Order to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, liberty and justice for all. Moment of silence to remember the service and sacrifices of the armed
service members who protect our nation and the first responders who protect our neighbors. >> Cler, please take the role. >> Councilman Freland >> here. >> Councilman Saget >> here. >> Council Quinn >> here. Councilman Brooks >> here.
>> Councilwoman Newman >> here. Councilman Salber >> here. >> Councilman Boyovich >> here. >> Council Vice President Brooks >> here. Council President Marson >> here. Adequate notice of this meeting was provided to the daily record the
official newspapers for the township of Rockaway. Notice was posted in the official boulevards of Rockaway Township Township website and notice was filed in the office of the township clerk. Approval of the minutes for the November 13th council of council regular meeting.
Can I have a motion? >> Cler, please take the role. >> Councilman, >> yes. >> Councilman Saki, >> yes. >> Councilman Quinn, >> yes. >> Councilman Brooks, >> abstain. >> Counciloman, >> yes. >> Councilman Salber,
>> yes. >> Council, >> abstain. >> Council Vice President Brooks. >> Yes. Council President Marson. >> Yes. That's seven yeses, two extension. Motion passes. Ordinance for adoption. O217 amending
chapter 7 traffic article 1 section 7-8 one-way streets sections 7-10 stop intersection and section 7-12 turn prohibitions of the revised general ordinances of the township of Rockaway County of Morris, state of New Jersey.
Can I have a motion? Is there anybody from the public that wishes to speak on this ordinance only? Is there any council discussion? Okay. So, this is the ordinance for the school lane one way. Um, I'd like to uh
give Mary the ability to uh clerk the wall. Councilman Frelander, >> yes. >> Councilman Sagen, >> yes. >> Councilman Quinn, >> yes. >> Councilman Brooks, >> yes. >> Councilwoman, >> yes. >> Councilman Saler,
>> yes. >> Councilman Boyovich, >> yes. >> Council Vice President Brooks, >> yes. >> Council President Morrison, >> yes. Yes, this motion passes. >> Thank you. >> All right. There you go.
>> Okay. Uh, moving on to the open to the public portion of the meeting. Um, I will call your name. When I call your name, please come up to the microphone, state your name and address for the record. Uh, you will have a three minute time limit. Michael,
>> Michael, 19 drive. Um, I see they strike clubhouse way today. Um, I'm still waiting for an answer or hoping to see some stop sign corners get strike, especially at Elon and North Brook side. Also, I'm still waiting for an answer
whether I can just pick up and throw out lawn signs that are all over the place and laying not even up anymore, just laying in the woods and everything else because it's basically litter. I would like an answer that I could do that without getting fined. I was fined years ago $10,000 worth of fines because I had
signs on telephone calls. I don't want to get myself in the same situation. I just would like an answer from somebody, the council or administration whether I can pick up this stuff which I consider litter. Um lastly, I've been asking for a burm. I spoke to Al the last meeting by um the
preschool on White Meadow Road between the Temple Driveway down to clubhouse way. It's all washed out. There's no storm drains there and that water comes down, enters the the preschool, White Metal Lake preschool property and then
our sump pump runs indefinitely when that water just continues to come onto our lawn because it doesn't stay in the street. There's a big brush there from the wash out. If we can get it burned because in the winter what's going to happen is when it rains after a snow it all ends up on our property then it
pumps out and freezes on the street. So, um, if we can get that BM up, that would alleviate at least all the runoff from coming onto the property. >> That's it. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. >> April. >> Hi, April. 14 Broadway. Um, hello,
mayor, council president, and council members. This is just a public service announcement for the people of Broadway. There's a new store where Party City used to be by the mall called Spirit Christmas. This store is owned by Spencers and some of the items out in the open are not appropriate for
children. So, please be aware if you have young children that there's no sign or section for the this merchandise and the store appears to have no intention of doing those things. Thank you. >> Is there anybody from the public that did not fill in fill out the sheet that
would speak? Okay. Um, shortly we are going to go into a closed session. Uh, at that point the council will go to the uh to the conference room. We should be in there no more than
30 minutes. Should we uh appear as if we're going to go past that 30 minutes, then we will uh send somebody out here to let anybody know uh should they decide to wait past that. Before we do that, um I I did want to bring up something. Um, recently our uh our clerk
has uh once again been uh subjected to trial by Facebook and there's a lot of misinformation out there that people are seizing with time and I want him to set the record straight. Um there is a gentleman, his name is David Wildstein. He runs a uh
he calls a a news site called the globe um where there was a lot of misinformation. There was a video released. Somebody seized upon that, put it on Facebook. Unfortunately, um it is full of misinformation, which quite frankly just isn't fair to the clerk or
the town. There was a statement made that um our township clerk uh failed her clerk exam. That is false. The clerk exam was not even taken. It's not even offered until April, April, March or April. It's not even offered until April. Um so she did not take the test.
