Good afternoon, West Orange. This is Joe Fagan. Welcome to the continuing series of West Orange Township Council budget workshops. Uh we are in Council Chambers at 66 Main Street. You're welcome to join us, but there is no public comment
whether in person or online. Uh just as a reminder before I turn the floor over to Council President, the next council meeting will be this Monday, September 8th. uh not Tuesday uh as we normally would meet and please note the change in time
is from 6:00 from 6:30 to 6:00. Uh details of this time change are online. At this time, I'd like to turn the meeting over to council president. >> Thank you, Mr. Fagan. Welcome everybody to our 14th, yes, 14th budget workshop
for the 2025 municipal budget. This one uh on September 5th, 2025. I note that Mr. Fagan mentioned the word continuing. I am hopeful that we are not going to be continuing the budget workshops uh
before we get this budget adopted. So, we'll see where we go. Madame Clerk, >> this is to inform the general public that this workshop is being held in compliance with section 5 of the Open Public Meetings Act, chapter 231, public law 1975. The notice for this workshop
was emailed to the West Orange Chronicle in the Star Ledger on September 3rd, 2025. Councilwoman Castelino, >> present. >> Councilwoman Ruden, >> here. >> Oh, Councilwoman Scarpa, >> present. >> Council President Koviaak,
>> present. And also, everyone should know that Mr. Smaldo, the assistant business administrator, is going to be joining us on Zoom. So, please be patient with the uh communication challenges. Before we start, I just want to uh make some not
so brief remarks to sort of put everything that we've done in context. This has been a very tough year for many taxpayers who have seen their tax bill increase considerably due to the townwide re-evaluation. That is why the council has given this year's municipal budget so much
scrutiny. And despite not receiving the mayor's proposed budget until midappril, three months late, causing the council to receive threats from the state regulators for tardiness, the council has been working with the administration, our CFO, our interim
business administrator and department heads for more than four months to see how we could reduce the financial impact on taxpayers by reducing costs without reducing services. I served for 10 years on town council and in those 10 years I never voted to approve a budget because
I always felt that we could have done much better each year to produce a budget that kept taxes lower and served the best interest of our citizens. Our previous CFO employed counting practices that inflated line items to create a
surplus, often disguising where money was really being spent. That's why this year the council requested we start the budget review process with department heads voluntarily making 10 to 15% reductions in their department budgets. I appreciate Mr. Diniac, our CFO,
working with the department heads to make these cuts because I believe they are the ones who know the workings of their departments best and can best prioritize and determine what items are essential. I also appla applaud the work of our citizens budget advisory board.
This is a group created years ago that I tried to revive uh in my first tenure on the council, but it still remained largely ineffective. This year, I drafted a new ordinance that greatly strengthened the function and even now have a representative on the deis to
better contribute uh to our budget review process. They have identified areas where the township can reduce spending without impacting services and have made other broad recommendations that we hope to incorporate in the budget process going forward. I also want to acknowledge uh all of the work
of Mr. Datiniac who came on board less than a year ago and has tried to sort through and make sense of a budget process and finance department that was in great need of overhaul. So, Mr. Tiniac, thank you for the many, many hours you have spent working with this council, educating members, explaining
processes, providing countless requests for data, crunching numbers, and keeping all the cuts and changes to the original budget proposal straight. You have shown great patience and professionalism above and beyond. To the municipal clerk and her deputy, you have served the budget
process extremely well. So, thank you. To my council colleagues, thank you for your commitment to the community and diligence in searching for ways to reduce costs and by extension reduce the tax burden. But we have been through the budget two and in some departments three
times. So it is now trying to wrap this up today if at all possible. As I said, this is our 14th workshop. Uh the draft budget from the mayor proposed to raise municipal property taxes by more than 6%. We've knocked that increase to around 1% and we continue to
look for additional efficiencies and savings. If you want to follow along, please go to the township website westtor.org. Use the search box in the upper right hand of the page. Type in budget, then click on the first result, and you'll see the top item in the budget version dated July 22nd. Mr.
Zatiniac will take you on a guided tour. Presently, we are not taking public comment today. If you want to comment or ask questions, please send an email to councilwwest.org, which despite what you may think, also goes to the mayor and several people in her administration. If you want to send
just to the council, send it to one of us and ask for distribution to each of us. If you need email addresses, search for council on the council on the township website. Recordings of the workshops are on the township website. Find them by searching for video gallery.
Uh the citizens budget advisory board representative on the deis today is Mr. Todd Dovi. Uh I just again remind and encourage everyone to speak into the microphones. We've turned off the air conditioning so perhaps that won't be a challenge today.
If you're a council member or an assistant business administrator, please raise your digital hand so Mr. Fagan can see and then wait until the chair recognizes you. If you see me pointing or nodding to Mr. Fagan, after you raise your hand, that is my acknowledgement that I will call on you as soon as I can. When you are finished, please say
so. I think we've settled on the phrase thank you. Uh lastly, I urge everyone to consider time efficiency in their comments and questioning to be sure that uh what you say is absolutely necessary and the faster we go through this budget, the better and the and we can
finally get to the finality of budget workshops uh before the adoption of the budget. Did I miss anything? >> I have a quick question before we get Sure. Please go ahead. Uh >> for Mr. Datiniac, um given the cuts we made at the last budget workshop, what is the dollar amount we need to cut in
order to get to a zero increase? >> Um I don't know right now. I'll calculate it uh before the end of the >> Okay, Mr. Ziniac, on that note, we can go to the schedule that we did not complete.
uh their agenda, excuse me, that we did not complete at the last council meeting and uh have a few more. I'm just going to let you take the lead on this, please. >> Sure. Um so, for everyone at home, uh if you go to west orange.org, or our our
website and I usually go to departments I find the finance department and if you click on the side budget I'm going to point to two files here. So the first one is the one we're going to look
at today is municipal budget as of July 22nd 2025. Right above it we have the 2025 citizens budget advisory board preliminary report to the township council. Um, I'm sure this is going to get updated at some point to be a final report. Um, really interesting reading.
Uh, you can print it, save it, um, search it. It's a searchable PDF. A lot of great information in here. And then, of course, this is the document that we're going to be looking at today, municipal budget as of July 22nd. Um, so looking at our agenda, we left off at
utilities and we're probably going to end up bouncing backwards, but let's move forward. Um, we're going to start on page 112 and that should be fuel. I will try to zoom in a little bit as
well. That should be good. Council >> Ruden. >> Um, >> now I can. Yeah, I zoomed. Okay. >> Okay. For the fuel. >> Um, can you tell me in each category
what the expenditure is to date? >> Sure. I just want to I want to make it easy for the people at home to see. I'm just trying to zoom in. Um okay so uh for line 142 gasoline fuel um
paid charged is $20 260,621.13 for diesel fuel paid or charged is um oh uh let me go back to gasoline fuel actually because I Oh no I gave give you
the right number. I apologize. Um, >> can you say that again, please? Cuz >> I already gave it to you. >> No, I know. I just erased it when you said >> that was very quick. 260 621.13. And then diesel fuel is going to be 64,000 and fuel maintenance is $34,7340.
So, it is a total spend of $358,69453. >> Can you say that again? I'm sorry. >> Sorry. Uh 358 358,69453 cents. All right. So, um, is there any way for you to break down
how much of the gasoline fuel is used by township personnel or township authorized or assigned vehicles? >> So, all of the fuel that's used is for township vehicles. Um,
>> does that include the police vehicles? Can you can you extract the police from that? >> I couldn't tell you here. Um, everybody that fills up uses a unique ID number to to fill up at the tanks. So, I think
we've we've provided reports. >> Yes, you're right. to that respect but I I we don't break it out from a budgetary perspective because the the purchases that we are making here are for the bulk delivery uh that fill the various tanks
that we have. So the the expense is not like a gas station expense where you know we're recording like you know it was a $50 fillup. We just record when we order every week or two weeks delivery
from the fuel company and then they deliver 300 gallons of diesel and 500 gallons of of fuel. That's that's what this represents. So we don't capture in in our system the usage by the actual vehicles but there that information is
available. It's just not part of this >> and and we have been provided some of that. And what my concern is is that these personal vehicles are being used full-time and the the cost for we are acting pretty much like a gas station
for township vehicles that that um municipal employees take home, drive to vacation spots, come back, fill up. Is there any way to break out what is actually being used for the police
vehicles and the township vehicles? >> Uh, can we just hold on a second here? Again, I recognize the great work you've done in trying to identify and expand on this issue. We are at a budget hearing right now and this, as far as I can
tell, is not part of our budget process, as you just heard Mr. Iniac say that it's all done uh in as collective bulk purchases and as far as I know there is no way today that we have the numbers that you're looking for or that we can
do anything about it. So I I want to just unless there is some direct impact on the budget. We will have to save this for another day and I can assure you as long as I'm council president you will have that that opportunity. >> Thank you council president. I do appreciate that. However, this is our
direct responsibility and this is the only time that we actually can address it because every council meeting we get bills for gas and we pay those bills. This is our only time to adjust the total and and what my concern is is an
abuse of the township vehicles and the gas as well as the easy pass which is another issue which is somehow not not presented in this budget. what we are paying for for easy pass it must be somewhere but it's not presented in the budget
>> probably it's included in a sub account but most of the easy pass transactions we don't get charged for so if you're going down the >> No no no I'm just pointing to Mr. uh Facen so he can put his hand down I recognize >> President uh pardon the interruption I just wanted to advise you that Mr.
Moraldo is also online. Uh I don't have a card for him, but um I just want to advise you he is online and he's able to communicate with us. >> Do you have a car for me? >> I can certainly provide one. Certainly. >> Maybe you could just use Councilwoman Ruden or Councilwoman Scarpas. That's a
that's a wellworn and usable sign. >> Actually, it's you put up a sign for for uh Councilwoman Scarpa will know that it's Mr. Saldo. >> Thank apologize for interrupting. I just wanted to point to Mr. so you can put your ar your hand down. So please
continue on. Uh Mr. Datiniac. >> Um so when when an easy pass um is used in a township vehicle or a a police vehicle and it's you know for going down the Parkway or something like that, we don't get charged for those. is when it's when
you would go um out of state like if you're taking the George Washington Bridge for instance or you know maybe going into like Philadelphia or something like that then then we do get charged and so we we do pay those those bills but the vast majority of the
travel that our vehicles do um fall sort of within that free >> okay >> parkway >> I understand but th those are for those are for police or fire officials that have a special exemption on easy pass.
Many of our municipal municipal employees who are using our vehicles do not have that privilege, so there must be some easy pass, but I know that's not in here, so I don't want to labor the point. >> It I I I'll check and see what account it gets charged to, but yeah, we do have
we do pay charges. Absolutely. Yeah. >> Okay. And and at I would like to see them and they should be reflected in in the budget. I know it's not in here right now. Diesel charges are not really a problem because I do not believe that municipal municipal cars that people are
taking home are with diesel. >> No. >> However, the gasoline is literally being used like the West Orange gas station here. And I do think that we need to rein this in. And the only way that we can do this is right here in the budget
to say municipal cars, you know, in our in the in the township um handbook, only the fire chief and the police chief are permitted to have take-home cars. I know that it is the assistant BA's position that
assign that that it is not the purview of the council to intercede in this or to or to make any statements and that it is the BA's position that he can um hand out cars to municipal employees. I do
not think that that we as a council have to support that sort of expenditure. There are some some municipal employees that will need a car, but they only need it to drive to to around West Orange when they're doing
inspections. And the our gas bill, which I have seen, does not reflect that that is all all it is being used for. >> So, Councilwoman Ruden, again, I just want to say I I disagree with you, respectfully disagree with you that this is something that we can address today
uh in the budget workshop. I assure you again that we will have a fully vetted e uh uh exploration of these issues but it's not something that we can do today uh for multiple reasons but be also
because uh Mr. cannot provide the data that you're looking for. >> I understand but I have seen the data and I would like to make a a suggested cut to the gasoline fuel budget. So before you make a motion, we have two
requests from online pending. Uh um Councilwoman Castelino, please uh uh thank you for your patience. Please speak. >> Yeah, thank you, Council President. And um you know, I I just want to echo some of your sentiments because I feel the
same way. Councilwoman, uh I applaud you for looking deep into this. the the only thing that I I respectfully have to disagree with you on is, you know, you make it sound like there's intentional malice there and and that's I I disagree
with that. You know, we might have been antiquated in ways um that maybe some things have been happening in the township and and definitely we could look at it and review. Today is not that day. That's a a meeting for another day
that we sit down uh with Mr. Moraldo the and the two chiefs to to go over that and I'm more than uh willing to uh have those conversations because I think they are important and we should analyze it. Um but you know just to you know clear
out abuse and accusations we got to stop going there. We got to wrap this bad budget up today. Number one um I'm looking at running the numbers on the gasoline. Um, we are look like we're on target to spend what we spent last year.
I don't know how what your recommendation is. I wouldn't I mean I could see maybe again maybe I I'm afraid to make a recommendation because we're on track of what we spent last year. So unless we have less vehicles and something has
changed, I could see taking out a good chunk. Um, I just don't know how much of a chunk would be reasonable to take out today without doing um that due diligence that's needed in a meeting that is not appropriate for today. So
again, just to recap, I I I I back you up to to sit there and have a meeting after we finish this budget. Um, but I I I don't think we have to cut into it today. Um, so if I get a a recommendation that is reasonable to
reduce this line item, um, I'll support it. But, um, I I don't think we should go too deep because we are on track by the math I just did. Um, but you, Mr. Tatiniac, could to tell me otherwise. Thank you, Council President. I'm done.
