the meeting to order. Would everyone please stand for a short prayer and a salute to our flag? Almighty God, grant us the wisdom to make those decisions that are in the best interest of all our residents. May the heavenly father of us all bless
those who have given the ultimate sacrifice in service to our nation. And may he watch over and protect our service men and women now guarding the gates of freedom. Salute to our flag. 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. Jessica, statement of publication. Take notice that this regular agenda meeting of the mayor and burough council
being held on this 18th day of August 2025 has been posted and advertised in accordance with the open public meetings act chapter 231 public law 1975. Uh roll call. Council persons Bala Khesi here. Novak here.
Roberts here. Sarski here. Zabrski. Okay. Council President, approval of prior minutes. Move the following minutes of the mayor and council be approved on roll call vote subject to correction if necessary.
Second roll call. Council person's Roberts. Yes. Bala. Oh, sorry. He's not here. Not used to that. Khesi. Yes. Novak. Yes. Sarski. Yes.
Okay. All right. We're going to go run into um I got to read the red though first. Whereas section 8 of the open public meetings act chapter 231 public law 1975 permits the exclusion of the public from a meeting in certain circumstances. Whereas this public body is of the
opinion that such circumstances presently exist. Now therefore it be resolved by the mayor burough council of the bureau of several county and middle sex state of New Jersey as follows. The public portion of this meeting is hereby adjourned in order that the governing body may meet in close private session for approximately 5 to 10 minutes to discuss the following matters. Attorney,
client privilege, litigation, bus depot. Following the conclusion of said closed session, the governing body shall reconvene the open portion of this public meeting to consider any other matters which may be properly brought before it at this time. The nature and content of the discussion which occurs in close session shall be made public at such time as the need for non-
non-disclosure no longer exists. This resolution shall take effect immediately. And also uh due to a potential conflict of interest with this matter, I'm going to recre recuse myself and not participate in this executive
session. I move that we go to close. That's a problem. Is there a second? Is there a second? Second. Roll call. Council persons Roberts. Yes. So, will he abstain on the
We're not taking action. No, but he he can still vote on the close session. Reszo, he can still vote on going into close session. Yeah. Kesi. Yes. Novak. Yes. I just got one question. This is informative that no votes are needed in here though, right? Okay. I just want to
make sure. I don't like three people. Sinars. Yes. No. Just want to make sure. Okay. Need a motion to reconvene. I make a motion to reconvene. Second. All in favor?
I oppose. Okay. Go ahead. Go ahead, Jess. Public hearing on the following ordinance. Ordinance number 18-25, Burough of Seville, County of Middle Sex, Ordinance amending the Bureau's General Design Standards with regard to parking areas and front yards and
residential districts. Okay. Uh at this time, I'm going to open up for questions or comments on this. There is a fiveminut rule in effect. Um so if if you come up, please um have
your your questions or comments uh for five minutes. Jim Thank you, Mayor Jim Robinson. I want to thank the council. I would like to have been able to specifically Councilman Drowski for his efforts in
this regard. We know this situation arose not too long ago. He acted quickly. He zoomed it through. He did. And and I think the solution is a good one. He did despite the fact that some of the folks in the construction office
thought the concern about this was quote nonsense because what I read in one of the emails that emails I don't think it's nonsense. I think it's a real concern. I appreciate that Councilman Dowski is doing this so quickly. And speaking
of Zooms, it's it is unfortunate that there are two council people missing tonight. assume they're on vacation or something. Um, which to which they are well entitled. It is a shame that we
don't have Zoom so that two-way Zoom so that people could participate so that the councilman I think John has two ordinances up tonight. Mhm. Councilman Bala has another ordinance up tonight so that they could be present
for this, vote on their own ordinance, speak on their own ordinance and and enjoy the thanks on this. And and I would note just before this you went into executive session. Uh Mike had to um recuse himself and you
have two people away. So you had three council people in there in executive session. No reason the council couldn't have participated on Zoom in executive session. They did that in the past and we would have had the benefit actually you know John Dowski and Dan Balo were
both former schoolboard members so they would lend some insight that the council does not have. So you know it would have been great. There's a good This is a great example of how it would be good if not only the
citizens but council people who might happen to be away or down the shore on vacation or in the mountains or in the hospital or tied up could participate on Zoom. That's all. Thank you very much and and I appreciate that this is being
passed tonight. Anyone else? My name is Kelly Le. I'm at 19 Yolner Street. I can't I can't hear street. Can't hear you, dear. My name is Kelly Lass. I'm at 19 Yolner Street. Um
is is this on this ordinance, Miss? Uh are you talking about the driveway parking or parking out on the street? Because I get I've gotten tickets in the past because of the bar at the corner. You have to cross the line. I've gotten tickets about that. Oh, this is
and people not parking in their driveway having many parties that when we have flash flooding, if you let me explain, we have to put boards up and cinder blocks because the road is not paved correctly. So, we can't park in our own driveways. We have to park five or six
houses away. Um, this goes all the way up to 10 Street, which two cars were just ruined. Where's your house? 19 Yolner Street. Huh? Yolner Street. It's a Melrose section. Okay. It's not a um we we'll we'll we'll
go over your your issue in detail, but the protocol is we're just dealing with this one zoning ordinance, you know, on Washington Road Walking in the driveway. No, you know, on Washington Road up by up by the restaurant up by the old brick
house across the street. It had to do uh th those are very small frontage uh and it has to do you can't pave your whole front yard basically as well. Oh yeah. No, absolutely. That's but when we get to the open
public portion I I'll I'll motion to you to to come up and everything. All right. Got you. Thank you, sir. Okay. Thank you. Is there anyone else for ordinance 18-25? I'd like I'd like to say something mayor on 1825,
please. On 1825, I want to thank Dan Kil Cumins. Dan Kil Cummins is the first one that brought it to my attention and then the work of the council and right up the chain of command and also with the zoning and code enforcement, we got this
amendment changed. So again, I want to thank Dan Kil for bringing it to my attention and in communication with him on this. Thank you again. Yeah, actually we'd like to put a put a name on this ordinance to Dan Kil Cummins. He called me on the weekend um to to go over this
with him and and we had very long conversation. So Dan, job well done. We thank you. Um and with that, I'll take a motion. Who is second on? That's me. Mike. Yep. Okay. I move the public hearing to be
closed. The ordinance adopted on second and final reading and advertised according to law. Is there a second? Second. Second. Roll call. Council persons Khesi. Yes. Novak. Yes. Roberts. Yes. Sarski.
Yes. Public hearing on ordinance number 19-25 Burough of Seville County of Middle Sex. Ordinance establishing resident residency requirements for all appointments to burrow boards, commissions, and committees. This time I'll open the public portion for
questions or comments. Jim, thank you, mayor. I just want to take a second to say you're absolutely right about Dan Kil Cumins. He and I haven't talked in 20 years, but uh in the last two months, we talked every day. So, uh he he he he did his homework. He did a
great job on this. But on this particular ordinance and I know why this ordinance was being introduced but there might be some unintended consequences and in particular I am wondering if this means that non-residents on the uh
municipal alliance and safe board will have to vacate their seats and more importantly on the local emergency planning committee which is made up by ordinance is made up
by folks from DuPont, from Ashlin, by Alzo, by uh the steel mill, by JCPNL, by PSENG, uh Reliant, Red Oak and all of these CME, I think the sewage authority has a
seat here um by ordinance. So, is it the intention of the sponsor, Council President Roberts, to take those people who all have pretty important roles in the community
and unseat them from the uh emergency local emergency planning committee? Is that the intention? Jim, I'll all questions come through me. That being said, I I will repeat the words of my former colleague and
councilman Jeff Palowski, which is government is a is a living document. So, there are always going to be amendments uh to ordinances like this. There was a time when um for political
reasons, we were there were out of town people being appointed to our local boards and commissions. There will always you will always find exceptions or for the most part most of the time you'll find exceptions and as we go
along we adjust the ordinance but this is basically well what started it really there were two brothers let me just ask is this my time it is your time well I would appreciate it if you would wait then as I have to listen as I have to listen
to you you have to listen to me but not on my time on your time no not on my time mayor claiming by five minutes. Please sit down. You This isn't Congress. You don't claim minutes. This is an by the courts for the way you conduct
public hearings. Your time is up. I want to say this. I'm glad you quoted former Councilman Palowski. I told him that the master plan was a living document when we served on the planning board together. Yeah. But I am just wondering will those despite way up there yet
your great story. Will those people have to vacate those very important positions on that important board? And does this apply only to volunteers under review to the chief of staff or to the recreation that you're
Please turn his mic. No, don't answer him. Mayor just finish the matter that if I have five minutes, I have five minutes. That's it. Jim, take it to court. You know, you're
But we'll play all your tapes. Question will these people, it's all here to be represent these industries in the town and the MCUA be thrown off the emergency planning committee. You have a whole new council person came up with this idea to
write about when you're sitting in front of your computer at home on your Facebook post real and imaginary people. 5 minutes is 5 minutes. It's the public portion. Jim, how much is left there? Public hearing on an ordinance. You have a minute left, Jim, so make it
good. All right. Would you please answer that question? No. The me the questions come to me. I'm asking you. Would you I said they I said they will be adjusted as the need requires it. So in the meantime, before they're
adjusted, will these people have to vacate their position on the local emergency planning? I don't see any reason why, Jim. Pardon me. You're you're the only one that's predicting doom and gloom, which is what you're good at. We have a committee there.
Jim, I appoint all these people. I'm well aware of it. Then why are we taking these people who represent the major companies and the MCU PSEG and JCPNL off of that committee? We're not.
This is for the appointment. They have been appointed. If they're What does the ordinance say? Would you please explain the ordinance to the mayor? Please explain the ordinance to the mayor cuz he hasn't read it. Will those seats be vacated? Don't answer.
Don't answer. Thank you. Yes, they will. As always enlightening. Always a pleasure, mayor. Read the ordinance. Enlightening, young fella. Enlightening. All right. It does say that those positions will be vacated in this immediately. Mayor,
can we let the entire public speak? Can we let the public speak on this issue and then we'll address are there any is there anyone else who would like to speak on this? Okay. So that being said, you never get it all and that's why you
make amendments. So let's councelor make amendments to cover the emergency and and these perform boards already taken care of. The first sentence of the new ordinance is unless otherwise specifically allowed by borrow ordinance or New Jersey statute. Meaning that if
we Mr. Robinson didn't read the orifically allows for those people to be okay including you know statutory for planning board members as well where it allows a a municipal official. So that exempts those right from the start and and thank you for that because it
was considered for this ordinance. It is important that the people that take positions on boards and committees in Saraveville represent Saraveville. We don't want people from Newark making decisions for us. We don't want people from CA California making decisions for
us. We do not want people from Canada making decisions for us. They're welcome to participate as volunteers, but not as voting members of our boards and bodies. And that's the intent of this ordinance.