She did not fail the test. Uh I did ask uh a clerk to see her grades so far. Uh there is nothing lower than a 92 and there's 100 in there. There's 98. There's I think four or five different sections. That's part of it. Um so it's
not even close. Uh there was a comment made that the township is paying for her to go to classes. That is 100% true. That is true for any town. um as it is a requirement of the position, of course, the town's going to pay for that class.
Any clerk in a in their their first position as a clerk, uh the township pays for that, right? Um actually, I think in in Miss Wley's case, she paid out of her own pocket before she was uh sworn in because she wanted to get a
jump on it. So, again, that is false. There was a statement made that she got a raise um after she quote unquote failed her test. That is also false. She did not receive a raise. She got like every other employee in the town. She
got her cost of living which was back I think in the beginning part of the year. There's no other races uh that were given for that. I can only hazard a guess as to who has been feeding this information. um you know the source of the information. I'm not going to go
ahead and say what I think, but I can only have a guess as to who that one specific person is. Um the reality is is these this is just completely misguided um pieces of information and it's an attempt to distract from what the
council the good work that the council and the town does. It never needs to get personal, right? There are people out there that wish to make everything personal, right? When you start playing with people's lives and their livelihood, you're going
over the line. All right? And I just I felt that it was important enough to bring it up here. If anybody wants to know the facts or question something that you see online and please question everything you see online, I think everybody knows that, right? If anybody
wants information, everybody here knows one of us. All right. Feel free to ask. We'll we'll give you the straight truth. Okay. Um All right. That's all I want to say about that. So, I'd like to make a motion uh or I'm sorry, resolution
R2520, resolution authorizing an executive close session in accordance with the New Jersey Open Public Meetings Act to discuss pending litigation. Can I have a motion? >> So, move second. >> Cler, please take the role. Councilman Frelander, >> yes.
>> Councilman Sag, >> yes. >> Councilman Quinn, >> yes. >> Council Councilman Brooks, >> yes. >> Councilwoman Newton, >> yes. >> Councilman Salmer, >> yes. >> Councilman Vtovich, >> yes. >> Council Vice President Brooks,
>> yes. Council President Marson, >> yes. The other piece I failed to mention was I do expect official action to be taken uh by this council after the close session. we got into close session besides >> regarding information in close session. Yes.
>> With that council down. It's called like to make a motion to return to close session. Can I have a second? >> Second. >> Please take the role. >> Council, >> yes. >> Councilman,
>> yes. >> Councilman Clint, >> yes. >> Councilman Brooks, >> yes. Counciloman, >> yes. >> Councilman Salber, >> yes. >> Councilmanovich, >> yes. >> Council Vice President Brooks, >> yes. >> Council President Marson,
>> yes. Yes. This motion passes. Uh consent agenda R25-209 through and including R25219. Can I have a motion? >> So move. >> Second. >> Cler, please take the role. >> Councilman Frelander.
>> Yes. >> Councilman Sack. >> Yes. >> Councilman Yes, >> Councilman Rose. >> Yes, >> Councilman. Counciloman, sorry. >> Yes. >> So, sorry. Councilman Salbury. >> Yes.
