Yeah. >> Call to order. Good evening everybody. The date is February 18th, 2026. The time is 6 o'clock p.m. And I would like to call this public meeting of the Rochelle Park Township Committee to order. Open public meeting act pursuant to the open public meeting act notice of
the February 18, 2026 meeting was published on the township website on January 7, 2026 and the Bergen record and Herald News on January 11th and the hour town on January 22nd. Notice of the close session meeting was published on the township website and transmitted to
the Bergen record and Herald News on February 14th, 2026. Copies of all notices are on file with the township clerk and have been made available to the public. Roll call, please. >> Womani here. >> Woman Carella >> here. >> Smith >> here. >> Deputy Mayor Chowinsky
>> here. >> Mayor Miller >> here. >> Thank you so much. At this time, I'll ask for a motion to adopt resolution number 26-081 authorizing an attachment committee to enter close session to discuss legal issues, litigation, potential litigation, contract negotiations, and
attorney client privilege matters. Topics include toll for real team first, the township of Rochelle Park and contract land use board attorney. Do I have a motion? >> Motion. >> Got a second. >> Second. >> Roll call, please. >> Woman Pichi. >> Yes. Woman judge Kavala.
>> Yes. Smith. >> Yes. >> Mayor Kinsky. >> Yes. >> Mayor Miller. >> Yes. All right. Thank you. The town committee will now enter close session for approximately 1 hour after which we will return to public session for further action. We are now in close session.
To come out of close session. >> Can I get a second? >> Second. >> Roll call, please. >> Committee woman. >> Yes. >> Woman George PLA. >> Yes. >> Committee Smith. >> Yes. >> Mayor Tinsky. >> Yes. >> Mayor Miller. >> Yes. All right. Please join us for the
pledge of allegiance and a moment of silence. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
>> Thank you. You may be seated. All right. At this time, I will administer the oath of office to the officers of the Rochelle Park Volunteer Fire Department. I'm going to start with Matthew Aelino and then we'll swear on the rest of the officers. Township committee, please join me in front of the Disin.
Congratulations. right here. >> All right, let's face the audience right hand on the Bible. Left hand on the left hand left hand on the Bible. Raise your right hand
>> and repeat after me. I state your name. >> I, Matthew, >> do solemnly swear >> solemnly swear >> that will support the Constitution of the United States. I will support the Constitution of the United States >> and the Constitution of the State of New Jersey >> and and the Constitution of the State of New Jersey. >> That I will bear true faith and
allegiance to the same. >> That I will bear true faith truth, faith, and allegiance to the same. and to the governments established. >> And to the governments established >> in the United States >> in the United States >> and in this state >> and in this state >> under the authority of the people >> under the authority of the people. >> And that I will faithfully
>> And that I will faithfully >> impartially >> impartially >> and justly >> and justly >> perform all the duties of the office of >> perform all the duties of the office of second lieutenant >> lieutenant of the Rochelle Park volunteer fire department. >> Lieutenant Rochelle Park volunteer fire
department >> according to the best of my ability. >> To the best of my ability. So help me God. Help me God. CONGRATULATIONS. >> All right. So this is just >> All right. Can I invite the rest of the officers to come join us in front of the develop?
Yeah. Just say I say your name. >> All right. Yeah. Please raise your right hand and repeat after me. >> I state your name. >> I do solemnly swear. >> Doly swear. >> Thou support the Constitution of the United States. that I will restore the
Constitution of the United States >> and the Constitution of the State of New Jersey >> and the Constitution of the State of New Jersey >> that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same >> that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same >> and to the governments established >> to the governments established >> in the United States
>> in the United States >> and in this state >> and in this state >> under the authority of the people >> under the authority of the people >> and that I will faithfully >> that I will faithfully >> impartially >> and impartially >> and justly >> and justly >> perform all the duties of the office of
>> all the duties of the office of chief department >> to the best of my ability to the best of my ability. >> So help me God. >> So help me God. >> Thank you so much. >> Stand up for a picture. >> Picture picture.
What do we got in the middle? Everybody look at me. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Appreciate it. >> Thank you so much. Congratulations. >> Oh yeah. Yeah.
probably just have to move the mouse. >> I didn't do anything. All right. >> So, while the volunteer fire department is still here, I just want to acknowledge that our Rochelle Park volunteer fire department continues to show what it means to serve our community. They get their time not just
when the call comes in, but through the drills, the training, and the preparation that makes those responses possible. So, on behalf of the township committee and our residents, thank you for your service and your sacrifice, and congratulations to each of you. Thank you.
All right. At this time, I'm going to pass the microphone over to our first presentation of the night, Mr. David Refkin from Green Ridgewood. Uh, and I'd like to invite Mr. Refin to come forward for this presentation.
Thank you. >> Please hold the button down. Not yet. >> Not yet. >> No. >> No. >> The green light is on. >> Okay. Hi. Thanks for having me here tonight.
Uh David Ruffkin. I live in Rididgewood and I serve as the chair of Green Rididgewood, which is the uh environmental committee that provides advice to our village council. Um and thank you for inviting me to be here. So, um I think you all know we have a pretty serious flooding problem in this
part of New Jersey and I think it's time for us to be proactive and try to start dealing with it. So, in Ridgewood, we had three serious floods and I'm sure you had it here also in Rochelle Park uh at the end of December of 23, January of 24, and then again in March of 24. And
we decided it's time for us to do something about it instead of just keeping our fingers crossed. So what we did was we put together a set of 20 recommendations for our village council. Uh one of them which we'll talk about more was to engage with Bergen County because the saddle river does not know
where Glenrock ends and where fair one begins etc. Um and um so we went to the county uh we did a study with Columbia University with their one of their graduate schools. We came up with a series of recommendations. We went to the county we asked them to engage and
we didn't get too far and it was kind of frustrating. So, one day um I'm riding my bicycle along the pathway in the Saddle River County Park, which I'm sure many of you enjoy also. And it hit me this this park is owned by the county. They have to do something about it because they own this park. The river is
of course controlled by D, but they had to do something. So, we started a second study with Columbia University and that's I'm going to talk about that today. I'm going to go through this relatively quickly because I'd like to talk more about what we can do moving forward to make a difference before the
inevitable happens again and hopefully not worse. And thank you Sam. So, uh because just we'll just go through a quick overview what key findings were and some of um some of the flood mitigation efforts what we can do um some of the flood risk analysis. there's
there's serious financial implications especially insurance-wise uh safety and well-being and then uh some ideas about how maybe we can deal with this. So if we go to the next one, uh this is the team from Columbia University. We had 11 students for 11 weeks and we got a great
amount of support from our professor who led the team. Next, um these that's uh so Green Ridgewood, I mentioned what our goal is. Uh and those are two of my colleagues uh who work closely on this project with the Columbia students. I mean, we were on Zoom calls with them two three times a
week. We had them at the park. I used to remind them repeatedly that the Saddle River County Park is twice the size of Riverside Park across the street from Columbia. This is a really unique piece of land that we have here that is really important and uh it's not being maintained as the way it should be.
Next, so a little bit of context. So, and I I know you're familiar with this and I'm sorry if your homes have been directly impacted by this, but we have had serious flooding. Um and these are some of these pictures are Sam's, by the way. Uh we've had serious flooding throughout
Bergen County. Um and I'm going to get to the headline in a minute and you'll understand how serious a problem we are truly facing here. Actually, can you go back? If not, yes. So, actually, there's the headline.
There are over 3,000 counties in the United States. We are ranked number one for most vulnerable county in the United States for flooding. Now, people look at me, they say, "Well, how could that be? It must be like New Orleans or Miami.
The reality is we have a lot of valuable we have a lot of homes and we have a lot of valuable real estate right in the flood zone. If you go down Route 17, that's all a flood zone. And of course when the Garden State Plaza was built in 1957, Sprout Run was kind of directed right
into your town. So your town and Ro and Saddlebrook both a lot of the town is in the flood zone. Uh, also I should just mention another part of the reason why we're number one is because out of a thousand counties that were
rated seven, we're number 703 for emergency preparedness. So, a lot of the communities do a good job of trying, but because we have 70 towns in Bergen County, it makes it hard to coordinate. So, of course, there's the park, you know, it it starts um starts up in
Richmond and goes through, you know, Glen Rock, Fairmont Pamus, Rochelle Park, Saddlebrook. It's it's an amazing place and it's really an a suburban oasis. Um it's overseen by the Bergen County Parks Department. There are 16 parks that Bergen County
overseas. The park does not have a naturalist for its parks. The park the the county has a budget for parks, not by individual parks, but just all the parks and it has a capital budget for all the parks. There is not one person
whose only job is to oversee those 577 acres. Frankly, our parks are dramatically underfunded compared to Mars County and Essex County who have some really wonderful parks. Next, okay, so this just provides a little context um for those of you who can see
this. I mean, the uh the blue here is the 100-year flood zone, and that's really a misnomer, 100-year flood. What that really means is there's a 1% chance of any year of you having a very large flood. And then we have these 500 flood areas in orange. So you could see your
community is right in right in the very serious area. And we're only getting bigger storms. We're getting more and more extreme weather. Um the 500year flood used to be 8 in of rain. Now it's 12 in of rain. And you know, North
Planefield, I believe, got eight inches of rain just this summer. I can tell you in Richmond, if we got eight inches of rain, we'd be all underwater. And so would all the communities downstream. We were just lucky that that big storm was 30 mi south of us. Next, so our objective was how do we
transform the Saddle River County Park into a model of resilience and sustainability and to provide recommendations. And I will tell you, as the study went on, it became clear it's just not about the park. It's about our six communities and frankly it's about all of Bergen County and the recommendations uh included that. So
they looked at you know the various pills of sustainability, environmental, economic, social and governance and uh as part of this they did a literature review. We made sure to interview people from all six towns that join the river. We were very focused on
this is a communitywide issue and we interviewed 23 people and I will tell you that your assemblywoman Lisa Swain was a really big help in all of this process. Also, we looked at a lot of data and then we came up with our key findings. So,
if you go to the park and you go near the river, this is what you see. You see an ecosystem in collapse. We have rivers that have flooded and all the tree roots are exposed and if you walk there you will just see trees collapsing all over
the place and it's it's just sad. It's very sad because this is a special place and that's just part of it. I mean obviously the uh the streams go way out to the side because they there's been so much silt that's come down. They destroy the pathways that are there. They
destroy all the wildlife that's there. And you know, people go fishing here. They have picnics. They ride their bikes. They take their dogs. They play soccer. It's a great place. Um, but it's it's not in good shape at all. It's actually really falling apart. Now, economic, and I don't want to depress
anybody, but here are the facts. We're seeing insurance companies leave Bergen County. We're seeing uh people's insurance rates go skyrocketing. Um, and we also have a situation where if you have to have flood insurance in your home and you can't get it privately, you
go to the National Flood Insurance Program. If you have a flood in your house, the maximum amount you can get back is $250,000 if you get approved for all of that. And the likelihood of that is frankly decreasing every day. So let's say you
buy a house for $600,000. You take out a $500,000 mortgage. You have a flood. the most you can back is $250,000. Who's going to pay for the other $250,000? What's going to happen is people just going to leave their homes because they can't afford to rebuild their homes cuz I don't know any home in
Bergen County that can be rebuilt for $250,000. So, at some point in time, the lenders are going to say, "This is a very risky place to lend money to people to buy homes, and we don't want that to happen. We want to remain economically healthy."