>> Okay. Let me just take this opportunity uh to make a couple of points here. First of all, Robert's rules of order, which is what we operate under, specifically prohibits the discussion of another member's motivations.
And I want to make clear that I am not going to allow any any comments having to do with characterizing another person's motivations. It does us no good and it does not move us forward in what we're trying to do today. The other
thing is I encourage you to consider not expressing your opinion except in the process of debating a motion because again opinions are great. We all have them and we all use them to
make our decisions but it doesn't help our process moving forward. So, I highly encourage you not to express your opinion except in the uh context of a considering a motating a motion. And if
you do continue to uh express your opinion and I don't think that it's going to be moving the process forward, I'm going to call you to order. All right. So, I I I don't want to get into this debate
again. Councilwoman Ruden, this is u uh an issue that needs to be vetted. It's just I've said this a couple of times and and I'm going to call to order. We cannot move this process forward today without
this data. And again, I assure you that I, as council president, will allow Councilwoman Ruden and anybody else on the council who wants to participate to fully vet this issue and come to some resolution that we think is in the best
interest of the of residents. Okay? So, I don't want to continue this debate. I want to focus on getting this budget reviewed and approved in a way that we can do today. And we will come to come back to this issue
uh later. So I know Councilwoman Ruden raised her hand. Uh Mr. Smaldo has his hand up before that. So Mr. Smaldo uh given what I've just said, do you still want to speak? >> No, sir. I I told Mr. Fagan I uh put my hand down. Thank you.
>> Okay, great. Councilwoman Ruden. >> Yes. First of all, thank you, Council President, for um your remarks. I uh am operating solely in my fiduciary capacity as a council person looking at the numbers and evaluating what may or
may not have been poor practices that were established in the past and that and that have continued. So looking at the numbers I I do believe and I have looked carefully at the at the gas
numbers. I do believe that we can make some cuts here and maybe the best way to do it would be to the overall budget so that it can be reortioned out. So I would like to make a suggestion since we
are the the diesel um has has only been used has used about half and we have a third of the year left that there is some room to cut a little bit there and certainly there is room to to cut in the
gasoline fuel because of what I um have referred to as overuse of township um vehicles. And I'd like to see if this is a way that we can address it. And I would appreciate um having support from the council to work with me to to dig
deeper into all of these numbers so that we get an exact number. The fact that we are on track with last year does not really uh speak well to me because I think that the practice has been um allowed to to go in a direction that it really should not be. And the budget
request for 2024 was 170, which is very interesting. And what was actually paid was twice that amount. So why have we felt now now feel comfortable with paying twice that amount for gas when gas is actually less expensive than it
has been in the in the fa in the past? So I would like to make a motion if this is the time. >> You you're certainly uh open to making a motion. >> Okay. Um but but I'd like to have a discussion on the numbers after I make the motion. So make the motion and then a discussion. Okay. Um so I'd like I'd
like to make a motion to reduce this from the entire page which can which can be reortioned as needed by 50,000. >> I'll second that. >> Okay. So we have a motion and a second to reduce the overall budget uh by
$50,000 uh dollars. Uh, Mr. Dutiniac, do you want to respond to this at at this time? Because I certainly want to uh to get your input. And we also I also recognize that Mr. Smaldo and uh Councilwoman Castelino are waiting to
comment online. >> Um, no, I I don't want to comment. Uh I'll just uh guess at who uh raised their uh digital hand first and I'll Mr. Smaldo please you have the floor. >> Thank you sir. Um I just want to point
out to the council I understand that we have to be we have concerns about the use of fuel and I'm not going to get into the debate of the actual vehicles. What I want to remind the council is that this is September. We are in the height of hurricane season. Um we are
also um approaching winter. We none of us can predict the weather. Um and I have been involved in the past where we've had some catastrophic injury uh um incidents whereby we almost ran out of fuel. So um by not having this money
allocated to to purchase this fuel, it may be while I understand we we're trying to get the budget down as tight as we possibly can. I would just caution you that this is a commodity that all of our trucks, our our vehicles, and and certainly even the take-home vehicles
are not going to impact that as much as I think people would would um you know, their their beliefs in this. Um I'm looking at strictly from an operational standpoint and a safety standpoint overall for the township. And that's my only comment. You you you make your decision. I'm just I'm advising you as
far as the administration is concerned. That's it. Okay. Um, Mr. Swallo, just to perhaps clarify, uh, we're now aware of your concern about this, the potential impact of any cuts, but are you saying that you
think, uh, there could be, uh, uh, an absence of funding for potential use, uh, purchase of fuel going forward if we cut $50,000? >> I I can't answer to that. That would be more of a Mr. the tiniac question. I
just don't have the numbers in front of me. The gallonage. I'm just saying I don't know what the I don't know what the the number of 50,000 reflects as far as how much fuel that would be cut. That's all I'm saying is that be is that it there are concerns when we have
commodities that we need in in situations where it may come up and that whether it be a hurricane or be a storm, a freak snowstorm, we've had we've had a hurricane and a freak snowstorm all happen within two weeks. know. So, we can't predict that and you know, it's it's a what if game, but our our job is
to um is to uh forecast and and hopefully we're wrong. Um and and say that, you know, if this were to happen, all I want to do is make sure that we don't we don't have to worry about not having anything in the fund that if we have to make an emergency procurement
for this particular commodity. That's all I'm suggesting to you. Uh >> thank you, Mr. Smaldo. Uh, Councilwoman Castelino, you have the >> So, if I So, this was an overall for the entire page. If I I just want to get the
the correct figure for fuel maintenance. We already spent 34,733. >> Yes, correct. >> Okay. So, we're already over budget. Last year, we spent 24,46169. So there that would not help because we
need to obviously bump up that line item. The 25 should probably be more like 50 if we already spent 34733 this year. And again, fuel maintenance comes in. We don't have a capital budget
and um you know, we haven't bought new cars that we know we're behind on. So you know, you have more fuel maintenance, you have other issues. So, you know what? I I I know everybody's trying to do their best job to get to a zero budget. I personally don't think
that should be the focus. The focus should be on how we could reduce the budget and and still run the township efficiently. And there are a lot of unknowns. The newer council members were not there for
Sandy and some of these other storms and these other situations. um that emergence situations that we had in in in previous years. So, I'm okay with leaving this for now, get a better analytical view over the the winter
months uh before we start the process for the next budget. And uh again, I'm open to finding out if there are some inefficiencies and correcting them for next year, but I don't want to play with this this year. So, I'm I'm going to stay firm on on this, especially because
if anything, you want to increase line 155. So, if you want to increase line 155 and reduce line 142, uh Mr. Datiniac, I I'll look to you for that answer.
>> Is that a Thank you, Councilwoman. >> Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. >> Ruden, you had your hand up. And then >> yes, I have I have I have two questions. First of all, I'd like to understand what is fuel maintenance. >> It's for maintenance on the pumps and the tanks themselves. Um the tanks get
pressure tested. Um there's fuel filters that get changed. Um so that there's any debris in a tank. Uh it doesn't go into the vehicle itself. So it's it's for those things. >> For what type of vehicles is that used
for? It's for all the vehicles. Yeah. So, all the pumps have fuel filter systems. The tanks get pressure tested. Um, it's for things like that. >> The tanks in the vehicles. >> No, no. I'm sorry. The storage tanks. The um the the fuel storage tanks.
>> Okay. And And can you explain why that's so much more than than last year? >> Um you don't have testing every year on them. You know, we may have had an issue with one of the pumps. I think we did have a pump down that we had to repair.
Um, and we can look into the details. >> Has the testing been done for this year? >> Yeah. Okay. Yeah, we tested our our underground storage tanks and we tested our above. >> So, that seems like that we're we're pretty good on that one. We're That's That's >> unless we had a broken pump. We We're
not going to have any more. >> Had to change a fuel filter or something like that. >> Thank you. Council Ruben, could I could I just ask that to you be cognizant of letting Mr. Tinyak finish and then >> please? >> Sure. Um I'd also like to understand is there you know if there is an emergency
is there is there an emergency um is there a provision for emergency purchases? >> Sure. Sure. um if we have an emergency, you know, let's say we did have a disaster in town, you know, we would declare the state of emergency. We'd pass a resolution.
um we would send that resolution down to DLGS and you know then we can I don't want to say bypass like local public contracts law but if we needed to like get a vendor out like you know immediately because the public is in
danger you know there's specific language that you would use that would allow us to um to make that purchasing that's the purchasing side of things the budgeting side so if we didn't have money for instance in an account that we needed to spend on whatever the the
emergency is. We would do another resolution and we would ask for an emergency appropriation and um again you send it down to DLGS and you would say I only have $100,000 in the account. I need $200. So I need $100,000 added as
emergency appropriations. and then we would raise it in next year's budget. Or depending on the type of emergency, the state might say, "Hey, you can raise it over three years or five years." Um, sort of similar to how West Orange has
managed um like the the employee uh terminal leave payouts where they would do the five-year emergency. So you pay out the money all in one year, but then you're raising it, aka asking the taxpayers for it over the course of five years. So you're
spreading out. Um so those that would be the the two things we would have the purchasing side of the emergency resolution that allows us to to move quickly and then the budget side where it allows us to increase the line item for the year and then raise the
difference as a deferred charge in the next year's budget. So, you know, if we'd spent if we added 100,000 in 2025, it would be a budget item for 2026 as a bird chart. >> So, what I'm what I'm hearing is that one, we have maxed out pretty much on
our fuel maintenance expenses and that we do have a safety net. God forbid there is an emergency to authorize extra money. So just for my council colleagues, I just want to break down what we have spent this year is 260.
Um that means that per quarter we're spending about 86,000. We are leaving in on the table 76,000 after the reduction of $50,000. So I
think that that that is very fair. So I I just like to have a little back and forth with my colleagues that you know why this number is still necessary when we when we have an emergency process for um to if there is an emergency and when
we have maxed out on one of the categories completely. I'd like to get some feedback before we we take a vote. >> Councilwoman Scarpa. Yeah, I feel comfortable, very comfortable with that analysis and the opportunity for the
emergency uh response. I also wanted to know who maintains and tests the fuel maintenance. >> Um, we hire a company to do the testing. I I can't think of the company's name off the top of my head. Um, >> is it the same company we've had for many years or do we bid that? I don't
believe we bid it because I don't think the testing exceeds the bid threshold and they're and then they're not a professional service. Um but we can talk to the DPW director and the purchasing agent. I don't know the the company off top of my
head. >> Yeah. Only because it's like a 10,000 difference and if if there was a lot of maintenance, you know, that actually had to be done. I just want to make sure that we haven't that cost has not uh risen. Also, can we get a breakdown, a fuel breakdown by department?
>> Um, so I I think DPW does keep track of the usage because the way I I look at it more of the perspective of what we buy from um
um from the the the fuel companies. So I see like in, you know, every two weeks we bought, you know, 300 gallons of diesel and we bought 500 gallons of of gasoline and they went to these various um locations like the DPW yard,
Firehouse 4, um uh the the recycling center. But I think internally, I know internally that because again, you know, I couldn't just come up with my car and and pull the the thing out and fill up.
I'd have to have a code and you're putting in um the mileage of the vehicle. Um and so like, you know, like let's say I filled up the the week before. I don't fill up, but not after. I don't have a
township vehicle. I don't use the pumps. But I would put my code in and I put my mileage in. Then the next time I come fill up, I put my code in and it's looking for mileage that is, you know, after the the mileage I previously put
in. So there's some safeguards in there. Not that you couldn't bypass it, but I mean, we do have safeguards in there. My point is though that we do have unique IDs that I think we can pull data for, and I believe DPW did. I I thought they
did. So, I guess we could put together sort of a report of, you know, take those DPW IDs and take those PD IDs and take the F uh fire department IDs and take the Jitney IDs and and figure out
a usage basis and then, you know, we can sort of come up with an average rate because we don't buy gasoline at the same rate um every time. It's it fluctuates just like you know any other commodity it's fluctuating and sorry
um but I I think we we can put that together and I know we've given some uh some data um to the council um because it was requested in in previous meetings >> like to see that. And will our new
financial software that we're getting track this more efficiently? it it won't it won't track the individual usage because there's really it's really not set up for that. Um
I have to see if there is software that goes along I'm sure there is there's got to be reporting capabilities that go along with the pumps. Uh and that would be the source of saying like you know if you wanted to look at it from a perspective of like who used the most
gas you know from an individual unique ID you should be able to pull that or can we group them together you know what group use the most gas or that I've never looked at that software um I will talk to DPW and see if that
stuff's all possible. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh, Councilwoman Castelino, did you raise your hand again? I'm sorry. If so, please, you have the floor. >> Yeah, sorry about that. So, okay. So, again, I'm I'm not a math genius, but
when I look at the 260 2 uh 621 divided by three per quarter, uh this is for line one 142 and then uh add add the last quarter to the 260 number, I get
347. So, I again, you want to cut that down to 347. Uh uh I could live with that or even 345. Um you're going to have to raise line 155 to 35,000
because that's what we spent so far this year. And then you you don't have much to shave off on line 150. So to to put in 50,000 is way too much. Um, and you you talk about emergency I remember with the recycling center
having to pay off that emergency expense. So, yes, there are there are other mechanisms in place, but because we we want to, you know, I I I get what you're doing, but we don't have the information here to make these kind of decisions. So, if you want to shave off
a little bit, 10,000 off the total budget, I I could live with that today. But anything else, I'm going to be a no. Thank you, council president. >> Thank you, Mr. Devi. >> Thank you, Council President. Um,
question for Mr. Dinac. Um, the the fuel use used today, 260. What period is that? What's the cut off? >> That's a good question. Let me pull it up. That's to the end of August. That's what
I base my figures on. month the end of August >> I did the same um for uh so for 8 months and then dividing that by 8 months and then multiplying it by 12 we're shooting
for 390 um if that's accurate. I guess the other question is whether or not there's a fuel there's a seasonal aspect to the usage of fuel. Excuse me.