>> Councilman Povvich. >> Yes. >> Council Vice President Brooks. >> Yes. >> Council President Larson. >> Yes. Nine. Yes. Motion carries. Um, regarding our close session, I'd like to make a motion uh that the council directs the mayor and clerk to sign a
settlement agreement with Benard. Can I have a second? >> I'll second that. >> Clerk, please take the role. >> Councilman, >> yes. >> Councilman Sack, >> yes. >> Councilman Quinn, >> yes. >> Councilman Brooks, >> yes. >> Councilwoman H. >> Yes. >> Councilman Sal,
>> yes. >> Councilman Boyage, >> yes. >> Council Vice President Brooks, >> yes. >> Council President Marson, >> yes. Yes. This motion carries. Uh, okay. We are going to do reports. Um,
very quickly, uh, the only thing I have is, uh, I'm just going to announce that the December 23rd council meeting is going to be cancelled, which means December 9th, 9th, 9th meeting will be the last meeting of the year.
Reports, Councilman Clint, >> thank you. planning board. Uh we approved the new sign for Sketchers. We also approved the new sign for Powerhouse Gym. And we approved
a uh new new business coming into town over by the uh DAM bus uh terminal. It was an empty building. So that business is coming in. It is a
dispensary and they'll be going in over there. All right. I attended the substance alliance committee with Manny and they're moving forward with their stuff.
I also wanted to let everybody know that uh Rockway Township uh our PC Green division, which is the 9-year-old kids, uh were asked by the Giants to come there and play after the
Giants game against a team from Hold on. >> She just Giants. They Yeah, but they they would have beat him because uh Tom's River team, they
beat that team four to two at four touchdowns to two touchdowns. That's my grandson. That's the way he does it because he's the center and he's also a defense, so he's an iron man. And so they played, they enjoyed it, they had a
great time. The one thing they complained about was all the garbage that kept blowing around the field as they kept playing, but the the cheerleaders were there, some of them, uh, for for PC Green, and they all had a
great time. So, it it's a great thing that the Giants did for these kids. They got to be in the stadium. Of course, it was after the game, >> so there wasn't a lot of people there, but it was an experience that they'll never forget.
Uh, the winter sports are kicking in, basketball, hockey. So, uh, that's going forward. There's signups now for spring, lacrosse, baseball. Parents look on the
websites for those signups. Also, they're also looking for coaches, so get involved, especially when it's your kids. Thank you. >> Uh before we continue, >> I'm just I got one more thing. Happy Thanksgiving to everybody.
>> Enjoy. Stay safe. >> I'd like to direct the sergeant-at-arms. Should Mr. Lardi make another disparaging comment about giants? >> He's a door for me. >> Councilman second. Thank you, council president. I attended
the League of Municipalities uh down in Atlantic City last week, the Tuesday through Thursday. It's great to see a lot of Rockway Township people there this year, more than I've ever seen in the gone last couple years. Council Matovich was there, the mayor, Peter over there, the clerk, many, many from
our town attended. It's a great uh learning experience. Uh just learning and relationship building. And if you've never attended before, I highly recommend attending at least once just to get to know people from other towns and seeing what's going on in the state
of New Jersey. It's a lot to take in a lot. Two straight days a lot, but uh definitely I think next year it's 19th to 21st. I think they already said around 17th 19th put on your calendar two nights down there. So that was a great event. Uh this Sunday, if you're
around, Kabad is having a family event which is nice. since Sunday morning 9:00 a.m. Habad and Rockaway. Um, also was wondering if we had a date yet for the Hanukkah lighting. I'm not sure that's worked out yet. I haven't seen anything yet. A lot of people have asked. I know
we got the Christmas tree lighting, a couple other events coming up, but wonder if we can report back on Hanukkah lighting date. Um, Hanukkah is the 14th to the 21st. And just wishing everyone happy Thanksgiving. Counc.