Um, so I feel it is a a well-ritten good ordinance and with your permission, mayor, I would like to go ahead make a motion to adopt the ordinance. I move the public hearing be the public hearing be closed. The ordinance adopted
on second and final reading and advertised according to law. Is there a second? Second. Roll call. Council persons Roberts. Yes. Police. Yes. Novak. I just have a question. I know on the uh recreation committee um it actually
specifically says in there well if you used to live in town and you just move to another town that's close by since it's in that one it it well that one will not change if it's in there but I think that even that one should change because they are welcome to volunteer as much as they
want but they should not have a voting seat. Okay. So you're going to have to change that one too because right now this this won't change that. will not and we will address the individual instance that we find from this point forward. Yes.
Sarski. Yes. Public hearing on ordinance 20-25, Burrow of Seville County and Middle Sex, Ordinance reducing the speed limit on a portion of Main Street. At this time, I'm going to open the public portion for questions or comments on this ordinance. Other questions or
comments? There being no questions or comments, I'll entertain a motion. Councilman Klesy, I move the public hearing be closed. The ordinance adopted on the second final reading and advertised according to law. Is there a second?
Second. Roll call. Council persons Kesi, yes. Novak, yes. Roberts, yes. Sarski, yes. Public hearing on ordinance number 21-25, Burrow of Seville County of Middle Sex Ordinance amending the
burough submission and checklist requirements for land use and zoning permit applications. At this time, I'm going to open the public portion for questions or comments uh on this ordinance. Are there questions or comments? There being none, I'll entertain a motion. Council President Roberts.
Thank you, Mayor. I am very proud to put this one up tonight. It is and I make a motion to adopt the ordinance. I move the public hearing be closed, the ordinance adopted on second and final reading and advertised according to law. And I'd like to affectionately call this
the Mr. Duffy rule since he is the one who brought it to my attention. Is there a second? Second. Roll call. Council person's Roberts. Yes. Yes. Kovac, yes. Sarski, yes.
Ordinance number 22-25, Burough of Seville County and Middle Sex. An ordinance accepting the donation of Crab Island from JennonRema LLC. At this time, we have representatives from Crab Island. If you could come up, please if you could state your name and
Thank you. My name is Steve Williams. I am with Environmental Resources Management and we've been supporting Genon for the past 5 years uh doing due dil. There we go. Uh supporting Jennon uh doing due diligence for all of their assets across
the country. Uh we looked at the uh Saraveville, the former Saraveville uh power plant and the the surrounding lands. So they have sold the power plant and the peaker plants etc. The only thing that remains is the is Crab Island. We looked at Crab Island as far
as potential risks and uncertainties there. Uh we talked to the Army Corps of Engineer who did a survey of the facility and uh determined that there is a very low risk of any of any um ordinance or any legacy issues
from the Raritin Arsenal that used to be across the river. Um so they in their feasibility study they looked at potential alternatives and determined that given the um condition of the island being a mud flat where you there's really no access to it. you sink into your waist to chest level deep.
That uh the best use or best way to mitigate would be for land use controls, meaning you put signs up saying no access, it's an unstable island or no access because of the mud. Um and that would be the uh safest and uh most acceptable u mitigation for the
facility. So we recommended to Jennon that um you know this would be a good island good property for donation uh because it's used as a bird sanctuary and and can be kayaked around and and looked at but there's really no access to it. So we support the Army Corps of
Engineers determination that um it's a safe island and there's really no risk uh for future use. Any any questions from the governing body? Um I just I don't have it really of him. I have it of the governing body. What
Mary? I don't think you're No, it's on. What exact Why is this beneficial to the town? It'll be taking a piece of property that's currently on the tax roles and there is a possibility that this
property is contaminated. I and to take that responsibility on us at some point in the future there's some flood or something and contamination comes off of that property. if we're the owner, we're going to be responsible.
And uh sec and the fact that um John Zabowski just at the last meeting told me that he really was not in favor of this. He asked me for my opinion on it. I was not in favor of it and he's not here to vote on it. So I would really make a motion to table this
until uh Mr. Zabrowski is here. Uh, any objection to tableabling this till, uh, we have a full quorum? Okay. Um, mayor, do you want to make a motion to table? Yes, I'd like to make a motion to table. Good. Is there a second? Second.
Roll call. Council persons Novak. Yes. Police. Yes. Roberts. Yes. But I do want to take the opportunity. Um, can we even if we're tableabling it, do we have the opportunity to speak to the
representative because you may not be here when we discuss it again. No. No. Will you will you make yourself available when we when we have a a council discussion on it, whether in person or by conference call? Yes. Okay. Okay. But if there's any questions now, I
could I'd be happy to answer them. Sure. I appear to have five minutes left. So, excellent. Um, so you had heard some of the mayor Donna, we're in the middle of of the roll call. So, okay, let's finish the roll call. I I will have Yeah. No, no questions. I got it. I got
it. Yes or no to vote means I I will table as long as you are going to be available for the questions in the future and maybe even later today. Okay. Thank you. I'm voting for tableing it, but I got to comment on it when we get get a chance also.
Okay. And just just before we go, if I may, just for the public and and for public recordkeeping, uh because we're in the middle of public hearing, we need to table it to a date certain uh unless we have to re re uh notice for the public hearing. So, uh when is the next Jessica, when's the next meeting? The 8th.
All right. So, just for September 8th, for agenda purposes, this will be table, the September 8th. So, if anyone in the public was curious or wanted to continue uh on attending this public hearing on this ordinance, that's when it would continue. Sorry. Thank you, mayor. Okay, go ahead. Uh, Donna,
um, so there were some questions about the taxes being paid and, um, any, uh, environmental issues. Right now, you know, of no environmental issues, I believe, is what you stated. Um, but with gifting that, that would just
be a free and clear deed signature sign over. It would not be something that for a few years which would be within reason that if anything were to happen that you would be available to address it. Um is that something you might consider? You
don't have to consider that now but I think they take the general would take that under adisement. Yeah. Okay. And um possibly waiting to a future date so that we don't we can um make sure that we have the tax revenue on our books so that might be not till
next year. were at the September meeting. Um, so that might be something we could possibly negotiate to move forward so that you can get it off your books. Um, I think Jennon would entertain uh discussion on that. Yeah. Okay. Um, those are my questions for
today, but I think I might have more and thank you for entertaining those. Okay. Thank you. Uh, Stash. Uh, thank you. I am for the getting the island. That's one of four or five islands that are located in that area. I hunted, fished, crabbed, lived on that
island. my whole life. Third generation cerevil. I never heard my grandfather or anybody saying that there is any contamination there. We know the arsenals across the river and I think this is a great idea because of the kayaking which we're going to start on Weber Avenue someday. We're going to have a big park over there and we
planning on putting kayaks there and the river is right next to that. So I'm I'm personally for it myself and I don't see any contamination there. It was all flooded over when Sandy was here. All of those islands were under 10 ft of water all the way to the Edison Bridge, you
know. So, I don't know what kind of contamination could be there at all, if anything. It it's it's one of those you're trying to prove a negative, right? There's no known or ever there's never been any evidence of any contamination on the site. The power plant didn't use it. Um
but because of the proximity to the former arsenal, there was a the Army Corps attempted to do an investigation, but given the condition of the site, they were able to get on the island one time when it was frozen during the winter. Uh but because it was frozen, they couldn't really do an investigation. They came back in the
spring to try it again, and they sank up to their chest. So they determined that there's no ability to actually do an investigation on the facility. Therefore, they looked at other alternatives and and determined that the best use would be to leave it as a as an island for for natural habitat and um
just put uh land use controls up signage that said, you know, it's uninhabitable. And that that was the Army Corps of Engineers. So given that they had they had very little risk or very little concern about it being a a risk or contamination otherwise they would have done something more about it.
Thank you. Uh, I know when when a motion is tabled, it's no further discussion, but since we don't seem to be following Robert's rules of order, I've got some more questions in here. It says this that the burough officials have reviewed all the
environmental analysis of Crab Island. Has anybody up here reviewed it? Because I never saw it, but we're agreeing that we saw it. Anybody up here see it? Oh, okay. That's interesting. You're not voting, Glenn. You know, I'm asking the people that are going to vote
on this, did they actually see this? I mean, we cannot eat the fish that we pull out of that river, but you're telling me that Crab Island is not contaminated. I don't know whether it's contaminated or not. I just don't think that it's good for the residents of this
town to take on. Could it be? Couldn't it be? We can do what you say, put it there and post it, but we don't own it. That can still be done. We do not have to take possession of a pig and a poke that we're really not sure of because nobody can stand on
there without sinking. That's the most ridiculous thing I ever heard of. If the river, if we can't eat fish out of that river because of contamination, don't tell me there isn't contamination on Crab Island. But again, nobody can get on it. I understand that. Why do we need to take possession? It can remain
exactly the way it is. We can post it just the way you said and somebody else will be paying taxes on it. And God forbid something happened, we won't be responsible. Okay. Anything else? Any other questions? All right. So 98 will'll
coordinate with you. Great. Thank you. Okay. Next item. Oh. Uh okay. I want to make the following appointments uh for the Office of Emergency Management because their their term
expires uh before the next meeting. So, as a three-year, they're all three-year terms for coordinator, the reappoint of Chris Barsley, for the deputy uh coordinator, Chief Dan Plumacher, for
the deputy coordinator Vincent Buffalolino. Is there a motion? Make a motion to accept the nominations. Second. Uh, roll call. Council persons Roberts, yes. Fissy, yes. Novak, yes. Sarski, yes.
And on the shade tree, there's another Oh, you have that. Okay. Is shade tree yours or what's that? The shade tree the mayor's or is it the council's mayor? Mayor. Okay. So, it's me. Okay. Uh there's an unexpired uh term and I will
appoint Brian McHugh to that unexpired term on the shade tree comm. I make a motion to accept Brian McHugh on shade tree. Second. Council persons Roberts, yes. Helissi, yes. Novak, yes. Sarski,
yes. Okay. Introduction of the following ordinance. Ordinance 23-25 and ordinance supplementing and amending ordinance number 2-24 fixing the salaries of certain burough officials, officers, and
employees for the years 2023 to 2027. Councilwoman Novak. Oh, okay. I got it. Y just the current positions that are that's still changing um the supervisor
benefits re reclassifying the title. Yes. No new hire. Thank you. So you want you want to introduce it may you're third on on um on admin and finance finance.
Okay. I move the ordinance be approved on first reading advertisement to offer meeting September 8th. September 8th second. Roll call. Council persons Novak. Yes. Khesi. Yes. Roberts. Yes. Sarski.