So, um, this is through through August. >> Okay. So, it looks it looks as though >> and that's the fill up. The fill up was was through August. So, >> okay. >> Um, when we filled the tank.
>> Gotcha. Um, how about the seasonal element? Is there a seasonal element to it or not? >> Um, I I would say I think the the factors year-over-year that are definitely going to be different is that
we added Jity buses this year. Um, so there's additional fuel costs for the extra Jity buses. Um, you know, if we got a really snowy like October, November, December, hopefully it won't get snow in October or November, but um, I'm guessing the
big trucks are going to be fueling up. That's more the diesel fuel. Um they're they're going to be using more diesel. Um I don't know from a price perspective if diesel goes up in the winter. Um I think gas
prices do go up, but I'm not sure about diesel um because of the winter additives. I know they go up, but it's a it's a good question. Um I I I would say again if we had snowy conditions then I mean that's probably only going to be like a few days hopefully. Um but that
would that would impact the gas usage. Um I would say though that the jitneys probably are more impactful because we have the additional lines and the additional vehicles and you know they're running every day and um we'll point to
the really interesting electric vans we got. I don't know if anybody's seen them outside. They're pretty cool. So, we're not going to have fuel costs for those. >> Well, thank thank you for that. Um, the Citizen Budget Advisory Board did
uh have comments on this this item and just mentioning what was already in our preliminary report. Um we suggested adherence to the employment manual uh regulations regarding the assign
assigning of township vehicles. Uh they should be assigned for exceptional reasons. Um eliminate vehicle easy pass and gas entitlements as benefit as a benefit of municipal employment. Um assign the fleet vehicles and easy
pass for official business or reimbursement for use of personal vehicles. then seek reimbursement and corrective action for any nonwork-related use of these vehicles. Um out of state travel should always be
pre-authorized with improved cost controls. So uh and the recommendation was a result was uh to for a reduction in automobile expenses, one of them being gas. Um,
I think uh I think a lot of that needs to be considered as has been mentioned by council members that um when considering what the the amount should be applied to for this uh budget item.
[Music] >> Okay. And and again uh Mr. Belby, I appreciate you repeating uh information that's in the report. However, we are not again we are not going to be able to address a lot of the issues you just raised uh in uh the budget process uh
today. But again, we have read it and we take it into consideration. We're already talking about changing the process for next year. Um is there is there any other uh discussion here? That's what Ruden >> I I would like to say that between 2024
and 25 2025 gas prices have gone down modestly but they have gone down and we also do now have some electric vehicles. I hope that we can get more electric vehicles. So um to stay on course with what was last year and what has been
spent to date is possibly not the best practice. But I would like to um withdraw my motion and make a second motion. Um I >> before you do that a second to be resended.
>> Yeah, I'll second that. >> You will you will resend. >> Yeah, I'll resend. >> Thank you. Okay. >> Does that work? Yes, >> madam cler. Okay. Yes. >> Please go ahead. So, I also pointed out the exact same, which is how much is in the how much has been spent to as as uh
Councilwoman Castelino um also mentioned that $260,000 has been spent if we process even along the same lines, which personally um I think is allowing for an too much expense. But but I did hear uh
Councilwoman Castelino say that she would agree to a $10,000 decrease there. I would like to go line by line and say for line number 142 a $10,000 increase.
>> I'll second it. >> An increase on >> decrease. [Music] >> Okay. So what you just to clarify for me and perhaps others you've you've gone from your original motion that you've
rescended to looking at the total budget item for this page. >> Correct. >> And now what you're saying is that instead of focusing on the overall number you want to go by line item the budget. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> Yes. >> And so what is the line item that you're
reducing? >> So the line item is 142 gasoline fuel. I'd like to counting on on my colleague support um I'd like to reduce it by $10,000. >> I second it.
>> Okay. So, you're reducing it from what number? I'm sorry. I'm still not in the meeting, so it's hard for me to >> 350,000 to 340,000. >> Okay. So, we have a now we now we're clear. We have a motion and a second.
And uh again there was mentioned uh Councilwoman Castelino uh of some remarks that uh Councilwoman Ruden was referencing. Do you have any opinion on this new motion that we have on the floor?
>> Councilman, are you able to be online? Sorry, I forgot to mute myself. I hate being on Zoom. Sorry I can't be there in person. Um, so I'm okay with that as long as I'm going to make a
motion for 155 to increase to 35,000 because we already spent that. Are you you okay? That's >> Well, let's deal with this motion first. I I apologize. I I know. I know. But I need different >> Let's deal with this uh uh this
>> Yes, I'm fine with it. I'm fine with that. Let's let's get moving because we're we're going to an hour and we got one page done. >> Yes, that's uh that's my concern as well. Uh again, I would like to get some uh feedback from the administration,
either the uh Mr. Diniac or Mr. Smaldo on specifically what you uh what you think about this proposal. And I'm excuse me, I'm not looking to put you on on uh uh on the spot. I'm not looking
for you to uh say anything that you don't feel comfortable saying. It's just I I value uh your feedback. uh because as I mentioned at the start of the meeting, you guys are in the trenches and you do have that idea uh a better
idea of of what's going on. And I also know that that things change over time. We're looking at a budget that was now uh last done in uh mid to late July and things could have changed since then. So I I I'm always interested in an update
of your uh educated opinion on all of these items. So, I I don't want to put you on the spot if you don't feel comfortable talking about it. I but I uh I would like to at least give you the opportunity to to chime in. So, so Mr. Diniac's looking at Mr.
Fagan, so I will take the lead on this. Uh >> so, Council President, I'm just going to stand by my statement. you know, it's it experience sometimes dictates over um you know, what's on paper and I'm just being I'm just trying to look from uh
the uh the aspect of what I know as public safety. We don't know what the weather is and predicting and you know, and as I stated earlier, if this is the council's desire, I I will, you know, understand that and we will we will work accordingly with whatever is approved. But I'm not going to change my statement
as to the fact that I'm, you know, I I have to I have my job is to worry about the whatifs and see if if and if this happens. I hope I'm wrong and I hope that um you know and I and I apologize in advance that if we we've actually
allocated too much funding, but I'm not going to make an apology if I was if I'm predicted correct. So um you know and I'm not going to ask for thanks either. So, um, but I just, uh, I stand by my statement. >> Okay. And, and that's perfectly
acceptable, uh, from the administration. If, if your opinion has not changed since the last time that that number was was put on paper, that that in itself says that you you feel confident that given even the uh, additional conditions that may or may not have changed, you
you still don't change your opinion. That that's fine. I just uh just want to give uh give you the opportunity because I'm interested in what you think. So, >> okay. And thank you. I'm done. I I I don't need to opine anymore. Thank you. >> Okay, Mr. Tin, again, I don't want to
put you on the spot. If you if you if you rest, then then that's fine, too. >> 10,000 is better than 50 uh as a decrease. So, we're happy about that. I'll make one very blanket statement if I may. Um
my my fear is that if we if we don't properly fund and it's not just this account any account and we end up overspending at the end of the year and now in 2026 we have to raise deferred charges for all those over expenditures
and not only that but now we realize that we have to budget at a higher level for 2026 as well. the increase to the taxpayer is going to be so great that then I'm fe fearful we wouldn't even be able to raise it. Um and now we're
looking at real reductions to services. So, you know, I know we want to get to zero, but if getting to zero then means that next year is like a $400 increase, I don't I don't know if it's worth it.
So, that's that's my piece. Um, and it's, you know, that's my fear is that, you know, we're not going to be properly funded and then I, but I know it's it's September, so I think a lot of accounts were going to be okay. But
again, that's just my fear. It's always been my fear is that we're not going to have enough and then we're going to have defer charges and then have to also increase the budgets in 26 and it's going to be, you know, a lot worse than it needs to be. So, >> right. And so just to to summarize,
uh the the chance of us uh having to do that to put in deferred charges next year and to increase the budget is is a danger that negatively impacts taxpayers. Whereas if we leave it in the budget this year and we don't use it, it
goes into our surplus so we don't lose it >> and it it goes to help offset taxes in the future. So, that's sort of what we're trying to balance here. And uh uh >> just wanted to explain that to everybody before we we take a vote.
>> And the last thing I'll say is I know we have the reval and I know that is difficult for a lot of people, but there are also a lot of people and I've heard from from residents who won't out them. Thanks. My taxes went way down because of the reval. Um, so we do have a very
large percentage uh of residents that the reval has been good to them from a tax perspective. Now, you can say they were overvalued for many years and they paid too much taxes in the last 1015 years, but it's it's not everyone and I know it's
it's a tough process and it's I think it's unfair, but that's the system we have in New Jersey. it. We do have a lot of residents that, you know, this reval's been good from a tax perspective. So, I don't want us to think that everyone has been hit over
the head and everyone's paying more taxes and and that we should do this because of just that. >> Yeah. And I think the uh the uh tax assessor in his presentation earlier this year, and you can probably find a link to it somewhere, >> said that roughly speaking, 40% of
people's uh property taxes went up and about 40% went down and about 20 stayed roughly the same. >> Yeah. >> Uh but again, certainly we understand the focus on people who are having to pay more. >> Yeah. Council woman, >> can we stay on track because we said
this was going to be an hour meeting and my time is limited. I certainly understand that. So, if there's no more discussion, um, Madame Clerk, >> Councilwoman Castelino, >> you need to unmute yourself. >> Oh, sorry. I forgot to mute. Uh, for 10,
this is 10,000 we're on. >> Yes. For line 142. >> Uh, yes. >> Councilwoman Ruden. >> Yes. >> Councilwoman Scarp. >> Yes. Council President Koviaak. >> Yes. >> The motion carries. >> Thank you.
>> Council Ruden, you said you wanted to make another motion or have further discussion. >> Yes. Since there needs to be an adjustment to the fuel maintenance since that has that has exceeded what it was the budget recommendation um is we need to add another 10,000 in
there. that would reduce it from the diesel fuel budget by 10,000 leaving diesel fuel with 98,000 and um they have only spent 64,000.
So if we reduce that by another 10,000 that would still leave them with 20 $24,000 and I think that that seems fair for the rest of the year. >> Second that. >> So it sounds like you you're asking for
two different actions. I think we need to just put one action for motion. Well, then I'd just like to for the rest of for the rest of this for 150 and 155 an adjustment of $10,000 and Mr. Diniac will make the the um account reconcil
reconciliation. >> So reducing diesel maintenance by 150 >> not diesel maint,000 and then you'll and you'll offset the difference in fuel maintenance to cover what has already been spent. So, in other words, you're suggesting that we
move $10,000 from diesel to the $10,000 move it to the line item for uh fuel maintenance. >> Yes. Is that correct? >> That Well, I I just No, actually, what I'm saying is reduce $10,000 from the overall budget and with what is left,
Mr. Diniac will make the adjustment from 150 to 155 in line item. He'll put a $10,000 in there, too. And that'll still leave 24,000 for uh diesel fuel. Okay. For the next >> So it's just a reduction to diesel.
>> Yeah. >> So So it's it's another $10,000 reduction in the >> in diesel. Yes. All >> budget. Yes. >> I I have a question. >> Okay. Uh first I'm sorry. Were you making council maroon, were you making a motion? Well, if there if I would like
to make a motion, but if if um coun council um member Castelino has a comment before I make a motion. >> Yeah. So, I have a I need a clarification from Mr. Soraldo. So, um
so when we reduced from 142, you know, that was my, you know, 155, that's my recommendation to give it to 155. So now you want to reduce from 150
which yes I I did the math too. You have a little wiggle room but I just want to get a clarification cuz we did add the extra jity line. Do those jitneys run on diesel? >> No, I believe they run on gasoline. >> Okay.
>> All right. But just so we just so just so the the the council and the and the public know we added the seventh jitney um August 1st um that route. Um so the whatever the increases it is one of the
um the route is on the north side of town. Um we just we what we did was we split the largest route which was the north side of town into two. So, um you know what the actual cost is um based on whether it's down the hill, up the hill,
it's really going to be based on gallons. I can't tell you which line is running more than the other uh right now, but um you know, it's it's still new, but there there is an increase to it. So, I I I will confirm though. I'm pretty sure the they're gasoline, but I I'll
confirm. I'll find out. I I I'll have an answer for you in a moment. And then my math is if we stay on track, yeah, we'll be around 96. Uh why don't we reduce that line to 100 instead of a full 10? I'm just I I just
get nervous with this, Councilwoman. I I I know what you're trying to accomplish and I support that. I just don't want us to, you know, be short ch, you know, I just don't want to just get in a pickle at
the end of the year. Okay. And I I understand that, but we're leaving more in the in on the table than has been spent each quarter, even while we're taking out 10,000. And we're also reappropriating the money to fuel
maintenance to cover to cover the charges already. here. 108 to11 is what it's budgeted now. They already took out 25,000. So, it's at down to 108 to 11. They've already
>> Yeah. No, the spend. >> Yeah. The spend this year 64,000 so far. Do they just fill up on diesel? Like, how does it when they fill up the tanks? How long does a tank last for? Mr. the act. Do we know?
>> I don't know. I don't know. >> I just say bring it down to 100. That line item. >> So I I just want to say that last year um the total amount paid was 80,000.
I'm suggesting that we give them more than that for for the last quarter. So it would be over what they spent last year when gas prices were a bit higher. It seems like a fair amount. They're still last year they only spent $80,000.
