps have we taken to
get people to sign up when we initiated the reverse 911 system uh we did Mass mail it's listed on the quarterly bills it's also on our website and on the Village website okay so that's why it was inadequate why was it
inaccurate so part of how we prepare the call is taking information to outline the area of effect the transfer of that data from one system to the reverse 91 911 system was inaccurate and caused
overlap in the area because in fact there were people who were notified that this did not affect them and they actually received a 911 call saying you are fine but they
actually were in the The Zone affected by this is that correct that's correct or some in the reverse as well and I'm going to Keith I'm going to turn to you for just a moment um why didn't we just send out a townwide email to let
everyone know what was going on so the answer to that is multifaceted first um obviously this emergency affected three of the four service municipalities um excluding Glenrock so a townwide email in Ridgewood alone was not going to
notify the folks in the other two municipalities that were affected in addition to that we have 75 email subscribers to our e notice e notification system 7500 7,500 email subscribers um in the village database
when the numbers were presented to me Saturday morning there were 1,700 homes affected approximately that would need to be notified in the village my concern was confusion and at the time that I made the decision not to send the email I made it based on
the fact that I believed that the accuracy and efficiency of the reverse 911 system would be much better than it proved out to be so when we so at the time we did not send out an email Village Wide again 7,500 email subscribers 1,700 affected
homes didn't want to give bad information to folks who weren't affected um once we were able to diagnose and we saw this unfold online and in customer phone calls to Ridgewood waterer and customer calls to the
village and email Communications I quickly understood that there were some inadequacies in the reverse 911 system and when the boil water advisory was lifted we sent it out townwide because we were trying to fill that information Gap got it thank
you so let's talk about what the next steps are what are we doing now to ensure that this does not happen again short term or long term let's start with shortterm
short term as soon as we were notified of the emergency uh Mr bewas employed the services of a hydraulic engineering firm to help us evaluate the situation and determine Solutions and what options did they give
you for Solutions shortterm we are exploring options to bring more water and pressure into the area today Mr kasmar Mr Beer and myself met with a neighboring Town um to see if there's a possibility of bringing more water into
that area from that neighboring town they are also evaluating possibility of moving or finding a way to move water from the lower parts of our system into this higher elevation part of our system using
pumps and mayor we should be clear that we don't currently purchase water from the neighboring town that we met with today that's correct right so you're talking about putting in some additional pumps to move the water to
this affected area in the future from either neighboring town or from the lower parts of our system where there's adequate Supply got it why didn't we do this before this happened the water restrictions were providing adequate
with pressure and flow in in the area how is a pump or pumps going to help this problem well the pump allows us to take the water from a lower elevation and using that energy to pump it up to a
higher elevation thereby providing the necessary pressure for that that zone to feed that zone you talk about a lower elevation and a higher elevation best example is uh West Glen Avenue as you drive from the bottom up from Maple
Avenue all the way up into Midland Park to move water up that hill you need energy that energy is T typically done in the water business with a pump pump provides that energy to boost that water up that hill so the affected area that
there was a problem was that what you would refer to as High Ground correct some of the highest in the the system and is that why they were affected in other parts of our service Sur area were not affected that's correct so when the
when the water pressure drops as it did in this instance it's those Higher Ground areas that are most affected correct correct great and how long would it take to
install this pump or is it one pump is it more than one pump that has not been determined at this point it could possibly be more than one one pump multiple pumps um once everything is verified and assuming we had everything
on hand um what we're looking at could take no longer than a week to install but that's again assuming that we have all the permits in place all the equipment procured a lot of the work would be done inhouse by rigid water staff and Rich we would need both njde
approval and County approval because it's a County Road that's correct and we've already um contacted New Jersey D Mr bewas again took proactive measure contacted the DP had a conference call with I know know how many of them
yesterday A large group they're amenable to this solution they understand the problem they know what we're proposing is a solution that will work and they're working with us um to to Fast Track that once we have the hydraulic Engineers um
approval that what we're proposing will work so and I've placed a call into the County Administration to let them know that this is a possibility we may consider so I'm I'm less concerned about the county than I am about the D um they are not known for um their quickness on
uh approvals um what what makes you think that we might get this quickly or very quickly we are in constant contact with them daily since this emergency occurred actually Mr Beer receiv the
call last night at 10:30 p.m. um they've asked us to report to them daily on status and we continue to communicate and they've gone as far to say that they verify and will support in any means necessary to stop the watering and so I
believe that means at the same time they will support anything else we need to do to make this be fixed temporarily so are you saying that because this is an emergent situation that they might move at a quicker Pace than they normally
would correct great um are there any other issues besides County and state approval in getting this done quickly we need to make sure the equipment that we
decide or the hydraulic engineer decides is required is available um you know some of these things are not off the shelf um but there are other means to supplement them if possible um you know roll in pumps temporary power we're going to explore all options that are
available when would you expect to get the report from our hydraulic engineer so that we can so that we could begin to look for this equipment so the engineer is doing two things they are evaluating this entire situation and we'll be preparing a report about what happened
and what they recommend but we've asked them in the interm to provide us by this Friday report back on these Solutions the two options that I mentioned neor in town and moving water from low to high it sounds like this has the
possibility of moving relatively quickly correct okay but we call this a temporary fix how long would you anticipate that this temporary fix could last if
necessary many years um up to 10 years really yes not so temporary this is going to be a hard piped um transfer station um I could Define that and essential transfer station is a pump
that moves water from low to high we would literally take piping in the ground move it over between the two zones and put a pump between it and that can be enclosed in a roadside box and last for many years so the pump would be
above ground but the piping would it would be connected to piping below ground correct and it would simply pump water from our low-lying areas to our higher ground correct good are there any
other short-term fixes that we can look at or hope for a compliance with watering restrictions um particularly during emergencies like this when we ask for a banon water um because we found that this drop and pressure is only occurring
during those morning hours so people are watering so we're asking that people follow the restrictions or in cases where an emergency happens like this and we ask for a ban on watering that they follow that now I know that we have an ordinance here in town in Ridgewood but
we're also dealing with three other three other towns do they have similar ordinances yes um they all adopted similar ordinances last year um thanks to the efforts of of yourself and the rest of the council um you actually had
sent them letter that I printed a copy of today back in February of 2023 and subsequent to that they did adopt the same ordinance that's in effect here in Ridgewood and I remember that letter specifically and I remember lobbying the
other Mayors um I know that we stressed that this ordinance is important um in addition to just our general water system but it also helped keep our pasas levels down correct uh to to the lowest
levels possible and maintaining it was important that we do this for maintaining um uh adequate water pressure for firefighting correct and I know that you have quarterly meetings uh or regular meetings um because I know I'm in
attendance with them Pam is in attendance at them um have how often do we did we discuss this at the time it was discussed that every meeting that I recall we actually held a special meeting in the evening um
just on this topic so tell me or I know but please tell everyone else um what the response from the other three municipalities were
to our request for ordinances passing ordinances and uh commensurate enforcement of those ordinances we'll pass the ordinance but we're not going to enforce it did all three towns say that no uh the burrow Glenrock agreed to
allow us to enforce but Midland Park park and wof no um into this state we still don't have the ability to enforce we do hand out warnings um in those municipalities or towns did Ridgewood waterer offer
support for this enforcement that was recommended we offered our own personnel and made it clear to each town that and any tickets that were issued um the fines go back to the individual towns not to Ridge of water or the village of
Ridgewood in your experience because you deal with this here in Ridgewood how important is enforcement to the compliance with the ordinance very important particularly when it's something new um and we found
that enforcement helps stop the watering you know in our experience here in Ridgewood we've been doing it since 2017 you granted there are still people that will take multiple fines and continue to water but the majority after getting a fine will make the adjustments
to their system and and we on the correct days so without enforcement the ordinance has no teeth correct and remind me again where was this problem
caused this was in Midland Park one of the towns that refused to have enforcement of the ordinance correct that's correct okay let's move on tell us all about the long-term fix
for this so the longterm fix could be similar to the short-term fix what the hydraulic engineer is looking at is the entire Zone again these highest elevations of our system and finding where is the best place to move water into that zone to provide adequate
pressure and Fire Protection so one of the temporary fixes can very well become the permanent fix and how long would it take to complete this long-term fix it could be approximately two years um from the time we get the study
complete do the design get all the necessary permits because that would no longer be an emergent situation um it have to go through all the normal channels and and funding of course where I anticipate something like this could be in the rough range of
approximately $2 million dollar or more got it and and you are not overly concerned that the long-term fix would take longer than the short-term fix will last correct and about how much do you
estimate the short-term fix would cost rough estimate um upwards of $300,000 between the pipe the pumping procuring temporary power for location got it and I'm gonna shift my focus for a moment
because now I want to talk about the fixes to the communication issue which is has been so was so inadequate that we really need to address it and Keith this is really your neck of the woods so I'm going to direct my questions to you
what's being done to ensure that this breakdown in Communications never happens again so let me let me just back up from your question if I if I may mayor I think um it's it's well known that one of the first things when
I assumed this position that I identified was a major need for improvement uh not only at the Ridgewood water level but also at the Village level when it come when it came to Communications and I truly believe that over the last year and a half we have
fostered a culture here amongst all the vill departments um even so much as onboarding a communications director specifically to carry out these types of functions um that Communications was key to our Collective success um but this is
another area that we were deficient in and we had discussions interestingly enough even before this emergency last week with regard to um trying to beef up our reverse 911 communication system and what I've done this week is I've
directed all Village departments to call all of their data points where they have direct contact information for Ridgewood residents and that's going to include tax records Health Department Records when it comes
to dog and cat licensing Recreation program uh contacts senior citizen contacts building department uh permitting and the contact information that was submitted there um and and some additional uh data points that we can
call throughout the village and we're going to migrate all of those contact all those pieces of contact information through our GIS system we're going to collect that and we're going to provide that to our reverse 911 provider so
basically this system that was an optin system we are now going to take all the data that we have and we're going to dump it in there um the one caveat and I think it's important especially when you're trying to protect personal information especially of our residents is that this is only going to be used in
the event of an emergency a true emergency whether it be a water emergency whether it be a plane crash whether it be an active shooter situation um only when OEM determines that it is um that it reaches that
threshold of an emergency situation um obviously on the Ridgewood water side in consultation with Rich uh will we utilize this to notify residents so this isn't going to be like our e newsletter where we send out um notice that there's a crafts fair no even road
closures and you know we had the street fair last weekend and different things like that um we're not going to use this for anything but a true and actual emergency where we in real time need to make instant notification to the folks who live here in the village and when do
you project that you're going to have collected all of this information uh um we have probably 50% of it already called um I've been working with Neil and his team and Dylan Hansen Our IT director uh to work with the individual departments to gather this information
um I anticipate that by mid next week we will likely have all of the information uh to be reviewed uh and prepared to be migrated into the reverse 911 system and obviously everyone's personal
information for people who are concerned that they have now given this to the government what if they say I don't want to be in this they will have we will be aggressive about notifying people that they have been migrated over to the
system so much so that once everyone is entered in we're going to do a reverse 911 call to those individuals to everybody in the system whether you exist in the system today or whether your data point is going to be entered in there in the next 10 days or so we're
going to do a reverse 911 call from me indicating to people that they have now been entered into our reverse 911 system that this information is only going to be used for emergency circumstances and that if they would like to opt out or
unsubscribed for instance let's say we have a data point for someone who's moved out of the village they will be able to go to either the Ridgewood water website or the village of Ridgewood website there will be a banner at the top of the homepage the landing page that will guide them to how they can
unsubscribe if they choose not to be part of the emergency notification system and we Ser as three other towns uh and I'm going to gather that we have similar issues with our reverse 911
system for them so what are we doing to incorporate those that contact information into our reverse 911 system so let me first state that any emergency notification that comes out from the village of Ridgewood to Midland Park
woff or Glenrock is exclusively on the Ridgewood water issue so for instance when they had the shooting in Glenrock that's up to the Glenrock OEM folks to utilize their own means of reverse 911 to notify folks of that type of emergency so this would just be used for
Ridgewood water but today I sent a letter uh to each of the respective Mayors in those municipalities with a carbon copy to the business administrat in each Town inviting them to call the same type of data sets that we are going to call here in the village of Ridgewood
and share that with Neil and his team uh in the gis division at Ridgewood water and we have extended them the same invitation to gather that information share it with us and we'll put that into the reverse 911 system that we use for Ridgewood water to service those three
municipalities and what else can we do to make our system more communicative and more reliable so even before this emergency occurred on Saturday uh I was talking with Carol Bowski our
communications director and we had intended on doing a townwide mailing um that would go to Every residential homeowner that would provide a QR code that they could scan on their phone and it would bring them back to a landing
page on the Village website that would be a listing of all of our different communication Outlets so that would range from our ews our reverse 911 subscription our recycling coach our my Ridgewood app app which we'll hear about
tonight from Carol um our uh SmartWater um all of the different areas that we use throughout our departments to communicate with our residents people would be able to go there and essentially have a buffet menu of what they want to subscribe for and what they
want to receive notifications too so they can receive they can sign up to receive notifications for lots of things at that point correct the other thing that we're going to do is we're going to expand our reverse 911 notification system Beyond just phone calls the um
system that we use has the technology built into it that the same message that's delivered by automated call can also be delivered by text message and email we're going to expand the system so that when we do have an emergency like we did with Ridgewood water on
Saturday you'll not only receive that message via rooc call you'll also receive it by text message and by email if we have that information for sounds like a lot of work how long is it going to take um I anticipate that within the
next 30 days uh we will have this up and running uh I do plan to have that communication uh that's going to go out by regular mail uh through the Postal Service uh done with Carol sometime in the month of October uh so that people can be directed uh to subscribe to any
of those services that they choose to uh be part of and as far as the uh the mass data dump into the reverse 911 system which will include phone numbers but will also include emails um I anticipate we'll have that done in the next 30 days Keith when you decided to use the
reverse 911 system as the primary way of reaching out to people did you suspect in any way that it was going to be this inadequate no the only um the only emergency situation
that I can recall um and Jeremy is is actually out of the country so he and I have to connect on this the only actual emergencies that I can recall during my tenure here that we've used the reverse 911 system for has been flooding and keep in mind that flooding events are