Yes. Okay. At this time I'm going to open the public portion for questions or comments on all consent uh agenda items. Uh Jim. Thank you. Mayor Jim Robinson, terrible resident. I see on the bill list this
month $45,000 for JCPNL. I've been talking about this for a year. There are more lights out now than there were a year ago. Tina Early was supposed to come in two or three times. I don't
know if she's even our liaison anymore. Councilwoman Novak asked about can we stop can we withhold bills because street lights are out. We know of two serious incidents accidents one on Main
Street and another one in town because of a street light being out. Have we What are we doing to get the lights on? That's primary. And secondarily, why do we continue to pay for a service that we're not getting? and the administrator
signs a voucher that says he certifies under oath that we've received these services that we haven't received. So, I'd please like an answer to that question. The other thing I see I was very happy to I'm always happy to see when we get a grant. I had to laugh though, the open space
stewardship grant. Um, you that's wonderful. $1,500 from Anjek. That's great. Um, you can't make this up though. But when I read it, I thought open space. Last meeting, we had an opportunity to
have a ballot question to determine if the people would rather have 250 apartments or open space behind Kennedy Park. And you know what happened by a 4-2 vote with Council President Roberts and John Zrowski and my friend Stash and
Mike voting no, you declined to give the public that right to vote on open space. And you got an appraisal saying that property is worth $700,000. Our own tax assessor says that property is worth
$1.2 million. Speaking of laughing, the mayor says that property is worth 20 $20 million is what you said at the last meeting. Mayor, 40 acres behind Kennedy Park, which is mostly wetlands, is worth $20 million. Um, you really can't make this stuff up.
But let I just want to talk when we talk about open space. We're building right now 800 apartments. Right now we're building 800 apartments and condos. Another 2,000 apartments will go into the point. That's the plan. People, a lot of people
don't know that. 2,000 apartments 2,000 more apartments on top of the 800 we're building now and on top of what the the new plan calls for are being right now being built right now. you had the opportunity to do something
good, something that people wanted, something that really had to do with preserving open space. And four of you, four of you, the O'Brien Roberts team, four of you said, "No,
you're not going to let the public decide on open space." But congratulations on the $1,500 grant. I'm familiar with Anjac. They're a great group. I know this money could be for the community garden. I know they give you money for trails, for preserving habitats and bees and things like that,
all those wonderful things. So, but the the irony really is is wonderful. We are getting a grant for open space stewardship. It's rich. It's rich. Thank you.
Okay, that being said, Jim, I understand uh that you're you're planning to move out of state. So, your house is says for 110,000. Should I look for a listing where your house is up for 110,000? That that's that's on your tax role.
On my tax? No, because there's an equalization formula. I explained that last week. If you take the equalization formula, you will know what the value is. And anybody who's been mayor for 22 years ought to know
how equalization formula works. That property is $395,000. Are you selling it? You buy the equalization formula. That's when you get the one.2 million that the tax assessor
worth. I hope I've educated you on that. Hopefully for the man who sat on the planning board long enough, who built the most amount of residential houses in Mayor, that's another one of your lies. That is a lie. Okay, that is a lie. Well, you'll have to prove it, but not
tonight, Jim. You can't prove it tonight. Is a lie. Okay, Jim, you're a liar. Always a pleasure, Jim. Um, okay. Are there any other questions or comments on the agenda? This is
entertaining tonight, folks. Sorry you have to sit through it. Um, for some people it's not entertaining. It's There you go, Jim. See that? There was a reason you came tonight. That being said, are there any other questions on
the resolutions? Being no other questions, I'll entertain a motion. Council President, I move the consent agenda items be I'm sorry. Um move the public hearing be closed and the consent agenda resolutions be approved on roll call
vote. Roberts um No, we need a second. Yeah, there was. We need a second. Yeah. Is there a second? Second. Roll call. Council persons Roberts. Before I vote,
I do want to clear up something that was stated in the public. Um the statement was a choice between 250 apartments or open space. That's not true. It was the 250 apartments would not have been an or that would have had to been placed somewhere else. So, I just wanted to
clarify that. Um and yes, yes, Novak. Uh except for Yes, except for uh 199. And I'm going to be voting no on the bill list because uh I I requested and I
was told by the attorney that we could in fact um not pay for the lights that weren't in. We passed a resolution. I believe it was unanimously passed that we give them 30 days to fix lights and if not we would start to deduct and here we are
months later. Um we have a lot of lights that have gone beyond that 30 days and we're still paying for it. And quite frankly, JCPNL is not a friend to this town. Every time we turn around, I've got to reset every damn timer in my house because the lights are going out
for one reason or another. Now, I'm not talking about accidents, but the we sometimes you go on to Jersey Central's thing and they go, "Oh, yeah, they're out. We're still sending a crew out there. We have no idea why." So, we the lights are such a simple thing. And if
they can't take care of the lights, then we voted to start deducting and we're still not doing it. So I'm voting no on the bill list because of that. Everything else? Yes. Dark. Yes. Okay. Correspondence. Motion to accept the correspondent
that's listed. Motion. Is there a second? Roll call. Council persons Roberts. Police. Yes. Novak. Yes. Sarski. Yes. reports correspondence as as listed.
We just did that. Okay. Um, mayor and council reports, administration and finance, councilwoman Novak. Yes. Um, pretty much with the public works, I'd like to say that the student No, this is admin and finance. Mayor,
um, the tax bills did go out. Everybody should have received them. If they didn't, please notify the tax office. You have until the 29th as opposed to the 10th which won't suggest to pay your taxes. But please remember if you pay on the 30th you are going to pay interest but going back
always. So please pay your tax. Other than that uh progress man. Thank you. Okay. Uh Mary, why don't you do public works while you're um public works? Uh we're doing uh right now there there's a combination of everything. And believe it or not, we've
already started to work on preparing for the winter. I got my first winter forecast from the state. Seems a little silly when it's 200 degrees outside sometime. But uh we everything moves on regardless of anything that come on. Mayor off of
public works. I would just like to I I'd like to touch base on the Florida during my time here. Anybody actually read this whole report because I mean it's it's absolutely ridiculous
if you look at the map of where they want to build these apartments. It's most so much of it is non-buildable. So they are going to try to squeeze all of these buildings into a very tiny spaces.
2 4 6 8 10 11 th threetory buildings they're talking about building in Kennedy Park. And I know we're under the gun with affordable housing. But in this Ernstston Road project, the most
dangerous road in Middle Sex County, and we're going to put all of these apartment complexes, we're going to remove the mini mall and we're going to build all of these apartment complexes. And there are other ways. The attorney at the last meeting admitted that there's a possibility of paying Winding
Woods, doing a subsidy that they will turn some of their apartments into affordable housing, so we won't have to do any more construction. And I noticed I I was really surprised at this, happy to hear it, but on our uh we just appro you know said received and
filed on all of these things. We got a notice of a public hearing to be public hearing to be held in the township of Woodbridge and they're going to discuss affordable housing requirements as it relates to payment in lie of construction. If other towns are doing
this, I just don't understand why we jump to something like this. You know, I it there are other ways pilot or or which we're talking about the affordable housing, not pilots. I mean, pilots are every every pilot should be taken individually. I am not, you know,
against pilots or or for them. You know, I think every thing has a I voted no on some, I voted yes on some. They all have. But I this this whole report and I know some of it is crap. I know they
have no intentions of taking down the the uh the transportation complex, but it's in here now. We couldn't have a referendum because oh, somebody might say that, you know, then we're going to be sued and everything else. We we've
got things in here we know we have no intentions of doing and yet we couldn't have a referendum. And I know it was non-binding, but that's the only way half of the people in this town really get to know it because as you rightly said, Kennedy, people don't come to meetings. You know, people aren't
watching us on Zoom, particularly since they can't comment anymore. But putting it on a ballot would have been a way for at least the people to express it and at least let them know what's going on. Unless you know that everything that's going on down there in Melrose right
now, there was so much going on, but it was approved years ago, but they never saw it and they never questioned it until it they actually started to build over there. So, putting it on a referendum and I know it didn't pass. So, but this this whole thing, why why
didn't we look at other alternatives? There are other alternatives. We passed a uh an ordinance uh mayor, you were still um you were in your previous administration, you were here that we actually could charge a
developer that was coming in and building like the pilots, you know, the warehouses, they have to pay a fee that we get to keep and use to offset affordable housing. So, we have money there to offset affordable housing, but
we didn't look into any of it at all. Can I please explain because what you're saying I understand what you're saying but it's actually not accurate. Um that money that the that Woodbridge is talking about is similar to the development fee. That's what you're talking about is development fee that anyone who's building constructing
whether it's residential or commercial within the municipality has to pay a development fee if they are not producing affordable housing. That's gives us our affordable housing trust fund that we're able to use when we need to meet our compliance requirements. Our compliance requirements means we have to
build means we have to have these units whether it's brick and mortar whether we can uh whether it is uh extension of controls or whether it is bonus credits that we can get versus for certain types of but we can't that just cuz they pay it that doesn't mean that counts as a unit. All that means is that we get
money so that we can now build that unit. when when it comes down to our compliance for third round, fourth round or whatever it may be, we still have to show that we're building these number of units and we're providing for the exact number of units that our requirement is per the state and which we agreed to in
a settlement in this case because it was a whole new mechanism that we went through pre earlier. Um the question at the last meeting and he said that we could do it. It might be cost prohibited, but we didn't even look into doing No, no, no. No. I'm I'm saying extension is one of the mechanisms, but it's still
that is now a unit that that is now being uh um is being accounted for. But that we still have to have our total number accounted for when it comes to the end of the day. I just I maybe I misunderstood what you saying, but it sounded like you were saying if we make them pay to us satisfies it. just gives
us money to be able to we have that money in a trust fund that we can use to offset affordable housing whether we build it ourselves like we did with the uh I misunderstood because when you're saying offset that's why I thought you meant like now we don't have to build it that's why that's how I heard it and that's very clear that and then we can
use the funds and to the best of my knowledge we haven't used any of those funds so far so there are other alternatives they told us the professionals that were here at the last meeting they told us that they could do it but it might be cost prohibitive but We didn't even look into it.