Yet the budget >> you say only but the weather it all depends on the weather. I know you say only but if there's more snowstorms we we have we have you know the fall we always wind up having some kind of uh
episode. So >> guys, I' I'd like to to to prevent any interruptions if I can. So when you finish speaking, say thank you and then that in a dialogue like this and the other person knows to to speak. So Councilwoman Castle, you you have the full
>> Okay. I'll ask Council, Councilwoman, what do you want that line item to be? >> I'd like Yes. >> Can we make it just a hundred and and call it a day and I'll be I'll support that. Thank you. Sure. >> Thank you.
I've I just I'll sleep better. Thank you. >> Okay. >> Okay. I heard a thank you, Councilman Ruden. >> Yes. >> Uh I I just saw Mr. Mr. Saraldo has his hand up. Do you want to hear him before you make a motion? >> Sure. >> Okay. Mr. Saldo,
>> just to confirm the counciloman's question, they are gasoline. I just wanted to confirm them. >> The Jity buses. >> Okay. >> All right. Thank you. >> Thank you, Councilwoman Rudington. >> I'd like to make a motion to reduce line
item 150 um from 108,000 221 43 to uh to just to even 100,000. >> I'll second that. >> So, we're taking out 8,211
>> and 43 cents. >> Exactly. >> So, I have a motion and uh a second. Is there any further discussion? >> No. >> Madame Clerk, >> um I thought there was a previous motion on the floor, but >> Oh, did I miss that?
>> No, but there was so many different So, I mean, I'd have to go back and review the video, honestly. U there was a motion that was just approved uh by a 40 vote >> and then uh Councilwoman Ruden was about to make a motion and then uh exceeded to
Councilwoman Castelino comment first but I don't think she made a motion in a second at that point. Then we had discussion came back to Councilwoman Castelino she made the motion and it was seconded. So I don't think we have a pending motion. Does anybody
>> understand differently? I thought we had a an a motion to reduce when the councilwoman was going from 150 to 155 to reduce one item by $10,000 and I heard uh councilwoman Scarpa
second it and I wrote that was not voted on and then and then there was a bunch of >> discussion I will I will resend that motion >> and I'll resend mine too. Well, I already erased it. Thank you. Just to be certain and and council president, I
have five minutes, so >> Okay. Uh, Councilwoman Ruden, do you want to re uh redescribe your motion? >> Yes. I would like like to remove um from light line item 150 diesel fuel
um make that in from 1,800 to 108. Why am I screwing up the numbers? 108 to 211.43 down to an even 100,000. >> And I'll second that.
>> Okay. Thank you. Okay. Councilwoman Castelino. >> Yes. >> Councilwoman Ruden. >> Yes. >> Councilwoman Scarpa. >> Yes. >> Council President Kokoviaak. >> Yes. >> The motion carries. >> Move to consent on this page. >> Oh, yes.
>> Consent. >> No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. >> Wait. Did you reduce? Did we add 10? >> Yeah, that adjusted. >> Okay, let's uh again, I I can't keep saying this and you guys ignore me. We
can only have one person talking at a time and when they're finished, they say thank you because otherwise we get situations where we don't we can't follow what's going on. So, I am now recognizing Councilwoman
Castalino. And please say thank you at the end of your comment. And please don't comment without being recognized by the chair. >> My apologies. It's hard to be on Zoom. So, um, okay. So, I just wanted to make sure
that we increase line 155 to 10,000. Did we do that on that last motion? My my screen froze. That's why I'm >> um >> I wanted to increase 155 to the 35,000.
Did that go in with that last motion because my screen froze? >> No. >> No, we did not. We did not uh have that motion and we did not have that vote. >> Okay. So, >> sorry. >> I'm sorry.
>> Finish. Council President, I'm sorry. >> Okay. I was I was clarifying that we did not have a motion or a vote that impacted line 155. >> Okay. So then I I would like to um make
a motion to increase 155 to reflect what we already spent this year which was 30 almost 35,000. So I'd like to increase line 155 to 35,000. That's my motion. >> Okay. So we have a motion. We need a
second before discussion. >> I will second. >> Thank you. >> Okay. So, now for discussion. Uh, Councilwoman uh Ruden had her hand up. >> Okay. So, when I was describing what needed to be done, I had said that this
cut, there will be a cut of $8,000 and that some of the money from diesel fuel, the 10,000 an additional $10,000 would be moved into fuel maintenance. And I believe that Mr. Dutiniac, you agreed to that that you would make that
adjustment. >> Well, it's not it's not an increase. We're just reallocating already there. So, we're there. >> But that's I don't >> it's not an increase, >> right? So that So to your point, that
would leave diesel fuel with 88,000. They currently have spent 64,000 and that leaves them with a nice nice cushion. So, what we have here is we did have a motion that was approved and uh we have
this non-motion in which Councilwoman Ruden suggests that we take the money we just took out of line 150 diesel fuel and move it to line 155 fuel maintenance. And
>> No, that's not what you're doing. No. >> Okay. Well, so please please clarify. >> I'd like Mr. Dutiniac to clarify. >> Sure. So, um, we had a motion where we reduced the overall budget by $8,21143
and Councilwoman Ruden is saying that with the existing pot of money that is left to reallocate $10,000 from diesel fuel and put it to fuel maintenance. So, nothing changes net to the budget at this point. It's
just reallocating between the sub accounts. >> Okay. Thank you, Councilwoman Castelino. >> You know, this this gets more complicated than it needs to be, and this is why it takes over an hour to get one page done. So, basically
what we did here was we made line 150 $100,000. Unless I'm just really getting a bad connection on my on my Zoom. Did we not did we not just do that? So, we have uh
we have line 142 went to uh 340. Line 150 went to 100. I was under the impression line 155 would go up to 35.
Does that make the total on the bottom reflect what you folks are discussing? So line 155 did not increase. The net effect of the two votes was that the budget was reduced $18,21143.
>> And I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to leave. So I want to consent in advance to what's been done so far. Mr. Diniac, if you could get me those numbers on what we need to do to get to zero and if you're there, you would appreciate the same spot. We have a motion on the
floor. >> Okay. >> Yes. >> Wait. >> Okay. So, so my motion was to make line 155 35,000. >> Correct. >> So, I think Council Castelino is ask
Hold on just a second. So, Councilwoman Castelino is asking to add $10,000 to uh line 155 >> and that is new money. That is not a reallocation, >> right?
>> Okay. So to add in we requires four votes >> and the motion is on the floor. Are we finished discussing? >> Yes. Thank you, >> Madame Clerk. >> Councilwoman Castelino, >> yes. >> Councilwoman Ruden,
>> no. >> Councilwoman Scarpa, >> no. >> Council President Koviaak, >> yes. >> The motion fails. >> Okay. So now, uh, Councilwoman Scarpa have has left the building with Elvis, and we need to
determine, uh, whether we continue on or whether we end this with we haven't even consented to a single page. >> Okay. Can I say thank you?
Yes, please go ahead. On Councilwoman Castle on Council. >> So, I initially proposed that we reduce this by $50,000. We have now agreed to reduce it by 18. I think that we can we should call this a day.
>> Thank you, Councilwoman Castelino. >> Councilwoman, you need to unmute yourself. Uh, call it a day. Like, we have a few more pages to do. Are we going to do them or what are we doing? >> Not literally call it a day, but just end this page. We've only reduced We've
only reduced it by 18,000, which is far less than what I had originally um asked for. So, >> okay. >> I I've I've heard your concerns and I've adjusted. >> No, I appreciate that. I thought we were done when we just consented. So,
>> Okay. We haven't consented on the page yet because you you said you stopped the consent. >> Oh, my apologies. I'm I'm good now. >> Okay. So, it looks like we have nothing more on this page. Then it's time for consent. >> Consent.
>> Consent. >> Consent. Now, we have to figure out, are we going to continue to move forward without Councilwoman Scarpa, which will require us to come back, or do we want to move forward? We have uh a majority uh to
reduce a line item. We no longer have a sufficient numbers of council people to increase. So the question is do we want to move forward uh at this time? My colleagues, what do you want to do? I'm I'm ready to to move forward to try
to get this done. Councilwoman Ruden, >> is the other option to have Mr. Dutin do the debt and finance presentation at this time? >> No, we are not going to do that. I thought it was going to save us some time. It obviously didn't, but we do not
we do not need to approve the debt management plan or have a presentation today. I was hoping to use that time to get through our agenda on items that we have to get through in order to get the
budget ready for adoption. So, I have I have deleted the presentation. We will do it at some point in the future. Uh it's it's incredibly important that we do so, but it's not as a big a priority in my mind
as to get our budget ready for adoption. To answer your question, Councilwoman Castelino. >> Uh yeah, I I I prefer to do, you know, what do we got? A couple pages left. like we need to get this budget done. Do we have a couple pages?
We got the utilities. Can we at least get through that? See how long that takes us? >> Well, we have a majority now of the of the three people left. Councilman Ruden, you you agreed you want to move forward? >> I'm fine with moving forward. >> Okay.
Mr. Ziniac, what's next? I need five minutes for a banking issue that I have to go take care of. >> Perfect. >> Are you overdrawn again? >> No, we don't ever ever overdraw. No. >> Okay. >> So, we will take a 5m minute break. It's
1:23 now. We'll reconvene at 128. >> Awesome. Thank you. >> Thank you. For those of for those uh in the Zoom audience, I just like to take this opportunity to remind you that the next council meeting is scheduled for Monday, not our normal Tuesday. It will
be Monday uh and not at 6:30. The time has been moved to 6:00. Um and the information is on our website. As council president mentioned, we are going to take a short bait uh short break, excuse me. So, I'm going to put on mute. There's nothing wrong with your
computer. We will return shortly and thank you for your indulgence. Thank you West Star Orange for your patience. We are resuming the meeting. Uh the break was a little longer than we anticipated but we are back and once again thank you for your patience. I just want to clarify a previous announcement. It was suggested to me and
it's a good suggestion. Uh, as I have mentioned, the council meeting on September 8th is starting at 6:00. Again, that's Monday. Time changed to 6:00, but council is going into executive session immediately following the start of the meeting, and then
public comment will resume after executive session. As you know, there's no determining or predicting how long they will be in executive session. But if you're showing up at 6:00 thinking that public comment will be at that time, it will not. it will be immediately following uh executive
session. So, I just wanted to make that comment and we're going to forge forward here now. And uh if you are with us before the break, Councilwoman Scarpa had to leave. So, she is no longer here. So, we have Council President uh Council uh Woman Ruden and Councilwoman Michelle
Castelino online. So, uh with that enough said, uh Council President, I'm going to turn the floor over to you. >> Thank you, Mr. Fagan. Just to potentially clarify, I can't guarantee this, but we're starting the executive session shortly after 6:00 and we expect
uh to be ready to start public comment at or around 7, but we will see. I just we're aiming for that. Of course, we were aiming for an hour today, so take that into account as well.
Uh Mr. Ziniac, >> thank you, Council President. We're moving on to uh the next page which is 113 and this is the electricity for the buildings and for recreation buildings and lights.
Thank you. Uh are there any uh changes on this? I I'm just anticipating Councilwoman Ruden is going to ask for a year-to-ate spend. Uh do you have those numbers? >> Yes. Um, so the year-to- date spend for
um, let me pull it up. Sorry, I Okay. Okay. The spend on electricity for building and property is $276,731.77 and the electricity for recreation is $71,312.32. So a total of $348,449.
Okay. uh consent? >> No. >> Okay. I figured it was worth a shot. >> Who would like to open the discussion? >> Councilwoman Ruden. >> Well, there's over $200,000 uh two thou $220,000
left on the table. Um very doubtful that that's the amount that will be spent even even during winter months. Uh so I just have to have to process this for a second. These payments are through July. >> Okay. >> We haven't paid August yet.
>> Okay. [Music] >> My hand up. >> I'm I'm sorry. We were We were waiting for Councilwoman Ruden, but please go ahead if that's okay with you. Councilwoman Ruden. Okay. >> Please go ahead, M. Councilwoman Castle. >> Yeah. So, I had asked Mr. Diniac at a
prior meeting. I just wanted to make sure because I know since the summer began, did you see a big difference with the jump from June to July? Because all across New Jersey, all of our bills are are are uh increasing drastically. So I just
wanted to make sure has any kind of calculations been done or any kind of analysis made from now until the end of the year on the increased costs uh that we've been seeing uh in all our uh electric bills. So, we did have a we did have a rate
increase um due to that Pennsylvania Ohio transmission um cost increase. Um but we have not done uh an assessment yet through the end of the year uh on how that impacts us.
[Music] >> Do you even know from a quantification what the percentage increase was in that uh rate increase? >> No. No, I couldn't tell you. >> But this will basically have an impact on the final five months of the
>> Counciloman Castelino. Sorry, I thought you were finished. >> Yeah. So, where I could be supportive with reducing it based on last year, I mean, even my own household, I I you know, I can't believe I have two properties. I I can't believe, you know,
how we're getting hit over the head from the state. So, um I would feel more comfortable if we I'm okay if we don't consent on this if if if they if if not today because obviously we're we don't
have the time, but if Mr. Datiniac could take some kind of uh uh look at it and and get back to us if he recommends any other decreases. um because I just again I we don't know what we don't know and we're it appears
from last year we could deduct but I wouldn't even do that for my own household with the way the rates have increased. So I I'd feel more comfortable that um that he just look at it and then get back to us and if we could skip over this page and go on to
the next one I'm good with that. >> Thank you. That's my recommendation. Okay. Counciloman Ruden, >> I'd just like to ask Mr. Dutin what your thoughts are on whether any reduction is possible.