So we have this insurance problem and we have a big insurance gap. I'll have a slide on that in a minute. Um obviously we have safety issues for people um and you know there have been floods where people loi have died um and we obviously don't want that to happen again. There's
a long deferred maintenance backlog at the park. Um and governance. How do we have a voice in the park? What is our voice in the park? Who do we talk to? How do we reach somebody? That's a real issue that we need to fix also. And then how do we as a community work together on solving these problems?
Okay. So um I won't go through this in a lot of detail but the the students professor came up with a whole list of different uh solutions to minimize not eliminate minimize the flooding risk. We'll talk about the tension basin
swailes repairing zone respiration and wetland construction. But uh I'm going to go through this quickly. Um this these pictures were taken in uh in Saddlebrook at Otto Valley Park. Um and you can have detention basins so that you hold the water when you get a big storm you hold the water back so it
doesn't all all the storm water doesn't show up at one point in time. You release it after you have flooding and these can be natural or these can be built detention basins. Um we did they did a lot of mapping um and they actually proposed the areas
where they should have detention basins and this is in uh in Saddle Brook just on the sides of the um the proposed detention basins right actually next to Auto Pale the lake over there um because that's an area that floods a lot also
there's a lot of there's a lot of detail here I'm taking a very high level approach to this uh building stormwater swailes which are basically uh ways where water can sit. We have a few of these in Saddlebrook. Uh we need more of them. Again, it slows down the
storm water runoff. There's no magic bullet to eliminate flooding. You have to do a lot of different things. And this is just one of the different things that you can do, but having more places for the water to go because we get these much larger rainstorms than our systems were designed for.
Um, and again, yeah, we have uh project, we have suggestions about where you should actually put this. And you know, a lot of this was I mean, here's Garden State Plaza, you know, and here here are you guys. >> Yep. Yep. So, um, there's a lot of a lot
of I think there's we'll see this later. I think there's 1,298 parcels in Rochelle Park that are in the flood zone. Uh, repairing zones that refer to the river banks. If you and right now they're they've been destroyed in a lot of the park. If you can if you have
vegetation there, it slows down the water. It absorbs more of the water. You have to you have to fix those. That's uh this diagram over here explains how you can how you can fix that. You get much more infiltration into the ground instead of going running into the river.
Uh and here are some suggestions about where to do this. This one is specifically in Glenrock. All of these maps are interactive. you can do a lot of a lot of work with this. And then wetland construction. Uh and this is uh this is a Grove Park which is in
Rididgewood right before um uh Glenrock and Pamis right where the Hooas Brook and the Saddle River meet. And we just need more areas for all of this water to go. It has to go somewhere. And it's going on its own right now into various
parks and other areas. And we should just set them up as wetlands so that they can absorb more rainfall. We're just getting more and more rain. I know we've had having a drought for the last 18 19 months. It's hard to to remember that we are actually down about 30% in rainfall over the last year and a half,
but we're seeing more and more extreme weather. So, the floods will come and they'll be bigger than ever. And again, uh suggestions on where they could be built and and how to build them and what's the best place. and it's uh Grove Park and Pleasant Park which is
right next door to it. And this is a place that Sam told me about uh on the Saddle River. Uh that's Fairon. Yeah. Where there's two homes that are close to falling into the river. And also, as you told me, there was a huge tree that
went down right along that same area. Uh we have reached out to the Bergen Record of North Jersey.com and they were with me and they filmed this and um we got we did some media coverage for that. Okay, so here's the the issue on the insurance gap. So
in the six towns that have joined the Saddle River County Park, there are 7 actually $2 billion worth of property at risk. Billion dollar 7.2 billion. Of that 4 billion is in Pamis, which is relevant for something we'll talk about
in a minute. Um we've seen a 59% increase in flood insurance premiums. I believe that's over 5 years. Um, however, the amount of insurance that we actually have compared to the risk is $29 billion of basically under insurance
in the county as a whole. There are $72 billion worth of properties at risk. It's just mind-blowing. And here's the numbers um by community. So, you can see Rochelle Park has 1,298
parcels. I think that's total parcels and the value of the property at risk in Rochelle Park is almost $500 million. There's that total of 7.2. You can see parameter says 4 million, but given the
size of especially no shell park and Saddlebrook, um there's a tremendous amount of risk and I'm trying not to be alarmist. I know these are your homes. Uh I'm just really trying to point out the reality and the urgency that we have to do
something about this. Um there are ways to save money. Uh community rating system, which I believe you do have here in Rochelle Park, so that you there's a way for people to lower their homeowners insurance. So there aren't too many communities doing it. Ridgewood does it, but I think we're the only two out of
the six in alongside the park. Okay. And then there's there's there's so many other issues here. um is how do we work with the parks? How do we manage investments? How do we get park personnel involved? And candidly, how do we get Burden County to care and to
provide the resources that we need? So, okay. So, then we we've put together there's a whole series of recommendations here on how we should um on on how we could move forward to manage this. There's a recommend I just go to the next one, Sam. There's a
recommendation on developing a uh a environmental living laboratory or laboratories maybe in each in each town so that young children so that young adults can learn about these concepts. These have been very successful at museums. We should think about doing
that. Let's go to the next one. But I would say most important is the idea that we work together to develop a task force or a consortium so that we have a voice in what happens to the the park in the future and also that we have a voice
in how do we minimize the flooding risks that we have to people property and the costs that we're paying. So I think at this point I think that's pretty much it. Uh yeah, we can skip through the funding
mechanisms. Yeah. Uh yeah, just go to the next one. Thanks. So the record this came out in August and there was a whole plan here for creating a task force, setting up a consortium of the six communities and launching something called the Saddle River Trust. So what happened is we had a Zoom call at the
end of August and we had about 3540 people on including two of the Bergen County commissioners to listen to the pretty something pretty similar to what you heard here but in some more detail. That same day, as it turned out, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection issued a potential grant of
$10 million for up to six communities, six people who applied to get roughly $1.7 million each for to to to develop actual solutions to the flooding challenges that we face. It would be a
series of consultants, some money for the community, some money for a community- based organization. So, we saw this and we said that a great way to kind of do this. So, we encouraged the county to apply because you needed to have a primary and the
primary needed to be somebody large like the county to do it. Um, it took a little arm twisting from uh people in Trenton and from people like us and others, but they did apply for the grant. As part of that, each one of the six
communities excluding Pamis had to fill out an application also. And Rochelle Park filled out an application as did Rididgewood, Glen Rock, Fair One, Saddlebrook, and Loi. Uh why Pamis wasn't included. Um I have some theories about that, but they were excluded,
which is really crazy because there's so much of the property at risk. So the application went in and unfortunately it was not approved. I found out last night that there were two communities um I think somewhere in Monmouth County and somewhere further south that did get
funding. However, there's going to be another funding cycle. On the website for NJ right now, it says in early 2026, there will be another funding cycle. So, why did we not get the grant? Why did Bergen County in its efforts fail? Well,
we got a letter from NJ telling us what happened and they cited three reasons for why we didn't get the grant. Number one was there weren't contiguous communities which you were required to have in this grant but what they were really saying was why was Pamis not
included cuz Pamis is the whole east side of the Saddle River. So yeah, you could connect Ridgewood, Glenn Rock, Fairmont, Rochelle Park. Well, Saddlebrook and Rochelle Park, but you're missing parameters, which really made no sense at all. Um they also said
that there's um there was an inconsistency in the applications for what the challenges are. So for example, some people talked about urban heat island. You know, when it gets hot in the summer, you'll hear that always New York is the hottest spot because there's so much pavement. Well, there's a lot of
pavement all over North Jersey. We all have urban urban heat island effects and frankly the biggest risk to people is heat because people die from heat especially when they lose their power. Um and the third reason the third thing that wasn't included they said was you
haven't shown any work together as an entity. Now frankly we have we've started that with the Columbia University process. Um that should have been mentioned. The insurance stuff wasn't mentioned in the application at all. um there wasn't any mention that
the there was an inconsistency between the communities and what the threats were which I mentioned and pramis wasn't included I mean frankly county did not do a good job and we didn't get the money so now there's an opportunity to start again and do this right so we have
been trying to figure out what is the right thing to do and how do we make sure that we can start to address the challenges that we face in all of our communities But frankly, especially here in the Saddlebrook because you guys are the most under the gun in terms of
flooding. We all get it. But you know, I I tell people, Ridgewood, you think you have a problem? Yeah, we do have a problem with Hocus Brook. It's nothing compared to what's happening further south. And when I say that, I also think of Loi, too. So, what we are proposing
is to get to arrange a meeting um which we're talking about doing on March 14th in Rididgewood. will host it and we'd like to invite the seven communities to be there and I don't mean this any way negative to the the political folks so
don't take it the wrong way but we're we'd like to at first include people from environmental commissions from green teams or folks like us who advise village councils to come up with a plan to say all right let's redo the
application let's use all the expertise that we have in our towns and I have to tell you in the Columbia report Dr. Degman would keep on saying to me there are so many talented people in these six communities that we need to have them involved as part of this process and use
that use their knowledge base and their passion to deal with this. So, we want to get the seven communities together, figure out how we could redo this plan, this application, which according to the website is coming soon, and frankly
do it and then send it to Bergen County and just say, "Okay, here it is. We already did the work." And I have to tell you, Bergen County didn't have the right people to do it. They have well-meaning people, but they don't have people who understand what these issues are and challenges are. and the deputy mayor of Rididgewood and myself, we went
there and said, "We really want to work with you as part of this." And frankly, that didn't happen. You know, we've been so engaged in this issue for a year, for years, as have people like Sam and other people in in communities, and we need to tap into all of that knowledge. We are
also contemplating the idea that should we consider putting together something that other communities have done to help alleviate their problems and that's to develop a watershed alliance of the key communities so that we have a
voice so that we are represented and they several communities in Paya County just did this and we've been kicking around the idea of something maybe called the saddle River wershed alliance so that the communities that
are impacted by the river they have a voice we'll have to figure out funding but that we can make sure that things get done and I will tell you personally I've gone to Hackinack seven times you know to four times to speak to
commissioners to try to get them to act it's been hard two a month ago after the application didn't happen I sent a letter to the top people in the county. I said, "Please, what is your strategy about flooding now that we didn't get
this grant? That was supposed to be the solution. What's your strategy now?" I have not received an answer. So, I worry that we're going to have a big storm. We're going to have flooding. People may die. Property is going to be destroyed.
And people will say, "Why didn't we do something about this before?" Because frankly, we know we're the number one atrisisk county in the United States. we have to deal with this. So, as I said to the um as I said to the manager for Rididgewood, I said, "It's time for us
to play offense and to make things happen because we just can't sit around and wait for the next crisis to happen or somebody to say, "Okay, we'll have FEMA come in and you'll all get paid and that'll take years and years and your lives will be messed up." And we don't want that. We want to be proactive and
come up with real solutions. Questions? Yes. county did you find? >> Um, I've been in touch with uh I've spoken to all seven commissioners four times. I've talked to three or four of them. I've been in touch with uh Tom Dutch and with Ken Ken Aaron Bright.