We're not building anything yet, Mary. What? Huh? We're not building anything yet. My wife called. I realized that. I'm doing that a lot lately. Sorry. Uh, no. Just that we we have we told we couldn't have the referendum because it might be a problem with the affordable housing
pro. you know that some some developer could sue us because we looked at something else of our attorney that yes, it would be a problem and that and that we need to move forward and that this is a 10-year plan subject to uh adjustments. I But if it's subject to adjustments,
why did couldn't we have the referendum? We were told the referendum would cause builders to sue us. To be honest, some of what you're saying tonight can also the it was the timing of it. This has already been adopted by the planning board. It's submitting to the to the program. So now we're
required to go forward with this plan until we get our judgment of repose and compliance from the court which is expected to be in December. After that time, if we need to amend it, we need to change it, the borrow is allowed to do so. But since this is we were required based on the procedures to adopt a plan
by June 30th, that plan was adopted by the planning board and submitted to the program. Now, we have to support that plan so that we can get our judgment to protect us against builder's remedy lawsuits. And then after at that time, if we want to amend it or change it, we can do so. But doing so beforehand
jeopardizes our ability to get that right and opens us up potential builder remedy lawsuits. And that's my concern. And that was my It had nothing to do with any particular site. had nothing to do with it. It was amending trying to uh almost attack our own plan that has already been adopted by the planning
board that's already been submitted to the program for compliance that we now have to defend. And so coming out or putting a referendum out against that undermines our own stance. That was my concern and that was my recommendation is not to go forward with it for that purpose. Uh, and it was brought to our
attention uh at the last at the uh special meeting we had that your firm represented MACO as late as three years ago. Did you find you said you had no knowledge of that? Yes, I I didn't at the time. I I looked into it. Uh a prior me uh partner at my
firm did represent MCO and it was actually five or six years ago. Uh well before my even time at the firm uh that it was about a a development proposal in the town. it resulted in some dispute. There was a settlement back in 2019 uh
which it resolved and it was built. Um you know based on it was on for a different site different different issue um that being said I had advised the mayor uh the administrator and the clerk that moving forward now that I have that knowledge I don't I wouldn't participate
in anything in direct dealings with Mr. MCO or any of his properties, but with regard to generally affordable housing and compliance that I could still represent the board because I don't believe there's a a direct conflict of interest based upon the the facts presented. However, I am a member of the
New Jersey Supreme Court ethics board. I I am very take ethics very highly. So, I voluntarily for an abundance of caution recusing myself on any specific dealings with that individual's properties. I just one other question and I'm not really accusing you of anything, but the
um were you the attorney for the planning board when this was being No, you were not. Okay. I was attorney for the burrow at that time. That's that that happened this year. That happened all in 2025. I was the planning board attorney in 2024.
In 20 because you were the one that was giving us the up the year the end of the year. the the mayor always invites anybody that was elected to go into meetings and it just you were the one giving the report on affordable housing. That's why
No, no. I I was I was representing the burrow as special affordable housing council in 2024 while I was representing the planning board. However, when the plan was adopted was drafted the affordable the housing element fair share plan that actually just happened this past spring that happened between
March and June. Uh, and at that time I had no involvement with the planning board. That's it. Yep. Thank you, Mary. Uh, Councilman Kazy, if you would do uh planning and zoning and public safety, please.
For uh planning and zoning, it's uh progress. And then uh for public safety, the first report is uh that I have is from uh OEM director Chris Barsley where um
he writes that emer uh office of emergency management is beginning to work on the burrow's house hazardous mitigation plan that's required to be updated every 3 years by the state of New Jersey. So, they will also be attending uh
several training sessions over the next several months and uh also beginning to prepare for the new school year uh by meeting with the board of ed and their uh procedures with um the different uh
scenarios that that go on there. So next I have a report from uh police chief Dan Plumacher um regarding uh recent traffic enforcement initiatives. So on July 18th
and August 8th our department participated in the high visibility sustained enforcement grant program. So that's in partnership with Middle Sex uh with the Middle Sex County Prosecutor's Office and the New Jersey Division of uh
Highway Traffic Safety. So um the program focuses on proactive, highly visible patrols aimed at deterring impaired and dangerous driving. So the results of uh those enforcement efforts
um I got back which was uh July 18th, our department had 144 motor vehicle stops. They issued 113 summones and 66 warnings were given and also
three arrests on that one day, July 18th. Then the second day this happened on August 8th, our department did 179 stops for one day.
124 summones were issued and 63 warnings were given. So these efforts were funded by the prosecutor's office like I said and the also the drunk driving enforcement fund. So it allowed uh our
PD to strengthen roadway safety uh without any additional costs um locally from us. So the police department remains uh committed to these uh data-driven uh safety measures and to protecting
both residents and visitors alike through continued proactive enforcement. Then uh from our uh fire chief George Gavvern is uh progress. And before I conclude, I'd like to take
a moment to remind our residents to uh stay alert and prepared, especially as we continue to uh monitor any potential impacts, especially this hurricane that's coming. So, please keep an eye on the official burough social media
channels and local news outlets for the most up-to-date information and guidance. So, rest assured, our emergency management is um closely coordinating with all the departments. So, we have some of the finest first
responders and dedicated Department of Public Works who stand ready to respond swiftly and effectively to any situation that may arise. So, as always, your safety is our top priority and we
appreciate everyone's continued cooperation and vigilance. That's all I have. Check on your neighbors. Thank you. May I say one thing because it has to do with public safety. Just really a question. Do you know uh Glenn probably
I'd asked you. Um with our uh firemen and first aid and everything, we have little perks like dog licenses. We only have to pay the state fee, zoning permits, stuff like that are free to volunteers. I was wondering if that applied to um auxiliaries, the police
auxiliaries since they're volunteer. I'm not sure. I'll have to review the ordinance. I I don't know if they're covered by it or not because anything we could do for, you know, because they they do an awful lot of stuff and we can't live without them. So, just if we looked into it and maybe some kind of perk and help them, you know, with their enrollment. Thank you.
Working on it. That's I'm sorry. Thank you, Mary. Uh water and sewer environmental Councilman Sarski. Uh thank you, mayor. Uh the first one is on our water and sewer. I'm still recommended that we conserve water. Our
water, when I first started doing this in March, our water, we did 130 million in March. Now we're at 216 million and that's quite a significant increase. We always know the increases in the summer because everybody doing all the watering
and washing cars and everything else, but we haven't been getting that much rain that's soaking into the ground. So, please conserve water. Uh, one of the funny things that I read on my report that they have younger people are part- timerrs that are painting fire hydrants. Over 50 years ago, I painted them same
fire hydrants in town. And now it's it's pretty cool to see the younger generation going out and working and painting the fire hydrants and everything else. And they got more paint on them sometime than they do on the fire hydrants. But it it's pretty neat to see. Uh, the second thing is our community garden over by across from St.
Sans. Take a ride over there. Go take a look. You're going to see some amazing things that the people have grown since it started in the beginning part of the year. There's big tomatoes. We have corn. They have cucumbers. They have radishes. They had zucchini. They all kinds of vegetables. Take a ride over
there and see it. It's it's it's just a nice thing to see. Volunteer, pull some weeds, hang out, talk to people. It's a nice thing to keep you busy. Other than that, that's the end of my report. Oh, I got one more thing. I've been getting a lot of calls about Journey Mill Road. Journey Mill Road bridge seems like it's
been under construction for five years. Uh it's a county road. I addressed Jay Cornell from CME today. He got back to me and he gave me a great report. Uh they move the traffic to the other side of the road because the one side's almost done and the estimated time of
the complete bridge repair is around the second or third week of September. So thank you Jay for getting back to me and and I can relate this to a lot of the residents that been asking me the questions about it. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, recreation council president.
Thank you, Mayor. Um, just a couple of things before I go into recreation. I know that there's been a lot of talk about um the affordable housing units that we're mandated to have. And I just wanted to be clear, this body, this municipal body has relatively no power
over that. Is that kind of correct over the number? Well, we uh mayor, if I may, we did um you know, that was one of the things we did fight on the first step of this process. We uh we fought uh went through the whole process and ended up entering into a settlement agreement
with the uh fair share housing center which was approved by the court. So the the process the number mechanism how it gets calculated is mandated by the state. However, we did our best to make that number as low as possible working within the parameters that we were given. Okay. So we we are trying to reduce that
number as much as this body possibly can and the requirement comes from above this body which is basically from the state directing every municipality and I've looked at other municipalities including Lambertville which where I
used to live and had a business there and other places that have the same kinds of requirements the same kinds of challenges and it's all being blamed on this level of government, but it's not coming from us. We don't want it. It's coming from above. So, the bay
that um Councilwoman Novak was talking about is that part of government. We have very little control. Is that an accurate statement, a fair statement? Um, we have also as a body put forth a resolution 2025-92 to oppose more of what the state
government is trying to do to create more building in our um in our communities. And that bill is to bypass basically um this is the bill just the way I read it was we could by the
developer could bypass our zoning laws to put in um more mixed use in places where they want to put it. So they would bypass us. We would have no say in it and the state would determine what and where things will be built. So, we are
all at this level fighting each one of these issues because it's really we're getting the blame and they're continuing to push these things and happily letting us bear the brunt of this on our shoulders at the municipal level. Um, so
that is very frustrating to me and I think everyone sitting here today. Um, so I just wanted to make that clear. We have opposed that resolution. It's still up for a vote in the the House. I think the Senate passed it. Have to double check. I have It's It's coming close, right? It's
coming close. Um so I just wanted to try to make that clear. We don't want it. And we all have to fight it. It can't just be us. It has to be everyone in this room has to be um participating in this. Um so I just wanted to get that off my
chest a little bit. And then now for the more fun part of my position is as the recreation liaison. So there are a lot of exciting fall activities coming up in August,
September, and more in October. I left a couple of flyers in the back. Um they're not the official flyers. I put them together for anyone who wants to pick them up. That isn't necessarily on Facebook just so that you have something to look at some of the great things that we've got going on. We've got Cruising at Kennedy Park shows on Wednesday, o
August 20th at Kennedy Park. Um, grill and game day barbecue. This will be the first of its kind. It's Friday, September 5th, 5 to 6:30 at Burks Park for it will happen before the high school football team's home opener as
the Bombers take on Lynen. There's there will be food, family fun, football. It's a $15 per person fee. includes a meal, a soft drink, chips and dessert. Pre-registration is required, and then you just go on to the football game. So, I think that's going to be a great new
event for our community. The Blast from the Past car show, Saturday, September 20th at Kennedy Park. Several day is September 21st. One of my favorite events of the year next to Saints Dance Carnival. Um, so that is September 21st is
Saraveville Day at Kennedy Park and community organizations and vendors are welcome. So register at serville.com if you'd like to have a tent or a presence there. The farmers market continues on Thursdays from 12 to 6 right at the
warmemorial park over here. And there's also we have the cultural arts team that's doing a great job. I have their flyer in the back. We've got a lot of concerts still coming up. You've already missed Groov into the 70s, back to the 80s. The Elvis night, the
Hawaiian Lu is being rescheduled. The Pride of Town Bonjovi night was already passed. We had our homegrown night just last week and was coming up August 21st, Latin Rhythm Night, and the August 28th going out with the bang down the shore
night. But that's not all because we've rescheduled the Hawaiian night. So, we've got a ton of things going on in town, a lot of positive things that we're doing as a community, and I hope we can continue the positive things as a community and really make change in the right direction. So, thank you, mayor.