isolated to certain areas of the village that are susceptible to flooding so I don't think that we would have realized uh the lack of full penetration so to speak through those reverse 911s because they were only intended to be received
by certain folks who were susceptible and in the flood plane Keith you've got a lot of experience before you came here you were in three different towns some smaller some bigger did you ever encounter a reverse
n you had you had reverse 911 in all of them towns I gather yes and you use them in one of those towns were any as inadequate as the one that you found here when you got here there's always a populace who you're not reaching um and sometimes they're vocal
uh but not like we experienced on Saturday we we have an obligation to beef up this data set that's in the reverse 911 system so that we have maximum penetration in a situation like this and well listen I'm not going to
take away from the emergency situation and the D requirements and everything that Ridgewood water needed to do within their due diligence this past weekend but you know what what kept me up other than trying to correct the situation and give people restoration of water service
what kept me up Saturday and Sunday night was if this had been a plane crash or a train derailment or an active shooter situation at a school or a house of worship that that would have been an ultimate failure because then you're talking about true life and death
situations and where we would have had to notify residents of what to do in those circumstances and we wouldn't have had maximum penetration uh in communicating with those folks so th this is what we need to do um there were there was some discussion amongst the
department directors about taking this information and putting it into the reverse 911 system I will deal with the ramifications of that decision if anyone is upset over it or complains about it um because I believe that this information is too valuable not to get
out in an emergency and we're going to give people a direct route to unsubscribe if that is their desire well I think that because we just dealt with an active shooter in Glenrock just a short time ago sure you know this is the kind of thing that we
need this information and if somebody truly wants to opt out it will absolutely be their option right um thanks Keith Rich I'm going to come back to you when did you start at Ridgewood water June of
2015 and what was your background at the time you started uh when I started here I had close to 21 years of experience mostly in local government I as well had also been in three other towns before coming
to the Village of Ridgewood um I also worked for a private firm and the Army Corps of Engineers uh my primary expertise was in the field of civil engineering mostly project management construction uh water system operations um and the last 5 years
before I came here in particular running what was known as the Livingston water department so you're a water guy yes when you arrived here what was your assessment of our water
system a sinking ship um 100-year-old system that needed a lot of help and why do you call it a sinking ship I know that when we spoke earlier you also referred to it as a system in crisis
that's correct it system in crisis because unbeknownst to me uh day one when I walked in what was handed to me were three administrative orders from the US EPA and New Jersey DP of various
notices of violation notices of fines um I was put right in the middle of several legal cases involving those and had to put myself in the position to negotiate um settlements and schedules
to complete all the necessary work to correct those actions the system didn't actually meet federal or state guidelines is that correct that's correct um and how long had it been since the piping and pumping and pumps
had been updated in some cases decades um I couldn't give you exact dates for each location just here tonight um but there were critical infrastructure what I mean
by that is places like storage tanks that provide fire protection and pressure in the system pump stations that move the water between the different elevations low to high let down water from high to low that were
aging hadn't been taken care of and needed help in in the form of a lot of investment and new construction and what did you do once you realized that you had as you called it a system in
crisis we created a plan um the plan started with what were the issues at Bay by the US EPA and required as part of the orders that were entered into by The Village Council at that time um my
myself the manager and DP um and that investment was essentially $40 million Capital plan over the course of about four to five years was that the whole plan no that
was just eliminating the violations so this this was to address the most serious issues first correct and when did you implement this part of the plan
started as early as 2016 my very first budget year so you got here in 2015 and in 2016 were you under construction we were under construction with least a storage tank projects can you give me an idea of
where you spent $40 million at that time we had to physically upgrade every single storage tank with the exception of Valley View tankers that had recently been and redone we had to provide security measures um to address the
possibility of terrorist threats to the water system um install security mechanisms like cameras um access systems we had to upgrade the supervisory control and data acquisition system that controls the entire network
of the system because it was our cake and communicated via old copper lines or Radio Systems that were delayed there were no controls on the disinfection methods within the system and they did not report back to scada we
had to make those Corrections and then every single major transfer station that had pumps to move the water was upgraded with no electrical controls environmental controls and security and as part of that $40 million
plan didn't you also upgrade some of the pump facilities that transfer water from low-lying areas to Higher Ground correct and when did you complete this phase of the plan approximately approximately
2019 2020 and had you not completed that phase of the plan would the current problem that we just experienced this weekend been worse um M undoubtedly much
worse so that was part of the plan correct tell me about the rest of the plan and and let's start with you spent $40 million how much were you planning on spending for the rest of the
plan in rough estimates probably in excess of another $200 million so this was really just the start of a much larger plan this is an aging infrastructure it's over 110 year old system there are pipes in the ground
that are over 100 years old the investment needs to be made and is now is legally required per the state legislature to be replaced with new infrastructure so you spent $40 million you had another $200 million that you
needed to spend did you do it no why not um a word that we use here very often the acronym being posos posos regulation came into effect
there was the need to address that not only regulatory but to provide safe drinking water to the community and that was going to be a major investment um that was necessary and when Trump everything else to get it done in time
to meet that that mandate why couldn't you do them both at the same time they both needed to get done it's an impossible feat in my mind um as I've told you all very many times this has been one of the toughest jobs
that I've ever endured giving the breadth of what posos has been and the reimagination that we're undertaking for this system and rebuilding it into 12 treatment plants million not not Millions but hundreds of miles of new
pipe to connect all the satellite Wells to those plants it's unfathomable to think about how we could get all that done but really even construct it all at the same time there would be such a disruption to the system and to the customers that it just wouldn't be
practical and aren't you doing other projects at the same time that you're doing posos smaller projects than this $200 million upgrading of the system we are replacing lead service lines we are every year replacing close to two miles
of water distribution Main in the system and are continuing to make improvements on well pumps well stations security measures f enses Etc so you've been keeping busy sir I've been keeping busy as well
as all the people to my right and left we live and breed this daily and we all love what we do I know you do I know you do I know it's a mission for all of you I really do and so tell me
today what is the status of that 200 million dollar in projects that was put off because of posos that you wanted to get started back in 2019 2020 where's that going
when when are we going to get to that so we've started the planning um thanks to to your approval we hired a hydraulic engineer separate and apart from the hydraulic engineer who broughten for this emergency to start evaluating where those improvements need to be made and
that's strictly on the transfer of water maintaining or disinfection in the system and a couple other variables in addition to that our GIS team has identified the age of our pipes which ones are criticals where we should start replacing pipe so we've begun the
planning process actual shovels in the ground will likely start in 2027 once the last P PL is complete so when would you actually hope to break ground on one of these projects 20 2027 or in in terms of the transfer of
water and the permanent solution to this problem we're speaking about tonight sooner got it so had the posos remediation project not interrupted your execution of this
$200 million in upgrades would we have experienced any of the issues that we experienced this weekend no so that set of projects that you had in
mind back in 2016 would have addressed the issues that we face today you all know how aggressive I've been on posos I would have been just as aggressive on that plan and getting that work done you know
one of the things that we hear a lot about is the lawn watering restrictions and there are certainly environmental reasons in addition to our limited infrastructure had you been able
to implement that $200 million project putting aside for just a moment environmental issues associated with excessive let's call it lawn watering would we have any lawn watering
restrictions at all if you had done that none I actually s sat at a public meeting in another town that we serve and said that very thing when I presented to them the plan for the future of ridard water and explained to
them that our goal in improving the system was to be in a position that instead of telling people in the summer that they can't water and that their lawn has to die that when that heat wave comes we have the supply and you could water more on this week got it thank you
um I want to let everybody know as may be apparent um I spent virtually the entire day with this team of people so that I could become fully educated so that I could ask the questions that I think everybody wants
answers too so that's why I was in a position to ask these questions and with that I'm going to turn it over to the rest of this Council to ask whatever question questions they feel are appropriate Evan why don't you kick it
off great thanks so much first of all rich thank you personally thank you to your staff for working over the weekend um I know that was tough I know when Keith was updating us we're originally told that the advisory might be lifted on Monday I know was lifted on Sunday I imagine it's because of a lot of hard
work uh by the people in front of me and your entire team so please know that on a personal level and on a village level we appreciate all the hard work that went in to fixing the issue with that said um The Vow that was broken how long was that broken I'll defer to Mr bewas since
that's in his distribution division so excuse me unfortunately at this time I can't answer that I can tell you that the valve was last inspected in 2019 and appeared to be functional but we cannot answer with certainty at this
time when that valve broke so I Know Rich you had said that the valve was a contributing factor not a causation Factor how how big a contributing factor was it to the issue over the weekend so let me try to explain what the the broken valve was causing the the
majority of the system functions well on the basis that water has the ability to get to any service connection from different directions called a loop system some cases people living on dead end they don't have the luxury of that in this particular area
it was looped but when that valve broke and dropped the water was only getting to that block or that street one way so when the watering began there was only that one source of water and not the ability for water to come in from the
other side and help Supply it and provide that necessary pressure gotcha okay um one of the things that surprised me was how how do we not see this coming I mean like how it happen so suddenly I assumed that pressure would was dipping did we notice that it was getting low I
mean I mean you know it's not the first time we've had issues with with you know lawn watering and people breaking um breaking the rules but how is it it happened so quickly that wouldn't see you come in this time I don't know the answer to that question I could tell you that we
received minimal complaints relative to the low pressure in that area we were lucky to have a councilwoman in mland park that lived in the era who started to complain this summer and as a result of that we we launched into action to the point that
we were monitoring it and that resulted in the low pressure result that we found last week I mean do we not measure the the PSI on a regular basis or how did how do we keep tabs on it we do measure but it's not at every point in the system it's at the the wellous or
treatment plants or at the tanks this was an isolated area amongst two or three streets the 36 to 100 loc locations that we originally identified it's import it's important to note too that the the low PSI happens between 3
and 6:00 a.m. so correct the reason that we don't get an abundance of complaints during that time period is most people are sleeping or as they're getting up and starting their day the system is coming back to uh a better pressure a better level of pressure am I correct in
saying that that's correct so has this ever happened before not since I've been here I could recall okay um so I've lived in Ridgewood for 12 years I've never seen this happen before um you know I view this as a bit of an aberration and a
sort of you know bit of you know you know a bunch of factors coming together with that it's an important aberration I mean people were legitimately I think scared um obviously there are holes in the communication system I'm not going to ask questions about it because I think we we know we have some homework to do here on on the reverse 911 system and Keith I plud your efforts on this
this is an area we got to get better on for all the reasons you outlined um because today was boiling water tomorrow could be something more even more urgent um but again Rich um I know I know I appreciate all the work that went into this I appreciate all the work all of you do obviously we got a little work to do here but um but again thank you for
all your hard work thank you thanks Evan sioban I want to thank the entire Bridgewood water team Carol from Communications and Keith for addressing this and I don't want to be redundant but um in some of the longer term discussions on how to disincentivize
watering of the lawn tiered price pring always comes up I'm wondering how quickly we can begin because effectively for people who are watching this the ordinances in place without enforcement are basically null and void we don't have the authority to enforce in those municipalities so it becomes a question
of how to enforce it and the economics of tiered pricing would um Force this exchange because it'd be the more you use the more you would pay per gallon so it's an economic way of Ridgewood water enforcing this um i al so that's part
one part two is I'm assuming you can tell the addresses of the individual consumption that triggered this and have we dealt with them uh communicated with them you know if it's three to six the can we switch the times um you can you can buy address correct find out the
mass contributors to the usage during that time period so first is long-term strategy tiered pricing which I think I think this ccil would love to discuss I don't know how to make that happen and then two are we with um um more pragmatic gloves going out to the users
that did this and talking to them about adjusting their usage in concert with each other so starting with the the first question tiered pricing and Mr popek could attest to this because he's heard me say it a bunch of times and he
and Mike's predecessor two times ago had this idea long time ago but again what became of it is other things got in the way posos in particular and the one very question I asked and posed to them when
it was proposed if we're going to do this we need to make sure we could provide the water to that person that wants to pay that high price 2015 we didn't have that Supply today we have that Supply but we do not
have the means to move it in every place that we need it and that's the second part of the the plan but undoubtedly you're correct here pricing is likely the best option and it's going to kick back up in our discussions once we're complete with beos I mean not not today
or tomorrow because you guys have been busy but I would like to see that added on an agenda so we can get an idea of what the actual tiering looks like that will require a rate study okay um so that would be something we have to hire a rate expert to do and you know again
you by the time we complete all the improvements that whole study could change so I would recommend you hold off on that I'm happy to discuss the ideas okay around it and explain to the public what tier pricing actually means um but but definitely it's a way to go in the
future a lot of utilities utilize it today and it and inen ifies the user and also provides those who can serve and particularly those who might be on a fixed income with a discount so great and then the second part of the second
part so in terms a Max contributors um we do have meter data meters are read monthly um we can identify usage on that that basis um we are proposing as a phase two of the hydraulic model you
approved a couple months ago to next look at how that works throughout our system you know starting with phase one assuming that everybody complied with the two-day a week watering what is the Baseline of that
what if only 50% of the people are complying which we believe is the basis where we're at today and have been at for a while and then looking if there what are the Alternatives you know changing days Changing Times um but that again all has to be
studied the good news is part of what we hired the emergency hydraulic engineer to do is part of this area and what occurred that we gave them all the information for those accounts in that area so they're plugging that
in thank you I hope that anwers good yeah great thanks Shan Lorraine thank you uh I just want to say thank you to everybody um I know you guys had a very very long weekend and I am going to look at this as a blessing
in disguise and no one was harmed people were inconvenienced certainly but hopefully this will um in the future we will get our reverse 911 all set and God forbid anything any
emergency happens it will be much better next time thanks thank you thanks lorine Pam at the point when we come to considering tiered pricing perhaps as way to add a cap at the high end correct
um and then I also for the public I just wanted to reiterate that this was not a situation of lack of diligence lack of monitoring laziness stupidity this was a reaction that was
totally professional this could happen to any water system and we are lucky I'll repeat that lucky to have the staff that we do at ridgwood water so thank you thank you mayor Keith um so first at