>> Aaronburgg, thank you. And with uh with other people there, too, the deputy parks, the the acting parks commissioner and other folks. We have a very good relationship with a lot of people in the county such as parks. I'd like to reach out to behalf of your with some of his
father. >> So they've they've seen this. >> I have a different relationship with them. >> I know. >> So I will advocate as much as I can. >> Mhm. Um, and I will push this on my end
>> as much as I can to get them to a meeting with you. If I have the person with them, I will get them to come. >> Look, I think the more the more people from more towns that we can get together to make noise, we're more likely to succeed. >> Well, there are certain people that are
in that county that are related to other people. So, we can get them there. >> We have to band together and get them. And I can start that >> with Ken Aronberg. Um Jeff Luna who's in charge >> his brother in Scotland but a mayor of
Lex. >> So we will reach out to them and we will push that get them here with you for the community especially the part and the planning part is going to be a little hard. I sat with you and you sat in that meeting with the mayors um and the BP
was there and the Army Corps of Engineers and we were pretty much told this thing and they weren't going to do anything. >> Yeah. >> But I think reaching out on the county level first with the parks with them is a starting point and
>> we I mean we'd love to see some action. I mean it's been very frustrating. Um and and you just you know you get excuses like well you're 70 town you're 70 towns and
it's your problem. Well no it's not. These rivers don't know where one town end and one town begins. So we have to deal with this. >> Any any other questions from any other members from the township committee? >> I mean not to do a humble brag here. I'm
actually a property casualty insurance broker and an agent. So, I kind of understand where you're coming from. And if anybody wants to do any research, I would highly recommend you look into how hard it is to get homeowners insurance in Florida cuz it's almost impossible due to flooding. What I would like to
find out is um I think people look at flood mitigation, maybe look at it like it may not be aesthetically pleasing. I think and a lot of the park is not being able to be used because like you said a lot of the trees have fallen. So I think
maybe kind of the question maybe to ask is by doing this stuff and helping mitigate flooding, how much would your home I mean your the value of your home is only going to go through if we do it now
while we have the opportunity and being able to help mitigate flooding in the future. that's only going to improve our values of our homes going forward. I think it's really important where when this stuff happens, it not only opens up parts of the park that are open to us
now, it also helps with going forward about the way our town looks and the way other towns look and how you can open up the park for bike routes and walking routes and stuff like that where I don't think people are even looking beyond that. They're just kind of looking at it like mitigating the flood. when you do
that, how it opens up parts of the park for for you know as a as a citizen as somebody who lives in the town. >> Yeah. I mean it it's a special place. I mean you know I I I left the corporate world 15 years ago. I started consulting and I can't tell you the value of
getting out at 5:30 at the end of the day and just being in nature for an hour and how wonderful that was. >> And before I moved to Rididgewood I actually checked out the park to see what it was like. So, we want these places to be there for our kids, for our families, for us. I mean, they're so
important. >> Anybody else? Yes, >> quick question. Did you uh or do you know of any history of prior um flood mitigation that was done years ago to to relieve or relieve any of this flooding
in the area? Did they give you any information on that? >> Um I'm trying to think. I mean, we heard some stories about things that were done, but it was hard to find anything official. I mean, there were dams along the Savile River at one
point in time. There was a dam in um you know, Hocus. There was a dam in Ridgewood. Um, of course, there was industry, you know, along those rivers, and that's another cold question. Um, but I'm not aware of anything major. I mean, we have >> Do you Excuse me. I'm sorry. Did they
speak to you about anything about dredging of the rivers at any time? So there was some dredging done in the past. Yes. So the issue with dredging is from what I've learned, I think this is right, is it helps short term, but it
doesn't help long term. In 2 years, the the the sand bars start to form again and you wind up with the same problem. And the rivers right now are much there's so much silt buildup that the rivers just go sideways. So dredging helps to some extent, but it's really
it's kind of a lot of different solutions. >> Did you also are you also aware that there was conversation with uh what we had uh with Cory Booker um getting with the Army Corps of Engineers with our flooding that was done last year? >> I know there's been conversations with
the Army Corps and we in Rididgewood we have um an agreement to have the Army Corps come in and do a study. I will tell you for the last nine months we haven't heard a word. It's kind of disappeared. >> So maybe that could be followed up on also because we did have a conversation.
I think there was funding there that was offered. Um I Sam's going yes right you remember this right? to something I was about to ask. In fact, the uh in May 2024, the team of park got a confirmation from um NJP that
they approved and authorized uh the uh uh it's called the um uh gen uh reevaluation report um up to 50%. And uh in fact what they're missing is
uh the official request from US Army to start the revelation report. So they haven't give you an update on but I know that we spoke I was on the conversation with >> so I I've been trying to challenge the uh the uh the um Bergen County uh
management or government I should say uh to prove the US Army Corp to send this uh application or this request to the NJP and we never got any answer. Uh we got we got a uh an email from the uh somebody at the NJDP
last year confirming that the phones are still available. there is no date of permission to those funds. So the uh if you know anyone at uh parent county who can help push us to start this regulation uh that would be awesome.
That's the first thing and they'll be the only one uh I would say uh in power to dredge the river. So in the past there was some dredging going on and dredging does help with flooding. It has some limitation in terms of effect, but
it's it's it's almost like a a recurring maintenance that needs to be happening every so often. It's not a one time uh also over 60 years. I do remember the judging of that because right by the river, you know, where I live.
>> So, um I do remember them doing it maybe like four something years. I can remember because they had big BMS on the side. Y >> and we used to take our slides down and slide down. I don't know if Dean remembers this, but this was going and then it just stalled. >> Yeah. >> But I know we had Dean, we had a conversation of how much was funding
last year. If I may not. >> Yes, please. So, back on December 2nd of obviously 2025, I got an email directly from Senator Booker's office and I'll just read it because it's brief. An update here to Senate Energy and Water Bill text was released a few days ago and it includes 500,000 for the lower Saddle River as requested and based off
the core's capabilities for fiscal year 26. We will continue to keep you updated as we hope to see progress on a larger spending bill in Congress, but I wanted to make sure you had the update that this congressionally directed spending request is in a good spot right now. So, I think following up obviously with our federal partners and seeing if that
making sure that 500k gets to the Army Corps of Engineer to complete the study, it's a big start. >> Yeah. And the also the NJP was funding up to 50% but they were asking for the nonfederal uh parties to fund the remaining. So, I'm not sure exactly what they mean by the non-federal parties uh
but that's that's the question the uh uh wonderful. Yeah. So, uh yeah, we should definitely do that. And the fact that uh your assembly woman is the chair of the appropriations committee in Trenton certainly doesn't hurt either. Um so, I just want to clarify something I said before. So, the
the plan has been that the the environmental commissions, the the um green teams, etc. would meet in 3 weeks and put together a plan. And once that plan is done, then we would go to all the political leaders and say, "Okay, we've put this together. How do you feel
about this? Can you bless it?" So, we should probably have an offline conversation, but what's the best time to to go to Bergen County and to the commissioners and say, "All right." And go go to Tedesco and say, "It's time." So, maybe we can follow up with that tomorrow. That's good.
>> Thank you, Mr. Rkin. >> Thank you. Um, one more question and I'm going to open up the public as well. So, go ahead. >> Uh, are there any other towns that that we can help by reaching out to to to get involved? >> Thank you. So, I um I've been talking
with the Pamis Environmental Commission, which is a big step because the Pramis Environmental Commission, frankly, hadn't been doing too much. They have a new leader now. They're very energized. So, that's great. Uh, I met last week with two people from the Glenrock Environmental Commission, which was the second time I met with them. Um, we the
the only town and I've been reaching out to Saddlebrook and to um to Fairmore. The only town I don't really have a connection with is Loi. So, if there's people in Loi we can talk to that would be helpful.
>> Thank you. My uh my question is uh what's the future of the partnership with Columbia University? Uh where do they fit in in regards to next steps? >> So, I've kept in touch with the professor. Um, we may do another project with Columbia on something unrelated. It this is pretty much a um it's unlikely
for this to continue. Although one of the people I showed you before, she's a graduate of this school. So, we do have an ability to go there and say we'd like more ex we'd like more work done on something. >> Wonderful. >> But they were great. They were really great to work with. >> Great. So, at this time, I'm going to open up public comment limited to the
presentation we just heard from Mr. Refkin as well as Sam. So, can I have a motion to open public comment limited to this presentation? >> Motion. >> Have a second. >> Second. >> Uh, roll call, please. >> Woman, >> yes. >> Woman, Judge Pllo, >> yes. >> Yes. >> Deputy Mayor Jinsky,
>> yes. >> Mayor Miller, >> yes. All right. Uh, public comments now open. Please state your name and address for the record. Uh, you're limited to 5 minutes and we'll do one speaker >> per. >> Thank you. My name is Charlie Greco. I
live at 46 Peak Street, Roshaw Park. To start off, before I start my clock, could we have the full name and address of the second person that spoke? It's not officially on the record. It's only on the record is Sam. >> Oh, yes. Sam, you want to state your full name?
>> Sam 26. Thank you. >> Um, question for you direct. Uh, I'm going to ask you a question. I'm going to tell you what I agree about and I'm going to tell you everything else. Why is a paramas in there? Why? You said you have feelings about it. Tell us your feelings. What do you think?
So, so you know it's one of two things happened is my understanding. One of two things happened. One is that the Paramis application cuz each one of the communities had to do their own application. The Paramis application did not get there in time. That's a
possibility. I've checked. That's a possibility. Look, I I'm I wasn't born yesterday and I mean there could be political reasons why Coramus wasn't included also. You know, people can draw their own conclusions. It was one of those two.
The other thing I should have said first, I'm wearing a fire department jacket and I'm not speaking on behalf of the fire department. I'm speaking on behalf of myself and nobody else just so that's out there clear. Okay. A couple things you said are great and I think the stuff you talked about with the keeping the the river area clear and
stuff like that. I remember as a kid when I had air, you could walk through the park and you could see the other side in Saddle Brook and see back and forth. It's overgrown. I walk a lot and I walked in other parts and they're a lot nicer than we have here. 110% I agree with that. Now I'm going to go to
the contractor and Matt, you'll probably understand what I'm talking about. I used to when I do drop ceilings in a big room like this before I had laser levels. You got a big pond of water with a big tube and you went around because the water seeks its own level. That's why a level always has water in it. Everything you're talking about is good
for mitigation and making that. It's not going to fix what's happening in Rochelle Park. Don't get the people here to believe it's going to fix the thing here cuz water seeks its own level no matter what you do. If you're going to take say it's coming in the brook or coming down the park, we're going to build these walls 10 ft high. Guess
what? It's going to find another way around that and equal its own level. When you have a street like Berdan Street over here from end to end is probably 210 of a mile long. Correct. And that's 8 feet deep with water. You're not going to do anything in
Rochelle Park to fix that. It has to be fixed down where the Saddle River goes into the Bic River because what happens and I should give a little history here so the people understand what I'm talking about that don't know me. I've been on this fire department for a long time since 1999. every flood, which is
Floyd, every flood we've had. I've either been here during the flood in the beginning or through the whole thing. If I was at my other job, I was there and then I'd come here and be here for the whole thing throughout. So, I know the flooding. I know what happens in town. We have rain stop in this town at 2:00 in the morning and 6:00 in the morning,
the water's still coming up. We can't fix that. It has to be fixed downstream. What happens is when the Saddle River was into the into the Snake River and it starts backing up, Wallington starts flooding. What happens is Wallington's people call up Roshel uh excuse me,
Lodi's people and say, "Hey, get ready. You're going to get hit." Then it comes up the line more and then Loi calls us and says, "You're going to get hit." And guess what? There's nothing we could do. We could clean that park out all we want. We could do everything else. That is the last. It should have either been done 50 years ago or it should be done
50 years from now. Right now, the effort has to begin to stop the water from building up. Cuz Matt, what I said about that level, is that true? The water just equals a level all the time. Correct. And that's what's going to happen if you don't stop the water from backing up. It
backs up. It equals a level. All right. We've seen it in this town. We've seen we put 700 people out on boats at night. And I'm not saying what you're saying shouldn't be done. I think it should be done, but it shouldn't done before or after. We're talking about doing it right now. There's better ways of
spending the money. That's the way you're going to stop. You're going to fix it for this town. You can fix that park 110%. Have more green areas. It's not going to do anything. We get the runoff and there's no place for it to go. You ever see a fivec car accident on the highway? The car in the middle. What
do you think? Well, that poor sucker had no place to go. We are the car in the middle. There's no place for this poor sucker to go without fixing the car in front or stopping the car behind it. plain and simple and that's where the efforts need to go. Anything else is a complete waste of time. Thank you.