>> I I wouldn't recommend reducing um because we still have uh we have to book August um September, October, November, December. Um, and I know the electricity load for
um for the colder months is less. Um, but so I I don't I don't think I would recommend cutting it any further. We cut 35,000 um a while back. I don't remember when. Um
>> um would you mind just giving us a a a breakout for for the electricity for recreation? Did you say that's 71,000? >> Uh yes. Um that was I say yeah 71,000 and change. Sure.
>> That's literally for half the year and we're they're asking for 179. Does that seem reasonable to you or does it seem like >> I I think overall we're the numbers right but the the recreation line is too high and the building and property is
too low if that makes sense. Um, so yeah, the recreation line is too high, but again, overall the 563 number, I think, uh, is what we need to get through the year.
>> Okay. So, I would just say that we just move to consent on this. >> Okay. Uh, Councilwoman Castelino, >> uh, um, fine with that. I also just want to ask in in the uh recreation electricity budget is that I not just
the building that's um for the parks and the lights and the fields and everything all inclusive. I just want want everybody to understand with that that covered. So it's just not like the recreation building, it's the >> it's all the fields that we own and and
our parks. But yeah, >> correct. >> I I agree. I'm more than happy to consent. >> Consent. Consent. >> Consent. >> Next page is page 114 and is street lighting
>> consent. >> These are fixed. >> Totally fixed >> consent. Wait, are I just >> Mr. Datiniac, are these fixed rates? >> Yes. So, will reimburse sub.
>> No, no, no. Public service charges us for all of the lights and it's like a per uh appliance rate. And um and then what also is included in this is the um street lighting for the various uh
communities that we reimburse. >> Okay. Um can you give a breakdown for each one? What year to date, please? Um yes second audience,
the dead air you hear is not a malfunction. It's just that we are waiting to uh retrieve some figures. So, we still are in the meeting. Just bear with us and thank you for your patience. >> So, I've got a couple of jokes I could use to fill the dead air. What? Just
kidding. I'm terrible joke, Taylor. Um, so for street lighting we are at $413,000 and for the condo street lighting reimbursement we are at $94,337.90.
>> Are we done with condo uh street lighting reimbursement because I saw a lot of that on the on the bill list this week. Um I I'll have to check and make sure that we've paid every one of the um so I I couldn't tell you off the top of
my head. Um so the uh condo street lighting was $94,337.90. And when we're re when we are reimbursing, are we paying for gas for Luwellyn Park?
>> Um, no, not not not gas. Llewellen Park we we reimburse for snow removal. >> No, no, I meant because they have they have special lighting. >> Uh, we have >> they have gas lighting.
>> Oh, like Glenn Rich used to. Um we we have a uh a settlement agreement with Lwellen Park that dictates what we pay uh the various reimbursements. Um so I don't remember
the exact calculation for the street lighting but we do reimburse for street lighting. Yeah amongst a few other things. Let me just We pay as they come in. Um, >> so >> while you're doing that, Councilwoman, could I just ask a quick question? >> Of course.
>> Okay. The 24 uh number uh on both of the Well, I just wanted to look at the street lighting was about $80,000 less than what was budgeted. And is that's anything that's going to
be impacting us this year? um that that there was less money spent last year. >> Yes, it looks like about 80,000 little little less than 80,000 spent. >> We'll do the calculate. I I think we're you know, we're not going to reach 541.
Um we we should have some cushion there hopefully. Um, so yeah, I I I'd have to look and see all the charges from force uh from last year and see what they were charging per appliance and and and
then look at 2025 and see what the charge per appliance is. Are there more appliances? Is the the rate higher? Um I I've I've never done that um here. So >> it's kind of interesting. The condo street lighting was within a couple of thousand dollars of budget last year.
So, okay. Yeah, if you could just, you know, send an email to the council, that would be helpful. >> So, So this year we allocated $77,000 more than was actually paid last year. Is there a reason why that when
why is it so much more? >> Um so we we kept we just kept the same budget amount from last year. You being completely honest, we we just didn't raise it. We didn't decrease it. We just rolled the previous
uh 2024 budget amount uh as 2025. >> And is this through August? The total that you gave us 413. Um, see this is through this is through June.
>> Oh, so it's six months. [Music] Do you anticipate using this amount since it's $77,000 more? Can we And you said that there's a cushion. One of my
favorite words. >> Yeah, I I mean there's not going to Sorry. There's not going to be much left. Um, so >> can we safely take out of out of here $30,000 since we have a 77,000? >> No, I don't think so. >> What do you think is reasonable?
>> I I don't I think we need the the amount that was was put in there. I do. >> Even though it's $77,000 more than last year. No, I I think we need to keep what we have in there. >> Is there any way to take out 10,000 from
this? >> No. >> Considering that probably all the condo street lighting has been reimbursed. >> No, I I would say we should keep what we have in there. >> Is it subject to the same rate increase? >> Yeah. Okay.
All right then. >> Consent. >> Consent >> consent. But that figure um sorry council person that figure for um up to June Mr. Diniaak we had already spent 413,000.
Is that what he said? >> That includes the condo. That's a one time Yeah. It's a onetime payment. >> Okay. Yeah. I Yeah. I'm comfortable with consenting. Thank you. >> Um, next page is fire hydrant service
and we make this payment to um, American Water and it's a set payment. Um, this number can't change. We just pay every month. So, >> again, I know you weren't here all of
last year, but uh you know, you're we're talking about uh you know, $160,000 difference between last year's budget and last year's paid. Uh I don't know if there's lag time, but
>> yeah. So, we're we're budgeting for what we need to pay. That's why it more aligns with um the payment last year. >> So that's why it's gone down uh 125 grand this year. Okay. >> Do I hear a consent? >> Consent.
>> Consent. >> Now we're on page 116. Um these are American Water Charges. Um, let me pull up the data. [Music] I'd just like to remind everyone that
grass clippings are not accepted at the recycling center and information has been posted on the website today how you can dispose of grass clippings. >> I like the PSAs. That's very that's very creative and clever. Thank you.
>> I like that. >> Okay. >> So, the per um the the per charged for 147 water for building and property is 29,17270 >> up until what date? >> Um I will give you that in a second. Let
me just give you the the numbers. It's two separate screens. Um, water recreation is 7,18353 and let me give you the detail. U so the water payments are through July [Music] um for water recreation. Is that for the
pool? I think the pool is filled with well water I believe. So um no it's it's the various uh >> all the buildings >> park park um parks and fields and where
there's like bathroom connections or water fountain connections or sprinklers. Uh >> I don't think we have any of that. Do we have >> Ospac Toby Cat Center >> like Franklin Avenue, Carter Street, Cherry Street, Ralph Road, Park Avenue,
Liberty Street, St. Cloud, Bowling Drive. Um, those are all the wreck properties. >> Okay. But yeah, I believe the the pool uses well because we have a we replace the pump um
to fill it before the season started. >> So why is the water recreation um $1,000 more than what was actually paid or charged last year? Um for this one is as I said with the
previous um or two budgets ago electricity we kept the same amount from 2024 that was budgeted we rolled forward for 2025. >> Can can we move both of these to reflect what was actually paid last year?
>> Oh you mean reducing the budget to the amount >> what was paid and charged last year? >> Yes. instead of the request, what was actually used. >> I mean, I I I don't recommend it, but if
that's what you want to do, um >> Okay. >> Counciloman Castelino. >> Yeah. So I I I I I see what you want to do counciloman but again like has the rates increased this year? So will the overall number be more than last year?
So so before we you know move to do that has that analysis been been done. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. We haven't done an analysis on this. I I mean I would just recommend keeping it because it is a pretty small amount of money. I mean, I know we're
looking at every dollar and I appreciate that, but um I don't know if we're going to really impact it enough uh to to warrant the risk of then overexpendure at the end or needing to transfer money in. I I I don't know if
it's worth it to tinker with the this number. >> Okay, I'm good with consenting then. >> All right, >> consent. >> Consent. Did we consent to membership NJSLM? >> I thought we did. >> I thought we did. Maybe we just
discussed it. Okay. >> So, if we could do this page. Um, >> so I think we we just received a bill on this this week. Is that correct? I didn't see it >> for this is for the membership for the magazine. >> Yeah. No, I didn't see it this
>> so >> that might be for next year. >> Okay. So, we had we had talked about this. We have a lot of subscriptions and we had talked about reducing this to just maybe six subscriptions. So, this number reflects
>> we we paid this one already. We paid this earlier in the year. So that that's what we paid was the 3819. >> So okay. >> So the bill we're getting is for next year. >> Um
>> well hell it's 2026 budget that we should be starting on >> because we have a bill th this week on this and I believe it's on subscriptions. >> Really? >> I thought we paid this like early in the year 381950. Um let me let me pull up
the data. Okay. >> Oh, no. That's advertising. We're advertising on the league, not not paying for the membership. >> Oh, okay. >> Oh, okay. Got it. All right. >> All right. >> So, this was already paid. This exact
amount was already paid. >> Yes. Okay. >> Um, >> let me let me just make sure. Um, >> Councilwoman Ruden, can I call on Council Kathleen? Councilwoman Castleina. >> Yeah, just real quick. So, how many like
I I I haven't I can't remember the last time I received the booklet. So, is this for all of us to get um all our books? I mean, did are we going to limit that? I mean we could do it one for the entire
council or I I don't know like if you want to say >> the membership is one the subscription is separate from that um that is a subscription for all council members as well as uh directors.
So, and I did a a um poll a couple of years ago cuz they offered whether it was a hard copy or online whether you wanted to receive it either one of those ways or not at all. Some people did opt out at that point, but many many did not. So,
I just want to put that out there. I for one I don't I'm not interested in it but there are a lot of department u I'm sorry directors that do like to have it. >> Okay. >> And I assume digital is less expensive.
>> No, I believe it's the same. >> Oh wow. >> Yeah. >> I'm not sure about that. >> It's the same. But I mean clearly we could we could cut that by half. But this is a membership is that's for the every municipality pays that. >> Yeah. If you want to be in
the uh New Jersey League municipalities >> that also gives council people an access to them. I don't know if anybody's mentioned that to you, but >> it also gives you a discount as opposed to a non-member. There's two different fees. So, if you're not in it, you'll pay more for the conferences and all that type of thing.
>> It's based on the number of employees, right? >> I'm not really sure to be honest. >> I I think that's the way they >> Yeah. calculate the cost, but we paid it in February. >> Okay. All right. >> Okay. >> All right. I'm good.
>> Consent. >> Consent. >> Consent. >> Didn't we do this one with the chief or No, >> I don't. We had pulled we had pulled several last meeting
>> this is page 118. This is medical transportation billing. Um this is um >> okay >> this is the service that we use Coronus. Um they manage all of our EMS billing
and the payment processing. And >> and what have we paid year to date? Um, I'll pull that up right now. So, we have paid to date $64,15.85. [Music] Um, let me pull up the time period.
[Music] President. >> Yes. I'm going to uh call Mr. Smaldo if that's okay with everyone. Mr. Smaldo. >> Yes, sir. Uh just to uh give you my insight on this medical transport building while Mr. Denniac is um looking
at the the monies charged. So the purpose we did when we hired this company since I was familiar with this a while back um is that um they bill us for um um based on monies collected and
received what not on receivables. So um and the reason that we use this service is so that um our when our um EMS providers, our our firefighters and the um and the ambulance go to the hospital, they automatically upload this right at
the hospital and they begin working on um on the on the bill claims um right away. So um so this is based on what is collected. Um, so, um, and what whatever is spent here, I just want you to keep that in mind that, uh, and I don't know
what the numbers are and the figures are, but when you're making your decision on this, if you choose to cut, just know that this is based on billable trips that are received and and and that we we collect on. So, um, some unfortunately the, um, sometimes there's
some, especially when we're talking like Medicare, um, you know, there's sometimes we just can't, u, there's some people just don't have the, um, the funding or they just don't pay. So, um, and that's that's a standard in the in the industry because, um, and we've chosen to do that as a municipality um,
not to do a balance bill, also the residents um, um, the the 20%. So you have to understand the the particulars of this partic of this of this service. So I just want to throw that out there so you have a better understanding why
we do this and how we do this. And it's been very profitable for us in that sense because we don't have to hire somebody to manage this for us based on the monies collected in the past. >> So we've paid through June of 2025. I'm sorry. What was that amount? I I
didn't get it. >> $64,15.85 and that's January through June. >> Okay. So, even if if that continues at that rate I'm sorry, council person, >> please. >> If if that continues at that at that
rate, um we would be um budgeting for 128 for the year. We've budgeted 185. I see a a need for a reduction here. And I'd like to to suggest that we make a reduction of $50,000.
And that would still leave you with a little pad. >> That That might be too drastic of a cut. >> Yeah, I agree. >> Well, it's >> okay. One at a time. One at a time. Um
then I >> Councilwoman Ruden has the floor. >> I would like to make it the same as what what it was last year, what was actually paid and charged last year. Then if you think that that's too much to make it to bring it down to 145 even.
>> So 40,000. >> Yes. 40,000. And that's still way, you know, averaging per month. That's still you're still doing okay, >> Councilwoman Gasolino.
>> So, I I hear you. Um, you know, if this service is less, that means less people are using it, which is which is a good thing. Uh, but this one we you know, you you need like a a crystal ball to know what the numbers are going to be at the end. take it to 150. I I wouldn't go
lower than that. I I'll agree to 150. >> Okay. So, I make a motion to reduce this by three uh $35,000. >> I'll second. >> So, we have a motion and a second. Uh Mr. Gene, I would like to hear your
thoughts, please. Um, I think, you know, based on what we've seen from January through June, I' I'd love to see July. Um, simply because there's probably,
well, the July invoice is probably going to be based on maybe May or June. I have to see how they work. Um, calls and and the billing and all that. So, um, you know, I just
wonder if like July and August are going to be, uh, larger, um, invoices. Uh, but I think we'll be okay. Again, it seems to be trending to where we'll spend around 130,000 with Coronus. So,
>> you know, we we can live with uh, >> what did we say it was? >> Well, now it would be 150. I I think we can live with that. Just want to ask a follow-up question.