the risk of prolonging this um I just want to Echo the statements of the council um in thanking all of the Ridgewood water leadership management staff the on the ground staff for the work that they've done since Friday
afternoon um relative to this um they have literally not slept um since the boiled water advisory went into effect on Saturday morning there has been Constant Contact not only
with Village management but also with the leadership in all three of the respective service area towns um I've been in touch with all of the administrators there uh over the weekend into this week um we all understand uh
that there were um deficiencies in the operational roll out of this and certainly in the communications Outlets um and we've learned a lot of valuable lessons from this uh but that's
no excuse and you know the first thing that rich and I said to each other when we connected late Saturday and we were in the midst of the boiled water advisory and there was a lot of information that was being shared on
social media and on other internet Outlets um we both agreed that we need to do better so you know when it's the best leadership you can have are folks who realize um that they need to take responsibility and they need to
take corrective action and I can tell you that everybody on this team uh is committed to doing so with that being said I debated with myself much of today whether I wanted to bring this up from the
deis um and when I came to Ridgewood in July of 23 um I was well aware um that there are media Outlets out there um that are critical of Village government
Ridgewood water um other levels of government um and I know that I knew that full well taking this position and I will never shy away as the village manager in this municipality um from someone asking a
question criticizing a decision um even playing Monday Morning Quarterback to say we could have done better because we should be saying that just as much as our critics should be able to say that
but yesterday afternoon rich calby and I received an email from councilwoman Nancy Pete who is a Midland Park council member she's the water liaison to Ridgewood water and I have to tell you if there's a hero in this whole scenario
it's Nancy Pete because since the summer she's had some concerns about pressure and one of the reasons that this was dug into as deep as it was going back to the June situation on graduation night when Rich and I were on
channel two explaining that people needed to curb their water use during that heat wave Nancy Pete had a lot to do with being able to report in real time to Ridgewood water what was happening up on Hill Street near the
Glen tank in the burrow of Midland Park but yesterday afternoon Nancy sent rich and I an email which included a write up from an internet
outlet that was patently and completely false and in it it said and what we found out from a confidential Source was that this weekend boil water advisory was likely triggered by human
error at ridgewoods Waters Wharton Dyke Treatment Facility in Midland Park rich is the treatment facility at Wharton Dyke in Midland Park manned by any Ridgewood Ridgewood water Personnel no there's there's no office there there's
no control panel there's no Personnel controlling anything on the technical side of Ridgewood water at that location no goes on to say it was said that someone there forgot to hit the switch and fill water storage tanks
serving Midland Park and portions of Ridgewood and whiteoff excessive lawn watering played no role in the boiled water advisory on top of a bad situation where we have all acknowledged
that we need to do better this is completely and utterly irresponsible and this misinformation campaign made a bad situation not for us we'll live to come to work tomorrow but for those residents that lived up in that
area of Midland Park and needed to boil their water and for that Council woman who simply wanted to go on an afternoon walk and was accosted by her constituents because they believe that this was [Music] true in the midst of an emergency in
this town and in our three service area municipalities we do not need misinformation from undocumented maybe non-existent sources to be spread during the mids of
an emergency that affects the lives of real people who live in the service area so not only do I think that the village needs to do better based on this circumstance not only do I think that Ridgewood water needs to do better in the circumstances but I think the people that are putting out information about
what's going on to the general public I think you need to do better too thank you mayor thank you Keith and I think we all agree you and I have this conversation all the time where I say to
you why do you even go on those Med and mayor I I would never bring it up from the de I know I know if not for an elected official who suffered greatly this past week didn't bring it to Rich and M's
attention yesterday and when we called her the woman was almost in tears and I don't want to put too much out there about Nancy she's a friend we sit on the GIF together we've developed a nice relationship since I've been here she's a terrific person too but she did not
deserve what happened there on top of everything else that transpired this weekend I still believe that you have to do the right thing and you have to tell people the truth and hopefully one day that that
message will penetrate to the people who populate some of the local media Outlets that are incredibly unreliable and with that I want to take a moment to thank you
all please pass along through me on behalf of this entire Council on behalf of this community the efforts that you made to correct this situ ation as quickly as possible I will Echo what
Lorraine said this was a blessing we learned that our 911 system is wholly inadequate and I applaud Keith's efforts because he has been working day and
night to correct this and not just correct it but correct it quickly because no one expected in the heat of this that we were going to have an inadequate 911 situation and while this was a very very serious
situation we can all be grateful that it was not an active shooter or something even more serious um and I applaud you because like Keith who has moved on this so
quickly and is has a goal of getting the 911 system in good shape within 30 days that you have already imple you already have a plan to get this repaired so it does not
recur and I'm just going to say because I do I do understand that the D is going to move quickly but I'll believe it when I see it in very short order um I mean this happened on Friday it ended on
Sunday it's only Wednesday and I'm not saying slow down step on the gas but thank you all because this is the kind when things are going smoothly that is not the measure of the quality of the
people who you are with it is when times get rough that's when we see what everybody's made of and I think we've seen what you are made of and again it's not to take away from what a difficult
situation this was but I am very impressed and I believe that I speak for this entire Council that you did a good job thank you all very much have a wonderful evening and with that and with my apologies for the delay
to public comment we will go directly to public comment now com anyone n if you would like to speak please come to the microphone state your name and
whether or not you are a Ridgewood resident and you have three minutes if you could do me a favor and speak directly into the microphone because if you don't we can't hear you if you could get closer to the
microphone not it's not should be it's not on forgive me there's a green light there's a button and a green light no so much better right and if you could speak slowly because the microphone doesn't come through clearly so my name is Indra
chakrabarti I'm a resident of rewood um and I have uh I've observed something which is related to safety and I would like to bring this to the councilor's attention um I'm a commuter from the train station um and before I go on I am uh a professional in the world of
Transportation Planning and ever so often um you know I use it four to five days uh a week um and I've seen what you would call near misses at the train station and that's because uh more than 50% of the
cars back into the spots rather than just kind of pulling in so when they're backing in they make a maneuver of going and then pulling back and when they're doing that they're holding up traffic and there are people who are rushing to the train station I have seen myself two
pedestrians almost getting hit and once a car almost getting hit so unfortunately in the world of you know transportation near misses are never recorded unlike OSHA you know where you record it until the accident actually happens the police is not there it's not
recorded in black and white but being proactive um this is a issue that needs to be dealt with I've worked on numerous New Jersey Transit stations uh where the rules are you just have pull in parking pretty simple as that nobody backs out
you're not you're not facing the aisle you just go in and you park in the evening you back out people are much more relaxed in the evening rather than rushing to the train station in the morning there's a surge uh when the trains are coming you have a big influx of people coming in at that point of
time and everybody's rushing at that point of time to get to the train um I have seen it in the own eyes and that's why I would like the council uh to direct Ridgewood parking um to eventually come up with a solution where this does not become a crash or an accident which impacts
somebody thank you thank you so much for bringing it to our attention and I'm actually going to inquire you can have a seat Heather do we not have a headin parking only ordinance there we changed it several
years ago we did we did so that's perhaps something at the train station in particular that we should consider something we will look at thank you so much for bring it to our attention anyone else yes yeah roic halay one Franklin Avenue
first I want to congratulate you Paul for a terrific terrific session in which you brought out the facts and informed us as to exactly what happened you're just superb now what I disagree with you
slightly and I agree with Keith 100% though with Keith it isn't a case of misinformation it is disinformation intentional ways of trying to mislead the
public and Paul I tell you you know the Mark Twain said it best that truth is barely tying tying on its shoes when the LIE goes halfway around the world you really have to take on the
Liar's head on you can't just wait for the truth to filter through so you have to take these people on head on and I really like the way you approach at Keith but anyway you what you did with
rigid water was just superb you're prepared these guys came here in force they're very good people I have a great confidence in reg of the water and you help alleviate a lot of announcement that took place thank you very much and thank you Keith
thank you Ro good evening Ann loving Ridgewood New Jersey um I was uh at attending remotely a board of ed meeting the other night and uh a couple of the teachers were being honored and they got up to take
photos and all but one member of the um board uh did not get up for the photos and I was curious about that and this is what I found out that the Board of Ed has the following policy which I will read the school district will not
distribute via Mass mailings or other means to the district community at Large Publications that include the pictures of any members of the Board of Education within 90 days before any election in which any board member is seeking any
elective office or any election relating to School District Operations held in the district any Publications distributed by the board via Mass mailings or other means to the district community at large within 60 days before any election in which any board member
is seeking any elective office or any election relating to School District Operations held in the district must be submitted to the executive County Superintendent for review prior to distribution to ensure that public funds are being expended in
a reasonable and costeffective manner that's like one enormous runon sentence but uh it's interesting because first of all the teachers that were being honored and getting you know retirement or other Awards didn't get to
have the photo op with the full complement of the board but on the other hand I it's apparent that they don't want to allow board members to um be I guess campaigning via photographs during
the 60 or 90 days prior to an election um it's just something that the next Council might want to take a look at because you know there maybe pros and cons to to uh to this policy that the board has and maybe the next Council
might want to think about that thank you thank you Ann anyone else from the audience seeing none we'll go to our hybrid access Katherine you're up good evening uh Katherine Schmidt 123
South Irving Street so I had three things that I wanted to talk about first the Town garage now that we own it I know that everybody is thinking about what we can do with it I'm sure everybody is telling you what we should be doing with it so I would like to put in my vote for a park not a kids park
with balls running in the street but an adult Park my model is Brian Park in New York with chess and Checker tables maybe a horseshoe or boty Court um perhaps even a path that could even sideswipe
the take the place of the sidewalk and wander through landscape Gardens where people can push strollers or seniors and others can walk a shadowed pergola um perhaps with benches would also be wonderful we talk about traffic calming
and beautification of the Franklin Corridor and we pride ourselves on increasingly becoming age friendly I think this would be a welcome addition to address all of those goals then I want to thank you for the crossing signals that were installed at South Irving Street I'm not sure if this
is an experiment or a permanent change but it certainly is an intersection that needs something I myself have been almost clipped by a car uh a while ago and I I do live on South Irving Street which brings me to the intersection of
Broad Street and East Ridgewood Avenue I continue to experience how no one at that corner knows what to do the Broad Street traffic thinks they have the right of way and they boldly and barely uh they they hardly and barely stop Cars
come out out of the train station parking lot or up Ridgewood Avenue they also hesitate because they don't know where they need to go and pedestrians are confused if they're paying attention at all um I've heard that there are not enough warrants I think that's the right
word to suggest that this area needs something there and I think that meant to say that maybe there's not enough evidence of problems or accidents but this all reminds me of an accident that occurred long ago decades ago um when a
young high school girl uh who I've researched her name but cannot find it was killed in a car accident on Meadow Brook at the corner of either Libby or peera but near Grace Church one of the reasons for the accident was that there was no stop sign
at the cross street yes there were a lot of other contributing factors but as one of her classmates or maybe it was one of her relatives noted there was no doubt that if there was a stop sign there there would not have been a car
collision at the time of that accident when I asked one of the council members why there was no stop sign there I was told well we can't have a stop sign at every corner and I thought really excuse me today there is a stop sign there and
it was there put there because of that accident I trust that we have a different standard now in terms of where safety comes in um and the safety measures that we put in place and that we're not going to wait until a tragedy
occurs to put in anything that could help prevent it I would like to Advocate to put in a four-way stop sign there at that corner um if it doesn't work it's easy enough to take down and it can prevent an accident so thank you very
much thank you Katherine anyone else seeing no one I'm going to close public comment um I have a comment um I remember that person um if we are speaking about the same person who was
killed she was not a high school student she was a young mother her name was Maria and I believe that there is a small monument in her name in vaness Park um that being said Broad Street the
Broad Street intersection is a very dangerous intersection and um we are going to take a closer look at it speak to our engineering department and see where what information they have on this and with that anyone else have any
responses to no let's go to our village manager report mayor I'll be very brief tonight um first I want to congratulate box car on reopening the coffee concession at the Ridgewood train station had a great grand opening yesterday morning and I
especially want to shout out uh Heather Mander our village clerk um contacting box car was Heather's idea she had a pre-existing relationship with the owner a gentleman named Joe they had done uh some uh they had worked out some uh opportunities for box car to provide
busing for the residents of Ridgewood um and if it were not for Heather's efforts in this endeavor uh that space may still be vacant um so Heather thank you for that and congratulations to Joe Tyler and their team um seems to be very well resed received by the commuters um as
they get on the train in the morning also want to thank the League of Women Voters uh for the invitation last Thursday uh to address their group at their uh monthly meeting uh it was very informative a lot of good feedback a lot of good questions was able to share sort of the status of the village at this
point uh with the entire group and I really appreciate the invitation and finally uh I want to congratulate our three class three specials uh who were sworn in officially uh by mayor vaganos on Friday they have been deployed to Ridgewood High School uh Ben Franklin
Middle School and George Washington Middle School uh they were vetted and interviewed by both Chief lions and his team in the police department in addition to Dr Schwarz from The Ridgewood uh School District uh we look forward to um their addition uh to
providing adequate safety traffic control and building further community relations between the police department and the students in our schools uh they will be formally sworn in at our public meeting in October um as they start their careers here in Richwood just a
few announcements uh Chamber of Commerce continues to provide their Farmers Market on Sundays through October 29th at the train station uh file of Life program is going to be held Thursday September 26th at 700 PM in the youth Lounge please call Bill Wright at 2011
247 7438 to become part of that program our Parks and Recreation Department uh is H holding their September parkwalk allow Deputy Mayor perin to talk about that a little bit more on in her report but it's Saturday September 28th at 10:
a.m. gold star families memorial service sponsored by American Legion Post 53 will be held at Memorial Park at Vans Square on Sunday September 29th that's actually this Sunday it'll be the dedication of the gold star fam's monument at 4:30 followed by the placing
and display of luminaries begin beginning at 7:00 p.m. the next Council chat will be held Saturday October 5th from 9: to 11: in the village hall caucus room right outside the council chambers please call the clerk's office for reservations walk-ins are welcome
however reservations have priority on Sunday October 6th at Ridgewood High School there will be a very special lacrosse event American Boy Fall Brawl at Ridgewood High School which will benefit opioid awareness and treatment
and the game will feature a lacrosse game between Princeton University and Colgate University I know council member winterr is going to speak at it on it during her report as well uh the village of Ridgewood and all Village offices will be closed Monday October 14th in
observance of Columbus Day the Ridgewood um the uh recycling center will also be closed and there'll be no curb side bulk pickup refuges that week Leaf season also begins on October 14th schedules are being mailed out from the streets
Division and they'll alsoo be posted on the Village website and our social media Outlets the YMCA will be hosting October Fest on Sunday October 13th at Wizzle Square lot on the West Village from 11:00 a.m. to 4m there will also be free