Thank you, young lady. Are you all here for the same for the same issue? So, I'm going to give you my spot. So, why don't you come up? All right. No, no, you come up. Sometimes these meetings can go long.
like to speak for themselves or three. Um, if you p if you would pull the mic down and once again if you'd state your name and address, please. I'm getting there. Okay. My name's Kelly Le from 19 Street. Call in regards to the flooding. And I thank you, Miss Novak, because going
back a couple years ago, we were here. You brought up the issue about the paved roads and the the newly paved roads and old ones where the water seeping under where there's no sidewalks. Our road is terrible. Okay, we're in a two family
homes at the end. Most of us, no, actually all of us that are sitting here now, some of the one family homes, they flood as well. If you notice or familiar with Yolner Street, our driveways go under our home. Our street
is belly up. It's not even a pitch. My father's worked in uh for Jersey Concrete and Clayton Concrete for over 60 years. And our road is terrible. I have over a thousand pictures on my phone. This gentleman right here, his
car was submerged in water. His driveway was filled to the top of his porch. This gentleman, his driveway was halfway filled with water. My landlord, $40,000 worth of a new sump pump. And in four to six months, not even six months, she
bought four new hot water heaters and three new furnaces. They don't make hot water heaters like they used to where you could relight the pilot light and you could call and it's a fact police department's been to our house and the fire department to come have to turn off our gas because of the way the furnaces
are made now. Right. Okay. It's been up for discussion, get an attorney putting taxes in escrow. We were told multiple times we would have a engineer come down to our professional
engineer and do our road. Now I know and we all know Scott Street is a county road. So theirs was done beautiful beautifully. Besides the facts we have cars coming down our street when the roads closed off for emergencies. Like
the other day they were digging up in front of somebody's house because of their sewage. So they closed the road off. But with the last storm we had, I called and asked if they could put barriers up to divert the water, and I was told it was an emergency. Our house flooded. Okay. Again, two new hot water
heaters, two new furnaces, 4 feet of water, his car was wrecked, everything. Two two motorcycles in his garage. We We have to put boards up in front of our driveways. The water comes up threequarters of the way on our grass.
And not to say for the zoning board, okay, I know Andy was in charge of the zoning board. I don't know who it is now. I don't care. I don't want to know because it's only going to start an argument because I've been making this an issue and nobody wants to listen or believe me. The home next to me, there's
a woman. She's a realer and I don't care if she's on Zoom and hears me right now. And please excuse me for saying this. As my landlord went away to mourn the death of her husband, this woman moved in her home, cut down her fence that was on the
line, the property line, put another fence up and said, "I put it on the property line. Don't you like it?" Who cuts down a fence without asking the neighbors and letting them know they're going to put up a fence? Come home, there's this big ass 6, eight foot white
thing around our house. You don't do like things like that. Now all her white rocks, her beautiful landscaping's coming under. I can't even I can't even I didn't even bring them with me. All the bills bringing my little dog to the airville vet, which
they could confirm her stomach being filled with all these little white things. She's chewing. Her stomach's filled with stuff. Okay. So now I should give her the bills, but she's not going to pay. Now we have real litters. She's a realer walking our streets, handing
out gifts, taking advantage of the elderly people that want that to be their elderly, their forever home and trying to get them to sell their houses. Now, you want to tell me that's not my neighbor? I'll say it to her face. She could be on Zoom. I don't care, Anna. If you're on Zoom, hear me out. Leave
everybody on the street alone. But the flooding is the biggest thing. We have been promised. And we all walked in to the office the one day and we were told to our faces, "I don't know why your wasn't done. You're on the list. You were on the list for February." Then
they put us off when they had PSCG come out to do do the gas lines across our roads. They didn't do our road. You know what they did? Black top right straight down the side of our street. Something needs to be done with Yer Street because they're going to fix Main
Street because you're allowing all this industrial building stuff going up. All these town houses and everything. We were told drainage can't be put in the middle of the road. Um, not for nothing, but the gentleman that's out in that seat three years ago that's empty now
told me when he came down to the street and Craig was great. He was down there. Soon as we left, he was right down there. He cleaned those drains out for the township. He from one end Well, I know those tubes ain't fit from one end to the other because we only have uh
what? Two drainage uh things at the top of our street manhole thing. All four of them. Okay. So, we got two at the top and two at the very bottom. One even get down there. It just goes right off to off the street and it don't even meet all or don't even go all the
way down the street. Now, the last storm we had, and it's all on video of over a thousand pictures, 3,000 pictures actually, Craig went with me, and I walked down into the woods myself after the water department truck was down
there and the fire department truck was down there, the chief, fire chief, whatever. Soon as I started walking down the street, they were out of there. You know who cleans the gutters on my street? Me. I videotape myself cleaning the gutters all the time so there's
somewhere for the water to drain. Now, my father taught me a trick to see the pitch. Every road has a pitch. I've learned this, but not a hill. We have a hill in the middle of our street. So, that's why the water's going down our
driveways, into our garages, up on our lawns. Okay? Our sidewalks go like this alongside the Here's the black top. Here's the sidewalk or the curb in the sidewalk. Sidewalks are going like this.
And it leads me to saying to what she said, if it's not done right, everything's just and cracking. Now, I have pictures from the last meeting we were here till now to show you how terribly
messed up our street is. So, cracks. I could go down there with my fingers and go up the black top. Long. What was the last time you were here, ma'am? Uh, two years ago. Two and a half years ago, maybe. Okay. If that. Yeah. Okay. Well, uh, the the
And she was very much of help because she did speak up and say, well, I I I also have a question in regards to the roads that have been freshly tarred or black topped and then the ones that haven't been done yet. The water is getting underneath. Now, we have kids
that have a bus stop at that one corner that have to walk up on. I don't I don't want I don't I want to I want to start answering some of I want to start answering some of your concerns. Go ahead. So, the business administrator just finished a meeting with the burough
engineer about your street engineer. How professional is he? Because you want to know something? The gentleman that sat in that seat, Mr. G, wait a minute, if you don't mind. He had said to me it would be cheaper to fill in our driveway,
her driveway, her driveway, and his driveway. It would be cheaper to do that and give us a basement than it would to repave that road and do it the right way. Is Is that professional? Sure. When you buy No, it's not. When you own a two family house and you want a
driveway and a garage and it goes under your house, that's unprofessional. I'm sorry. And then you got people living next to you that have a driveway. They filled it in, but now they're illegally having people live in their basement. And I keep hearing from Andy, well, was hearing
from Andy, that that's not true. It could be used for recreational use only. And I got them lying twice. And the cops went to their house when they were apparently broken into and stole one Coach bag out of one specific closet and keys to what looks like a Ferrari, but
it it it's just a Trans Am car. Okay. And they keep telling you is there's nobody living down there. It's recreational use only. And one more subject before you I'll let you go. Okay. Grandfathered in. Almost everybody here
has owned their homes since these houses were bought. They're forever homes. So, they're grandfathered in. They have sump pumps in their basement. And I'm sure you're all very well aware of it. If you're very well aware of your ner
street, okay, so with that said, buy a house today. What do you got to do if your sump pump's not working? You got to get permits. You got to pay thousands of dollars to have your pump system redone and everything. Okay.
Well, their son pump is ran through their yard towards our house under their front gate. Their white pretty rocks are turning brown, oily, mucky, disgusting, and that shit's
running in my yard. And I say my yard because I live with my aunt and I'm a potential buyer of her home one of these days. So with that said, I'll let the next No, stay there. No, no, stay there, young lady. So the the business administrator and
the engineer coincidentally recently had a meeting about your street. So let me turn it over to the engineer and to the business administrator. Is that anybody named Glennard Chuck? I beg your pardon, dear. Glenn or Chuck because I was who? What's that? I'm Glenn.
Okay. Well, nice to meet you, Glenn, because I was told to call. Yeah. And we I've actually have been having an ongoing discussion with Miss Wexler from your your community down there. The long and this the long and the short is and Jay can give you infinitely more details. There's a couple of things that are wrong with the
way you street is constructed. One of but but there's peripheral aspects as well. So, South Amboy and the county have not been on top of keeping their storm water systems cleared out and we address that with both of those entities in an attempt to give you
Yeah, they have a marble. If you take a marble and put it on top of the street, it has a slight pitch. My father taught me. Understood. And if they're storm water nowhere near Scott Street, if there if their storm water inlets upstream of you are not cleaned out, that water's going to look for someplace else and it's going to make a beline for
Yolner Street. So, we did reach out to South Amboy and the county in an effort to get that rectified. We've also looked at the ditch at the end of your street and we've I don't know when the last time No, it has not been cleaned out. Not this year. I know we did it last year. I No, you did not.
No, we I could tell you we did cuz I was I have pictures of everything that's still down there. Well, then I was hallucinating when I was standing out there with the crew, but nonetheless, we did go down there with the hoses and they opened up the tree stuff into the woods. They cut down a tree and what Greg had told me if that's his name that
was sitting there he I was told there is a problem that water will drain a little bit but the only problem is is we got to figure out what to do with the truck the with the tree in the drain. It wasn't
draining properly. Okay. So unless you got the tree roots that were growing in there that I walked down there with my father at 80 years old to get in there and look and take pictures, then tell me you did that. Did you do
that? Because I'll go back down there and take more pictures. We sent a crew out there with a backhoe last year and cleaned out that ditch. We absolutely did that and we will repeat that now. You didn't get into the cement barrel and clean all of that out. I'm getting to the last part of my explanation,
which is is that the the pipe underneath your roadway is not enough to accommodate all of the volume. I've had that discussion with Jay. We're beginning to look at that. It's about a million dollar fix and we're starting to plan for that. So, can I make a suggestion? On the way
here, well, one, we were you were talking about street lights. On the way home, the last time there was 11 street lights. I counted them on the way home. And tonight I'm going to count them again because I just went to Arties the other day and there was still 11 lights
out. Um, but I lost my concentration. It's just let I just got to tell you it's very frustrating on their part. And when we call our homeowners and our renters's insurance and they aren't covering this because they're saying it's an act of
nature. I'm sorry. It's not. It's a It's an act of dilig uh Sarville. Saraveville is not doing what they're supposed to be doing. Sorry, it's been over four years. Okay. If the correct people were down there
doing what they should have been doing and I'm sorry because I'm getting flustered now, okay, because I have to see what she's going through all the time and now worrying about like the storm he's talking about us preparing for which I know is going to be further south. Hopefully, it stays there. Okay.