>> Anybody else? >> I think the the problem was addressed multirong though. I think what um Mr. Rekin was and what the what that suggested was there's areas upstream to slow the water down with
>> Right. And so you're talking about upstream. We didn't talk about downstream where the water dumps out. Right. we didn't talk about and the other part of this I think has to do with state legislation with runoff with commercial properties and runoff you know when I grew up and visited Garden
State Plaza and I'm sure all of you know it was an outdoor mall there was a gravel out there there was no Macadam there were no corrugated pipes 24 in and 24 in going to the same sprout brook that went through from point A to point B 24in corrugated pipes from runoff
that's collecting that turning like a faucet that fill that like that, right? But I I think it's a multifaceted prog uh problem, but I think the solution some of the solutions that that are presented I think will definitely definitely bring relief. Um uh whether
you know it's not all all targeted into the park, but the park is definitely part of the solution and getting everybody on board the neighboring towns on solution and maybe reaching out downstream. I agree with you first, >> right? That's the first step.
>> We got a contact downstream. Let's knock on that door. >> Anybody else? Yes, Mr. Davidson. >> Do you mind if I sit please? >> Please. Sir, I'm not sure if you're aware that uh I had set up a meeting with the
county probably about eight years ago, if not even a little bit longer. I'm starting to lose track of the time, but we had all the towns from from Ridge Ridgewood all the way to Wellington there. Prior to that meeting, um, through the assistance of the police
department, I was able to get a drone up and and actually fly the drone over the river, which we utilized and also the county wound up doing it as well. Um, so this way here gave us a good idea what was going on or what the conditions are
at the for now. I know that we can get those records back. I have the engineer um wrote a few reports on that. I don't know Dean whether or not you've seen them or not. >> Yeah, if you don't mind there may >> please. So yeah, it was 2020 by it was
my first official action or your request is when I first made chief we had Lieutenant Kakowski drive that. We actually I've shared that with Senator Booker's office that report the letter from um the Boswell engineer at the time. >> But we also but we also had a Ken Job was the engineer prior to that one. That
was when they had a meeting with the county. Um, I'm sure I can either get it either you can get it through the represent here or we can get them through uh Ken himself. The other thing is I have to agree Charlie I mean I go back quite frankly to the election day
back in back in the 70s. I forget exactly what year that was. 77. Okay. So I go back to 77 as far as flooding is concerned. I and I was all I worked each and every one of them since other than one when I was not in town but um so so
I've had quite an experience myself and I and one of the things you really have to understand and take a look at is where the Jason town apartments are in Washington that is the major issue if that is not and there's really I don't know how you correct that it would it
basically turns the whole river back and and that's where you get a lot of back, you know, where this it all falls back into Wellington. So, uh, one of the things that they also was able to toh come across at this meeting is that a
lot of the properties in Loi that there were that they were a lot of the businesses and so forth were encroaching onto the onto the properties and I don't think that's ever been corrected. So these are these are there's a lot of things that need to be done just to try
to help a little bit. Now I I had the experience being out in in the desert. I lived in the desert for a couple of years and I found it to be very interesting because I actually had was able to watch what they wound up doing
out there from the with the mountains with the water coming in, you know, going into the various uh communities and how they built their spillways. It was extremely uh interesting and it really would it's it's a wonderful idea,
but we can't do that here. We're too flat. So you you can build all the you can put all the square ways you want here. First of all, it's not going to do a thing. I I wish it could, but it's not going to do it. And and be honest with
you, there's only one way to correct this. And it's not a it's not a pleasant one, and that's through Blue Acres and where we built in the flood zones. That's that's the problem. I mean, it's the reality that, you know, homes were built where they should not have been
built. quite frankly and and so and everything else. You're just trying to mask it. I'm sorry to say it, but I'd be more than happy to work with you if if you know if you wanted me to. I'd be more than happy to do that, but and I'm not a naysayer.
I I definitely would love to be able to see something that's done done correctly. Um, but I also am a realist and I understand very unfortunately and believe me I have worked really hard with the town here uh throughout the years to to to try to to correct to to
do whatever I could possibly do. We had we had the meeting with the county. I actually had Mr. Dedesco on the phone. Promise you the world. I'm sorry. All these people they promise you promise you promise you get nothing done. you
know, studies or all that is is you all you're doing is funneling money to these various companies and you're you're wasting your money. I hate to say it, but I've seen it over and over again. There was a bike path was supposed to be done. A multi-million dollar uh you know
uh project. Okay. All the money went to the engineers. Never got built. >> We found that study from 2015. >> Yeah. >> It's over and over again. All it is is this is just how they fund the the uh
their people set it this way here and get reelected. Sorry about Thank you, Mr. Davidson. Anybody else from the public hearing or seeing no one, do I have a motion to close public comment? >> Motion. >> Have a second.
>> Second. >> Roll call, please. >> Committee woman. >> Yes. Committee woman Judge Corell. >> Yes. Committee Menith. >> Yes. >> Deputy Mayor Chowinsky. >> Yes. Mayor >> Miller. >> Yes. Thank you, M. Refining. Before you go, I just want to give you the
opportunity to restate the objective that you outlined in your presentation. Is your goal to find a magic wand and make flooding disappear in Bergen County entirely? You can use that mic actually that's right in front of you as well. lights on
on the bottom. >> Is that working? >> Yes. >> Okay. So, uh I I wish I had a magic wand, but uh but I don't. Um I mean, this to make and and we're never
going to eliminate flooding risk. We can try to minimize it as best we can. That may be only 10%. I I hope it's a lot more than 10%. But there's a lot of steps we can take. What we're trying to do is to make action happen because we
are the number one at risk county in the United States. We can't sit around and just wait for the inevitable to happen. So the the vision is or has been we will play offense. We will get the seven communities together. We will work
together to put together a new much stronger application. Um, we have filed with Oprah to find out who won and why they won, what was in their application and what was successful. So, we can learn from that. Um, and you know,
frankly, there's well-meaning people at the county, but they put together a lousy application, and we will hand them a much stronger application because it still needs to be the county as the prime and hand them this application. But then I I believe long-term these
communities should work together to make sure that this isn't a one-off. We have a voice, we have an organization, and we can be listened to um instead of, you know, every now and then we get somebody's attention when there's a big flood. We have to have a regular steady voice. Thank you so much, Mr. Ruffkin.
Anyone else from the township committee? Uh we look forward to collaborating with you and your organization and hope to see you in the near future. >> Great. Thanks. Thanks for the opportunity. We look forward to working together. >> Absolutely. Thank you so much. >> All right.
Next up, we have a presentation from fire prevention, a budget presentation. Sean, you want to come on down? >> Uh, you can take a seat right here. Yeah. Do you want? >> Sure. That'd be great. Thank you so much.
Thank you. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Good name. >> All right. Bear with me. to do one. Make sure >> on the base.
>> There we go. Bear with me. I've never had to do one of these before. Uh so I'm representing the Bureau of Fire Code Enforcement to our operating budget requests. I'll just walk through my worksheet. I gave you a copy of what worked well, needs to consider, and our new priorities to outline the new year.
So our funds last year support a prompt investigation of all fire code related complaints, violation issuance, and postfire investigations. All of our operating was kept within budget, actually under budget, and we had no emergency overages. Needs to consider for the upcoming year.
Uh wasn't really applicable. I couldn't think of a whole lot um because my budget in the grand scheme of things is quite small. Uh the only thing I could consider towards the end of the year, I had to make a couple of purchases that would have normally come out of my operating out of my penalty trust
account only because I know we had financial constraints towards the end of the year last year. So, um, I probably would have used up the entirety of my O and I spent about $9,800 last year. I probably would have, you know, spent that extra 6,000 towards the latter half
of the year, but it ultimately was a non-issue for me. Uh, new priorities for the year, budget will be allocated for inspection tools, personal protective equipment, uh, field equipment we have is either non-existent or significantly aging and nearing its replacement. Uh, one of my big plans for the year is to
restore fire safety education in Midland School. So, um, some of my budget will be used to purchase age appropriate materials to coincide with that. And, uh, I know one of my other projects I started last year, wasn't able to finish was I'm releting my Ford Explorer. I have little decals. I just
need to labor to install that. And that would, to my knowledge, I believe Fire Engine's always had approximately a $15,000 OE. I'm not seeking anything additional. Thank you so much, Sean. Any questions from the township committee? Go ahead,
Teresa. >> I have no questions. Sean, >> confuses me too. >> No, exactly. Sorry, Sean. Good night. >> Sean, I have a question. Uh, you have requests in the 15. >> Yes.
>> Again, for this year, >> correct? >> Um, my under misunderstanding, my understanding that it's supposed to be kind of self-sufficient self-unding on us with your penalties. We are I've been honestly I'm trying to figure a lot of this out myself is you
know stepping in by the year. I'm not sure where the 15,000 we get is allocated from. I know we intake I'm not sure where the 15 the operating expenses for the year where where that's funded from. I'm not I'm not entirely sure. I
know we intake a significant amount in our uh annual registrations, permits that that offsets my salary obligations and uh I uh to my knowledge offsets I'll say 98% of my operating. I'm just not
100% sure. I know my penalties are put in a trust account. It can only be used for fire prevention related expenditures. Basically very wide swath with everything except salaries and wages. I can use that for >> Okay. So, some of this on here or or for some equipment that you're looking for?
>> It can be purchased out of there if it needs to be there. >> Okay. And is there a fund balance on that right now? Do you have a balance on? >> Uh about $13,000. >> I'm sorry. >> About $13,000. >> And which account? >> Uh my 212A trust account. My penalty account. >> Your penalty account is 12,000. >> 13.