parking at the HUD Hudson Street Garage during that event the Ridgewood Guild will be holding a fall Harvest Market Place on Saturday October 29th from 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 pm. at Memorial Park at Vana Square and finally our upcoming Village Council meetings uh our next
meeting will actually be this coming Monday September 30th uh we move the date in light of the Jewish holidays that'll be a work session October 9th will be our public meeting and October 23rd will be a work session all start at 7:30 pm that concludes my report
mayor thank you Keith let's go to council reports Siobhan sure um so I too just want to mention congratulations and welcome to boxcar some of us were there at 6:45 and it's so great and thank you Heather and Matt for making all of that happen with
the negotiation not only did Box Car become Our Last Tenant in fulfilling our Revenue generating plan at the train station because all of those buildings plus P's now have tenants but they did take the added step to reach out to Caroline who used to work there and many
of the commuters were happy to see coffee return and the employee return so that was great so thank you to everybody um two last week I went to the event at the Richwood Library where Kathleen Willet who's a homegrown author presented her book um the friends of Library were great I know Evan couldn't
be there but our library host these series of events and it was a unique experience to have a rwood high school graduate on her reunion weekend come and read aloud from her book so thank you to the briard public library for what they do and it's extra special when it's a homegrown author um last night we met
with Parks and Recreation we had kind of a more of a status meeting on you know the State of Affairs within Parks which I won't go into but I did want to let people know that we have a new employee in Parks his name is David no pun intended wild um which she'll fit very well in with the wildscape part of it
Ellie since you're here and we're very excited to see Nancy have the support for master library and the additional Recreation programs that we have um you all should have received mailers regarding our programming and in addition to the ones that you sign up we're now offering some drop-ins so if
you're intimidated by signing up for a whole session there are some drop-ins available and we would love to see more people engage in our awesome Parks experience if you didn't receive this reach out and let us know and we'll give it to you um I also wanted to mention
and this is big I'm going to pass this as I've said access weekend has expanded into access week and we've have some of these posters that'll be going up and it's um it's a fun fact when you move to legal siiz paper with one of your committees I want to thank access for
truly expanding to touch on all disabilities um as we've seen in the last year we have a huge commitment to housing which is frequently discussed but this has been expanded to neurode Divergent um physically disabled we have an ASL sign instructor coming we have
seeing eye dogs uh and it's quite intense so we have this long long list of everything that all the council has we'd love to see you represented at any or all parts of it this is a big compliment to access and it's incredibly important that not just the access
Community comes to this but everybody comes to it um and I will say One Last Time one of the coolest things we're doing is pull over properly because um for any teenager being pulled over can be a traumatic experience and it's one of their first engagement with our First Responders and our First Responders have
been so wonderful with the access Community um an often discussed issue is that if you're nurd Divergent and you have an extra stem you might react poorly with the police officer so our police officer officers have very much engaged they've launched Operation Blue
envelope to like get more in detail with that community and when this pullover properly happens it's interesting because the simulation teaches not just the neurod Divergent driver or something but it teaches the police officers on how to interact with that community so please take the time we'll be releasing
them in different social media bites if you're part of an organization we'd love you to distribute it I know all the fields and the sports communities are doing that as well so thank you for that and um two light-hearted notes I want to thank um councilwoman Reynolds for
taking the commitment through Comm Communications our whole entire Communications committee was thrilled to see a council member on video um when I joined here and the communications committee many of the council members were resistant to some social media applications and Lorraine got on there
and promoted our town and I woke up on Sunday morning and said what is happening Communications so thank you to L rain for her important messages and thank thank you to the whole Council who continues to promote the good parts of this Village of which there are many and lastly I'm going to um announce more
about the rla uh event at ridgwood high school but um yes it is Colgate and I'd like to remind us that there's two Colgate parents and one Colgate husband up here but I wish everybody good luck it's a great compliment to have um that type of sporting event in our community and I hope everybody plans on attending
so that's it thanks sioban Evan given uh how many people are waiting to present and how late it is I'm going to pass in my comments today okay good job Lorraine thanks I'll make it really quick um citizen safety advisory
committee met last Thursday just a couple things there were some residents there from Crest Road as a followup they had met I believe with the mayor and the village manager they were concerned about traffic and parking and behavior at the view um they since they met with
with the village manager and the mayor there's been an increase in enforcement and the police have issued approximately 100 tickets in the last month so there really was a serious problem with uh parking and hopefully
it'll uh remain better now uh there was a resident that came to express safety concerns about electric scooters and ebikes especially around the high school and she wanted to know if there were any like specific rules that the state of
New Jersey had or Ridgewood had and I know that uh our village manager has contacted the chief of police and it's a topic that many towns are concerned about because there really are not
regulations but hopefully in the future there will be second notices were sent for corner site triangle violations we had 14 houses that were out of compliance and 54 have now become
in compliance the committee talked about potential consequences for those who are continuing not to be in compliance and I know the village manager is getting involved in that as well good news uh
some more portion of West Glenn Avenue sidewalks are underway small section probably four or five houses from number two 210 to 228 but we're getting there little by little the village is still waiting D approval for the north side
where there's a drainage Gully hopefully we'll get some results soon um the county also did two separate studies regarding the intersection of East Glenn and Oak Street which has always been an issue the Ridgewood police department
will present the results to us at a future meeting hopefully I don't know if a date has been set or not but hopefully it'll be not too far away our next meeting is October 17th and last but not least project
Pride will be planting fall uh foliage mums cabbage things like that on Sunday October 6th if you have a green thumb or even if you don't if you have some muscle we'd love to have you
there we're meeting at s square at 7:45 Sunday morning October 6th you can email me or just show up bring pair of gloves a little hand Trel and uh a good attitude that's all we need thanks
thanks lorine Pam okay uh let's see cbak met on the 12th which was late not our usual date and again in October we're going to be meeting later because of the Jewish holidays and that's going to be
October 17th in the senior Lounge at 7:30 downstairs um and the open space committee will be holding a walk this Saturday as Keith mentioned it will be at Twi Pond 10
o'clock and I'm leading the tour and uh let's see uh CBD met the central business district advisory committee our Communications director Carol balowski came and got feedback from our members
on the new business checklist that is new businesses that come into Ridgewood this is a guide for which department you should go talk to how to get through the permitting process and I think it will really ease things for new uh businesses
to come into town I also had the pleasure of attending the distinguished alumni awards at Ridgewood High School this weekend and it was very inspiring to hear about the graduates who have become investigative journalists or or
filmmakers or um contestants on Jeopardy who wins 19 games in a row uh it was really very interesting um and let's see I also had the pleasure of going to the new exhibit at the schoolhouse Museum
which is all antique quilts from here in Bergen County it's called covering Bergen and that's open every Saturday and Sunday at 1 to 3:00 and that's all I have thanks Pam and I just want to take a moment to recognize that Pam was one of the
co-chairs that put this entire 50th rhs reunion oh that's separate from the distinguished alumni s though it was later in the day you'll always be distinguished uh alumni in my mind but she put this together um and it was a tremendous amount of work she she
actually housed several of the alumni in her home um she really went above and beyond the call um and uh I was really proud and impressed so thank you Pam I forgot one other thing go ahead for all four candidates who are running for
Village Council the Ridgewood am Rotary Club has invited each of them to speak at their regular meetings and the public is also invited so the first one starts tomorrow morning at 7 11:30 a.m. at the Y the YMCA in Ridgewood on Oak Street so
um if you get up early that's worth going to see great thanks Pam and because uh the hour is late we've done so much already we're going to just move on so let's go to our first presentation the plans for The Pedestrian
tunnel mayor so if I may um I'd like to introduce the representatives from Conley and hickey um this is a project where the council awarded a contract uh to Conley and hickey um I guess late last year um and we have started to
identify grant opportunities uh to improve The Pedestrian tunnel that runs underneath the train tracks um Margaret um and her team have done extensive work um actually on the train station previously so they are fully
aware of um this endeavor and then the second presentation that'll be made tonight is going to be about the artistic element relative to this project so Margaret Margaret would you be so kind as to speak directly into the mic first
make sure that the green light is on we we are not going to you have you have to it's got to be on you have to see how close I am to the mic yeah Margaret hicky historic preservation specialist better thank you uh Tom Connelly principal architect and Tom you're gonna have to do this you're G marar can I make a suggestion if you
move to that chair you can use that microphone might just be a little bit more comfortable for everyone there we go Tom so much better conell and hickey thank you please
proceed once once we get the chair at the right height in the mic okay um so there is a slide presentation on on the screen correct um so we were tasked with looking at the uh pedestrian
tunnels um and the kiosks that you know that provide access to the tunnel um and we found actually most of the I know the Interiors don't look great but most of the problems actually revolve around the the kiosk themselves and not the tunnel the tunnel is actually in pretty good
shape on next slide Margaret we usually refer to kiosk as a thing that we put money in to park but you're talking about these little shelters that's right the shelters that's correct yes shelters yes correct
um so the shelters are the are the are the issue next slide so we um we we suspected that there was a problem with the the walls the brick walls that surround uh the shelters so
if you you scroll down um the car accident that happened on one of the I think it's the the um now my orientation is all off the
West Side um approved what we suspected which is the brick exterior wall and the Terracotta interior wall which you can actually see it's it's clad with stucco from the
inside are not actually connected um and so the brick is separating from the backup wall in all locations we we see this throughout um and probably being exasperated by the vibrations from the
trains um but this this accident that you could see in the picture really helped us get a good grip of what was exactly going on so if you go to the next slide and there you go okay thank you okay there we
go go back to the other one so this this is a detail of the conditions that we're talking about uh so to the left in the right hand slide is the brick and to the right is the uh the the AATA actually
where the car was hit we believe it was hit once before because there was a repair there already so previously it's very interesting um uh so that that is your main problem at at the at the um at
the kiosk the the rofes were replaced when the roofs at the main train stations were so those are actually in good condition overall there's some you know terracotta sometimes gets cracked and stuff like that so there'll be some repair there um and everything is
heavily soiled so we are calling for cleaning of everything and then also um uh a good thorough Surface Prep and painting of the Interiors you want to go to the next um so this shows you the condition
where you could see the cracks in the stucco that's because the the two walls are separating um and then it gets pretty clean at that that line that horizontal line uh next to the railings the concrete below that is stable next
slide uh so this just shows some of the general soiling that you're dealing with um we were also uh recommending putting some new nosings on the steps which would help um with the there there's some deterioration there and you know
painting the railings and just a general overall uh refurbishment next um we also have some structural problems they're not the they're isolated um there the concrete um has
gotten a little bit wet and is spalled and so that that's part of the repairs Margaret how about on the west side where uh Chris's team short up the uh the one downward ramp uh yes that that all has to be rebuilt so we we have a
detail here that's going to show what the repair is great I get ahead of our sorry it's okay and then the other um thing is the Vault lights which are now currently covered um but you could see some of them from the underside um we're
recommending that those be restored but they're not an inexpensive Venture so we do them as a bid alternate um next uh so we started to develop the drawings you're really not going to see much um at this scale that's the the
cover sheet which shows the location of the um shelters in relationship to the the the main train station next um and this is just one typical uh shelter that we've done the full set of
uh drawings on with regard to the repairs next um and then that's actually the the the views from the interior um with the with the notes and the repairs next and then this is the picture of the
tunnel where uh you're proposing to put the the the artwork um that's actually in good condition I mean it does need Surface Prep and painting and we do need to need to deal with the signage I guess that the the advertisements that run how how that how those those are going to be
dealt with but they're actually in pretty good shape next um so these are the two details um so Tom do you want to explain the one sure the det on the left is the uh wall
section through the one of the shelters let's say where the the car um knocked a hole through the wall there so we're proposing to rebuild that wall um as it was done for one of the repairs previously with um CMU in place of the
Terracotta block so from left to right if looking at this drawing it would be stucco um be replacing the stucco uh finish on the interior replacing the Terracotta block with CMU reinforced CMU
um using rebar and a bond beam and then with the brick on the exterior actually tying using brick ties to tie the exterior um brick finish to the CMU um and what was interesting here and
I guess we didn't notice in or point out in the photograph was the column supports for the the shelters are actually uh rail railroad track um I thought that was interesting um use of
material um and that's noted in in the drawing here as well um the drawing on the right is a detail of the um Prismatic glass um that's that makes up the uh the Vault lights that we hope to restore and bring
light to those pedestrian tunnels um and work uh related to this would be to actually improve the lighting in the space because right now it's uh fluorescent fixtures not well placed so that that
would be one one thing that we're we're proposing um you do have a lot of electric down there that we Pro that we can't touch like you know lines that probably control switching stations uh you know switching above um and then uh
painting the the the grills around the the the um I'm so used to kiosk the shelters and um um like I said thorough cleaning of the concrete and CLE making sure the drains there's actually a
drainage system underneath there making sure that's all cleared out uh so we would do that all together just want you to be prepared that you will have to close The Pedestrian tunnels while this work is happening um but um I think if we put in um you know deadlines for the
contractor and liquidated damages we should be able to to make sure that they they meet their schedule on that point Margaret could we close them one at a time um you you may be able to phas things yes and then there'll be a
section when we're actually working in the tunnel they'll probably have to be closed but yes we could probably yeah pH it split it in half right there because there is that Central stair right what is the projected length of time for the restoration um I would give them six
months yeah how much how much um so uh right now the projected costs are um just a little over a million dollars um that's uh but once we
get the drawings a little bit further I'd like to update those um so and how long do you think those update how long till the next time we have to fix it like how long do you think the repairs and the upgrades would last before we'd have to go back and and do repair work
again oh I think by addressing what was it inherently bad structural condition um it'll be it'll be a long time 10 years 20 years oh no we we tend to do 50e repairs we oh I like that um Keith
that fancy um Grant riter we hired yeah so so there are a lot of opportunities here uh both through the New Jersey historic trust and once we have our drawings and our design for this project uh complete I think that will give us a
competitive advantage in submitting to the New Jersey historic trust and also to Bergen County um I can tell you that Bergen County historic preservation um Grant Awards not this last funding round the funding round before I think gave Park Ridge about
$350,000 to offset the cost of uh some work at their train station um up in that municipality uh and then we have the historic 2 um you know which we've been successful in getting here in in Ridgewood before um so we're going to we're going to aggressively put a grant
plan together uh to cover as much of these costs as we possibly can and if we go forward as a thinking we would put this as part of next year's capital budget the the balance a portion of it um I I will tell you that almost every Grant opportunity we're going to pursue is going to look for some sort of match
um from the from the municipality so that that's a discussion that we'll have as we get towards the capital budget in so we'd have to authorize the full million and then with the hopes that we'd be able to offset it some to what we doing with the lights out here yeah I I think some of it's going to depend on um when the grant rounds are and how