But what all these women have to go through and then this goes back to 1975. Do you want to Google that or you already know about that article in the newspaper Sville? How Serville made it in the paper? I was in high school then. Okay. In 197 when
it was 1964 1964 and 1975. Yer Street was in the newspaper for the for the flooding. Okay. When her parents border her home, they were like, "What the hell are these boards doing up here with these cinder
blocks?" They go out on their honeymoon, they take the boards down, they take the bricks down. Well, they get a phone call, their house is flooded. How would you like that? my next door neighbor that bought the house on the other side, not the real litterer because I don't care about her and I say it to her face
all the time to come in my yard and pick up her white rocks, which she still hasn't done cuz she claims I should come down to the burrow and look at the the the property line that that's hers three in. No, we're talking about 10 of my
feet into my yard. I feel wet, mushy, swampy water that's coming from her pump because she's got it ran down to the end of her fence and run under the ground so it pumps out into her grass instead of the road and hopefully not to the sewage
because isn't that illegal? Absolutely. See, I learned a lot living here for 30 years myself. Okay. I'm not just a renter. I'm her niece. I want to buy that house. But you have other people that come down there and they're not
told they're in a flood zone. And if they're considered a flood zone, their house has to depreciate how many thousands of dollars now you're talking about. This man thought, "Oh, $16,000 this or this or that. Are you a realator now?" Because I could tell you right now, she can easily get 650,000 for her
house. But you consider that a flood zone and she ain't getting nothing but four, maybe 375. My neighbor next door moved in same as the other woman on the other side because her brother out beat them by $25,000. Lent them the money. He
would have never moved in. He was actually supposed to be here tonight and had to go to the airport. He would have never moved in. He has made the comment multiple times. The last storm we had, he came running to my house because it was late at night knowing that she was
in bed and I was away and put her boards up and her bricks and by then it was too late. His wife was screaming for him outside. You can hear on the cameras, go help Sharon. Go help Sharon. And poor Steve didn't even know it was happening either because it was a last
minute late at night thing. Now you got people's garbage can. His mother's phone was wrecked in the front. Somebody had a garbage sitting out on the car. It wasn't even a garbage dig with all this uh electrical equipment and It ripped the whole front end
of his mother's car. His car was ruined. His motorcycles. What more do you want? When is our road getting done? When is a professional engineer coming on our street? Tell me the name of the company cuz I want to
talk. This is this is Jay Cornell. He is the He is the burrow engineer. Uh he is a professional engineer and has been the burrow engineer for 30 years. Uh so that being said, it told me to to talk to you, but now
you want I just I wanted to thank her because it was at first that to the attention of this council years ago. Miss Miss L. We will set it up where we will either come down to your neighborhood or we can
come here and and go over what's going on. Whichever way I prefer it on the street. I think everybody prefer to walk up and down the street so you can all see what's going on. Okay. So, we'll set it up and and the sinkhole ma'am I'll show you pictures. They're deeper than me.
Ma'am, go ahead. We'll set it up and our professionals will come down. You're professionals. You're saying you're professionals though. I'm not like we're talking on Scott Street. We're talking about You got to stop. You're I understand
your frustration, but I'm trying to make progress here. And we're not because you you you want to do it the Seville way, which was already done. It's the only thing I can do with taxpayer money. Ma'am, I'm talking about the right way, which
is Scott Street. That has that slight slight little pitch. Thank you. Thank you. You're quite welcome. have to do it the way that the walls because Miss Novak hit it on the nose years ago that our street is screwed up. Okay. Is there anybody else from the
street who would like to come up? Let's get the ladies first. No, your aunt behind you has her hand up. So, come on up, dear. It's okay. Don't Don't put the timer. And if she starts coming, I am going to go crying. I am going to go blow up
there. Thank you, fell. If if you would state your name and address, please. My name is Sharon Atamant. Sharon, if you could lift the mic up a little closer to you, dear. My name is Sharon Atamanti. I'm at 19 Yoliner Street, second floor. Um, I just
want to thank first of all the uh firemen and the policemen who have come to my establishment many times during the floods to shut off the water, to shut off the electric so everybody else doesn't get burned down. uh and they
have come uh Johnny on spot. Wonderful. So I would like to thank them for that because it's been great. Um let's I got I just got a few things to go to ask. Um also one of the things that I was peeved about the last time I got my tax
bill and I think I verified it was Steve that he got his the same way. It was on a postcard and it had everyone's name on it. had all of our essential information on it. How much we paid for it, the yardage of our yard, our name, our
everything was right out in the open. The mailman hands it to me. Here you go. He looked at it. I'm sure everybody else is as well. So, I want you to know if they could put it in like a private envelope or something. It just seemed odd that it comes out in a postcard for
everyone to read, to write down. Wait, they broke the prophecy. Wait, what? No, no, no, no. I can't have I can't have an open an open thing. So then maybe young lady, I I've been I brought you in
because you've been very patient waiting here. Okay. So, go ahead, Jessica. That's an assessment card. Everybody gets it in the burrow. Everybody in the burrow gets the same thing. So everyone knows everyone's
business. I mean, like I said, if it's public record, it's public record. Yeah. So they can So if any get out of hand to someone who just wants to come and see about it and then come and do something, they can come right down to the second floor and look it up and and and request
it. It's online. Yeah, I I understand that. But it's not in their hands. And how many people would go down there and look, actually, I don't know. But but it's the thing is it's a public document. It's open to everybody. Why is it sometime in a in it? So the
assessment you get is the same that the tax bill that you get. Is that correct? I don't know. No. Jessica, if you help this young lady. It's two separate documents. The card, the postcard that you get is an assessment card that with all the information on it. With all the information that tells you
your taxes, correct? You get your tax bill, which is a separate which comes in an envelope, right? But it has the same information on it basically. Basically, there you go. All right. But one comes from our tax. Nothing can be done. That's all I want to ask. Nothing can be done about it. It's going to continue coming in a
postcard. Thank you. Okay, young man. There you go, guy. Good job. Uh, good evening. My name is Dar Deianuk from 23 Yulner Street. So adding to what uh Kelly said about the flooding, if we
look at the layout of Yulner Street, it seems like Yulner Street is getting all the rainwater from all the surrounding streets including Felus Street from South Embo. All the water comes down and that that street turns into river.
Actually last storm it was like a tsunami hitting in into the garage and flooding in over three feet high. And on that street there is only four storm drains street over which we know is
county road but there was a reason to install 11 storm drains on that street which is not even getting as much water as you street which has only four storm drains. those four storm drains even they if they are clean cannot take all that water that is coming down from all
the surrounding streets there. So even if we replace that pipe I believe we need to add more storm drains there because nothing's going to change if we just replace the pipe. No, I think I think the engineer and the
business administrator have established that the the pipe that carries away the storm sewage, the storm water is needs to be larger. Uh there are a couple factors that pipe has to be enlarged.
The water coming to you from upstream out of South Amboy, is it coming in off of 9 and 35, Jay? Yes. What? Beg your pardon? the Ridgeway Avenue Ridgeway. Ridgeway. Okay. Um, so it's coming in from outside of
Seville, so it's a coordination with with our neighboring town uh to find it's it's not as simple a solution. Um, but it's one we're we're in the process of beginning to address and to plan. It's not a quick process. Understand that.
All right. and we appreciate that, but we we waiting. We've been waiting for so long to for for results and and haven't seen any. So, okay, it's really getting old replacing all the appliances in our basements, garages, and cleaning up all that mess every time. It it's really getting uh
frustrated and okay, getting old, but thank you. All right, young man in the t-shirt, you want to come up like on the way here. I wish you were show. If you'd say your name and street address
I live in Yun Street and what number what number Ununice 19 19 we've been having I've been living there 49 years and we've been having these floods since every five years we get them they're getting worse and worse the storms and the last we had two recently
and we've been getting that's when we had all this damage replaced all the water heaters and everything else two years ago we have to replace them again. They're getting worse and worse. We need something done now. Every time you come to the meeting, nobody cares. You say we send you're going to send somebody to
look at it. You're going to send somebody there, but nothing ever gets done. It's like we're in a zone where nobody wants to care about us. Nobody wants to do nothing for this street. Well, it's starting to be addressed. You know what? What if we water? How do we What about the water heaters here? Do
we send the bill to you guys? I begg. Send the bill to you guys. Yeah. the water for the water heater. And wait a minute. I can only have one talk at a time. No, you you have to stop now. I'm going to ask you politely for your negligence that you don't do nothing for our streets. You should
replace the water heaters and everything in the houses because we should get a lawyer and hold back our taxes till you do something. That'll be the only way and get on the news. The only way you guys will probably do anything for our street. Our street's a disaster. It haven't been paid once since I've been
there. Not once. Now you got potholes, you got bumps, you got everything there. It's a disaster. The only thing they did was we had a sinkhole. They fixed a little sinkhole. They brought five, four or five trucks there, five guys, and they stood there two days doing nothing.
And then finally, they fixed a little sinkhole, but nobody ever pays our roads. Our roads weren't paid once. We pay our taxes just like everybody else, but yet nothing gets done to our street. It's It's getting ridiculous. We should get a lawyer to hold back our taxes for
the whole street. Then then probably you guys will do something. Thank you. Thank you, young lady. Thank you so much. My name is Mariana Lechuk and I live at 12 Boner Street. We moved it in there in 1975 and that's
when we made the papers because my whole garage and everything flooded and the fire department had to come and pump us out. So after that I had a French drain put in and a couple other some pumps in the back and it still happened. I got a call from
work that my house is flooded. My car was in the garage so I lost my car. I lost my furnaces, my hot water heaters, my washing machine, my dryers. I lost everything there. So now I have a
permanent barrier at the top of the driveway. It looks like crap. It's an eye sore, but it's not being removed. And now we have like a sinkhole or something developing near the pole. There's the catch basin right there
where the water's supposed to go in. and it's starting to sink there and figure okay next thing's going to happen is the whole pole is just gonna topple over and that'll be it. You take a look at that. I mentioned it to the construction
company that was doing sinkhole and they said they emailed somebody from Sarahville to take a look at it but I haven't seen anybody yet and I don't want that poll to come down and fall on my car. Plus, the BA said he'll have his people out
tomorrow. Oh, sorry. And the the lighting on our street is ridiculous. It's always so dark that if anybody puts on their porch light, then we have lights. We used to have a light on that pole. Now we don't have a light on that pole.
And I want something to be fixed. I'm afraid that that pole is going to fall over. Well, we'll be looking at it tomorrow morning or in the morning. Okay. Okay. Good. Thank you very much. Okay. Uh is there anyone else from the neighborhood here? Yes, sir.
Hello, Mayor. Uh committee, how are you? And your your name and address? Guerrera. I'm from uh 16 Yna across the street from um my neighbors here. Um, I just want to say that somebody said that
uh Yula is collecting water from a couple of streets above uh towards uh Route 9. Correct. I did my own uh investigation on the last storm we had on a Thursday uh night. Uh we are
collecting I believe uh the water from five different streets if not more. And uh just because of the way the um Richway Avenue is and uh Scott, the
water has really nowhere to go but on Yula. Uh the second problem we have is at the end of the street right before the water goes into the woods. There's a little bit of a slope on the street that goes up.