This this uh this invoicing reflects the amount of volume of collections. Correct. So if we mis reduce and we have more than that,
does the state allow us to just take money out of the additional revenue that caused the additional billing? >> No. No. Um that's uh that's like contra accounting. We're not allowed to >> pull fees from from revenue.
>> Okay. O only if they're in trust funds like animal control trust fund, you know, we can essentially we pull the the the expenses from the revenue. Um but they don't they don't allow that for anticipated revenue which you know we do anticipate EMS revenues. So um do people
do it? Yeah, they do. Um but it's it's it's technically not allowed. We have to budget for it as a separate appropriation to pay for the service. >> Okay. So, just to clarify, the budget request is for $185,000 to cover the billing costs related to
the revenue. Uh, we paid out uh a little over $145,000 last year and I'm I'm not sure, Councilwoman Castle, what your motion is for. Is it for 150? >> Okay.
Was that was I'm sorry. Was that Councilwoman Ruden's motion, though? >> Yes. Okay. Suggestion. >> I know your I know. I just want to make sure we >> Thank you, Councilwoman. >> Seconded by Councilwoman C.
>> Oh, okay. Close enough. Any further discussion, >> Madame Clerk? >> Councilwoman Castelino? >> Yes. >> Councilwoman Ruden? >> Yes. Council President Koviaak. >> Yes. >> The motion carries. Consent.
>> Do we have a consent on the page? >> Consent. >> Consent. >> Consent. >> Thank you. >> The sewer. I know we did. I know we did, sir. I know we consented. Right. I know we did it cuz I remember saying we can't change anything about it. It is
what it is. >> Madam clerk, still read your we can still read your lips. >> Just so you know. >> Well, consent if we need a consent. So, >> yeah. Was a
Can then let's just can we consent on joint outlets who are maintenance. This is >> it's okay with >> Oh, council president. Can we >> Yeah, I I don't see any reason not to. >> I think yes, we got three consents. >> Okay.
And then we did maintenance of free public library. Correct. Or did we ever consent to it since there was >> Okay. >> I don't have a >> if if if the council will look at page 120
um maintenance of free public library. If I could just explain um the pieces. So, uh, the line 200 is the third of a mill calculation. It's the municipal library levy for 2025,
which must be paid over to the library. This is their appropriation. Line 210 was a special request line that the library has made in the past few years for $50,000. the council um with the introduction of the budget
had reduced this line uh had uh rejected it. Um so we did not put the $50,000 in the library special request. And then line 211 was a line that was
used to maintain the 10 Rooney property but does not belong in the outside cap maintenance free maintenance of the free public library appropriation. Um, so what I did was I reduced the line from
the request by the full $700,000 and then we put back in something like 300 something thousand into public buildings and grounds. Um, so those are the items that you see here. So really what's left is we will pay that full
amount of $2,828,55.36. There is no getting around that. We must pay that out to the library by the end of the year. >> Councilwoman Castelino. >> So, okay. So, my question was on uh we
did take out 210 and I just want to explain, you know, the reasoning behind that uh requested numerous times for the itemized budget from the library director, which I'm very disappointed we did not receive.
So, um therefore, um you know, we couldn't um grant that request until we saw the his uh itemized budget. Uh what he had sent to us was not that. So, I'm a little disappointed uh that we did not receive that. Um and in any case, I just
wanted that to be noted. Um but I'm fine with consenting on this page. Thank you. >> Any further discussion? >> Yeah, I I have a question. That's one >> um for the library that the request was for 700,000 although they had for two uh
line item 211 was that for realy pro what is >> they were they were included in that as well that it's this was not the library requesting this >> this was the township um
the township had put appropriations in here to take care of the 10 Rooney property that realy pro was included in that for you know when they took over the building they they kept them on you know it it could have been really to do
anything at 10 Rooney you know replacing uh you know I don't know fixing the property fixing the grounds and you know when I saw it and I had talked to the the library director and you know
I learned what this was really for I knew I can't leave it here anymore because >> um this particular line in the budget is and I've explained this is outside of caps. It's outside of the the appropriation cap because the state recognizes that you know you have to pay
the library whatever they're due. So we're not going to punish you for um their library levy and and and put it in caps. So it's always outside of caps. The state also allows for if a municipality wants to increase the
appropriation to the library, they can do it and they can put it in that outside cap line. This $700,000 does not go to the library. It was for us to use for the property. Um, and it's not allowed to be in the outside cap. So
that's why we we took it out fully and then what we put back in to buildings and grounds to take care of Ten Rooney was not a full $700,000. It was a much smaller figure. >> And what was that figure again? Um, let me go.
Joe, can you give like a history of this fun fact? >> Sure. Uh, I actually do have a public service announcement. You know, home safety is paramount. And, uh, the other day I inadvertently handed my wife a
glue stick instead of chapstick and she still hasn't spoken to me. So, I Just wanted to put that out there. No. Um, home safety of course is paramount important. It is not a joking
matter. Uh, next month, October is going to be fire safety month and West Orange public can expect some announcements shortly about open house, our annual open house at the West Orange uh, fire department to promote to promote, excuse me, uh, public safety. Thank you,
Council President. Mr. I hope I filled enough dead air before I come dead air. >> Oh, here it is. >> $325,000, >> right? And so that's what is the justification for 325
because the realy pro was 8,000 a month and that is now done, right? We paid the last bill for that. So I I think we charge some utilities there. Um
building maintenance, cleaning. Um >> we we pay for the cleaning of the building. >> Yeah. >> Is that part of our overall cleaning contract? >> Um yeah, I think it's included. Yeah.
>> Okay. So why would that be additional? because we we've already approved the cleaning contract for the municipal buildings, >> right? But the the 10 Rooney gets charged to that particular line item. Um
God, are we going to revisit buildings and grounds now? Well, I'm just I I don't understand why that that's a very large amount to just shift over to buildings and ground when I don't really understand what what's in this 325,000.
>> Okay. Um let me pull up what we're spending. Um >> and if you can confirm whether realy we are done with our relationship with realy pro.
Yeah, we're done with them. I We were paying unpaid invoices from a prior year. Okay. Um to them >> and have we >> I don't understand. I mean I it was nice that we spread it out, >> but you know, I don't know why they decided to take it that way. I would
have thought they would have said pay us all at once, but we were spreading out unpaid invoices from prior year. Um we are done with them. Yeah. Uh, we have repairs, phone bill, alarm, cleaning,
>> utilities, >> utilities. Yep. >> But isn't all of this in the overall utilities budget, building budget, cleaning budget? >> It's I mean, for whatever reason, they they wanted to separate the expenses for
this particular property. I don't know if they're, you know, they wanted to show that the the overall building was generating a profit because of the TSA lease. And I I don't know why, but they segregated expenses for 10 Rooney to one particular
line item. Let me let me bring it up. >> Does that seem like a lot to pay for the maintenance of one building? Um, yes. But then when we have like the sewer back, I mean the the the drain
back up and we had to do all this work there, then it's then it doesn't seem like too much. Um. Oh. >> So my question is then is this 325 just there in case there's an emergency
because everything else seems to be covered by individual bills that we've already addressed. >> Uh let me let me pull up what we spending. Yeah. >> You need to No, no, no, no. I I have um
yeah, so so far this year we've spent uh 175,000. Um, we have the rental lights, we have the uh we've had HVAC expenses, we have
plumbing expenses, you got that dog park, >> which why are we paying for the >> landscaping? >> You said last time that that that was a mistaken bill for >> they didn't make a mistake on the bill.
The bill was wrong, but they're still doing stuff there. >> Was the bill too low? >> No, I think it was too high the last time. >> Okay. Discuss that later. But so we're we're paying a lot of money for these these Herk rentals. >> We're we're paying on the Herk rentals.
We we did look into >> different lights. We we did um we did find there's a hybrid version where it's a uh um there is a solar component and then gas and then there there is a totally solar
but it didn't have the output that we needed for the for the parking lot. We did look into the Whole Foods lights too. Um >> and there would be no savings. We're spending $5,000 a month on gas lights still.
No, I I do I still want to buy lights. I don't want to rent them anymore. Um we're just trying to They wanted to sell us really old ones and I don't want them with a ton of miles on them, a ton of hours on them. Um but we are trying to
find new lights. Um let me see what else. We we put a fence up. Um >> why were the light to begin with? Um, and the electric for for for Rooney is pretty expensive. Um, why were the lights out? I don't I don't know. Um,
>> I don't know how long the property sat before we took it over. I don't I just don't know the history of 10 Rooney. Um, >> okay. So, I know that this this touches on a different budget, but that still seems like a big gap between 175 and
325. Is there any way to reduce that and adjust a different page? >> The electric bills have been like $15,000 a month. >> Why why are they so high for one building when we also get income? >> Old lights.
>> The lights, the HVAC, computers, uh >> $15,000 a month for for two basically big rooms. >> Well, no, it's it's I mean, it's the entire building. Um, you have the
library, you have TSA. Um, it's a I don't know. I think Mr. Smaldo probably knows more about like the square footage of the building and all that, but >> uh, yeah, I mean, I'm looking at like the April 26 to May 27th electric bill was
$12,619.50. March was $13,742 for electric. Um >> the unusual plumbing bill that we had came out of this. >> Yes. Um yeah, for the the backup and and all
that. And we put in an insurance claim for that, but we we did charge it to here. Is there some way to reduce this budget? >> Maybe not this year. Um >> I just don't know if one building is this expensive.
>> No, it isn't. It's free. Remember? That's >> right. >> It's free. >> Right. I mean, they Not your fault. >> I guess I I I guess like the there's the HVAC is all electric and not only the cooling, the heating. I I
think I don't know. Maybe I'm making I shouldn't say I don't know what it is. Um >> well, I believe Mr. Swaldo said that we need to replace the lights. the lights are very old and they're probably much more efficient if we can get in new ones >> and and hopefully we can include them
because you know we do get a we got approached actually um a few months ago um I can't remember the companies they work with PSENG PSENG frequently um you know puts out these major grants to I think they've done it here in the past
replace lighting and and um HVAC which I guess they're not going to replace HVAC but to replace lighting and all that um to be more efficient. So, now that you know, we do own the building that could be included in in one of those projects. Um, you know, I don't know if there's
any room for solar and I would think sits out in a big parking lot, big roof, maybe there could be solar components, but you know, I'm just speculating now. >> So, uh, before I call on Councilwoman Castelino, just a quick question. Is
this the only facility where we have cost center accounting or do or do you do that for other >> um it's the only facility? I mean, we do some with recreation, like you've seen some of the utility where we break out recreation, but essentially it's all the parks and all that, but no, this is the
one the one property that we have like really segregated and uh and are applying expenses to, you know, just this property from a a line item perspective. Yeah, I actually think it's
a good idea because if uh if we ever want or try to sell that the buying market is going to know going to want to know those numbers. >> I'm sorry. But to go back to realy pro, I mean you are right like realy pro is done and that was a significant cost.
Um, but I think, you know, we did cut the budget pretty significantly on on Ten Rooney and you know, we've had issues in the last few months that, you know, we're making major repairs and we had to put a fence in and um so that
money is is going to be used to to take care of the building. But we have six months I I I believe to still account for in spending that we will not need the $8,000 a month which we had been using.
So it seems fair to request that $48,000 come out of this budget. And also we really should be moving moving to getting a better lighting situation. Having diesel tanks burning outside the the library is not a good solution for
>> I agree. I don't like them. When I walked by it, you know, I was like, "Ah, what is this?" You know, smells bad, >> right? It gets noisy. >> And we've been look, like I said, we looked at hybrid. We looked at um some alternatives. Plus, I don't like the
fact that, you know, we are spending a lot of money and and renting them um uh >> a lot of money. Isn't there something that we can bring in that is a is a stop gap solution that is less than 5,000 a
month for diesel lighting? >> Um I'll keep working with the DPW director. I I did approach him on this and I I did have Paula looking into some other methods. You know, I asked about solar. Um the company said that the
output wasn't enough. Um and that if you weren't getting enough input, you're going to end up with lights going out before you want them to. Um that's why I I sort of like the hybrid model. Um that if you need it, the the gas engine kicks
on. Um, >> okay. So, while this is still being worked out and you're trying to find a better solution, can we just reduce this by 48,000 because we are no longer paying realy pro and that was part of what was budgeted for in this request
and it this particular line item though is something that you discussed with with director Reynolds and you know he came in here and and I thought there was an agreement on the overall buildings and grounds because this has been in there the whole time. So, I don't I
don't want to just say cut 48,000, >> but this was moved to >> this this was moved way before >> I gota we got to speak one at a time, please, Mr. Diniac. Th >> this was moved when before we introduced the budget and
and this was part of the conversation with director Reynolds. Um, so I I do understand your point about Realy Pro, but you know, I know the director was in here and he had a lot of conversations with you and and I
thought there was an agreement on what buildings and grounds was going to be. So I don't I don't want to just say, "All right, take 48,000 away from it now." >> Um, >> I'm sorry. Was this a separate line item in buildings and grounds? >> It is. It's It's at the bottom. It says maintenance of 10
>> 325. >> Yes. and and we really had never discussed that that line item. It was just transferred right in. >> No, there was a discussion. >> I I have all my notes here. It's there's no there was no discussion on the 325.