that drives with the uh our Capital planning for next year um but you know coming into the end of this year we'll we'll have that set up we'll know what the grant opportunity funding rounds will be and we'll tie that back to how much we might have to consider for Capital so I'm I'm going to defer to
most of my fellow Council people on the design because there are more artistic folks than me up here on that uh on the money piece though I feel pretty strongly on that um it's not just rid residents that use our train station so I really do think that New Jersey Transit Bergen County others should chip
in as well um and again I we we we should fix this it looks terrible the way it is and it's it's not becoming of of a station of that Grandeur um but I what I really like to see is when we do look to do this as part of next year's budget which isn't that far away that we have some really firm opportun unities
lined up some applications filed um so that it doesn't fall solely on the residents of ridt to fund what I think is really in my mind the transation that's used by the by by the larger Community not just the village so so next steps once once the team at uh colie and hickey finalizes the drawings
and and we have a a pretty good budget in place uh we're going to meet with the representatives from New Jersey Transit um while this is squarely our responsibility from a maintenance standpoint uh we are going to meet with them to to make sure that number one they're on board with no pun intended
with what we're going to do um we're also asking them to do some other infrastructure work uh at the train station including the cleaning of the U The Underpass Under The Trestle on Franklin um deputy mayor parin has been uh very vocal about wanting to get that done sooner rather than later uh but
we're going to we're going to sit down with them and we're also going to bring the dot into the conversation um not sure that they would be willing to put some skin in the game but to your point never hurts to ask um so once we have finalized drawings you know we're going to have larger larger Gatherings to to discuss this project through identify
grants and we'll see if there's any other type of funding available and when we do have some drawings and some renderings I would like the historical preservation committee to look at it weigh in as well for their com this is going to require shipo approval too so it's gonna it's going to have to go to the to the state all
right so uh Central business district advisory committee has been looking at the tunnel for years and um um I have several questions with the CMU the brick ties and the rebar will that once we
install that first of well will that cure the efflorescence problem the the the sloughing off of the paint on the walls so you you will always because
it's a damp location you will always get some of that that um it does so paint always requires maintenance um and our recommendation is when it starts to develop you just do a spot area of that we could look into
using a um mineral based paint which would then get you a longer um um time period for painting but I'd like to coordinate that with the actual product that's being proposed for the for the artwork okay and what what is CMU uh
it's concrete mason unit so it's just it's a concrete block oh okay um and what are nosings uh so those are those metal strips on the edge of the steps that kind of help preserve the
step and then also give people a visual look to see when they come up and down the stairs um actually while we were there doing survey work someone complained to us about those conditions so yeah as well slip resistance yeah and it also helps with slip resistance as
well yeah okay and as as horrendous as the walls are the floor is pretty bad it's gross what can we yes what can we do about the floor well we're going to we're going to clean it um we would not recommend
sealing it though okay um because that just becomes a big maintenance issue it's it's easier probably just to um on a regular basis uh you know yearly clean it you know with a pressure
washer um the electric lines that run all over the walls like snakes is there any way to collect them in one area or well that's one of the things we'd like to talk to New Jersey Transit about because I think some of that actually controls
some of the equipment above okay um I think that's all the questions I have right now anybody else I I just want to say thank you and um I just wanted to because we're all here and it's a work session we do have a replant on the west side of some trees that need to go into
this plan because the trees are governed by Sho so we have money for these trees they're outside of this but we can't plant them because the area that the ground is in shipo needs to approve the planting of the trees so I just am going to tell you that so when we go to submit the whole plan we have trees on the
other side that need to be replaced as part of the plan and shipo said to our engineering department it needs to go in an application so we've been holding these trees to put them in with us so you just want to incorporate that into whatever we're proposing yeah that's fine yeah I I'll have I'll have Chris get you I it looks great I mean everything
you guys are going to do to promote it like it's a beautiful train station that just underneath it's like the underneath belly of something lovely and I look forward to seeing it improved great oh I I have one more question um on page two there's a picture of the outside side of
the kiosk shelter where where the um car hit and right by the um cone by the orange cone standing next to it is a black stanson of some kind I think did that once have a telephone booth on it
or something and can we get rid of it you could definitely get rid of it I don't know what it was for looked to me like a parking thing but yeah sure I think it's from I have to talk to them I'll talk to engineer about it yeah because I I I mentioned it to engineering and I'm surprised it's still
there okay thank you anybody else and wasn't there an art portion of this so mayor what we're gonna do is we're going to uh segue BR to uh Genie Johnson Margaret and Tom thank you so much for your time
appreciated um so as the second phase of this Margaret and Tom are quarterbacking the uh the structural and the uh um the Integrity of The Pedestrian tunnel um the second element of this is the artistic element um which jeie Johnson
approached me not long after I arrived here um about she and her committee's thoughts about how there can be um some aesthetic improvements and an artistic element to this project and tonight she's here to present that aspect of it to the Village
Council okay there we go so just to let every everyone know that I did um present to this body uh 18 months ago about well first of all just to back up uh I I went to Heather in October of 2020 and suggested that we paint a mural
inside the tunnel and through extensive research we it was recognized that that would simply just be putting lipstick on a pig so then um Connelly and hickey were uh assigned to this and um
we have been working very very hard the committee uh I want to tell you who the core team members are right now it's uh Village manager Keith kasmar Deputy Mayor Pamela parin Village engineer Chris ruteshouser special projects coordinator Carol Bill Kowski and
representatives from The Ridgewood Arts Council uh Lisa sh I don't know shalat I'm sorry I don't know how to pronounce her name Laura halada and representatives from the historic preservation commission Stacy saparis G and Gail GUI and former Ridgewood public
school art teacher Sheila jamr Schilling and local fundraisers Megan Bracken and eileene Seaman and myself Jeanie Johnson um so what I want to say hang on I'm G to get this up here so it's a prop these
are proposed Village of Bridgewood public art installations and the project overview I I'm sorry you guys guys I don't have pretty pictures like Connelly and hickey did um but so this comprehensive public art initiative will celebrate Village's
Rich cultural heritage and leave a lasting Vis visual Legacy for our community the projects there's four of them span um four phases as I said and each showcase a distinct AR artistic element that comes together to create a
welcoming and captivating environment does anybody want to help oh sorry the purpose is um first of all it's it's important for us to sort of revitalize our Central business district and that's what public art serves to do
um it drives growth in Revenue by encouraging people to walk through our Central business district and it encourages people to come visit our community and it enhances our property values and it really in it uh contributes to Stronger Community
engagement there are four phases as I said and each will incorporate similar artistic elements such as trees or leaves and this approach will maintain a consistent theme across all public art installations creating a visual visually
and engaging setting for residents and visitors alike and since we are a tree Community um that's sort of the theme that we're going with we um as you'll see through um this presentation that we are going to be doing um installations throughout the village
so the pH uh because of the slowdown in the construction of The Pedestrian tunnel uh We've revised this plan and put the pedestrian tunnel um sort of as the third phase so we bumped up phase
one which is a sidewalk Hall of Fame and the concept is is to bring in notable celebrities from Ridgewood and surrounding areas who have made significant contributions in societ Society this would be people that you find in the movies on in the theater
music uh or musicians um people who have um risen above in the Sports World anybody who's a celebrity and um they we they will be invited to create a 12 by8 piece of artwork and it's a litho Mosaic
process and it is embedded into the sidewalk inches right sorry inches 12 by 18 inches yes I'm sorry sorry did I say feet I'm sorry um so yes so we will be working very closely with the chosen
celebrities with some litho Mosaic professionals and we are um recruiting people from the community um to be on our artistic team and I also want to point out that we will be working closely with the
Ridgewood High School alumni association to help us declare who should be um honored in this way uh through their wall of Honor over at Ridgewood High School so the cost of this is the lithos cape Creations uh range anywhere from
400 to 600 per square foot dep depending on the complexity and then you know it takes a special Mason to install this and they charge about5 to $800 per square foot so each of the uh pieces
will be about $99 to $1,400 and so with the timeline on this we want to start as soon as possible so um given this will be ex uh approved today uh we will start with our Artist Artist uh Recruitment and um we'll send out the
typical uh application that the village uses for their committees and commissions and boards and will get people involved and help us design a pilot tile and if the pilot tolerates the elements uh such as snow and salt
and plowing and scraping um but then we're going to move forward with it and then we'll select the celebrities and they'll create their um pieces of Art and then we'll prepare the sidewalk and hopefully we can start installing um
these pieces in July of 2025 um initially we want to start off with 10 to 12 uh pieces that will go throughout the community again it'll start at Maple Avenue and be on each side of the Avenue um of Ridgewood
Avenue and then we're going to hop over and we're going to really focus on the West Village too to make sure that um and the side streets as well to make sure that each part of our community is represented um and it's really important uh I'm just going to go back to that for
a minute it's really important to help people want to Traverse through our community either on foot or by bicycle because it's been proven that cyclists and and pedestrians actually spend more money than motorists because motorists make an
appointment to go into uh particular business and they get it taken care of and they get in their car and they go where pedestrians and cyclists will walk through the community and they'll stop at three or four locations and spend quite a bit of money so this is what we're trying to encourage is foot
traffic through our town and that and also because we are um you know highlighting these celebrities it's going to be a big draw for people from surrounding communities and and probably as far away as you know New York City people will want to come and take a look at who who we are honoring on our
sidewalk Hall of Fame so the second phase of this initiative is a painted mural Under The Trestle and as it was mentioned before Deputy Mayor parin is working to um clean up that area underneath the Trestle and get those dagm mites off of there and we are
hoping to you know get that wall cleaned up and uh put a beautiful mural there uh you know we're very very lucky because rossies of Ridgewood has uh offered to donate the paint and supplies for this
as well as The Pedestrian tunnel so that's a big coup that's a lot of money that we don't have to come up with um so anyhow be beautifying the space beneath the train trestle is going to add significant value to the The Village because it transforms an industriall
looking area into a vibrant and welcoming space which again will draw visitors photographers social media influencers and it'll ultimately boost foot traffic to nearby businesses so again we're going to go through that artistic involvement um with the hand
selected artistic team uh determining the image and then a professional mirror list will be retained to compl complete the commission the cost of it is going to be around $37,000 um that does not include the paint that rossies is going to donate
the fee the $37,000 fee is uh project management of the the muralist will oversee the entire project there will be Community involvement um she said she would allow to uh some uh adult volunteers to participate in the
painting process um this particular muralist that we interviewed um she has her own liability insurance she has to get uh scaffolding there's various other painting material ceiling and things like that um buckets and brushes that are included in her
fee and the timeline for this again would be you'll start as soon as possible to determine what the design will be and get that approved and then hopefully in June or July the mural will be installed with the final touches and
the third phase is The Pedestrian tunnel Mosaic um again a thoughtfully designed art installation will enhance the experience for pedestrians and cyclist passing through the tunnel and it'll create which is very important a safe
and inviting environment um to attract tourists and um you know what really one of the things that really excites me about this project is um it will encourage school children to walk to school they W they will feel safe and
energized going through there and um that right now is such a critical piece of promoting social interaction and boosting their their mental well-being so I'm I'm very excited about that um but again overall it's just going to foster a vibrant and more connected
Community by by doing this um next slide there we go again same thing artistic in involvement our team our um artistic team and the professional litho Mosaic Artisans will
collaborate on the design um the artwork again is going to be a you know it's going to be about $1,400 uh per per square foot um and I also want to point hang on sorry about
that guys um the the Mosaic is going to be put in um in in panels so it won't be directly on the W as of right now um because
shipo has requested that we do something that is that isn't permanent so we have to do it in panels which I think is going to work out better for um the inter interior of the tunnel and it can work around all of those wires and boxes
and things like that um and the other part of this is to include lighting and Security in The Pedestrian tunnel and we mentioned that or uh Margaret mentioned that in her proposal um that it's right now it's fluorescent lighting we want to have some sort of Art Deco is type of lighting um so we're
going to work collaboratively with the village of uh the village engineering department and the police department to make sure that we put something that is functional and artistic in terms of lighting and security cameras because again we want to make sure that it's very safe in there and the other part of
it is um you know with those security cameras it's going to deter any kind of uh graffiti artist that might go in there um because they'll know that it is they are being recorded so that's a very big deterrent and we do not have pricing on that we haven't explored that yet so
the timeline is going to be determined based on the Tunnel refurbishment construction my target is to have this completely done by December of 2027 and it's a heavy heavy lift because we need to raise a lot of money so this comes
this brings in phase four our sponsor and Don wall of Honor if you see that there's a tree that's depicted there and it it shows the roots and it shows the branches and the leaves and that's really important to me because
when we are selecting our artistic team it's it's super important for me that we have representatives from the Past who have designed our community as beautifully as they have I want those people represented there and then I want the people people who are adopting our
community and building it into whatever they want it to be to be represented so I want the past the the the present and the future to be represented with our um artistic committee uh selection um the
purpose of this tree of Honor serves as a lasting expression of gratitude toward those who made this project a reality and it elevates the sense of community community by recognizing the the generosity of individuals and
organizations and most importantly it inspires future Generations um again this artistic involvement um it's it's just as I mentioned it's it's very important that we recognize all the people that have come before us all the
people that um are building this most vibrant uh phase of of public art installations um you know as I said the leaves on this tree of Honor will um they will be purchased by individuals or
families and depending on their sponsorship dollars will determine what size Leaf they get or what color Leaf they get and their name will be um engraved in each of the leaves and again like I said the roots will pay tribute to those from our past who have made a
lasting contributions um to our community and again this too the cost is to be determined um the timeline we're going to get started on this as soon as possible uh we have to build our fundraising team that's critically
important so we're going to again put that application out there and hope hopefully we'll get some people who are really eager to support this um and the soonest we can start uh getting people to buy into it literally by putting
money into it um then you know it will help this project immensely um all of the funding will be gone will be um The Ridgewood Arts Foundation is overseeing all of the
funding that will come in and all of the bills that will be paid and so on um so again hopefully we will have this constructed and installed somewhere between this pretty pretty big range May
of 2025 and October of 2027 um I've talked about recruitment uh the village will uh put out this information uh the application for local artists and fundraisers uh through the
village newsletter their website and social media platforms and the most important thing is that we need to engage passionate and dedicated community members to contribute to the artistic process and to assist with securing funding because guess what we
have to raise $1 million to fund all the phases of these projects so um we are actively pursuing already uh spent most of the day uh trying to get information to our grant
writing team at Millennial um for the vibrant spaces Grant um we will work with the National Endowment of the Arts the New Jersey state Council of the Arts um we'll look at other private foundations um who will hopefully um