So the water has to collect there. It doesn't really go into the woods until it reaches certain height. And the water coming down a street is tremendously to where it starts backtracking. And that's how we get
flooded into our uh basement. When the water finally reaches whatever uh height it is at the end of the street right before the woods, water gushes down um the um the trees and our street
gets cleared. I went to drive around Scott and uh the other street behind us for that Thursday night uh storm and both of these streets were wet, yes, but none of them had any
puddles. As soon as I drove back into Yula, it looked like a small river coming down. Uh so, you know, I everything else got pretty much covered, but you know, I'll appreciate if something can be done because there's a
couple of problems. We're collecting water from at least five different blocks. I know that for a fact. And the end of my street has that little uh uh slope that you know the water collects
uh before it drains out and that's how we get flooded. I had a couple of Hey, when when you go down you'll mayor the gentleman's correct. Everything he said is correct. There's problems upstream. There problem on the street with inlets and capacity of the storm sore pipes and there's problem
downstream with the ditch and also your garages are below grade. So all those things combined are the causes of the problem. I I I honestly think we can take the water if the end of the street was level down to where the water has somewhere to
go, but it doesn't. And you know, you'll take a look at it, Jay. Yeah, we we'll have we'll have you saying right that the end of the street is a problem also right before it hits the woods. So you know, I don't know. It's
just very unfortunate. you you and and Glenn will get together and schedule where to coordinate with the residents that live down there to go there and then advise the governing body when what day and what time. I just to give you an example, I've been
there for 20 years. I probably had 10 12 times my basement flooded. Uh these two storms that we had uh I think I had 10 inches last time. I mean, uh, on that Monday night, last storm we
had, I had 20 to 25 and I got your basement are are below the street grade. What was that? Your your basement are below street level. So, you understand the problem is once once the the water starts backing,
right, up on the street, right? Water has really nowhere to go, it covers the street where the cars drive, right? It rises over the sidewalks. A lot of us have basements down into
your a driveway down into a basement. Once that water reaches the the sidewalk, it just gushes down the into the basement. I I have two pumps. There's is not enough. It's water's coming in so fast.
Jay, is that area Scott Avenue was always prone to flooding? That that is that a high water table to add insult to injury down there at the end of the street. You do have some wetland. So there is that there's a ditch that makes its way through South Amboy and then out toward the bay.
Okay. You do have water problems in the area. Yes. Okay. We're trying to find a solution. First you have to understand the cause and in order to design a solution, right? So I don't I don't see any problem on Scott at all whatsoever. It's
It's not emptying into into the into the Oh, Scott goes into Main Street. Scott goes into Main Street straight down. Okay. Ya cuts. Oh, you run parallel. Yes, we run parallel, but my street is it cuts
into the woods and that's that's where the problem is. It doesn't go all the way down to Main Street. Okay. All right. Okay. All right. I I can't I need you to come back up to the microphone there. two
wants to tell you that there's five believes there's only five drainage inlets. There's what? Five drainages. I believe in walk Sharon again. I believe in walking down Scott Avenue. They have 11 drainages on their street. So it's like you one two three four
five. So that carries the water down. They don't have a water problem. Okay. Thank you, dear. Is there anybody else from the neighborhood that wishes to speak? Okay, this is where it happens. With that, I thank you. Uh we'll be out
uh tomorrow uh and and we'll start the process. So, I thank you. I I fit you in. So, I'm now going to go back to the regular agenda um so that you guys can get home. Um I
thank you for coming out. Okay, with that I'll go to uh general discussions, administration and finance. Glenn, help me. Application for social affair permit received from American Legion post 211 to serve beer and wine at their
football tailgate party on September 14th from 11:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Any objections? Next item. Authorization to award a non-fair and open contract to TK1 Solutions LLC for software maintenance for 2025 to 2026 in an
amount not to exceed $25,987.50. Any objection? Requests to travel received from President Park Fire Company to attend a company fundraiser at MJ's restaurant in Madawan on August 20th from 10:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Any objection? Authorization to award a
contract to Motorola Solutions for Vesta support maintenance through NJ state contract in an amount not to exceed $47,681.30. Any objections? Next item. Authorization to auction 2002 subf 95 foot midmount platform 1500 GPM pump
500galon fire truck on municid.com. Any objection? That's it for me. It's on Glenn. Business administrators ation to appoint William Alfrey and Derek Lets to labor one in the Department of Public Works effective September 2nd, 2025. Any objection? Next item.
Authorization to appoint Thomas Ryan and William Wor to laborer one in the water and sewer department effective September 2nd, 2025. Any objection? Next item. Authorization to appoint Nicholas Jenkins as recreation leader in the recreation department effective September 2nd, 2025.
Any objection? Just a question. Is this a new position, Glenn? This is the position that was authorized by the council. It was offered to another party who ultimately declined the offer. This is the next person in the uh you know the next question.
Are they addressing? It just seems next item. Authorization for an exemption of time off for Michael Bailey, Charles Wassic, and Jonathan McGra from September 2nd to 4th, 2025 to allow them to attend the final inspection on the new fire truck
that was ordered in Appleton, Wisconsin. Any objection? Uh CFO's report. Danielle. Hi. Thank you, mayor. Um authorization to amend the 2025 budget for the following DCA resilient communities
grant Melrose pump station 2,859,780. Any questions? Anything else? Danielle, thank you. Burough engineers report. Thank you, Mayor. One item, the improvements to Elizabeth Avenue projects been completed. We're recommending a resolution closing out the contract approving a final change order which will have a net reduction.
So there was there was a comment about this. Is it Elizabeth Avenue or Elizabeth Street? Street signs say Elizabeth Street. Tax records say Elizabeth Avenue. Tax map says Elizabeth Avenue. I lived on Elizabeth Street. That's what the street sign say. They had it wrong all these years. Donna,
I think you all had it wrong. I need to fix it. Okay. I make a motion that. Okay. Uh, burrow attorney's report. Uh, nothing this evening. Thank you, mayor. Okay. Thank you. Uh, public portion. Uh, there's a five minute time limit. Jim,
thank you, Mayor. Jim Robinson Parl, there was no mention of it earlier. I I assume we know that uh, Councilman Junor's murderer was sentenced um to life today. And I hope that will bring
some closure to the community and maybe before the meeting adjourns um you'll observe a moment of silence or something. Um, I saw on the communications agenda that the planning board is going to have a preliminary investigation to see if the
17 properties in the area around the mini mall um that is slated to be affordable housing both based on the vote that took place a couple weeks ago is in need or if that's an area need for redevelop in in need of redevelopment.
And I saw some some social media posts about eminent domain and how some equated it to socialism. And I I just wanted to talk about that for a second. I think that it is very
interesting that there are 12 thriving businesses on 17 different properties. Most of them are ethnic restaurants. In fact, a lot of them are minority restaurants and a hair salon and a baker place, a few other things um over there that are
going to be discussed. 12 different businesses and you voted on a plan that will put affordable housing where those 12 businesses are now. And um Councilwoman Novak asked before, I see she has the plan. Did everybody
actually read that entire plan? All all how many pages? Okay. U well anyway um and that that makes it even more interesting that if you read that plan and you don't understand how this is going
to take place. I is it envisioned that we're going to get all these people from these 17 businesses in a room. We're going to talk nicely and we're going to get them to voluntarily voluntarily close their businesses and sell or donate or do something with the property
so that affordable housing can be built there because you know if if we acquired them by eminent domain that would be socialism. Um apparently um great great plan. Um, I just
I think the folks ought to know that you have a plan that says where you have 17 bit 12 businesses now, 17 different properties, and one, you know, that cell tower, somebody can correct me if I'm wrong. Glenn, you might know the answer to this. I in my days in the
legislature, I I think that was part of national defense. I I think it's it's it's located so co so close to the coast for a reason. I don't think it's a cell tower. And I I learned this back in the 80s when they didn't have cell phones. So I I think you got to look into that.
But um I think you have to be honest with the folks about what the plan is. Not just the 250 apartments on MCO's 40 acres behind Kennedy Park, but what you really plan on doing, how you're going to
achieve this over at the Mini Mall. And by the way, the MACO approval was August of 2022. It wasn't 5 years ago. It was August of 2022 that MACO was in here to get that approval for the 1.7 million square ft
of warehouses on Main Street. But and it is interesting and I'm not going to mention that $10,000 contribution again, but it is interesting that the lawyer for the firm that represented MCO
told the council that they can't do a referendum concerning MCO's property is also the attorney who gave us the opinion that there was no conflict in doing that. I I find that interesting.
Stash, I forgot to wish you a happy birthday earlier. Happy birthday. Sorry I missed that. At the last meeting, I talked about the DuPont settlement, um the cleanup there, and I know that we hired our own PFAS attorney. I think
people ought to know what we're doing there. What properties are impacted? Is the bus depot area impacted? Is the first aid squad area impacted? We ought to know. You have our own attorney, which I think is a good thing. I compliment the the governing
body for having our own attorney on that. But I think, you know, this is something that impacts did these chemicals migrate off their property? Probably they did. And do they impact neighbors, including the first aid
squad, including the post office, including where the bus depot is going to go. So, I think it would be good if you gave a report on that. Thank you very much. Thank you. Anyone else? Good evening, mayor and council members. My name is Taylor McFarland. I'm from Keyport, New Jersey, 82 Atlantic Street.
I'm also the conservation program manager for the Sierra Club New Jersey chapter. Sierra Club is the oldest and largest environmental nonprofit in the nation with almost 4 million members nationwide. I'd like to lift up again that Williams Transo's Northeast Supply Enhancement Project is back. um also
known as Nessie. This is the fossil fuel compressor station proposed in Franklin and then new pipeline that would cut through Old Bridge, Saraveville, South Amboy, run under the Raran Bridge and go to Long Island. None of the energy goes to New Jersey. Want to make that clear.