>> 13,000. >> Ballpark. >> Sorry. >> That's a ballpark number. It's probably some 13. >> I'm getting echoes. That's why I'm sorry. >> No, it's about 13,000. Yeah. 13 that you have left in it. >> Yeah, that's a revolving fund. So, as I issue fire code related penalties, they're either settled, negotiated,
reduced, whatever the case may be. Half of it goes to the fire department, half of it's retained by the bureau. >> So, uh, okay. So, half of it goes to the fire department, >> correct? >> Why? >> H, that's just the way the state fire codes written. So if I write Teresa's
Bagel Shop, I go I have to go back six times there, write you a $1,000 firecode penalty. >> But that's a state require. >> That's a state requirement, I guess. >> Okay. That's statute. >> That's a state statute. Yes. >> Okay. I'm just asking. >> No. Yeah, it's a state statute. Yep. >> But um so half of that goes to them to the fire department.
>> Correct. >> And then you keep the other half to use for whatever you need. >> It's it's the best way I can describe it is a rainy day fund. And I hate to use that term. Um, it's a if I need to purchase a vehicle, that's primarily what that fund would be used for. If I
need to purchase a something a little, you know, the vehicle really would be the big one I could think of. Or if uh, you know, we need a really expensive new tool, we wanted a drone last year or a few years ago, we need a new investigation camera. It's something that fund would be used
for. I do remember and I don't know what funds would come out of but I do remember um going I'm going back um there was a lettering room I'm sorry numbering needed for the outside of the rooms >> outside the building and school so god forbid there was a fire they could
pinpoint whatever it is >> um and I believe at that time the fire official >> helped the school out with that I don't know if that could come out of this funding too >> it absolutely can yeah I have a very wide discussion on what to use it for it to language the code reads is fire prevention related interests.
>> Okay. >> The only thing I can't use is for salaries and wages. That's the the only uh >> So this 15,000 that you're asking for, you already have 13,000 there. >> Yes. Um I do I would like to not die to
use that as my operating for the year only because I know my one Explorer is about 13 14 years old. Not that it has a lot of miles, but it will be reaching its replacement cycle in the next 5 to 7 years. And that's for for the inspectors to go out. >> Correct. That's their transportation.
>> Okay. Thank you, Sean. I you know, I know you've done a lot of work this year. Kind of catching up on things. >> No, I've tried. >> Appreciate it. Thank you. >> Of course. Thank you. Anyone else from the township committee? Dean, did you want to mention anything? I I heard you. Okay. >> All right.
>> Wonderful. All right. Thank you so much, Sean. We really appreciate your presentation for coming here tonight. >> Thanks. >> Thank you. >> All right. Coming up next, Chief Greco with the Volunteer Fire Department budget presentation.
I'm not ask >> No problem at all. Um when we volunteer fire department unlike fire department and such we don't have any opportunity to be self-sufficient. We don't get any registration permit violation fees.
Nothing comes into us. We rely solely on the allotted budget from the township committee. In 2025, we were allotted $100,000 for our operating budget and we're asking for an increase of 15,000 branch to $115,000 for 2026.
Some of our major expenses last year were apparatus maintenance and repairs was about $32,000 and that was a fairly good year all things considering. We didn't have any major breakdowns. um hoping we can continue that trend,
but that's not a very foreseeable endeavor. Our annual equipment testing was about 12,500. Our annual software renewals was $10,000 and equipment maintenance and repairs was 6,500.
Moving forward next year or this year rather um as with most things in the world today, we're expecting an increase in all of our annual fees, testing related fees, as well as repair costs for any equipment. Another big thing to consider is by the
end of the summer, our SCBA units will be out of warranty. So any repair cost that will now be coming out of our budget instead of being covered by warranty. Um, what was that? I'm sorry.
>> SCBA units are air tanks. They they've all been under warranty for the past 5 years as they purchased, but by the end of the I believe it's the end of July or end of August, they will all be out of warranty. They're still in good condition. They're still working fine, but any repairs
needed now will be a budget expense. >> Can you extend that warranty, Mr. Per? >> No, they don't have any extended warranty. Um the new units that they've come out with now are lifetime warranty, >> but that is a very large purchase to replace.
>> That's a lot. >> Yeah. Unfortunately, the new ones are not fully compatible with our current ones. So for us to replace, we would have to replace the entire in one set. We can't deal it little by little. >> Would you then have to do some kind of
readjusting to replace the air in the tanks from the what's it called? rescue or something when you have to replace. >> So, we would have to replace all the regulators, all the fittings on all the fill stations, both in house and on the rescue truck. Uh, we would have to modify some of the bracketing at both
the units and the rigs, as well as potentially new masks in the coming years after that. >> Thank you. >> Uh, we will be looking into grant opportunities this year, but unfortunately, we can't guarantee any.
In the last few years, we have not had a substantial amount of luck with our grants. We did receive one state funded grant last year or two years ago rather, I'm sorry. Um, but other than that, we haven't haven't been lucky enough to get
too many other grants in. So, ultimately, we do rely solely on an operating budget from the city. >> Thank you. Any further questions for Chief Greco? >> Mr. Roco, how how old are the Oh, I'm
sorry. I'm sorry. >> No, no, no, no. >> Uh, the apparatus that you have now, the trucks, give them an age. >> The oldest apparatus is from 1997, and she's showing her wear and tears. >> Which one is that? >> That's uh engine two. And then from
there, the rescue truck is a 2008, the ladder truck is a 2012, and engine one is a 2018. And the mileage also have uh two marine units. The boats uh the one boat is a
2002. The other I believe is a 2010, but don't quote me on that one. I have to I'll have to double check on that one. >> I appreci I appreciate that. So the the the which one did you say is showing warrant for the the engine? >> The one engine is is starting to show it. Yeah.
>> What year is that? That was in 197. >> And why do we have Elmer Parks piece of apparatus? We're currently borrowing on the parts rig because the R97 is out of service uh waiting on repairs. >> How long does the average firet truck
with the 1997? How long do those usually last? That just on average >> the NFPA gives them a lifespan of 25 years. >> Okay. >> So, we are right over that right now. >> Got it. Thank you. >> Right. But the the mileage on that is a little bit lower than what their
recommendation what that is. Isn't that correct? Is the mileage low enough? >> I don't believe they have a mileage cap in their standards. >> What is the mileage on it? Do you know? >> Well, again, I do not, but I can find out. >> I'm just curious. I mean, you know, this is 1997, so it's been a while. >> I I off the top of my head, I really
don't know. I have >> Yeah. No, I understand. I I understand. So there's four >> apparatuses that you're talking about just with the the vehicles themselves. Am I understanding that? >> Uh we have four fire apparatus >> engine rescue >> boats and two command vehicles
>> and also the fire gear that you're using. Just give me a full park on one alpha firefighter. >> To out of one firefighter in turnout gear, not counting a SCVA air pack, is about $6,000 >> for one >> for one.
>> Um, is there a statute that has to be changed so many years that they have to change it out? >> How many years? >> Thank you. Are there due? Are there any due chair? >> We keep that on a rotating basis. We replace four to five sets a year. That way we don't incur a major bump at one
time. So every year we replace four to five sets a year. >> Appreciate it. Thank you. >> Could you go just I was trying to get the numbers on the last last year's budget. You started out with 32,000 in repairs, apparatus repairs. I'm assuming that's engines and vehicles, running
vehicles. >> Yeah. >> And and 125 was what? What was that for? >> 125 was our annual testing. >> So that's our pump tests have to be done every year. pumps have to be tested to a certain standard. Uh our hose all has to get pressure tested. The ground ladders,
the aerial lateral has to be tested yearly. Our uh gas meters have to be tested and calibrated quarterly. So that all comes into that. >> Okay. So outside agency testing, right? >> Yes. >> Um and then 65 was equipment repairs.
What would that kind of stuff is that? >> Equipment repairs. cucumbers. Uh when the saws have to go up and be repaired, they're they're not running properly, they need to be sent for uh service. Um any of the other equipment needs to be maintained when we have the uh
>> man tools like man >> the hearse tools, the rescue tools on the rigs, they have to get serviced yearly. That all goes into the equipment service. Um any repairs that need to be done to any of that, we have to replace any aging equipment. We had a pipe break
last year. We had to replace that. That all comes out of the equipment placements. >> After that, what was the other I didn't get the other ones up to this? >> Our annual softwares last year was $10,000 for our annual software, which is the uh reporting system we use. All
our incidents get reported and documented to the state. The division of fire and safety keeps record of every incident we run through. >> That's a annual fee. >> Yes. And >> after that, did you have anything after that?
>> Uh that was all of the numbers that I was able to come through. >> Is there was there a surplus or a balance left on that from the 100,000 last year? >> That would not be uh full spent. Everything else then was upgrades to equipment that we purchased throughout the course of the year. Uh I believe at
the end of last year we were right about 92,000 spent of the 100,000. >> Okay. >> And that's just off the top of my head. So I may be a little off on that figure. >> When you say equipment you're talking
about again >> equipment could be any of these tools that we have on the rig. um flashlights, saws, axes, housings, all of our little odds and ends equipment. >> You get replaced yearly or it get uh
>> most of that has a pretty good lifespan. Um as we see a wear and tear on it, we replace it. >> Okay. >> There's no set standard to >> Okay, I think that's all I have. Thank you, >> Mr. Smith. >> Yeah, I What is Do you have an estimate?
And I'm not putting you on the spot here. As far as that, the truck that's in the shop right now, do we know what that's going to cost to be repaired? Cuz I know you're borrowing the one from Elwood Park right now. So I would like just to find out the one from 1997. What is that? >> Getting estimates. >> We're in the process of getting
estimates right now. U one vendor gave us an off the cuff of upwards of $30,000, but we don't have any uh concrete yet. I'm waiting on two vendors who come examine it to give us proper reports. And how much would a used truck like that cost or a new truck like that cost?
>> Uh, a new truck right now is ballpark about a million dollar anywhere between $900,000 and a million dollar. >> Wow. >> Okay. Thank you, >> Mr. Chair. M, go ahead real quick. >> The quote for the the dam, what is it?
It's a failure of the tank on that engine. >> Yes, the water tank had cracked and it's not maintaining it. Okay. What's that? What's the date of the tank? >> It's a steel tank. >> Steel tank, not stainless. I don't believe so. Not 1997.
>> Flex shield. Come on. A little freaking >> Go ahead, Teresa. >> Put that commercial to the test. >> Chief Breco, uh, estimate of how many calls you did last year? >> Last year we finished the year about 340 calls.
>> That was rescue calls. Every other clinical, that's a total. Yeah. Well, >> okay. >> Thank you. >> Anything else for Chief Greco? Wonderful. Thank you so much for the presentation. Very informative. We really appreciate you coming tonight. >> Thank you. >> Thank you.
>> Any other questions? >> Absolutely. Thanks, Chief. >> All right. Our last budget presentation is from our courts. So, our court administrator, Patricia Gro Gratowski. Please join us. >> Good. Good evening everyone. My name is
Patricia Kaskki and I'm a court administrator representing the court. Um, so I'm here to uh to present our 2026 budget proposal for the amount of $23,000
uh which includes personal and salaries, any necessary operating expenses such as interpreting services, office supplies, postage um and to pay e tickets.