lend some financing to this and we're also going to organize events and crowdfunding campaigns um and as Evan mentioned that it's not just a tunnel or this isn't just a space just for Ridgewood residents so we want to open
it up uh to surrounding communities too that they can take pride in this too um so in to conclude this proposed in these proposed installations will allow Ridgewood to show case its commitment to public art and Community engagement with the support of local businesses artists
and residents we can create a legacy that will be celebrated for Generations Jeanie thank you so much um The Pedestrian tunnel to put it mildly is very tired oh
it needs some love and I know you walked through it and we've spoken about this a couple times and you just took this on as your own and you inspired so many people to get behind you on this um you
put together a murderer's row of local citizenry to sit on your committee You' got Keith involved and Pam involved and um you know I just I I always say we need everybody to get off the bench and
in the game I don't know that you ever sit on the bench um so thank you very much for this because it's something that it it's so desperately needed and and most people don't even realize it so
thanks other comments great vision great vision and I look forward to making a silk purse out of this s ear jeie just want to thank you for your leadership on this and your leadership on so many other issues affecting the
downtown business district Richard is really happy to have you here I'm really to have you here I just have a couple questions thanks jeie um it looks fabulous um is the million dollars the same million that conell and it's so
it's $2 million we need for this restoration so a million is really just just for the artistic part of it for all four phases that that includes the sidewalks that includes the the mural it
includes the wall of Honor and the Mosaic inside the tunnel okay um and then just a question right now we've recently had mirrors put into the tunnel to help you know as you're coming down
the stairs you could see people coming are the mirror you know are you foreseeing that the mirrors would still be there yeah because that's a safety right piece and and we have to keep that okay all right thank you I'll call you tomorrow so I don't it
was such a good job and thank you so much I don't want to be redundant but it's awesome and I was thinking you know Barcelona with the mosaics now has competition that's good thanks great jeie thank you so much thank you and we're gonna take five minutes um and I
mean five and we'll be right back so I mean a real five 11 o' 11 o00 that's than spe e for
for e br know and we're still waiting for one but we will begin and um and I will say um please take as much time as you need to make
your presentations but because the hour is late as close as we could keep them to 10 minutes or so would be great but if you need more time by all means so let's move forward the Bergen County Historical Society
Peggy and Peggy thank you for your patience appreciate it oh yeah s sorry sorry it's taken us this long to get to you it's been an exercise in Civic government and uh history played a role
in many of the things that were discussed tonight including the 120y old pipes uh running our water do you do you have any materials on those by the way oh never mind I I think the water department does
they have a um um I think a 1913 map marked with all of the it's probably still good so welcome Peggy um I come as a chair chair of the library Committee of the Bergen County Historical Society I'm joined in the
audience today by Beverly Hashimoto who is our president and uh one of our board members and other board members have joined virtually so this is a project that um all of the the board is concerned about and I will tell you
something about the library something about the Bergen County Historical Society and then a broad proposal for the use of the zabki shedler house the Bergen County Historical Society library and archives is looking
for a new home because we need more space the zabriski shedler house might be a great location for us and provide the village with a use consistent with the historic nature of the house that would bring only modest traffic to the
site the Burton County Historical Society is an all volunteer membership 501c 3 nonprofit organization that was founded in 1902 We own land at historic Newbridge Landing State Park in River Edge and at
that site features three historic homes including the stuen house in a barn bchs opens the building and sponsors events at the site ranging from vintage B baseball to The Baron's October
Fest the Bergen County Historical Society has both Museum and archival collections that have been collected over the past 125 years of the society's existence Museum objects are stored and
displayed at historic Newbridge Landing the library and archives has had several homes and is presently at the chiaro Learning Center at Bergen Community College in hackensac we have outgrown our classroom
there and are looking for new space the library and archives has an important collection of rare and unique manuscripts photographs postcards and maps in addition to A small collection of published books we have one-of-a-kind
documents like General Green's original order orderly book from 1776 all the way up to 1950's tax maps of towns in Bergen County researchers use the library for genealogy ology Town
histories house histories study of industrial social environmental and military history of Bergen County it is staffed by volunteers including three professional Librarians the library is used in person
and by phone and email queries there's a potential for collaboration with any history organization in Bergen County but particularly with the Heritage Center at the Ridgewood Public Library and the Ridgewood Historical
Society we proposed that the zisy shedler house in Ridgewood would be an excellent site for our library and archive and would provide a purpose for that historic home our proposal will include the use of the meeting room on
the first floor and the four rooms on the second floor this would leave the hall in the bathroom on the first first floor as joint use spaces the hall would provide access to the library rooms as well as to the three rooms available for
Community use we presently have shelving for books flat files for storage of maps and file cabinets for our um miscellaneous files and all of our
manuscripts we're open by appointment and usually have from one to five people in the library at a time the library in our arives requires Heating and Cooling Security Internet access um
and other things that uh would need to be provided um there are concerns about the use of the kitchen uh it's not clear what the plans are um for kitchen use which is not compatible with the library
in the archives um and they're concern about the structural adequacy for support of Library materials as it was certainly constructed as a residential building so there are many details that would need to be looked at and at this level I think it's to determine whether
the council has some interest in US pursuing discussions about whether this would be a good fit for the village and for the society we have some Community Partners who were willing to help pay for improvements that would need to be made
to make the um house suitable such as uh partition between several two of the rooms um the um special locks Etc um and there might be improvements
that the village needed to make uh particularly for example in providing the uh phone or cable service that would um allow internet access um we feel that the use of the library the house for the library
archives would be a benefit to the village and we're interested in working with the council and the village to make this possible and uh we are a nonprofit organization we uh are willing to help
pay the C expenses of being there we're not an organization that can pay a market rate rent for this building um but we hope you're interested in continuing to discussions about whether
the Bergen County Historical Library and archives uh would be a good use for the zabki shedler house thank you Peggy questions do we have any idea how much the um extra if we have to reinforce the
the the the structure any idea would that would cost or is that to be determined I I think it has to be determined I Keith so so through you mayor um basically we don't have any of that information at this point um the
presentation tonight was to just get an understanding of what it would be used for by the historical society and determine whether the council would like us to move forward with exploring this concept um if in fact that's the direction we want to go in our next steps would be to have the historical uh
folks in to meet with our engineering department uh so that we can talk about exactly what the specifications are at as to need um exchange that information and then have Chris do an analysis as to what the needs are and what the cost associated with those needs might
be my off the top of my head feeling would be that it's either suitable or it's not it's not a retrofit that would correct you would be able to do the other thing that Heather and I have had a conversation about is climate control I mean that that is another concern when
you're dealing with records and and you know is there um whole house air conditioning in there it's air conditioned um we just need to make sure that it's the to the standard of historical documents that's a conversation that we would need to have with Chris so so cause Evan's gonna so there's a couple things I've I've gone
back and forth so thank you it's very exciting to see you here and it's very exciting always because we're finally talking about the house which is so exciting we never talk about the house um so we're going to need to talk about sprinkler systems because the it doesn't have systems um the climate control and
the reinforcement of the floors so those are all in addition to the $2.6 million those would be additive I did in not like a overbearing way I did ask if you guys had money and we've gone back and forth for that but the Capital Improvements we'd have to figure out how much that's going to talk the appealing
thing is the upkeep and the house wouldn't be vacant right that's kind of nice because we don't have anything in there but the unappealing thing is that at some point I'm assuming because the kitchen was an expensive cost contributor that was part of the House's
charm and part of the original plan I don't know why that happened but you know the fact is that the kitchen would be a concern because the fire generation and it would be obsolete in this scenario right so um I I think it's interesting to look at because it's an
idea I don't really want to spend any money looking at those things but we need to get a price tag for fire temperature control meaning fire meaning Sprinklers and then with that is the air conditioning would need to be run that temperature the heating and everything
would be constant for the documents which is also that would just be part of upkeep um and I I did also love in the letter that you said V vintage baseball because it would be if everything says adjacent to a field which is always great and we have that discussions how
sports are historic particularly baseball and Lacrosse is the oldest sport in America so I like I love the letter thank you and I personally as long as we're not putting other projects I'd love to see what the cost drivers are I don't think but I don't want to spend like I don't want to hire an
outside listen I I before we bring staff in from other departments into these decisions I just wanted to have some affirmation that there is Council interest in pursuing this as an option and if the answer tonight is yes then we'll schedule a meeting with
engineering and with Peggy and as she said I think I think you hit the nail right on the head you know we need to determine whether this is a good use or not whether it will work or whether it won't and then we can proceed from there yeah ke I'm in complete alignment with Shan and this I love the use it's a great you know we don't have anything
else to do with the house right this is a lovely I think it complements the history piece complements it well um but to me I I agree with Tron I'm not going to put under dime into the house I'm just not I I won't vote for it um but if there's Comm if it's doable and we can find grant money or other money and
again I agree with you and we're not I'm not looking to make money off the the society by any stretch um but what I'm not looking to do is is authorized another couple hundred, into the house to support it either but let's see if it's doable if it's doable perhaps we can get some cost esus then we can talk about some fundraising for it um but I
certainly would be supportive of this use rentree as long as it doesn't cost us anything to to council member Winter's earlier point this evening you know this is another Village asset that we want to occupy you know are we going to pay all the bills with it no but we
want to make sure that these these Village owned spaces are occupied and don't dormant and I think that's what we did downtown and what we should be looking to do at this house the other point and I want to because we're talking about the house I know it's late is that the Deferred maintenance is something we need to be honest about too
it's vacant right now you know in New Jersey if you leave your rental income house vacant for a while and something happens you're in trouble for it so I've I've been very nervous about the house being vacant this long um they're also because I went back and forth and thank you again for that is that the full
floor print isn't going to be covered here so maybe we could do two things in the house right and we could talk about that sharing that which is where the locks come in like could we keep their stuff private and safe and I actually asked the question could you guys be on one sole floor and then we have another
and that was no but I I do think it's very exciting that we have an offer and I'm very grateful you're here and I just think it's a question of Economics for me and probably the book ends think the exact same exactly the council consents you know my office will take the lead on setting up that meeting for you Peggy we
we'll talk to best tomorrow we'll get a a convenient date on the calendar and if everybody's okay with it we'll we'll have those discussions I am interested I wasn't quite clear from your letter whether you would insist on exclusive use of the building or whether for
instance the newcomers have exp expressed interest in having meetings there too so um what I did in my original letter to Keith that I um summarized in here was I actually had the floor plan and the room numbers
and there's if you've been in the house there's a large living room and um a fairly large hall and then the handicapped access is directly into the Hall so the hall has to be a joint use
space um then in the back there is a essentially a small room and then the kitchen and the idea going back probably 20
years maybe not quite that far is that there should be some space in the house for Community Access and by using most of the first floor space but not all of it there would be room for some
Community Access for meetings with and then some of the modifications would be have to be that our space could be locked and separate and um the
um so that part of the house could be used and the bathroom on the first floor would have to be used by both community and the Historical Society so it would be like taking your house and specifying certain rooms were for the library and
other rooms were for a community small community meeting event or and there's a range of things one can do in the kitchen from having a full fish fry to using it as a catering kitchen and heating things up and
washing up dishes and I think it's the full fish fry that really is out of the question for a facility housing a library and archives but um probably is also uh pretty far
removed from what you want to be happening in the house anyway so I think these are all issues that we can uh work on I appreciate that you see this as a use that might be possible and um I
think moving forward to to get some of the details looked at because there are a lot of details from both sides and um we can pursue that thank you you would the entire upstairs you said three rooms upstairs
is that are how many rooms are up there four rooms it's the room on the left and then the three bedrooms so you'd take the three yeah okay so the one on the left part partly um that would be so that um each of those rooms would not be
completely full with collections you could put collections around the outside edge which might be structurally um more acceptable those are kinds of things we need to explore with the engineer thank you and Peggy
thank you so much for coming in I think that we are all very open to the idea of doing this there are clearly some hurdles that we need to get over but let's see if we can uh because I think it would be a a wonderful use of that historic space thank you very much all
right be well thank you so Paul can I suggest uh maybe shelving the next two topics and seeing if we have time at the end I know the two topics after that I think the guild is here for it's already after 10: I know we have the 11 o' curfew so perhaps c and d and go right to e right
now should we you just want to pull the guild up I want to skip the next two so we can get to the guild I think D I think D may also be the guild oh is it the D is the D is is Carol leading into the The Guild discuss
Ian I'm fine with pulling the guild up if that's what you want to do but I don't want to scratch anything from the agenda uh let's see why don't we you know what let's plow through and let's see if we can do this as efficiently as possible um so
because we do have an 11 o'clock curfew that we we it is wable but we try to adhere to it because some council members have to get up very very early so let's let's go to the Ridgewood app and um I I do want to say the guild is now
going to be the most informed citizenry because you sat through this so thank you for being here D thank you to everybody who always attends but Tony I'm gonna give you a test tomorrow good evening Carol good evening thank you all I'm going to do a jersey slide through my
presentation um so I'm excited to let you know that the my Ridgewood app officially launched on September 16th if you haven't already downloaded it you can scan the QR code on the screen it's available for both Apple and Android phone so you can just check the app
store or Google Play and be sure to look for my Ridgewood because there are a couple of other apps in there as of Monday I want to thank the 1,366 people who downloaded the
app and you may be wondering why do I need this app what the app does is it puts some of the most visited pages on our website in the palm of your hand such as meeting agendas the calendar recycling parking Etc and since
September is passport Awareness Month um I added a link to the Ridgewood libraries passport center to the app so rather than searching things on our website which is very dense you can just tap on the app go to the library go to
our calendar go to recycling and find things very easily in addition to giving you easier easier access to the website the app is also another tool in our Communications toolbox so whether there's road work a special event coming up an important
notice you'll be notified through the app only if you enable notifications so anyone who downloads the app I strongly recommend that you enable notifications and you could just if I could just interrupt you a second if you could go back a slide so Carol had the
idea before the recreation department Street Fair of having these cards made up so they're they're business sized cards um and they were passed out at the street fair that was held by the Parks and Recreation Department two Sundays
ago um that is probably where the bulk of the folks who downloaded the app came from uh but we have these in our office so if any council members want them or if there any community events that you think we should share them at maybe Council chat might be a good one if