I mean, I I know I talked about moving this out and I talked about how, you know, it wasn't just moving 700,000 to another line item that there was a significant cut and right, but the cut the cut wasn't really a cut. It was just going back to what
the previous paid amount was. I mean you had requested 700,000 when you hadn't the the usage was was only 306 >> and it was budgeted in 24 or 700,000 as well. So
>> so you know we we were pretty close to what was paid or charged with our request. Um, but again, you know, we've had I know we're not paying Realy Pro as much, but we also had So, we had to put the fence in because there was a danger to children falling off that retaining
wall. You know, we spent 17 something thousand on a fence. Um, you know, we had the plumbing issues. Um, >> I hear what you're saying, but it sounds like those those large costs have already been paid. We've paid we've paid the large sewer bill. We paid for the fencing.
>> Yes. and we are no longer paying for realy pro. So it seems appropriate >> to reduce that just to reflect the fact that we no longer have that obligation. >> I weigh in council president. >> Yeah, I'm I'm done. I'm sorry. I thought
the counciloman council room is done. So please Councilwoman Castellino. >> Yeah. So, my recollection of this was, you know, I know we want to talk about Rooney and what a horrible transaction it was. We all forget we get 1.4 million
in in rental income. And we also receive, you know, if we're we're smart, we'll keep uh renting out the other space uh on the lower level because that is an opportunity for additional revenue for this space. um we have not passed a
capital budget. So, you know, unless you're going to put things in capital and they don't have to go to this, well, I would say uh reduce it. But we haven't even had a conversation about the capital. It is an older building. it
things come up constantly on on this building and unless we do a direct analysis again to do that work um this winter in another workshop which I'm willing to do um
I I say I would not play with this. they reduced it from 700 down to 325 and so we did have a discussion on and we all agreed to with the 325 number at the time. So I I I highly recommend that
we move on. We got to get this budget done and we could we could change it again with the 2026 budget, but having no capital budget right now, I'm reluctant to change that. None of them
Thank you, Council President. >> Thank you. >> So, can I speak? >> Sure. >> Just for the record, we have spent $175,000 to date. What I am suggesting still
leaves them with $100,000. I'm just requesting to reduce the amount for realy pro, which we no longer have that obligation. That is just sensible. We still have $100,000 and that's enough to cover the rentals,
the uh electric and um emergencies I would imagine. >> So what was the amount that you >> 48 48,000 was to to to reduce it to 277.
Sorry, I'm just going to the page. >> I have a question. >> Okay, hold on. I I think Mr. Diniac is >> I just want to bring it up for >> Council Ren. >> I I just want to bring up the the page for the the people at home because I I I didn't go back to the page on the
screen. So, um just for everyone at home. Um, so can I can I counter with I think we can live with 300,000.
>> Can you go full screen on that, John? >> Oh, yeah. It just gets really small, though. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> Make a motion to reduce this budget to 300,000. And that's that's taking out 25,000. And that's what Mr. Duana just made a
motion. Well, people pay attention, but >> I have a question and I'll second it after my question. >> Extortion. Okay, go ahead, Councilwoman. >> Um, so my question is the renters that we have in there now for the lower uh uh
part of the building, when are they there until >> uh the end of the month >> and then they're done? Are they are they uh going to renew? >> I I don't know if they're renewing or not. Mr. Smaldo had a conversation with them. I think it was a threemon.
>> Yeah. So, council president, if I may. >> Yes. I You beat me to it. >> So, the contract expired August 30th and they they had a three-month option to renew and they chose not to. So, the uh
>> Okay. Okay. The lease end concluded August 31st. >> Okay. So, no one's in there right now. >> Correct. >> And in order to get that ready to rent out to somebody else, uh what kind of work needs to be like have we thought about any of that? What kind of work
needs to be done? Again, we don't we haven't discussed capital. >> Yeah, I think I think the accounting term is called buku bucks. >> If I could if I could just interrupt this please. Uh, again, I I just want to focus on what we're going to do with
this budget so we can get through the budget. These are all very good questions, but I don't think it's something that we can address or need to address as we're trying to get the budget ready for adoption. Do I understand that correctly? >> Yes,
>> Councilwoman Gasolino. So my if I could So my thoughts on this are that before we lower it, I just want to make sure if we could if we need revenue to renovate
that space so we could capitalize on the revenue that we could be created from that space. I just don't want to sell short. So, I if if anybody I'm not sure. I may be the only one thinking this way, but in my brain, I would say we have
that empty space. I would hope we're someone's looking at it to say, "Okay, let's lease this out. What do we need to do to get it ready?" So, I just want to make sure we have some funds there to prep this space so we can make
additional revenue on it. And if if that hasn't been discussed yet and we need to wait on this page, uh, fine. If you could do that with reducing it by 25,000, fine, too. I just want to throw
it out there because I don't want to just, you know, get into a conversation a month or two from now. Why didn't we rent it out? Oh, we didn't have money to to renovate it. That's all. So, I'm done. Thank you, Council President. >> Thank you, Mr. Debove. Thank you,
Council President. Um, the the cost that might be associated with getting the space available for uh to rent to another tenant should reflect what the future tenants going to be. And since we don't know
that, you really don't need to allocate money for that. And frankly, you could probably negotiate um the costs associated with a renovation into the lease uh rate um
where the tenant may actually end up paying for that. So, um, I'm I'm going to just use my prior real estate background to suggest >> we probably don't need to spend much, if
anything, on readying the space until there's a tenant who is ready to sign. >> Okay. >> Yeah, I I agree with that. Um because again, we don't know what their needs are going to be. you know, we could get a tenant like we just had that, you
know, they just needed a space. So, we didn't have to outfit anything and um so yeah, we'd have to do more of a wait and see and before we uh we do any major renovation. >> Counciloman Castelina, did I hear you
slip up? >> Uh no, I'm okay. I I mean it's I just wanted to put it out there. So if you're comfortable with that, I just you know I I think you you need some money, not much. I'm not talking about you know
redoing the whole thing and gutting it. I'm just you need nominal dollars. So I'm okay with the recommendation. What do you that Mr. uh Diniac? You said what 300 you could live with. >> Yes.
>> Okay. I'll agree to that. Thank you. >> Okay. Thank you. Just just a clarification. You say that we've uh spent $175,000 so far. >> Is that as of June 30th uh or July 31st or >> No, that that's as of today.
>> Oh, okay. Yeah. Okay. >> Yeah. Their last expenditure was on September 1st. >> So, it's not wise to try to extrapolate that. Uh Okay. Okay. Just just another point of clarification. Does the library
pay in any way for its operating expenses? >> Yes. Yes, we do get reimbursed for for their utility. So, we use a uh um utility management company software program to basically
figure out um their usage and then they do pay us for that. >> So, they pay for electricity, do they pay for anything else? >> They they pay for electricity. Yeah. Okay. Which is not insubstantial, but >> No, I mean it's pretty. Yeah. And debt. >> Okay. >> Let me let me just also um
>> Council Ruden, >> so and TSA pays us as well. >> Okay. So, you had you had mentioned that the the uh charges that were included in the 325. Initially 325 included electricity,
>> but now you're saying that we actually get reimbursed for that electricity. >> We do. Yeah. Yeah. >> So, why is that? Not all of it. I mean, there's a large part of it that's that's our own. Yeah. >> How much of how much of it is are we actually paying?
>> You mean net, >> right? >> Net of any payments from either of the tenants? Is that what you're asking, council? >> Yes. After we get paid back, what what are our costs? Our real costs because the others I don't know what the HVAC
costs. We do know what the Herk rental costs and the plumbing we just dealt with, but I'm I'm just saying we're still leaving $100,000 on the table. >> Well, most HVAC is electrical, so I don't know that we can actually cost
allocate a uh an HVAC system. [Music] I'll I'll have to get that. It's I can't tell from the budget detail report I have. >> That would be substantial though that we're getting paid back for and we
we've put that in this in this budget line. So that's extra pad. >> Well, it's it's >> it is extra pad. Am I correct? >> I don't want to talk without >> Who brought this up again? >> I did.
>> This was after you said I would agree to $300,000. >> Right. But you had previously said that that the costs that this was covering included electricity. It does. which you're saying is mostly reimbursed by our tenant and by the library.
>> So, I'm seeing a little >> extra >> Oh, yeah. >> cushion there. >> What are you thinking? >> I'm thinking >> What are you thinking? 50? >> Yeah. At least >> at least more. >> At least another 50 because we're you're
talking about maybe a 12 You said a $12,000 >> Yeah. >> for per month. >> 12,000,000. We reduce this by $50,000. They're still golden. >> Uh >> they're getting reimbursed,
councilwoman, for that expense. >> If I if I get called on, I'll I'll answer you. I got to wait to get on. >> Just hold on for a second. We a three-way just doesn't work. >> Yeah, >> we're waiting for >> because I don't think that picks up when
um there's too many people talking the We're uh while we're waiting for Mr. Datiniac to come up, uh, Councilwoman Castelino. >> Okay. So, I have the libraries budget here, which is not in the format I wish, and I apologize because Mr. Saraldo did
see receive uh um I did not get it because it went to my spam and I was away the first week in August. So, he did send something. It wasn't the format that I was looking for, but deciphering it. He spent on in 2024
for his utilities. I'm not sure how much of it he pays us back. Um he had down for utilities $5,168. He's also budgeting 96,000 for this year, which I I'm totally blown away by. So, I don't know why he would budget
that when he only has $5,168 in that column, but I I don't I'm totally confused here. >> Counciloman Castle, did you say $49,000 budgeted in that line item for this year in the library? I have here utilities
2024 $5,168 spent and then he has proposed for 2025 $96,000. Why he
increased his utility fees by that much? I I don't know. That's a question. The year before he had budgeted $150,500 and only spent $5,168.
So I I again I'm just confused. It's not our budget. It's the library's budget. So >> Councilwoman Castelino, could you just email that to the rest of the council when uh when you get a chance, please? >> Yeah. >> Thank you for bringing that up.
>> Okay, so we're we're back, I think, to Mr. Tiniac >> council president if I may just interrupt for one second. I'm sorry. Did actually that was sent to all the council on August 4th. I'll I'll re uh forward it to you right now. Um so for the the one that Mr. QB sent I'm going
to send that to everybody right now. >> Thank you, Mr. >> Okay, Mr. >> So yeah, I'm I'm checking with one of my accountants. Um so the way I would book it uh would show as a budget reimbursement. I don't see it as a
budget reimbursement. So, I'm checking to see if it comes in as miscellaneous revenue not anticipated. So, a revenue item, the reimbursements, but I I will let you know. Um, and we can obviously quantify it because we do get checks
from them. Um, so maybe we come back to this when I get that answer. So, you want to hold on this page until you get the answer or do you want to >> the library page or the buildings page?
>> This has to do with building. >> Yeah, the buildings page. Yeah. >> Do we ever consent to the library page? I don't know. >> No. >> No. >> To the library page? >> Yeah. Oh, >> what's consent to the library page? But for the buildings page, >> consent. >> Consent. >> Yeah. For the buildings page, let me get
the numbers to you. And you know, so I think 25,000 is where we're at right now, but obviously you're going to want >> Well, do you want to just do the 25,000 now? Because you've already agreed that that works for you and works for administration.
>> It's easy to go back to it and keep reducing. So if you want to do 25,000 now, >> you've been reimbursed 25,000. >> No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I I think >> you have a motion, counciloman. I think when you we talked about the $25,000 if you want to vote on that now, take
that out now and then revisit it. We can always revisit it. >> The original >> Oh, you had you had said 20, right? Okay. >> Go to 300. >> So, did we did we vote on that? >> No, because we didn't have a second.
Councilman Castelino wanted to get an answer to your question and then promise to second. >> I second. >> Is there any further discussion? >> Are we coming back to this? >> Yeah, we can come back to it. Yeah.
>> So that we can find out exactly how much we're being reimbursed. >> Let me give you the reimbursement numbers. Yeah. And then if you want to >> Okay. So then we should cut the 25 right now and then and then get the number of how much we're being reduced we're being reimbursed and then reduce it further
right here. >> Yep. >> Okay. >> So we have a motion. We have a second. It is to reduce this line item by 320 I'm sorry by $25,000. Do I understand that correctly? >> Yes.
>> Okay. Madame clerk. Councilwoman Castelino, >> yes. >> Councilwoman Ruden, >> yes. >> Council President Koviaak, >> yes. >> Yes. The motion carries. >> Thank you. >> And we're going to come back to the page. We're not going to consent to the page at this time.
>> What page is that that we need to consent to? >> 79. Um, did we want to go back to business administrator or what did we what did we table? Yes, we did do >> business administrator
with litigation expense. [Music] >> Yes, I think we should, but I'm I'm confused about what Well, I think we left it with the administration to give us I'm not sure why we tabled it.
>> Which item? Which page? >> Uh, page 31. >> Is that the business administrator? We are planning to have an executive session. Got it. >> With uh legal for legal guidance on Monday.
>> Okay. >> Yeah, we had two pages for legal guidance. >> Okay. >> What was the other page? >> Um litigation expenses. Uh, this is interesting.
[Music] >> Get to Oh, I get what you mean. Yes. >> Sorry. Um, it SNW. >> I believe that was the other one that you wanted to uh to wait on. Oh, >> that uh that has to do with one of the
employees. Yeah, >> correct. >> I I have not gotten any additional information. We had a very very very brief reference to this at the last budget workshop. I don't have any additional information. Sure. >> Uh and I'll need that to figure out
where we go from here. So, that's not something that's going to be settled today, unfortunately. >> Okay. Is there anything else that we need to revisit? Um, >> um, Madame Clerk, we tabled some of the
central IT, correct? >> Um, what pages are those? [Music] >> 42. >> My agenda. Um, 43 to 47. >> Well, 42 we're not going to talk about.