Um I just want to note that our uh 2026 revenue was higher by 27 and a half% by our >> Yes, I am so sorry. So yeah, our revenue for uh for the year of 2025 was higher
by 27 and a half% compared to 2024. >> Um >> thank you. Uh do you know uh of that uh $200,000 number what is the OE um request the operating expenses for the
the court? >> Um around 25,000 >> 25,000 and what was do you know the number off top of your head what it was last year? >> I I don't remember exactly but I think it was like 175
>> total to what the that's what Okay. Yes. All right. Any questions from the township committee? Wonderful. Thank you so much for that information. We really appreciate it. All right.
Moving right along. Any discussion? >> Any correspondence? >> Yes, Mayor. We have one we have one piece of correspondence. It's a letter of commendation for the police department. If I may, mayor, >> please.
>> Okay. It was a lengthy letter. So, I will read a summary and um into the record. Uh the writer expressed sincere gratitude to the Roers Park Police Department, particularly Detective Nick, for his professionalism and compassion while she reported years of abuse. She
highlighted Detective Nick's calm, respectful approach, his support during a difficult special victim's unit interview and his continued followup, including informing her of the suspect's arrest. And I'll go ahead and I'll read the last two paragraphs of the letter. Detective Nick exemplifies what law
enforcement should be at its very best. His actions reflect not only his own character, but also the standards, leadership, and values of the Bchaw Park Police Department as a whole. Your town should be deeply proud to have officers who lead with both strength and compassion when it matters most. Thank
you for fostering a department that treats victims with seriousness, respect, and humanity. I will never forget the professionalism and care shown to me within your roles. And that's all I have. Mayor, thank you. >> Thank you so much, Gina. And thank you, Detective Nick, for his constant support and professional.
>> Last name, please. >> It's McRone, right? >> Wonderful. I read that I read that letter and it's I was talking to Dean before. It >> makes you really proud to know that someone like that works for this police department. It was >> choked me up reading it.
>> Absolutely. Thank you so much. That was touching. >> All right. Uh approval of the agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the agenda tonight? >> Motion. Have a second. >> Second. Roll call, please. >> Committee woman. >> Yes. Committing woman judge crello. >> Yes.
>> Committee men. Yes. >> Deputy Mayor Chinsky. >> Yes. >> Mayor Miller. >> Yes. All right. Reports. Uh, let's go to this side. Jen, would you like to start? >> No. >> Jen. >> Yeah. >> Sorry.
>> Okay. The volunteer fire department for the month of January had a total of 32 calls, 10 mutual aid calls. On January 1st, 2026, Primus Fire Department requested Roshaw Park Fire Department engine 2 to
respond to a working fire in their town. Roshell Park responded and was put to work. We were assigned with checking hotspots for the overhaul. That's for the fire department. Uh OEM, they had a recent OEM
reorganization and planning meeting and tabletop exercise. I unfortunately couldn't attend because I was sick, but I'd like to thank everyone who did attend, especially our OEM coordinator, Pete Donatello, and the emergency management team for organizing a
productive and well-received session. I understand that it was a valuable and informative exercise. The meeting covered life safety priorities, staff ro confirmations, emergency contact updates, flood prepare preparedness
initiatives, register ready updates and prophylactics distribution plan, emergency operations, uh plan review, races, coordination and planning for the future of special events in town, including FIFA and the
World Cup tabletop exercise. Uh the department reports were also provided by the police department, fire department, DPW, our search team, administration, fire prevention, crisis response, building, Midland school, EMS, and health. That's that for OEM. For the
Boy Scouts, the Boy Scouts will be hosting their annual spaghetti dinner and tricky tray on March 21st at the American Legion. The tickets are $10 for adults, $5 for children if purchased in advance. Day of the event, tickets will be $12 for the adults and $6 for
children. Seating times are 2:30 to 4 pm, 4:30 to 6 p.m. So, there's two seedings. And to please contact Diane Vasslet for tickets. Sorry, Diane. Uh, the veterans, it's that time of year
again. The hometown hometown hero banner program is open for enrollment from February 16th through March 30th. They're accepting new applications from anyone interested in participating in the program. The cost of each banner is $225, which guarantees the display for 3
years. And they said to please note that due to normal wear and tear, they can only guarantee the banner for this three-year period. If you're interested or would like additional information, please contact the commander, Dennis Duty. That's it for me. >> Thank you, Jen. Matt, take it away.
last was it last week I believe Kier's Engineering was out to see our existing pump station. Um the only update that I'm aware of is that they did the on-site conditions assessment of the pump station um of the structure and while some
features are still in working condition, others are not. They're aware of that their specialists are reviewing the data and will be able to provide a preliminary report by this Friday. So, we don't have any full information yet, but they're working on it and they're
getting back to us. With regards to um Matthews Field, for those of you who don't know, the fieldhouse is under construction. Been working hard at um getting the carpets up, the floor down, preparations being made. Found a couple little goodies on the floor. And we're
getting there. progress opening targeting for opening day for baseball that that place will be redone to complement what was been done by the field. Hats off to Dean for getting the the grant for the field which is covering the cost also of that
renovation on that at Matthews Field Fieldhouse. Um regarding Midland School, they're under a serious search for a new superintendent. In the meantime, they have an inter interim, but they are they
are hot on the prowl. Um, I did see police activity there today. Was there police activity there today? You're not aware of All right. I I was not aware of No, >> can't talk about We can't talk about the police cars I saw outside today, but
they were >> about students, you know, over >> there. All right. Um, in any case, thank you all and that's all I have for now. >> Thank you, Matt, Sean. All right. Uh, thank you, mayor. Um, now, uh, for Wreck, uh, Wreck is having
their inaugural family day, which is, uh, this February 28th. I contacted, uh, Mark a couple of weeks ago, finding out if we needed any more signups and seeing how everything was going. It was sold out. 75 families, preK to third grade.
It looks like it's going to be a really great event. So, kudos to Wreck on that. Um, Egg Hunt Carlock will be 3:28 March 28th at 10:30 a.m. Make sure you're there for that. Uh, Rochelle Park Day
will be May 16th this year. So, make sure you put that in your calendar as well. Uh, baseball registration closes March 15th. Please sign up right away. Please do not wait for the last minute because it's really important to them
they get a good headcount so they're able to disperse the teams and make sure that you know it just makes things a lot easier. Um basketball is doing great although my team is one and three. Uh >> we won the championship last year. We
can't win it all the time. >> Yes coach anyway. Uh so yeah, thank you coach Scott Serendai who's actually my coach is with me. He's been today we have practice. So thank you Scott. Um and yeah, it's been really great. Thank
you Midland School uh because we only have one gym in this town. Midland School has been fantastic about opening up. So thank you Midland School for helping us with basketball. Um Access for All Walters over there. We need
volunteers. It's an incredibly fantastic organization. Walter does a lot of great work. If you've ever been at any Rochelle Park, you know, event, you'll see the signs there for access. Again, it's really I can't say enough about it,
all the stuff Walter does. Um, so really, really, you know, appreciate Walter's work and, uh, the meeting will be on Wednesday, a week from today at the senior center. So, please show up and 5 to 10 hours a year. That's my I think every Rochelle Park resident
should volunteer 5 to 10 hours for the year to their community. It's not a big deal. >> Yeah. >> 2025. >> Yes. Make sure. Yes. Sign up. Yeah. >> No. >> 250. >> Oh, that's one's going right back. So,
America 250, I was talking to Michaela and Jen and everybody on here. We're all hands on deck. I would like to have a meeting by the end of the month. I realize that we're cutting it close right now, but I'm going to talk to Muel after this and we want want to make sure
that we have just an initial meeting because I think this is a really important year. I think we really, you know, to celebrate 250 years of this country is really important. There's going to be a lot of events going on all over Bergen County and all over the country. So, I think it's really important to get on board. Um, and I'm
looking for all sorts of ideas. So, I will keep you all in the loop and uh Yeah. No, thank you. Thank you. appreciate. >> Thank you. >> Thank you, Sean. Go ahead, Teresa. >> Thank you very much. Let me just start off with the health and safety. I don't
know. Can you hear me? Health and safety. Uh so, it came to um Gabe Brown's attention from what I understand that there were six Canadian geese that were found deceased uh in the county park. We were alerted on it. Animal
control confirmed that the cause of death was most likely the bird flu. So, if you see any dead birds, don't touch them. We don't want to touch any of those. Uh, so I guess we'll just keep an eye. I I believe they're going to try to
keep an eye on all that stuff, right? All right. The seniors had their meeting last Thursday. There's a Valentine's Day beam. Uh, it was very enjoyable. Wonderful singer was there. Uh the the chief uh also uh Lieutenant Katowski and
Captain Deprada came spoke with the seniors about senior scams that seem to be popping up um and and they gave a good explanation on that and also it was um uh the chief brought up about uh
crossing guards. We're in desperate need of crossing guards. So anybody who wants to be a crossing guard I they can see um the police department, right, Chief? They can come over to there. >> Correct. Correct. Um we actually did get one applicate one applicant as a result of that. So I'm glad glad we won through
there. >> That's that's great because we do need >> we could use more. We could always use more. >> Well, I think there's substitutes you need to. Right. Correct. So um so that was good. I'm glad they came in and spoke about that. And also the scans. If you think you're being scammed for any reason, whether you're young or old,
that's my answer, contact the police department and they'll tell you, you know, this is true or this is not, cuz it seems to be getting worse and worse and they seem to be targeting seniors a lot more and I believe that was said by Captain Deprad. Um, so that that's the part of it. Uh, the next meeting is on
the March 5th for the seniors at 1 p.m. Library library meeting was held February 9th. Uh there's going to be a program held this Sunday, February 22nd, and it's hands-on with uh it's food making with making smoothies. It's kids
ages 5 through 13. I'd still like to know how to make a great smoothie. So I yeah, show up at um >> there's also story time twice a week on Saturday at 10:30 and Tuesday at 10:30. And Thursday is drop in techtutor at
12:00 p.m. For anybody that's not techsavvy, that would be myself. Um, and I'm going to report from the police department. And this is for the month of January. The police department answered 1,418
calls of service, 54 motor vehicle crashes, 115 EMS calls, 274 motor vehicle stops, 11 arrests, 16 criminal charges, and 595 summones issued. The police department has worked alongside
the DPW during the past big storm we had, helping them safely plow the streets by getting the residents um to remove their cars and basketball hoops, affirm roadways, and enforcing the ordinance against throwing snow in the streets, which you know seemed to be a
little bit a major problem that was going on. Um we had uh in January some of the department members uh qualifications for the rifles um including uh the new SEO uh had to qual make sure they're they're
qualified for those. Detective Bureau was directly involved in assisted Bergen County Prosecutor's Office in several investigations that cumulated from criminal arrest, including 11 illegal firearms possession and aggravated
sexual assaults that took place in Rochelle Park. Administratively, department is preparing for the World Cup, possible pop-up parties and large crowds that come with those. Um they're also meeting with other departments within the county
to work together with that. Um they're also we're also looking ready to move forward or they're asking to move forward with the replacement of a recently retired lieutenant. Hopefully we can work on that be able to start progress working on that um and discuss with the town council committee and to
continue the or provide the high level of services for our residents have become accustomed to. Now, on a sad note, uh I was notified by the chief this morning that um detective, I'm sorry, officer
Mike Gallagher passed away this morning. He was a retired police officer for 20 years. Um Chief, would you like to talk a little bit more about uh Oh, sure. Absolutely. Um yeah, Michael was hired back in um
1996. I actually know Michael from being a kid. Mike was a heck of a wrestler and a tougher football player, tough fullback is, you know, one of the toughest that you could have. Michael decided to move down to Washington DC where he started his career with the Metropolitan PD. Uh then came back up
here. He was hired as a dispatcher by us and then eventually went through the police academy. Um retired in 2013 after spending his entire career in the patrol patrol division as well as u our motorcycle unit. U Mike will be missed dearly. He um unfortunately you know his
body gave into a longterm illness that he was suffering from. >> Thank you. So um you know I remember Michael with his two brothers as children years ago. Um and I know they lost their mother a few years ago. Um so our I hope I speak for the council when
I say that our thoughts and prayers are with the uh Gallagher family um during this difficult time. And that's all I have. Thank you. Thank you so much. Uh my reports. So I just want to start by saying I know this is Dean's last
meeting as administrator and I want to thank him on behalf of all of us up here for his service in this role. He's put a lot into this job and I appreciate his leadership and support over the past four years. And I know every employee at town hall, every volunteer, every
department head, and every member of this governing body and previous ones likely has a story of calling Dean with a problem or a question and him helping it sort it out with patience, professionalism, and a quick response. And I also know that after March 1st,
even if any of us reach out to Dean with a question or in need of a quick reminder, uh Dean's still going to pick up the phone and answer with the same professionalism and diligence he always has. And I know he's going to support his successor in this role and want her to succeed
because that's the kind of leader Dean is. So, thank you so much, Dean. administrator reports. I'm illprepared. Uh just briefly, mayor, um want to touch on some of the things that you're going to be voting on real soon. Most importantly, the open space grant that's referred to as in a
resolution that's for the dog park. Um I just want to pass along that the application period for the next fiscal year or this fiscal year is open space um grant applications are the letter of intent needs to be sent by the uh middle to late March. I did speak to Gina about that. I'm going to ask this committee
come up with some ideas, thoughts, what where you'd like to see if any. So that way um when Samantha comes on board, she's, you know, has some ideas of what to send uh to the county. And again, thank everybody for the opportunity to serve in that in that regard. I always put RP first, never DP. And that's I
will continue to do that um in my coming months and years that I have left. So thank you. Thank you so much. It's not goodbye, it's see you down the hall. Appreciate it. >> Can I May I ask one? >> Yeah, please go ahead. Did we not receive a very large check today?