you're if you're talking to to new constituents um but these cards are available that we can hand out so people can scan and download the app right on scene if anyone has any questions or if anyone needs help downloading the app please reach out to me I have had
wonderful people come into the office I've taken their phones and help walk them through the process of downloading the app and enabling notifications so Carol I think 1366 I was one of them it's great yes awes yes you were uh we should get more people signed up I know
you sent the email out it was great we should absolutely do as much as we can to get the word out it's about what 25 26 27,000 people that live here uh 1366 i' like to see that number a lot bigger because it's great work it's fantastic this is why I think this will be one of the buffet menus as I
discussed earlier right one of the Entre when we do that when we do that mail out go ahead speaking of which seg going into that as Keith mentioned we are in the process of creating a direct mail piece that's going to be sent out to every household in the village next month so there will be a QR code that
will take you to a page where you could sign up for the app for E notices for everbridge reverse 911 and water smart so that you don't have to fish around two websites to find the links for what you would need to sign up
for my second point of excitement is the launch of the new business checklist that the deputy mayor was speaking about it's officially going to launch tomorrow and after meeting with business owners department heads in the village
members of cbdc and people from folks from the Chamber of Commerce and the guild we compiled this checklist which is designed to help entrepreneurs navigate the many steps required for opening a business in Ridgewood and the checklist is it will
be distributed to members of the chamber and the guild as well as rers it also exists on our website an expanded version of it exists on our website and I want to just quickly tell you what the Genesis for the checklist
was um council member of winegrad organized uh a meeting with Keith uh with people who had recently opened a business in Ridgewood as well as Tony demano from The Ridgewood Guild and we sat in a space in the central business district and we heard about the
lingering challenges of opening a brick and mortar business in town and we knew about the council's desire to cut through some of the red tape so we all worked together to make this happen and I ju Just Want to quickly say this is one of the the first initiatives that I
got involved with when I was hired and I have to say this was just so gratifying as a staff member to see so many different groups of people come together no arguing no nonsense sitting around the table saying yeah we can do that
better and we can do this and we can do that and contributing ideas and that all resulted in something which I hope is going to be really helpful for people wanting to open a business in town thank you Carol I I just want to say thank you so much I know you're the director of
communications but you really are the director of communications here um because this is this is this is why we want to get our out to all the residents they're the stockholders in this $60 million Corporation and um you know these are
terrific things um the the app is fabulous which I have by the way because she downloaded it for me I I did I helped him um but the opening of business in Ridgewood uh look I'm you know there there are two former
presidents of the Chamber of Commerce in here and and the and the head of the Ridgewood Guild um um and this is this is something that is has been so desperately needed for so long thank you for putting it in one succinct place for
everybody really really nice job and and just to be clear when when someone comes in to any of our respective departments whether it be the building department whether it be um to see Jane in the in the land use office and they're looking to open up a business this is going to
be provided to them um and this again has the endorsement of of the um CBD committee with the help of the Deputy Mayor it's also been reviewed by Tony and the guild and Joan groom over at the Chamber of Commerce um so we're all going to be collectively um pushing out
this document uh to try to give people the easiest path from deciding to open a business here to the day of their grand opening I just want to say extra big special thank you to Carol and Evan and I both ran on a communications platform and what's clear is that this town has
an incredible appetite for information and since you've joined us you've made it palatable and digestible and improved a lot the new business thing is so critically important because before we have things like this people would come in engage in a lease and carry the property for so long eating into their
profits so this is so great and because Tony's here I I want to thank everybody who made it happen it's just been such a pleasure to work on so thank you thank you both thank you I have to say it's really been a extreme pleasure to to work here it's the best job nice going
okay and we're GNA keep it moving Tony Tony and Company good evening Tony Damiano 274 South Broad Street um I'm here tonight with Lisa pla our president and Jill alberman who we've hired to do some marketing for
us and Jill is also doing work with the Chamber of Commerce so we're going to talk a little bit about digital marketing uh specifically Geo fencing which is new to me and if you have any questions Jill will be here to answer them and then
we're taking a look at the uh Placer survey so as an overview uh since our July meeting the guild has explored another marketing approach to track our events called Geo fencing we're working with a local local marketing person Jill
oerman and she's the founder of shops local nj.com if you haven't visited her website please do and again she's working with the chamber and the guild we'll also take a look uh at the Placer study and lastly the vacancy report so
what is geofencing geofencing is a form of location-based advertising where anytime a potential customer enters a geographically designated area called a geofence a spe spe a specific advertisement is served on their mobile
device for example a customer walking in proximity to a clothing store may receive an advertisement for 20% off when he or she is with a defined distance from the store The Ridgewood Guild most most recently Geo fenced the
street fair that took place on Sunday September 15th and by the way this is all in conjunction with bringing people downtown uh which is our mission at the guild and of course then they will shop in dine and mayor Paul has been saying
this for years as I have every time there's act an activity in that Park an event a program the businesses really take off uh people shop and dine so that's our goal
here how does it work so goo fencing can either be location based or an an event based campaign Jill I'm gonna ask that you speak get closer to the mic thank you
okay and the campaign that we ran was event targeted um it took place you could set your own parameters and it took place over a 24 approximately a 24hour period
beginning 6 p.m. on Saturday evening and ending on Sunday at 12:00 a.m. what we t targeted was um the street fair the craft street fair that happened was that last weekend no two weekends ago two
yeah yeah so um while you could set your own parameters we did a mile and a half radius from um East Ridgewood Avenue where the street fair took place we
tracked um and what was tracked people could actually um see ads that we ran for the guilds event that's coming up in October um so when people open certain
apps that turned on their location services um these ads would be displayed the apps such as weather apps social media apps um even their browser um things like that um would
display the ads that we created when the ads are shown If people could click on the ad and go immediately to the Guild's website and the event page in this case they were taken to the
fall Harvest Market pleas thus bringing attention to the event and hopefully will attend the group um as you'll see in our next slide we we um the ads were shown to
over 4,000 people um and with the ads from the fall Harvest Marketplace and there were 18,000 Impressions which roughly mean each person was shown about the ad approximately four times and more than
that actually 326 people um visited the guilds website and saw the the page of the event um and these are also known as clicks and what's really great is now we
have this spacee of people that are already introduced to the event and when we get closer to the event we were talking about a two week period actually retargeting these people that we shown
the ads to to hopefully hopefully reinforce them coming to this new event of the guild so it's really fascinating uh it's a new means of advertising basically and again
it's done via your cell phone you could geofence any event and lead them to the advertisement that you choose on their cell phone and as Jill said when they click it on it drives them directly to
our event page on our website so again we tracked them to our new fall Harvest Marketplace and reached a much wider order than we could even with social media any any questions before we move on does the person with the phone have
the ability to turn off these communications and turn them on I don't understand so actually the it's it's based on your location services so even if you have your location services
turned off off um certain apps turn them on so they when these location surfaces are turned on they don't they can't have control over it to turn them off so they
do they the ads are shown so which apps do you have to have in order for this system to pick up and and advertise to that person well if you see there there was probably around 8 to
10,000 people that attended the event so if we were able to reach about 4,000 you could see how widely spread the apps were um that were actually turned on with location services of the people we
were able to reach so so if you're within that radius which we tracked a mile and a half and you're in the park or within within a mile and a half away and you happen to go on your phone and open any app it's
our ad is going to pop up it's not any app it's well not not any app but yeah but there um it's a widespread variety of apps like I said like your browser your the Google Maps things of that
nature that turn on location services when the app comes up if your location Serv services are on you may even have um you may even get more ads displayed to you so this is Pam and I went to the
technology session that Heather told us to go to last November good job Heather we saw the presentation so this is not only used in retail it's also used in law enforcement as well you've probably seen it so if your phone there's Wi-Fi how it's set is how you tap into the
public Wi-Fi and that's how the range is set it's very interesting from the technology we went to the one with CBR I believe is the one that gave the presentation so basically when you have your phone and you're doing anything you will be pinging off your location unknowingly as you drive down the road
um it's all kiding aside used in a lot of investigative crime which they told us at the seminar because you could say oh I wasn't there and then they'd be like well your Wi-Fi phone tapped into the house where such incident occurred um it's very interested it's very controlled too because Wi-Fi is so
present so and and I think I'm going to the thing tomorrow I I'm assuming only two of us were invited right there's a yourself and P okay if anybody else wants to go you know you can have my spot tomorrow but it's going to be very interesting and I think that's just
Council or is the guild coming to I think it's your okay okay we're good all right let's move on to Placer um ai ai by the way stands for artificial intelligence I I just learned that
actually maryly Lisa is the green light on on your microphone I don't oh there is that better and there you go ah there we go all right so um just to recap Placer contacted Tony back in July so that they
could um focus on a specific area of the CBD where one of our Guild events was taking place so the ridw guild chose to focus on Memorial Park at vanas square and the studies that took place um were
between July 1st 2023 through June 30th 2024 so it was a full year the event data was based on the Ridgewood guilds Winter Fest which took place on Saturday November 25th 2023 from 12:00 to 3: the Saturday after Thanksgiving which
coincides with American Express's small business Saturday so how are people tracked anyone who enters the park and remains for 2 minutes or longer is tracked via their cell phone the cell phone just needs to be turned on in order to be
tracked tracking also took place before and after after the event the businesses closest to the park were patronized the most the survey proves that whenever an event takes place in our Park the local businesses benefit from the
events so here's the survey um of people who visited Winterfest on November 25th keep in mind Winterfest is a short event it begins at noon and ends at 3 so let's take a look at where people
visited prior to Winterfest well because Winterfest began at noon they all went for breakfast um high on the list number one on the list the daily treat number two raymens number three bear burger and so on as and as you can see most of these
places people frequented for breakfast where did they go after the event at 3:00 again Raymond's ranked number one really no surprise it's right across the street from the park followed by daily treat um and the office so again here's
proof that when you have an event in the park our businesses do flourish uh and many of them were visited before and after the event um Raymond's 3% afterwards which is um which is pretty
high on the scale survey based on where people visited during the course of the Year while visiting Memorial Park at vaness Square Raymond's again ranking number one daily treat number two there are some
surprises on the list Chick-fil-A is one it's in out of town this one was in ramsy the office Starbucks Paris Baguette again Wendy's in Midland Park Suk McDonald's in pamis and Felina September was the strongest
month and I attribute that to last year we had the Ridgewood Guild Music Fest the gold star mom event took place in September and the street fair which really brought that that graph way up July and August are strong The Guild
does movies in the park Art in the Park summer concert series in the park and October the chamber does Haunted Harvest surprisingly December didn't rank higher I don't know why that is so that's a question I'm going to ask on the zoom
call that we have have on Monday um our Winter Fest actually falls in November had Winterfest fell in December along with the chambers tree lighting I think December would have got a bit um you know gotone higher on the
graph Walgreens was the most visited business prior to attending Winterfest the daily treat again most visited uh Restaurant Prior and Raymond afterwards um this graph shows sorry I keep forgetting the click 27% of
the people came from home 7.3 another location 4% came from work 1.9 from Walgreens and 1.6 from the daily treat post 33% went home 6.5 went
other places 3.1% went to Raymond 2.6% went to work and 1.3% visited the daily treat most people visit at the park between 12:00 p.m. and 1 p.m. secondly between
700 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. and lastly September again the strongest month um because of all the events that happen I know we have the zoom call with Placer on Monday so I do have some questions for them uh but they
can do pretty extensive studies on each and every event that the guild runs the chamber runs and the village runs such as Earth Day and such I think it's pretty fascinating the way people can be tracked via their cell phone as we mentioned in
July and any questions on Placer anybody how much do they charge they did this for me pro bono um and they called me out of the blue I did not Source them so they explained the process I chose the part
because most of our events take place there I chose Winterfest because our Film Festival was out of town this year and Winterfest was really the last event of last year so they did all this initial work pro bono but obviously it's
it's a high ticket if they're going to track each and every event and it's not only events they can track the train station and do demographics on that they can track the parking garage um and see who's using the parking garage and any other place in the village that you know
you give them as a project Tony this is a great work and as usual you've been working for many years to bring people thank into our Central business district very successfully with all the events that you run and now you're taking it to the next level so
thank you so much and on behalf of the council we all really appreciate it you're welcome lastly just quickly the vacancy report we are at a good number again um and sioban and I went over this and I thank Siobhan for helping out
we're at 15 vacancies uh newly opened in town Rose Persian Grill Fiesta Bowl Sabor Latino Sweet Kitchen flaming feathers and Cold Cut barber shop there is a lot coming toque Colonel en roast
and by the way I spoke to that owner today little delayed but she should be opened within the next two weeks JNS AO Audio Video Ridge cafe Aaron's Ridgewood a ramen restaurant uh in the old bagalicious spot signature cocktails
Chase Bank tat Bakery and a Korean barbecue only one business Clos uh Lisa's Mediterranean Kitchen but um there is a restaurant coming the chef from St evees in Hoke is is taking over that
space so that's good news and he's a local guy and he's a local guy yes so that's the uh the current vacancy report I'll email everybody um and we'll just keep up with it so I I just want to add because Tony and I we've G out there's
been a couple things one I want to thanks Keith's office because when we get the new business notification we're now including the chamber and the Guild on that which seems so simple but of the 15 truly vacant category we put four in pending which means they're under lease
negotiation so they we wanted to be clear they're clearly vacant but they're just closer meaning and we didn't want to disclose those details because we like oh we don't want to mess up the lease so uh it's looking really really good and I
want to again just say if anyone feels there's any informal way because adding Tony to that distribution is good for the business and it's good for us knowing who's coming and going um didto the building department because sometimes the buildings are sold which is something that I was looking for
renters and we did have a situation there where property has been sold so so um both the building department and Beth are now including the guild and the Chamber and these notifications which has been very advantageous so so speaking of the building department I I did speak to uh Tony Merino
probably a week to 10 days ago and um he indicated to me that they were really processing uh these new cosos at a pretty rapid Pace um Expediting some of the inspections uh trying to make sure that we we kept a good Pace here um that
being said correct me if my math is is is off but out of those 15 if you take those four that council member winegrad referred to as pending I guess they're they're close to consummating a lease that gets to 11 that are Bonafide vacant
at this point which is a far cry from I think the number was 23 when you came over the summer at one point at one point last year I think we're at 42 okay yeah but but most recently I think when you spoke at the public comment I think
it was around 22 23 so my point in bringing this up is based on the number going from 23 to potentially 11 that would confirm what the building department is reporting to me as far as Expediting uh a number of these Co
requests and these these permitting requests great it's great to hear all right thank you all so much Tony don't go you have your request for the um free parking for your Marketplace so just T is going from one to the next actually with with mayor that's actually next on
the agenda if you want just go right there so if we uh if we jump down to 10B one which is under parking uh this is a request uh from The Ridgewood Guild uh to provide free parking in only the Hudson Street Garage on Saturday October