>> Right. Thank you. No report on Mars County Commissioners. Uh December 16th will be the final open space trust fund meeting of the year and it'll be my final meeting. My three-year term is up. So it was again it was an honor being able to represent uh our area. Hope I got something good done. So again, thank
you for that mayor. Appreciate that. And I think I'll be able to apply again in 27 as large. I'd like to that's all I have. >> Council to >> Yes. I also attended the League of Municipalities. Right. It's
like uh Councilman Sackin said, it's a I think 110th uh year that they've been doing it uh over the course of four days. I think there's a lot of sessions. It's more of training for clerks and other members of
the governing body, but I attended one of the sessions that was uh in a reference to the mayor's wellness campaign. And I guess you guys I hope you guys are aware because Mayor Jackson talks about it all the time. But it was uh one of those proud moments where you
sit there and Rockway Township is recognized in the whole state of New Jersey and uh Mayor Jackson was there. Mr. Tabet um who else? >> Mr. Tabit's crew from the health department was it
>> Britney Burns? Yes. Uh Mr. Dire was there. But again, Mayor Jackson spoke in front of a group of I don't know 40 50 other mayors and governing bodies and talked about the program that he and his
uh administration started and it was uh yeah it was nice. It was nice to see that. Um that's all I have for that. Uh to Mr. Lordian sir maybe you could check you on the legal side of that. I believe that
if there's sign or anything on um public property, it's abandoned. So, I would throw it in the garbage, right? If it's private, it's somebody's property. But if it's, you know, on the street or whatever, doesn't belong to anybody.
It's abandoned property. I would throw it in the garbage. They think >> unfortunately councilman we have the the signed laws are both state and local. Okay. The
laws on election signs are somewhat easy. Okay. Signs on private property are problematic depending upon the nature of the sign. Um, mayor has instructed us to take a look
at our sign ordinance which is mostly geared to stuff you're not concerned with like you know business signs on businesses and things of that nature. Okay. Where the issue is basically a dimensional and a light quality issue to
the stuff you see you know every day like you know Harry's power washing and stuff like that. U we have to tidy it up. Unfortunately, in this process, and the mayor and I talked about this this probably two months ago, okay, the there
is new legislation pending in Trenton which has worked its way before all the committees supposed to come before the assembly next month. Okay? So, there isn't really much point in us doing any definitive with our local ordinances
unless until we see what if anything the state's going to do because as you uh with all the legislative work you got to deal with in your current position, the you get things coming from legislative committees in both the House uh the
House, the Assembly, the Senate. Okay? They work their way through the committees. If they survive that process, they're voted to the floor. Okay? Then the first consideration for passage is the assembly.
Uh then it goes to the Senate. There's usually a what I'm going to call a cross reference or cooperative committee composed of people from the Senate, people from the Assembly to have a commonly agreed upon copy of any legislation. But once they get that,
it's passed by the Assembly, they go to the Senate for final passage. So for example, the recent amendments to the Open Public Meetings Act, if you want to see that because they haven't necessarily been incorporated into the bill that you're going to find online if
you just don't open up and look for the open public meetings act. You got to reference it by the Senate number. Okay. But we got to see what's coming down. Fortunately, I've been in touch with the office of legislative services which is
an official body down in Trenton which will tell lawyers what's happening with X Y and Z and when is likely to happen if at all. So, I'm kind of tracking the the state legislation.
uh if nothing happens in a relatively short order, we'll do our best we can with our ordinances and uh you know considering the applicable state regulation. But posting in rights
of way is a problem because then you have to distinguish between state rights of way, local rights of way and private property is always problem. Not so quick. Quiver. >> Okay. Just thank you, Council President.