>> Yes, we did. So, and it was probably received the other day. I I being off day, but yes. So, we've continued to receive the checks, Bob. It's the MOU with the Garden State Plaza to Westfield uh created way back when um long term long time ago. We received that check
again. We get that every year. Um it's money given to the township by the ownership of the Garden State Plaza for the inconvenience caused to this municipality by having such a large mall when they expanded. Um and you know that was received and will be deposited by the finance if not already done.
>> Yep. Yep. >> Thank you uh clerk. Just briefly, mayor, um I don't have any uh reports relating to the township um clerk's office, but I do want to thank uh administrator Pinto for um he played
a instrumental role in my smooth transition here when I first came on as a township clerk and he has been such a great support and we look forward to um working with him as the police chief and uh welcoming his successor and uh
continuing the successes we've seen. uh with our administrative team. That's all. >> Well said. Thank you so much, Gina. Attorney report John. >> Uh no, just joining Gina's comments. It was a pleasure working with Dean as his capacity as both the chief and the
administrator and uh I think that we were able to accomplish a lot during the tenure together. Thank you, John. >> Thank you, John. All right. >> One more thing, >> please. Go ahead. >> Uh I just want to reach out to um Mrs. Kim. Her birthday is coming up and we
won't be here on that. >> So, happy birthday, Gina, because I know you always recognize all of us. Thank you so much. >> Happy birthday, Gina. Thank you. >> One year older, none the wiser. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> All right. Any new business?
No. All right. Do I have a motion to open up to public comment? >> Motion. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Roll call, please. >> Committ one PG. Yes. >> Committeewoman Josh Cavlla. >> Yes. >> Committee Smith. >> Yes. >> Deputy Mayor Chowinsky. >> Yes. >> Mayor Miller.
>> Yes. All right. Public participation is now open. Please state your name and the township you reside in. For the record, you have 5 minutes to speak. And please note that each person may speak once. might just have to adjust the microphone. Diane, I apologize.
>> Diane Bhassel Park. >> Um, I'm Well, first I want to say thank you, Jen, for announcing. If anybody wants anybody, I do have them tonight. Excuse me. If anybody wants any, yes, >> I'll see you after the meeting. Um, I have two questions. When builders get
work permits, and I guess Matt, you would know this, but you're an in town person who's done stuff for a while, so it' be different. So, I'm talking about builders that aren't always working in town. When they get a permit, are they given like a list of or ordinances like when to work, not to work on Sunday, or
what time to start work or whatever. I'm just curious if that's something that's an automatic, or do they have to ask for it? >> That's something they have to ask for. Uh, so if they choose not, do they won't know rules? >> Well, I think in anywhere in this in Bergen County or the state of New
Jersey, it's it's pretty common. >> Oh, okay. >> Uh, as far as time, start times and stop times may vary a little bit from community to community, but the the message is the same. >> I'm saying that because I've seen a couple of crews, and I'm not trying to get anybody in trouble, but that working
on Sundays, and I did think that was something they're not supposed to do, but I'm not going to report them or anything like that. I'm just curious if they're automatically told not to. That's why I was curious. Um the other thing, um and this was done by the committee, not by the land use. Um you
had ended tenant review process and I understand part of it was the concern about cost and everything. But now when tenants move in, they just move in. And there was even a case that was mentioned, I don't know, I read it somewhere where they uh where they were
making Srirachi sauce and after they were in the fumes like the neighborhood, it was very strong and like the neighborhood had issues. So I'm thinking any company could move in anywhere and once they're in they're in. So we don't know if they have enough parking. We don't know if they're doing something
making cheese of things. I mean I don't know. I'm coming up with but anything they could be doing. We don't know what they're doing. Once they're in, they're in. And we don't do home um inspections either. And I know there's a thing where it used to be anyway that um when a new tenant moves
in, whether it's an apartment, any of the we have in town or two three family house or whatever. When a new tenant comes in, it used to be that they had to have an inspection before another one moves in to make sure they have the carbon monoxide, all kinds of stuff.
Now, nobody has to say that they're getting a new tenant. So, what happens to all those whether it's a commercial or private review? >> I'm hearing a lot of whispers. Who wants to >> I I'd like to I'd like to chime in a
little bit on this. >> Go ahead, Mr. Trinsky. >> So, yes, we used to have a tenency review, right? I I >> I think there's a a common ground for this, and I don't know if we have this, Dean. I I'm in the process. I I just actually It's funny you mentioned this because
that's something that's been on my mind. Um I'm was made aware from a couple other communities that they have a tenency application that has to be filled out that has all those requirements that they would normally have to uh that they would see before a
land use board that they have to physically fill out and that application has to be approved by the zoning official. in that application. It's a public record. It's on record and it could be opened. It it could be um it could be brought back out and on there
it has all those those questions. How many parking spaces do you have for your employees? How many parking spaces do you have for your your your clients? and you know, signage, everything that the land use board or the the planning board
would have seen prior to them taking that space. >> In other words, somebody moved in and didn't do that. >> Well, I don't I don't know if we I honestly don't know if we have an application for that, if there's an application that we have or what the pro I don't know what the current process is right now. And I know that we should
have an application for that. >> Something for tenants. >> We got rid of it. But no, but when a commercial tenant comes in, they have to get typically they have to go to the building department to get a sale and if they need a variance, they got to go before the court. The only change in the ordinance was so to not make it
difficult for a tenant to start a business in a landlord because otherwise it would be a two or three month process before he can get into the rent space. So it's not that a tenant can go in and do whatever they want. If they conform with the zoning ordinance, there's nothing that the board can do with the tenant review anyway. So if I come in
and I'm a tenant in a commercial zone which is permitted in the zone and I don't require any variances, it doesn't matter what I say to the board, they can't deny me the right to rent the space because I don't need any relief. >> So they wanted to eliminate the review
process to to the extent that it didn't really serve a purpose. >> But is that an inspector? Somebody goes in and says, "I want to open a whatever business and whatever the space was." And I'm not talking if it was a doctor to adopt, something like that, something different. They fill out the application then what
is it? >> Well, I don't know. I don't know what the process I don't know what the process specifically is here if they're filling out an application. But they do have to go to the building department. >> Correct. Yeah. >> And they do have and the zoning officer or whatever has to would ask them the question, what type of business are you
putting in? Then he would tell them whether or not it's permitted use in the zone or not. >> So, they do have to speak to an official. That's okay. >> Yes. >> And I I I I know Mr. Rings back there. I believe with change over in apartments, do they not have to go through the fire
prevention to have it reins each time they change residence on that? >> Only if they report it. >> We uh Yes. Any change in tendency to families or apartments are subject to an exception by us. If you find a change tendency without notifying us, we have
the authority to evict them until >> Thank you. So they they have to tell you >> they have to. Okay. >> Okay. That's what I wanted to know. >> So to further that, I I think the key is in the application itself and where that application is visible. That's what's
going to be helpful. >> And with rebuilding a website and what we're planning to do uh to make everything more transparent, if we can possibly have that transparent to to a link, it would be it would be very powerful. Once you have your full-time person,
they'll be there to ask the questions when the person comes in and says, "I want to open a whatever business." As you said, if they're there to ask them the questions, then that's perfect. >> But they have to fill out they have to fill out an application, >> right? But I'm saying there during the
day, there'll be someone to ask them a question or answer questions. Either way, >> should most commercial tenants are going to do their due diligence because they're not going to want to enter into a lease and then find out they can't operate their business there after the fact. >> Mhm. >> You know, I'm not saying it can't
happen. It would be a very >> I mean, it would be a a commercial tenant who really doesn't know what they're doing is not to go through that process. Well, I guess I'm thinking back to a business that opened in town that back
then when they had it come to I don't remember zoning or one of the other and there were questions asked where they expected to just open the business and then questions were asked by the board at the time. I'm not saying they didn't do their job where the company thought they could just come in and open and the
end result was, "Wait a minute, you're going to be using chemicals. You're going to be doing this. You're going to be doing that." And it ended up being several months till they got through the process. So I'm not questioning it doesn't happen. I guess and I didn't realize there was a requirement. So I appreciate that Sean that a tenant has
to report well should report it or else there's questions. So that answers that. >> That's a legal point. >> Okay. And you said about they may get information about working on Sundays and when they start or whatever they should know. >> Yeah. I don't think it's I mean there
might be a bulletin that's posted in I don't I I haven't been in the seen it in the building department but there a lot of times it's posted in building department operational hours for contractor they'll put it a posting in there so when you go in to get a permit you'll see you know Monday through Friday >> whatever
>> Saturdays no Sundays >> but again if you're a contractor and you're operating in the state of New Jersey or in Burton County specifically I think it's pretty uh common place from municipality to municipality not to be working on Sundays, not to be
working past a certain hour or before a certain hour. I I know that from from experience. Let me >> just on that thing. >> Thank you, Diane. Thank you, everybody. Yeah, I I do love that idea and that contribution from Diane just about fast facts for builders that enter the
building department. Um the for anybody though that wants to know Rochelle Park's ordinances, uh our code book is online. If you just Google codebook 360 Rochelle Park, you can also search keywords such as sidewalks, trees, and
you'll find our uh ordinances on those uh policies there. Thanks so much, Mr. Davidson. Uh first of all, my deepest condolences to the police department and to Michael's family. Uh not going to say
anymore. Uh the other thing is I just like to know have you heard anything from the county which seems to be my favorite governing body. Um if reference to Rochelle and Railroad has and the only reason why I'm asked is I just got done
reading an article about and actually somebody mentioned here on the day about the soccer and and the county is going to be improving three intersections in the area of Metife. Well, the last I checked, there's been many, many
football games, concerts, and everything else. Why in the world we need to be fixing any intersection there when we have when our project has been sitting out there for at least one maybe 10 years? What is going on? Maybe somebody