19th uh for their fall Harvest Marketplace event from 9:00 a.m. to 8: PM am I correct Tony is I didn't hear the is it one floor Keith uh no we we would we we've opened up the garage completely right Bob for the other two requests for the chamber so it would be
the full garage oh wonderful wonderful thank you very question is do you want to limit it like you limited the other events hours wise yeah I think it makes sense to and in terms of fairness it should be the hours of the event just as we did with the Chamber of Commerce
events so Tony what's the actual duration of the event that day time wise the event runs 11: to 6: but setup time is at 9: and that's really what I want the we we have 61 vendors which is incredible so
I'd like them to unload on the park and then rep park in the garage so you know if they can have that space beginning at 9: that would be great I think an hour at the end so maybe 9: to 7: yes yeah yeah yeah I mean I mean it's it's the
Saturday we only yeah we only meet till 6 10 to 6 on Saturday something 9 to six I guess I mean I'm I'm sorry if if they're getting there at at 9 to unload by the time they unload it's
going to take an hour so maybe the garage We Begin the garage at 10: I think is I just I don't have we're not allowed to have isn't parking on Saturday doesn't start later 10 okay good because so it's all day we're
talking about basically giving the wave is from 10 the entire garage all day and my concern as I as I say this every time we talk about giving out the free parking is that um the
employees get here first and they know about this and then they stay there all day and no one gets to park so it can be
counterproductive um so you know I I and I I've seen this so many times and so and so for the benefit of the of the uh um full Harvest
vest it can actually make it so that the spaces are locked up um Tony Tony was only asking for one or two floors though yeah I was just going to say that my request was actually just for one floor
so that the vendors could park all day so they don't have to go out every 3 hours and pay the kiosks but I think the Paul's point the the employees will just go to that one floor do this with the chamber that's what I was just thinking is there a way to do a permit or something we can give
the vendors for free parking for the van the only thing I would request is that there's some consistency between organizations we do it with the chamber we should do what we did with rather than reinvent it we should just agree that Paul's point is valid but we kind of ignored it with the chamber sorry Paul I mean but we kind of ignore and we
should move forward detailing the hours that we want to give because we just went over that events in the park generate business sorry it's late I didn't mean to be short but we're all in agreement we're all in agreement that we're doing free parking and it just needs to be the time so you only want one floor are you sure about that well
to Paul's point I mean I don't want to take up parking space is with employees that are going to park all day my initial request was one floor for my vendors so they don't have to go out every 3 hours and pay the kiosks is there any way I can live with one floor
so what if what if we reserve the fourth floor for for that day for your vendors third floor floor is CBD Park employees thir third Flo third floor so third floor third floor 10 to 8 for the full day assuming people will come at the tail end of the event and stay for
dinner on Saturday only me there's still six six okay so 10 to six 10 to six third floor and what I would recommend is that you tell your vendors to get there early because again the employees the employees are going to find out about this right well and if if if the
request is only for the vendors and the council supportive of doing this let's have a conversation offline before the end of the week with Bob bruny maybe we identify your vendors okay and you give them a a placard work we can work we can work something
around that good right I like that idea that that'll prevent the that'll prevent the mayor's concern from um from happening there very good okay let thank you all right Bob Rooney come on thank you all right Mr Rooney so as as Bob's walking up I'll
just call the council's attention to two performer resolutions which is under budget C2 uh which is a uh chapter 159 we're taking the 7 $5,000 Grant and inserting it as a source of Revenue into the budget any objection and then the second
is the uh Award of the Professional Services contract for our employee assistance program this will be the second year we're doing this with intervention strategies uh there's no increase to the contract and it's being recommended by our health Director D any objection good all right then we'll
Circle back to parking uh item B2 and then Bob also has C1 so Bob those two items are yours Lucky Bob should I talk slow no no only kiding uh so I sent a a memo to council or to
Keith rather and was passed on to council uh regarding my proposal for increasing the uh permit fees which we do on an annual basis um currently our projection for parking is not to have a need for increase in hourly rates uh but
consistent with what we've done in the past I'd like to have a modest increase for the permits uh asking you if you would approve that so we can get the ball rolling and get the decals permit uh printed and and the Hang tags and everything of that nature uh so we can
move forward and Bob just to be clear for the council and the public uh these modest increases uh are consistent with the Walker Consultants December 2021 recommendations correct okay and there's
no increase to the our L parking fee this is that's correct strictly for um for the Hang tags that's correct for whatever the motorcycle CBD parking uh whatever is shown in here is as the um the rate for
2025 questions nope okay idea everybody good y move on to C1 which is the third quarter financial statements okay I'll I'll do this high level and if you have any questions stop me I'm more than happy to answer uh so uh there's 37 pages and I'll see if I
can get through it rather quickly uh I uh this time of year I include the uh balance sheets once they're audited by uh our Auditors and we blessed that report a couple of means ago uh but a high level in assets of the current fund
uh the total assets were flat roughly $800,000 was an increase in cash offset uh including 880,000 accounts receivable offset by a decrease in deferred charges uh same goes for the liabilities for the
counter fund um $500,000 decrease in appropriation reserves 200,000 incre decrease in prepaid taxes 100,000 increase in tax over payments and a net increase in fund balance of $300,000 uh Grand fund showed about
600,000 increase over last year uh that's more of a proactive uh appropriation of grants for various um particularly the the Health Grants uh but more proactive in appropriating funds under these
programs under water which is on page five I'm sorry under operations which is on page five um we showed an overall increase in fund balance net of $300,000 the various fluctuations where Revenue was s Mis layous Revenue
anticipated was 900,000 over last year delinquent taxes were decrease of 100,000 current taxes uh $5 million increase non-budget revenues a decrease of $1.1 million for a total of $4 million increase in overall Revenue that was
offset by a $5 million increase in overall Appropriations for County uh school and Municipal uh resulting in an excess of Revenue decrease of $800,000 uh after the statutory reductions or increases for deferred
charges that was 1.5 million net change of 300,000 over last year water operating balance sheet on sheet 7 um shows roughly a $3 million increase in assets and liabilities primarily the assets increase of $3 million in cash
offset by a $1 million increase in appropriation reserves and $900,000 increase in acred interest for bonds and notes um and offset by a reserve increase a reserve of million dollars overall fund balance um was flat from
the pre previous year sheet nine shows the revenue revenues for water being approximately $1.8 million over last year offset by $900,000 decrease in prop credits from appropriation reserves total expenditures were up $2.4
million and overall Revenue was a decrease of $1.5 million again uh fund balance being flat parking assets um page 11 parking balance sheet uh I'm sorry overall
Capital um I added that this year to show the capital for all three funds so the assets over uh from 23 compared to 22 was up approximately $121 million um that's offset or comprised of
increases in uh notes payable and bond bonds payable the significant increase of that is in the water for the uh posos projects that have been approved through 2023 sheet 13 parking utility operating assets are up approximately um
$800,000 uh cash being up $800,000 deferred charges down $150,000 appropriation reserves up 160 and Inter fund balances up $400,000 sheet 14 shows the operations of the parking Utility Fund overall revenues
are up approximately 300,000 over 2022 uh total expenditures roughly uh approximate increase of $100,000 resulting in excess of Revenue approximately $150,000 then we get into the um revenues and expenditures for the
current fund uh as of June 3024 uh going through the the total revenues um there is nothing of concern there are several items that uh have no revenues at all because of late Billings and that's all timing and when they're collected they'll be reflected in the
financial statements state aid starts to be starts to come to the village in August there's been a modest amount that has come through so far the balance will be uh collected in October after the uh best practices is completed uh other sources of revenue
are pretty much uh where they should be for this time of year and the overall revenue is at 48% of the anticipated budget I'm not going to go through the appropriation items um they're all starred or asteris if those um are
without incumbrances which would account for uh slightly lower amounts uh and if there are amounts that are complete for example on sheet 23 um it's a small small number but it's a it's an example of when something's
encumbered for a full amount for the whole year uh you see an increase uh which is greater than the 50% that's anticipated there are a few of those in here that relate to the timing such as pension expenses which are paid in April so that's 100% expended Debt Service um
depending on the timing of the um the payments are due overall the total budget um for the current fund is about 55 I'm sorry one more page 54% of what the
budget was anticipated and again the fluctuation being because of the timing un certain payments that are made in water um 42% of revenues were uh collected to date there are two U
increases that are for cell tower rent and increase in water rents that are due to be that were build in July so their collection is imminent um other than that the revenue is pretty much where I would expect it to be the
Appropriations are at approximately 51% and again that is predicated on the timing of some payments for U pension and Debt Service parking utility revenue collected to date uh through
June I'm sorry page 35 uh parking utility revenues are approximately 47% of what we anticipate at the time um and Appropriations are roughly 46% so they're pretty much of a wash any
questions thanks for staying so late Bob you got A plus on the math but I hear Rumblings about the font it's larger right it's so tiny he's staying for Clos session too so we don't even get to dismiss him mayor that
concludes our portion of the agenda thank you so much and we will go back to public comment uh good evening boy a ling Ridgewood um it was a
gentleman who made a comment here about misinformation disinformation uh he has since left the room but I'd like to follow up on his comment at this point in time and that was that there was a person who called in on the phone and made a comment about
a person who was killed unfortunately at uh on Meadowbrook Road and there was some information that was provided by a member of the deis someone on the deis and that information was incorrect so I'd like to correct that the person's name was Carrie Lynn Monahan and she
died on July 24th 2000 she was a 2000 graduate of Ridgewood High School and she was the sister of Tim manahan who was a friend of my daughters and who was also an assistant principal I think at GW and
the high school and he has since moved on to take a job in Connecticut so that is the individual who unfortunately met with a tragic demise at that uh at that location and I believe the memorial is in her name at that location no we know Tim very well and we were very sad when
that when that happened so just wanted to correct the information was given out on the de uh with respect to the commentary about the communications issue concerning the water boil water advisory let me say
this I cannot recall a time when I have signed up for service from any any utility whether it be water electric gas or cable television where I was not required to provide my phone number and
address as a part of the signup process so I question why Ridgewood water doesn't have the phone number of every subscriber in their system boggles my imagination that they don't know the
phone number of anybody who is their subscriber I don't think that you can sign up for a utility service unless you provide an active a phone number so perhaps maybe this is a rhetorical question but if somebody could find out the percentage of
Ridgewood water subscribers in any community that they don't have a phone number for I'd be very interested in knowing that number also with respect to the kiosks at The Pedestrian underpass I'm wondering how much of the damage that was caused by the car accident
which I believe happened on the east side not the west side so I have photos of at that accident how much of that damage is going to be covered by Insurance whether it's our insurance from the GIF or the insurance of the person who un had the unfortunate
accident that was not mentioned when you were talking about funding but certainly if there was a significant amount of damage caused by that accident that that damage should be covered by insurance thank you very much and have a good evening thank you Boyd anybody else
let's go to hybrid access Katherine you're up yes thank you um you know for people who know me it is not my tendency could you just state your name please oh yeah sorry Katherine Schmid 123 South Irving Street it is generally just so you know
we we no longer require someone to State their address if they choose not to just whether or not they're a orig resident yep I live here yep so if you know me you probably have figured out that it's usually not my
tendency to question expert um and I you know believe that people who come with more information than I know more than me but I also worked for a boss once who always said to me think about whether
it's logical and I got to tell you I was really surprised at the presentation today about the underpass heavily soiled just needs Surface Prep and painting some paint and finish loss really surprised me because when I have
walked through that tunnel with members of the community I see mold I see cracks and I see what we lovingly called stall mites and stall ties all over the place so I'm just really surprised especially to hear that people
say that the tunnel is is in good condition it just seems to me that there has to be a better solution than simply scraping and painting it and I certainly can't see that as a 50-year solution so at the risk of being being
irreverent maybe we need a second opinion thank you thank you Katherine Susan you're up um Susan ran um I live in rwood whatever that
means anyway um calling in regard to um I I watched the presentations tonight they were very long so I feel bad for you guys um but on a separate note the Army Corp of
Engineers um what is happening with that as well as the ad hoc committee when will interviews begin for that and that's pretty much it I don't want to keep you longer than that thank you thank you
Susan anyone else seeing no one I'm going to close public comment and would anyone like to respond very very quickly I'll I'll be brief to to Mr Loving's comments about the phone numbers at Ridgewood water um I can tell you we can get those numbers
um we can talk to Justin about that the one thing I will say that's been a bit of a phenomenon here is the fact that that a lot of the numbers that are in the Ridgewood water system were Legacy numbers this also exists with the reverse 911 system in general meaning they were landlines and how many of us
in our own lives have eliminated our landlines or don't use our landlines and that creates a barrier in being able to get this information through the reverse 911 system to folks so for those people who may have landlines on file over
there but now they don't have them in their homes that poses a challenge um there is an insurance claim that Heather's office processed and worked through um I don't know what the result of that was but we can look that up tomorrow um and with regard to the Army Corps we did have a zoom meeting with
them maybe two and a half weeks ago um they are in the process of looking at that short-term um work effort over on Warren and Marshall um and we are also in uh waiting to hear about the warna funds uh which would be approved by
Congress which we have money um that we requested through Congressman gimer um so the results of that which we expect to happen um this quarter uh down in Washington um as they sift through the uh the federal budget um that will be an
indicator as to what we can take on as far as the Army Corps of Engineers so we're waiting to hear about the funding mechanism I I also want to add clearly there's been many discussions about Richard water and how this happened but for longevity users like my parents they
didn't have a phone number so I now handle my mom's online and it's amazing the generational shift there's a commitment to paper my mom was still getting mail in the mail and now because when you have somebody who's vulnerable or elderly a significant number of them
have been with the utility for a long period of time and it wasn't a requirement and the landline issue is real so a lot of people not in an agist way who've been with the with Ridgewood water for a long time did not have to re reement or entered a number of a spouse
that's been deceased and it's it's a little bit of a mess what's interesting to me and I want the public to hear this if we don't insist that the public self- populate it goes on populated a lot of people do the bare minimum to get on and when you have longevity users which
Ridgewood has a ton of it's entirely possible that they have a spouse's number that's deceased that they never had as a requirement the landlines gone missing so I mean my own personal mother didn't have one in there so I'm sure it was required and uh I just want to comment
um Boyd I knew a woman she was a young mom and it was somewhere around shortly after I opened my business because she was a customer there and um she was killed in a car accident I'm pretty sure it was on Meadow Brook I could be mistaken in
addition to the loss of your friend so um wasn't trying to spread miss or disinformation it's just just my recollection of someone I knew so with that does anybody else have any comments no uh motion to be it resolved by The Village Council of the village of
Ridgewood as the Village Council meet in closed session on September 25th 2024 at 7:30 p.m. or soon thereafter as the matter and the agenda can be reached and the de close session will be held in the caucus room at the r Village Hall 131 North Maple Avenue rard New Jersey and be further resolved that the matters
should be discussed in close session are limited to Personnel matters to include management and non-union salary ordinances and legal matters to include lubon D versus Village Ridgewood these matters are allowable under njsa 10 col 4-12 at SEC and be a further resolved
the admes of this meeting shall be made available to the general public when such matters have been deemed completed by resolution of the Village Council may have a motion second uh all in favor I anyone opposed okay thank you e