New Jersey is not receiving any of this gas. We are just receiving the pipeline and the gas compressor station. TransCode did construct a pipeline currently there about 50 years ago. Uh it was put in before the Clean Water Act
actually was passed. The Raridin Bay was in bad shape at the time and by now that original pipeline should be sequestered under the seafloor along with a lot of the toxics that were were released to this bay. The answer to someone raising the question of what difference it makes
if uh if um of what difference does it make it that we have now done a great deal to clean up the water in the red bay by closing off much of the toxic toxic wastewater sources. We've been bathing along the beaches of the beayshore of Mama County and have a
thriving shelfish industry and this pipeline would basically reverse all of the work that we've been doing uh to really clean up the bay. Um I want you also to consider that uh New Jersey took in more than $50 billion in tourism in
2024. So again, I think we really need to consider the impacts of this pipeline and compressor station. I do know that in Franklin where the compressor station is going to be built, Williams Transco is looking to use eminent domain to buy to take over the land for their pipeline
and compressor station. Penny's pipeline tried to do this before and this is can happen also in Seville. So I want to ask the question, what is the public benefit of this project? If the energy is not going to New Jersey, what's the benefit of this project for the Seerville
residents, for the town? um you're going to endure just the costs of all the construction. This is going to go under 35 the parkway under the train tracks. Like what is the public benefit to it? Opposition to this project is growing. Oldbridge opposes the project. Passed
the resolution to oppose this project. I sent you all the resolution. I will send it again to you. Continue coming to these council meetings. Continue emailing you. Continue calling you. Oldbridge, Middletown, Rumson, Keeport, Union Beach, Manowan Highlands, Atlantic Highlands, Montgomery, Franklin, and
South Brun Brunswick have all passed this resolution to oppose Nessie. And I please ask you to consider putting this resolution on the agenda for the next council meeting. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Being no one else, I'll entertain a motion to close the public
portion. So move. Yes. Can can I ask the attorney to um clarify some things that were said and to um straighten them out because I heard some things that were Yeah, go ahead. a little inaccurate. Would you
you have to speak in a moment? Okay. So, can you uh clarify some of the things about eminent domain and how things are planned and um it the way it was sounded? We have to close a public pool. Oh, I'm sorry. I made the motion. I'll second the
motion to close the public. All in favor? Opposed? Okay. So, um just to clarify some of the plans that were made, their plans. Um there was also mention of um a I should just
pull out my planning document. the um Sarah moved something to planning to determine if it qualified for a certain type of redesign and that has to go
through planning. It has to be um a collaboration with the owners of the property. Um it isn't going to move forward in any way, shape or form as today because the plan has to go through multiple stages. is it has to be approved and it may not look like what
is envisioned today by a planner but a collaboration of many different steps. Is that accurate? Yes, I think I I understand your question is that um when it was brought up about the notices for the redevelopment and the studies being done by the planning board um do preliminary
investigations and there was actually a number of them. Some of them are properties that are in the uh housing element and fair share plan. Some of them are additional properties. Uh those are being done they were done at the request of Sarah uh during their investigation as to what areas they want to see the potential redevelopment. They
came the request came to the burough council to adopt a resolution directing the planning board to conduct those investigations and that's what these notices were of the public hearing on those investigations. All of those redevelopment investigations are non-condemnation.
Condemnation is the same thing as eminent domain. So all of those resolutions pursuant to the redevelopment law when you go through the process you have to identify whether or not right at the beginning of the process whether they will be for condemnation or non-condemnation. All of those resolutions all the
investigation studies all are non-condemnation re um uh redevelopment investigation. So there is no eminent domain on any of these properties. Uh that also being said this is just determined whether or not they meet the criteria to be deemed an area need of
redevelopment. When that happens, uh, if it does meet that criteria, it will come recommendation from the planning board will come back to this governing body. This governing body will then make decision whether or not to deem the area in and declare actually is the terminology the area in need of redevelopment, which then goes, if it
does adopt that resolution, it goes to the DCA to get confirmation whether it does actually meet all the criteria. They look at everything, the planning, the planners report, the planning board hearing, and the municipalities to determination. Um, it all looks in that and it will be confirmed or not confirmed by letter from the DCA. Once
that's done, then Sarah then starts the process of looking on what type of redevelopment plan. A redevelopment plan is essentially an overlay zone. There's no nothing uh requiring the property owners to do anything in these instances. Um, especially when the in
these like these type of cases where it's a bunch of properties owned by a number of different people. It's just a plan that puts forth what the burrow would envision that development to be sometime in the f future. So whether the property owner voluntarily wants to upgrade their property and wants to take
advantage of that, uh they're allowed to do so and do so under the redevelopment plan and not obligated to do anything. Um, if it's a thriving business, it remains a thriving business until they voluntarily want to do that or they decide to sell it off to a developer who wants to to comply or or or I shouldn't
say comply, wants to develop in compliance with the redevelopment plan. But it's all voluntary. There's nothing being mandatory on any of the um the property owners. And uh when it comes to whether or not these are properties that are in the housing element redevelopment plan, that will be discussed when they
start developing the redevelopment plan. when if it gets through all that other process I explained, then they'll put an affordable housing requirement of development on those uh developments. But once again, it's not a requirement. So even though it's something in our plan, it's our affordable housing plan. It's something that's we're going to put
into place to address our need because we have to have zoning in place to address our need. um how the law for affordable housing and I apologize mayor for going on a little bit but I really think it's important to clarify how it works for affordable housing is and how it's supposed to work is that the
municipality has to zone for it whether it's an overlay zone whether it's a redevelopment plan however it may be they have to put the zoning in place to allow it required or um are or empowered to make that individual or property owner to actually develop it as
affordable housing we just put that opportunity once we do that we have the zoning in place. Uh then that's left to uh the the property owner as to whether or not they actually developed it or not. Now in the third round, it was a little different because we were before the courts and the courts were basically
making all municipalities to actually build brick and mortar if they didn't have a developer sitting right next to him saying I'm going to build it. Right now how it's working and how the the the legislature the amended fair share act works is it's once again supposed to be the original intent. We put the zoning in place and then it's up to the market
as to whether or not a developer comes in and actually builds those units. Um it's not a mandatory thing where the if they don't get build, the municipality then has to go in and build them. That's how it's supposed to work. I can't guarantee it won't fall back to where the round three was where they actually did make municipalities say, "Well, if
you don't have a developer at your doorstep, you have to now bond and build it yourself." Which was a little bit overstepping, but that's what the courts did. Basically what you're saying is this means nothing. This plan it it it it doesn't mean anything. It
means we're compliant with the requirements of the fair share act showing that we're putting forth zoning out there that will allow for the development of the number of units that we have to provide for for the fourth round. But if the if the property owners say no, I want to keep my business here,
then we have to come up. I just don't understand. Why don't we make these determinations before we come up with a plan that's calling for all of these things on this property that's owned by somebody else? It's zoned by they have businesses on here.
I mean, if if this is basically a joke, this plan is a joke. The reason why it's it's like that in Seville versus and because that's the other problem is the state created a mechanism that's supposed to apply the same way to every municipality, but not every municipality is the same. on a t
on a town that has a ton of open space, which not I'm not saying like reserved open space. I'm just saying unrestricted open space, you know, a house that's on 20 acres. That's an easy situation where this could apply where you say, "All right, well, that property, if they ever want to develop, it can be developed
that way." In a town like Seville, everything's pretty much developed. There's not a lot of just undeveloped open space where you can say, "That's where we're going to put our affordable housing and zone it." So, it has to be somewhere. So what happened is what the planning board did is looked at the various sites. They had you know I'm
assuming a subcommittee meeting um you know at times and talked about it and they had a presentation from our planner who put together this plan that said these are some locations that potentially maybe need redevelopment or potentially may redevelopment within the next 10 years. So let's look at these sites to maybe put the overlay zoning on
top of so that if they do develop it hopefully they'll take advantage of that de that that overlay zoning and develop it with the affordable housing that we need. But there's not nothing. We're not going in there saying we're gonna borrow is going to take the property and sell it to developer and they're going to develop it that way. That's not how the
the borrow is proceeding. That's not how any of these documents are prepared and that's not what the plan provides. So basically, I mean, I know of at least three uh this area and and the the over there by the uh the bus stop over there.
What then? We'd have to come up with another whole plan to meet these numbers if these people don't want to sell. No. Once we have once we have the plan and the order in place, our job is done until we go to the round five. The municipality has its order protecting
it. Unless we determine that another developer comes along and says, "Oh, I want to develop here." Then maybe we want to amend our plan to say, "You know what? That is a good idea. We'll let them develop it here and we'll take it away from somewhere else so we don't have overdevelopment." But unless that happens, once we get our order and we
have everything in place, the borrow is done. It doesn't it doesn't have to do anything else until the next round comes along. And when the develop if if they come and develop it, that's great. If they don't develop it, then we'll have to address it because what's going to happen at the fifth round is fair share is going to go, well, was that site
actually a suitable site since no one came and developed it? So maybe you have to find a different site. You can't keep that overlay zoning there. you got to move it to someplace else because since no one developed it in 10 years, that's no longer good. That would be one of the arguments we'd have to face in round five. But that's how how how the system works.
So So can I once again say from earlier today at the municipal level, we have very little that we can do about it. It is all dictated from above this level, the state level, and those people who are legislating what we have to do here,
which I personally disagree with. I don't think that affordable housing makes sense. We had said that at the last meeting. Um and and I hope our resolution from our last meeting holds up and has has some teeth somewhere so
that we can stop this continual overdevelopment all over our state, not just in Sarville. It's everywhere. And it's it's I I would like to see something that shows that it's actually solving any problem whatsoever because I don't know if that's the case.
I can't find anything substantial that says it is. This is our problem and look how we're solving it. All I see is this is what we have and this is how much more we want to build. So, um it's the problem we have. I guess it is the
problem we have and we're going to have to find a way to solve it. And I don't think here at this body we're going to be able to do it ourselves. I just I I think this this whole plan is joke. I'm not saying it's the town's fault, but it really is we're just
playing a shell game here. I mean, we're saying they're saying they're saying we I'm sorry. They're saying that we have to come up with a plan as to what we're going to do. And then at the same time, we're saying, "Well, this really isn't a plan. It's just just to pacify the state." We said we're going to do this,
we're going to do that. How can any of the residents in this town believe in any plan that we put forth when this is basically you could wipe your butt with this? You know, this is nothing nothing in here is serious. I believe except for the 40 acres next to Kennedy Park. I
think that will happen. Probably the only thing in this plan that will the planning board knows it. And the final thing I'd like to clarify, if you would please, is to describe what eminent domain is because that was used as a suggestion for one of the pieces of
land in town. And I want to be clear on what that is and why we typically do not move towards eminent domain. And I'm sure the the young lady in the back corner understands. Um well, em eminent domain is the
state's taking of property against the property owner's will. In essence, uh it's when the property owner doesn't want to sell and the state needs the property for a reason. When I say the state, it means New Jersey, county, municipal, or even, you know, they allow the New Jersey Transit Authority, any
sub subdivision that or or subset of the of the state that's allowed to do so. And you have to you can do it, but you have there's a two-step process. You have to go into court and you have to prove that you have a public purpose that supports the taking of of of real property. And then once you get that
order and the court determines yes, you're you're a public entity that's that's empowered to take property uh and that you have a public purpose to support that taking, then you have to go and have a second hearing uh before the court uh with regard to determining the
reasonable uh market value of that property. And then the municipality or whoever the state entity has to pay that to the property owner to take it. But ultimately you're taking their property without them wanting to sell it because if they wanted to sell it, it'd be a negotiation because of either they didn't want to sell it, refused to sell
it, or that property owner um you know, you can't come to an agreement with the with the property owner and the the state's using their uh hammer to come down and saying, "Well, we're taking it no matter what." But it's a court process. It takes multiple years. Uh it can it can be very expensive. We my firm does handle that for a number of
municipalities. I don't do it personally, but my firm does. Uh, and you know, it can be uh up to, you know, two to $200,000 uh in legal fees alone to get through it if it's opposed and if it's um you know, uh goes through the whole process court systems.
Okay. Thank you. All right. I'll take a motion for adjournment. So moved. Second. All in favor? I. Thank you everyone.