Um, Substance Abuse Alliance, I just want to mention a couple things with them. Uh, right now, uh, they just, uh, finalized the date for for phases. is a member of the program has four phases and the last one is celebrity day and
that will be uh in uh June actually June 1st so you you'll hear about that uh coming up uh also in they're planning fundraisers and here's save the date April 25th last year was the first bingo
fundraiser very successful and they're adding to it so that's that's another thing uh as far as uh the introduc introducing of the Sen Senate and Assembly Bill. Hopefully uh our
government down in Trenton will kick in and uh approve uh our program as a statewide uh program and it looks I think it looks pretty good. So hopefully we'll know about that soon. uh library
uh they contacted there's a the group committee for the architect on the bathroom because there's money that was set aside to upgrade the interior. uh Ford Face House, another uh they're starting to work on the uh grant money
that we received for this year again because we take they take certain things at different times of the year. And now they're applying for 2027 because you got to, you know, do it a year year ahead of time. And uh now for
the holidays, mark this down. The date, December 6th, uh just the night before Christmas, the Ford Face House will be open for people from town and pretty pretty pretty good. You have a nice uh crowd showing up and the mayor will be there and doing his
thing with the elves and uh that that'll be good. And uh that's really it. Again, Thanksgiving is coming up. Enjoy it with your family. Uh it's special now for me because you never know what's going to
happen with people and your family and your friends. So very very good time because you never know what could happen after. Thank you council. >> Thank you uh council president. Um first
thing I wanted to congratulate the uh combined Denville and Rockway Middle School hockey team for winning their championship last weekend. Uh those are sixth, seventh, and eighth graders that attend either uh Copeland or Valley View. I don't think there was anyone from Rockwood Burrow on that squad, but
correct me if I'm wrong. Um with the uh cancellation of the December 23rd meeting, um this will be my last council meeting. I will not be attending the first one in December 6th. I'll be attending my boys playing in varsity ice
hockey game. So, I will not be here. So, um, I had some things I wanted to say, but I'm going to leave on a clean and good note. So, I just wanted to thank everybody for the last six years. It was an honor to serve with you guys, and, uh, you might be hearing from me soon.
Bye. >> Counciloman, >> yes. I just wanted to thank administration for scrupling, finding getting through, and it was a lot of hard work with everyone with all the studies and whatnot, but I'm glad to see that that
is finally taken care of. And uh oh, the only other thing I want to know is do we have a a um dates for Santa going around on with the firehouses yet or not? >> We have nothing to do with that the
firehouse planet. So >> if we find out, we'll put some out there. >> Okay. All right. Happy Thanksgiving to all. Thank you, >> Vice President. Um I don't have any report. I just want to wish everyone a happy blessed Thanksgiving.
>> Thank you, Council President. U just one quick obviously I said earlier happy Thanksgiving to everybody. Um at our last meeting, I had a chance to speak to uh Mary and Rachel concerning uh their
service on the council. you weren't here. So, um I want to thank you personally for your tenure of the council uh for your cooperation for working with everybody. Uh I think any council to come can take a lesson
from this council in terms of its ability to work together productively regardless of policy party affiliation uh for the good of the whole way. So I thank you So, um, M Councilman Sack, I I thought
I'd been scoring my phone. I know I had a communication with Shan about the manora lighting and I just can't find it. So, I did text her. >> It is 12:15. >> It is 12:15. >> It Okay. I thought there was a date. So, I'll make
>> Yeah, I'll I'll make sure we announce to the council. Yeah. I'm sorry. Um, but thanks for bringing that up because I was like I It's so funny because my wife asked me the other night like, "Do we have a date for a neural?" I'm like, "Yeah, I'm positive." She told me in So, okay, we'll get that out. Um,
wanted to thank uh Peter Tabet for the presentation he put um together for me for the mayor's wellness uh campaign. So, it was pretty cool uh like councilman to said, so you go to these things and I was the third one % and
it's always like you know how are these first two presentations going to go and Peters just blew theirs out of the water and it was great. was I think very well received and as council says pretty cool to be up there for Rockway Township and getting accolades from everybody and
people asking you questions afterwards about how you did things and it's a testament to Peter but um more so Britney Bernstein and the work she did to really um you know a couple years ago when it it got put in front of me about the mayor's wellness campaign um I let her run with it and she's just done