can put out another phone call to them because it seems like you get no answers from them. >> Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Davidson. Any recent updates on Rochelle Avenue and Railroad? >> No, nothing. And I I typically reach out quarterly. Um but and yeah, to be doing roadways down by the stadium when
there's no vehicles allowed in the parking lot doesn't make much sense to me either, Mr. Davidson. But I could follow up tomorrow. I'll definitely shoot an email over. I have a great relationship with Kenny Aronberg and Mr. Dutch as well, and I'll go, you know, find out what where we're at. >> Understood. Yep. That's why I'll go
right to them. >> Thank you. Anybody else? Yes, please. This is actually my first time coming into a council, so I appreciate just your patience with me. Uh my name is Alan Tori. I live at across the street
120 West uh known as Adelfford. Been there a resident for almost 2 years now. Um you know, we're so close to the proximity of Garden State Plaza up in the summers. There's kids doing donuts um for 20 30 minutes. Fine, so be it. It
affects your sleep. Um, most recently we had a big storm. Um, they were doing snow removal from 10 p.m. till 2:00 a.m. And I know that there's like no legal jurisdiction for you guys. So, my first course of action was let me call the
premise police department. Um, I called on the hour every hour from 10:00 p.m. till 2:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m. Um, and I was speaking to the dispatcher. They would not send me over to the police department to speak oneonone. And so they're responsible as we're talking to
GSP management. Um they contracted work from 10:00 p.m. until I guess whenever the hell they were even finished. Excuse my profanity. Um and so it's becoming an issue now where it's cons consistent where GSP doesn't really care about the noise that is contributing over into our
side. And you can see that it's such a small street. You have homes, residential units on the side there. You have us that are tenants. Um we're so close in proximity and the biggest thing I'm sure it's the biggest eyesore. Um you see it it's big circus that they are
now. Um so even just today I came home from the office. I drove an hour. Came home had my windows dry. I'm like probably done practicing um with everything that's going on in the surface right now. So, I'm seeing I'm seeing a pattern change and I feel
let's, you know, nip it in the buck before it gets to the extremity of, you know, we we have nights that are exactly the same as that one night where we were awake from 10:00 p.m. until 2:00 a.m. And I'm just the bottom of the barrel. I'm just I'm what, 28 years old that have a husband and a dog. There's people in our resident building that have 61y
olds, 2-year-olds, kids. Um they're closer to that side of the building where they have windows. The circus isn't even ongoing at certain times of the night and they still have glaring lights um going into our apartment buildings. The light transfers
and bounces off Columbia storage unit into my apartment. And so, you know, I'm not getting a lot of leeway with premise police. Every time I call them, they're like, "Well, they're contracted to do work." And I'm like, "Can you send a police presence over?" I think you know, you mentioned um Matthew. So there
there's certain ordinances where there shouldn't be noise after a certain time affecting us. I mean I pay a pretty penny for that apartment building and there's moments I have to end up leaving because I can't even stay inside the apartment building and enjoy, you know, my home piece of choir or read a book. And so it's becoming a really big issue.
Um I just wanted to come as a resource for you guys. if you have another resource that I can reach out to. You can see I'm being proactive and you know this is not my commonality coming to a board and you know expressing all of the things that are going wrong. But I think like it's just been so consistent. My
sleep schedule's growing at this point. Um yeah, any words that you guys can help us with? >> I appreciate you bringing that to us. I'm going to pass it over to our police chief uh who can speak more to this. >> And while I'm still the administrator, please send me an email. And there's two emails you can get me on. It's either adminj.gov
or DP pinto roparpd.org. Um I will say I've had great relationships and I say had because unfortunately Wesley Rabies and Lawrence Allen I believe have moved on from Westfield who was the ownership. Um, I don't I but I will still reach out to them. I'm sure their emails will get forwarded and I'm talking this is the
Westfield Corporation out in California were my contacts and only because I had a similar situation from our residents down on Harvey Avenue were complaining about the driving school and I actually was able to get the plaza to get the driving school to remove the backup alarms off the tractor trailers so those residents weren't woken up all you know
and and annoyed by that. So I promise you I like the promise PD why we have a local PD because we're responsive to our residents. I will absolutely follow up and make those phone calls. I'll make those uh attempts and and if you email me, I will copy on my email uh responses
so you can see firsthand and I I make you that promise. >> Okay. Appreciate it. >> Anything we can do in the short term? >> Um circus is going to be >> unfortunately circus is going to be ongoing. Again, you know, like you said, jurisdiction, we really have no jurisdiction over that. I can again when
I send this email to them when I ask, hey, can you maybe at least put blinders on, you know, we did this again in a business here in town at 365 West Street. Their parking lot lights were blinding our neighbors and I was able to get management to u actually dim the LEDs and to put blinders or um basically
metal panels on the lights so that right um and again I can ask for that and I will reach out to I have a great relationship with the prime police chief um as do some people sitting up on it. So, um, and I know Chief Gadetti will, you know, probably share and try and help me if I, if possible.
>> Okay. I'm happy to hear that you've got a good relationship. >> We'll see what happens. I can't make your promises. >> Reaches out, you know, as a resource. >> I'm um, you know, he tells me that he's sending a police presence over and we have a direct view into the parking lot >> and that's unfortunately getting, you know,
>> I will make that clear. Chief to chief, I will have that conversation. I can promise you. >> Okay. >> Okay. >> Thank you. Do you do you mind saying your name uh for the record? >> Sorry. Uh O L S E N A last name K O T O R I. >> Thank you so much. John, you also
mentioned the uh lights from the storage facility? >> Yeah. >> Um how are they affecting >> the tenants in your building and what side? I mean, is it affecting the whole building? Is it only affecting that one side closest to the storage facility? >> I've had an issue with that. Um, so my
living room window directly faces Columbia storage unit. And so in the beginning I when I moved from a blackout room to now being next to the storage unit. Um, it did affect my sleep for sure and you definitely noticed it. So if there's another tenant that's been
complaining about that, it's definitely valid. But what I will say is I think I've taken it upon myself to get curtains installed where when I do close them, it is a blackout situation. >> Okay. So, the curtains do assist, but at the >> It also depends on assuming what floor
you're on, the angle at which the lights are coming out. So, there's I think a lot of different variables to that. Me personally, my you know, experience I've been able to tackle that. >> Thank you. >> Um I'm sorry, could I ask what floor you're on? >> Sixth floor. >> So, you're on the top. >> I am on the top. >> So, it's like right right into the
window, right? >> Yeah, right into the window. Um it's not just me. I like I'm very friendly with all my neighbors in the building. I try to, you know, >> yes, I I know some people of course um and a lot of people I know we had our building manager that he reached out to
the town and the response is telephone. The response was you can't really do anything about it. >> Which town did they reach out? >> So I believe Dean maybe can check into it. I believe that's under the nuisance ordinance that we have. >> So that I don't know who in the town was
reached out to. It definitely wasn't me, but I'll find out. >> Telephone. I mean, it could have been reached out to the building department, too. I don't know who it was reached out to, but we do have a nuisance ordinance that can be enforced, >> you know, because that that's I'm talking about the building right next door, the storage thing. >> Yeah.
>> Um, and I just talked to the council about it. If it's in our town, we can enforce that. Correct. >> And the lights are coming off of the >> Let council speak on >> Well, you have the building department would have to check the plans because when they submitted their plans to get the approval for the storage, they had to show what the lighting was going to
be. And if the lighting is not consistent with the plans, then you could issue a violation or compel them to conform with whatever their plans are. Typically, they require shielded plans with no spillage. >> Yeah. >> But that doesn't mean you won't get anybody. No, I think they're supposed to
be sensor uh sensor activated because when I noticed for certain floors when there's individuals and you probably gotten calls from the TS police department individuals moving into the storage unit at like 2 in the morning making a ruckus when they walk through the storage unit some of the
floors are areensed >> and so the lights will turn off. There's a few floors at the in the storage unit that just stayed on the whole time aren't motion sensor and so and I do I it's my understanding that those are the lights that are feeding into how
>> well again that would be something the building department to look at the plans and look at the lighting is in compliance with the plans and if not to make the property owner comply. >> Thank you so much for bringing this to us. Uh we look forward to staying updated from the correspondence and
communication from Mr. Pinto, but also we really appreciate this feedback from our attorney as this is an opportunity for us to reach out to our building department on this matter as well. >> Thank you so much. >> Absolutely. Anytime. >> I appreciate any.
>> Thank you. >> Good thing. >> Anyone else hearing or seeing no one? Have a motion to close public comment. >> Motion. >> Have a second. Second. Roll call, please. Commichi. >> Yes.
>> Committee woman. Judge Cabella. >> Yes. >> Mouth. >> Yes. >> Mayor Chowinsky. >> Yes. >> Mayor Miller. >> Yes. >> All right. Introduction of ordinance. Our next item is the introduction of ordinance number 1260-26 entitled amendment of chapter 4 entitled
administrator. Do I have a motion to introduce ordinance number 1260-26? >> Yes. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Roll call, please. >> Committee woman. >> Yes. Committee women Carelloo. >> Yes. >> Mayor Vince Smith. >> Yes. >> Deputy Mayor Chinsky. >> Yes.
>> Mayor Miller. >> Yes. >> And the statement, >> please. >> Notice is hereby given that ordinance 1260-26 was introduced and passed on first reading at a meeting of the Taria Committee of Rochelle Park held today, February 18th, and order published in accordance with the law. said ordinance
will be considered for final reading and adoption at a meeting held on March 11th, 2026 at 7 p.m. in the township of Rosha Park Municipal Building at which time all persons interested will be given an opportunity to be heard concerning such ordinance. Thank you.
>> Thank you so much. All items listed below are considered to be routine and non-controversial by the township committee and will be approved by one motion. There be no separate discussion of these items unless a committee member or citizen so request in which case the item will be removed from the consent agenda and considered in its normal
sequence on the agenda as part of the general orders. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? >> Motion. >> Do you have a second? >> Second. >> Roll call, please. >> Committee woman. >> Yes. >> Committee Judge Carllo. >> Yes. >> Committee Smith. >> Yes. >> Deputy Mayor Chinsky. >> Yes. >> Mayor Miller. >> Yes.
>> Thank you so much. The next township meeting will be held on Wednesday, March 11th at 7 p.m. Do I have a motion to adjourn this meeting? >> Motion. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I. >> Thank you so much. This meeting.
>> Thank you.