amazing things so um kudos to Britney too. Uh, real quick, Divine Mercy Academy is having their Holiday Hustle 5K walk and run on December 6th. It's going to be starting at Peterson Field. Um, so all participants will receive a
commemorative beanie. Um, my wife and I are signed up for the walk portion. We will not be running at all. So, I don't know how long it's going to take to walk 5K. That's going to be a while, right? That's >> Okay. >> Oh my gosh. Really? Okay. So, yeah. In
the rain. take a car if you luck >> do a rosie. Um, and then I wanted to announce too that Kimberly Johnson received an assessor's achievement award at the league conference this year. So good stuff for Rockway Township um all around the league. That's all I have
tonight. >> Two things. Just happy Thanksgiving to everyone. Want to wish you all happy Thanksgiving. Um also to update you on the budget process. I've met with um almost all departments uh so far. I met today with police. I met with Allison
Fonte and engineering construction. I've met with um Dell in the clerk's office. I met with the finance team. Um the health department, all except for DPW. DPW we're going to be meeting with tomorrow. And they've been going very well so far. And uh as always, I'll be
giving the budget once it's complete to the mayor sometime in mid January or so. and then to the council in February with give you about a month's time to review it and then have our um Saturday uh morning budget meeting as a whole but
it's going very well. Thank you. And speaking about budget, we received a grant from Jersey DO 176,895 um for roadway improvement for Circle Drive and Midway Court. So where we have
Halloween res >> resurfacing curving uh again that's a portion of what the construction cost will be but uh drainage at the intersections curving and research.
>> Great. >> Um, just two things, council president. Uh, first, just a final reminder to residents that we have our second rabies clinic on the weekend after Thanksgiving, December 6th, from 9 to 12 at the road garage. So hopefully we'll see more residents vaccinating their
dogs and cats. Um, and despite the fact that the mayor and a couple of our council members did mention the mayor's wellness campaign presentation, thank you for those very kind words, mayor. um mayor did a phenomenal job presenting was very natural presenter and it was it was terrific. But I I did want to give a shout out again to Britney Bernstein who
as the mayor said has really done remarkable things with this program on behalf of the mayor and the township. And uh just two things we we designed the program uh to have social, mental, physical and financial well-being for all age groups. And this has come to
fruition. We had 44 programs in our first year in 2024. As council members may remember, we received the gold medal award from the state, uh, which only a few towns did. And in 2025, we had 70 70 some programs that were consistent with and earned points for the mayor's models campaign. So, the mayor's true to his
word. He's he's been promoting this and indulging uh the division of health to put together some really good programs and I think the residents are benefiting. Um, speaking of which, uh, we have de-stress December programs. Britney put together an amazing variety of programs throughout December. Uh
they'll be posted as they near. Uh these different programs, Project Healthy Bones, aerobics programs, Tai Chi, chair yoga, mental health programs for all age groups, uh even cyber safety and fiscal well-being. Um so again, thank you for indulging me.
>> Real real quick, I'm sorry to interrupt. So yeah, 12:15. Um we haven't been notified. We're waiting on the rabbi to approve the flyer. >> We're not so without his approval. Uh yeah, but it's definitely
>> 7:30 chief. >> Thank you, Council President. Uh just very quickly, a little bit of commentary as we move into Thanksgiving. I would like to uh say I am thankful for
Mayor Jackson. I am thankful for Lisa Pal Mary, our administrator, all of my team members here on this side of the uh the aisle. I appreciate and I am thankful for the council and all of
the members and all of the work that they do for us as a community. I am thankful for our volunteers, our volunteer firemen and fire women. I am thankful for our community that we serve. I am thankful for the men and
women who serve with me in the police department. Um, but tonight I'm in particular I would like to mention Lieutenant Matthew Tannis. Uh, he will be retiring.
I am thankful for him and his 25 years of service to our community. I'm thankful that I had the opportunity to serve alongside him. I am also thankful to his family because along with the officer's commitment, dedication and
sacrifice, their family exhibits the same dedication, commitment and sacrifice with the officer who serves. So I'm very thankful for that. Thank you. I'd like to make a motion to adjourn by consensus. All in favor?
>> I Happy Thanksgiving.