That was the uh >> Okay. >> 43 we approved. 44 we approved. >> Was it um central IT PD expense? >> Yes. >> We didn't have approved. >> So that >> Oh, we needed to get feedback on that.
>> 45. We were supposed to get a breakdown >> for the additional money >> while ago. It might be in his office. >> Sorry, Council President, can I have two seconds? Oh, there he is. >> Um, all right. >> ESP
like the assistant business administrator. >> Mr. President, I I just want to say that um I was uh looking over Miss Kazinsk's notes and page 79 on August 7th
was consent 30. >> Yeah, >> there was a couple of items voted on on 84 and then she went back to it says continuation 70 pages 79 and 80. consent 30.
>> Are you sure we did 79? >> That's what she wrote here. >> Okay. So, what do we need to do to make that correction? >> I don't know. >> Well, we we've revisited >> Yeah. >> pages that we consented to. >> Okay. So, I'm going to I'm just going to make that note that we're going to
revisit. >> Um, >> Right. >> But I just wanted to point that out so that >> Thank you. >> you know. >> Thank you. You're welcome. Great. >> Yeah. I thought we had uh done that page.
Okay. So, now we are back on >> page 45. >> Page 45. Thank you. >> Whoa. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Page 45. Central IT PD expenses.
Mr. Garcia, welcome back. >> Thank you, >> Council President. So, we have Mauricio Garcia here. Um, Mauricio handles the IT for um, non-uniform um, but you know obviously has a lot of
knowledge about or is going to give us as much as he can about the the the PD operations but um, the employee that that is in charge of the PD IT operations is is not available today. So um, but we've asked Mr. Garcia to come
in and provide any insights that he can. >> Actually, before I started, I got a couple things I wanted to say. Uh um just let you guys know, I spoke to AT&T FirstNet um about our budgetary
issues and they changed all of our pricing for our cell phones, MFIs, and uh tablets. So, our current pricing for a phone with tethering on it
is $39.99. They dropped that to 25.83 as effective I think last month uh for pertunity uh for from now on. Uh we also migrated our data plans for our our MiFi
onto a tiered system. So any Miffi that's that's sitting around in someone's desk or something that's not being used will be charged from 0 to 1 gigabyte $10 uh from one to two gigabytes 15 and then anything beyond
the 2 gigabytes goes to uh what we're currently paying the $36.99. Okay. >> So that was a good that was nice to >> so have approval. >> Yes. Did I have one question real quick? Did you threaten them? Did you threaten
AT&T that Councilwoman Ruden was coming after them? >> I think they were expecting all. Yeah. >> Okay. >> Please go ahead. >> Thank you for actually on top of that uh Nick at uh at some point he removed 57 MFI and I had removed 23 MFI and tablets
on on top of that budget. So most of these were relics of the co times where everyone was working from home and and whatnot. Um and they were just nobody really monitored them uh after that. So just let you know that.
>> So first of all, thank you for taking a look at that. Um I do want to ask if you will continue to monitor those MFIs that get from zero to to um 10 gigabytes.
>> Yeah, right now there's only four MFIs on that. I'm looking to move all of the cars, all of our MVTs in the cars onto this particular system as well. In case a car is in the shop or something, we have to be paying uh for it and the
worst that we pay that we're currently paying. So, right, there's there's really no disadvantage to do that. It's a much better interface. the original uh personet interface. We can run reporting and stuff, but often it'll
take a day or two to even get the report back. This new system for the mylies instant, it's it's a fantastic system. >> Okay. So, am I correct that the bill for this month went down to 7,000 from the prior three uh 10,000?
>> I have a look at that. >> Okay. And that's what we got. So, I was pleased to see that. So I think I think your work is is being reflected. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Now why did they lower it from you know 45 to 27? >> I talked to them kind of regularly and I
told them this is you know this is where we are and uh and they said well you know a lot of municipalities are doing this. We have new plans. So they they put me in touch with someone to uh with their new plan. They probably wouldn't have if they didn't talk about it.
That's yeah, that's what I I call every year to get a new plan because they always they always end up lowering it. Um >> now, FirstNet, just so you know, I I was very hesitant to get away from FirstNet. FirstNet is a uh national
it's a national company under AT&T and they ran this with uh the federal government. So, we're actually on a different bandwidth than your average AT&T users. We're on bandwidth, I believe, 12. Um,
so if there's another uh Sandy or something like that or something terrible hits, all the first responders are in a different bandwidth and they get priority. Uh, >> okay. >> Priority for >> So, we're not with FirstNet anymore. We are >> Oh, we are, but we're just at a
>> They just changed the pricing on the First Net. So I was I this new pricing sort of competes with T-Mobile and stuff like that. T-Mobile is not does not have that priority services uh first responders >> right now. This might not be in your
comfort zone. You can probably imagine that it's in mine. Um would you since they obviously had this cheaper plan, would you be comfortable asking them to make an adjustment since they had this out there and they were charging us 45.
Yeah. Like a >> several months or a year of of adjustment. >> I'll talk to them. >> That'll be great. >> And all of you know, we'll make sure that that goes directly to you. >> Oh, yeah. >> Um I can you guarantee >> Council Ruden, excuse me, before you
continue and pardon the interruption. Uh Council President, um Councilwoman Castelino has uh her laptop battery has died. She has not been with us for the last few minutes, but she will be rejoining us by phone and uh as of now she is not in the meeting and I just
wanted to make you aware of that, but I will advise you when she rejoins us. >> Yeah, let's let's hold on. If she's going to be on phone, it should only take a couple of minutes. So, >> okay, >> maybe we'll take another >> We're going to we're going to shoot for five minutes. So, it's 30:07. We'll be back at 3:12.
>> Okay. Thank you. >> Okay. So to members of West Orange Zoom audience, uh, as you have heard, we're going to take a short break. Councilwoman uh, Castelino will be rejoining us by phone. So I'm going to be putting you on our our signal on mute
so you will not hear anything. It is not your machine. Thank you for your patience in advance, and we will rejoin you shortly. Steve. >> I don't think he ever >> he always won. >> Two two. >> Uh, excuse me. >> Yes. >> Council Ren, our microphones are live.
Uh, just for the last 30 seconds. Um, the person who was in the meeting with the last three numbers 3347, is that Councilwoman Castelino? >> I would have said on camera. >> I was not aware. >> I don't think it's appropriate to
discuss it off camera. >> This is This has to do with the the phone bill, which is not a budget item. >> Dr. Castle, can you hear us? Well, I would I would call Mauricio to ask him this question anyway. So,
>> but if you want to discuss it, you want me to ask this again? >> Yeah, >> um yeah, it's her, but she doesn't mute herself. I have Megan talking to her right now. Our microphones are live and close
captioning. >> What? Very sensitive. >> See, this is the AT&T mobility bill this month is 7,000. That's what it used to be 10. >> Okay. Yeah. So, it definitely went down. There's no question. I mean, we got rid
of, like I said, sex >> getting picked up. Okay. >> That's fine. >> Wi-Fi and tablets. >> Well, we added a few. We added about 20 >> tablets.
>> No, but yeah, they wouldn't be on seven seven Wi-Fi tablets. >> I thought we were going to reduce Wi-Fi. >> I'm sorry. >> I thought >> Wi-Fi tablets. >> Oh, okay. So, and there's an additional charge from July 22nd to July 21st for a cell
phone. A cell phone for 313. Do you know what that is? We're not We're not starting yet. We're just on >> Well, we live. This discussion is being broadcast. Um, >> that's fine. That's fine. Interesting. To those members in the Zoom audience,
thank you for your patience. We have re reached a technical difficulty with Councilwoman Castelino uh not being able to get into the meeting. She is attending remotely. Her laptop battery has died and we're trying to get her in by phone. As of yet, we have not been
successful and I apologize for the uh for the delay. >> Councilwoman Caselino, can you unmute yourself? I see you in the meeting. Uh, I got your text message that you can hear us.
I think star 67 unmutes you, but I'm not sure. >> Can you hear me now? >> Yes, now we can hear you. Thank you. >> Beautiful. >> Thank you for your due diligence. >> Sorry, guys. >> I'll be at the laptop in a few minutes.
>> Council President, uh, Councilwoman Castalino is back in the meeting and I think we can resume now. She can hear us and communicate with us as well. Thank you everyone for your patience. [Music] Okay,
>> Council President, you can take over anytime you. >> Oh, okay. Thank you, Mr. Fagan. Thank you for your great efforts. Welcome back, Councilwoman Castelino. >> Sorry about that. >> So, I think we last left that there was
a dialogue between Councilwoman Ruden and Mr. Garcia. I don't know who was speaking last. I think you were starting to speak and then follow. No, I think I think we were just reviewing the phone bill, which is not part of of the police it, but thank you so much for everything you've done,
and really um you know, look forward to more savings that we're going to make on this. >> We also uh removed several phone lines, the hardwire lines. Um, we're doing when we started the that audit, there was a
2,000 lines that downloaded. >> We dropped down when we went to our VoIP lines. There was still 300 lines that were still active. Most of them were uh POS lines for um
uh security measures. A lot of fax lines. We're chipping away at all of our fax lines. It's probably about five or six lines that still require facts because as all of our phone numbers that we have can receive text messages, faxing and all that. So, we
got rid of most of the fax lines, but we still have a few departments like the health department, finance administration that require uh secure fax. So, we got eax for for those and we're chipping away at removing all the
other faxes. A lot of them we just don't know. you know, we have phone numbers, locations that we're not even sure exist, and we're tracking them down. >> Okay. >> Okay. I I I would like to move back to the budget. This is all good news. Uh just so everybody knows when you say
pots, uh what that means, it used to mean plain old telephone service. >> And I'm not sure what it means now because you said >> there's copper lines. Yeah, there's the copper lines that >> Okay. Yeah. But then you said I I thought you said it gets faxed now. So
there still these pots, right? >> The pots don't are wipelines all get >> Okay. Okay. So let's get back to the budget, please, if we could, >> but I can't remember where we were. >> Okay. So we haven't started. >> No. >> So we're on page 45. Central IT Police
Department expenses. This is one that we tabled. And as I mentioned earlier, uh Mr. Garcia is the IT director for all the non-uniform. Um who the employee that handles our police department IT uh and radio
dispatch can't be here. Um so we've asked Mr. Garcia to fill in and he's going to do his best to answer your question. >> And please just speak into the microphone if you if you can. Yeah, I should be able that.
Council President, pardon the interruption. Uh, >> Councilwoman Castelino wants to speak. >> No, Cast Councilwoman Castelino is on, but because of she's on phone, she's not going to be able to raise her hand in the normal fashion. So, she has texted me uh that she has her hand raised and I
will advise you of such, but currently she does have a question. Counciloman Castelino, >> thank you. Not not so much a question, but just just a quick comment because Mr. uh uh uh Garcia is here. I had mentioned going back to the the the
phone conversation. I appreciate all the work that was done. But I also had mentioned uh a prior meeting just make sure that we have this these reviews on our best practices yearly uh uh sheet so we make sure it's it it becomes a part
of our best practice uh best practices on a yearly basis. That's all. Thank you, Council President. >> Thank you. Okay, we're back. Councilwoman Ruden, I think you should uh hit the first serve, please. >> Well, there's not much for us to do
because we don't see a breakdown of >> Yeah. of the budget. We have We are being presented with a police IT budget recommendation for 385. >> I gave everybody the sheets on Tuesday. >> Oh, I'm so sorry.
>> That's okay. We have more if you need copies. Actually, Mr. Mo doesn't have any. >> Anyone else? >> I'll take another. >> This was this was about the 45,000. >> I can probably find >> Right. Right. That was the the quote
unquote cushion I said. >> Right. So, we could just cut to the chase and uh remove that $45,000 cushion since all of these are fixed um services that have been paid or will
be paid and these are the exact amounts. So, what what they actually need is 365 356 and we have a cushion here of 45,000. Unless you can explain to us u Mr.
Garcia why such a cushion is needed. >> I cannot. >> So just to potentially clarify uh this budget has already been cut by $42,000. Is that correct? >> Yes. >> That's what it shows on the page. Okay.
67,000. >> The budget request was almost 45% larger than last year's actual usage. So cutting that did not really affect what >> what they actually spent.
>> So Mr. Tiniac, you raised an issue. there's a a potential discrepancy between uh what has already been cut and what you're showing here. Is that possible to explain? >> Yeah, I think we we cut more um when we originally had this detail. So, this is
the amount we introduced at was the 385 uh 985. self. So my sheet >> right we cut more before we introduced because I had I had done the detail on this and then you guys cut
>> that's not the sheet that we got. >> I know you have the detail but we introduced at 385 >> not not 410. >> Okay >> cuz I now I remember we we cut an additional round from the 42. You wanted
another 25. >> Okay. So then um I'm sorry John, what what did you just say >> on page 45? >> Yeah. >> We introduced that $385,98555.
When we originally talked to it expense and I did the detail, the council asked for another 25,000. So I I reflected it in my document. I just didn't reflect it on the detail supplemental. So but we did introduce a 385. So, it's not 410,
it's 385. >> Okay. Before we move on, Mr. Smaldo has had his hand up for a while. Mr. Smaldo. >> So, Council President, um I just want to let you know that I did speak to um the IT manager from the PD this morning and
and um one of the things he wanted to make sure we remind everybody, this is public safety. And and I'm I I think I mentioned this the other night too and I reiterate this is that this is the public safety area. And while not all of that money has been allocated, some of those funds and that 45,000
may be for um electronics that that fail things such as the MDTs and servers and things of that nature. I don't know if we need the entire $45,000, but I would caution cutting the entire amount out in the event we have some
kind of catastrophic uh failure with any one of the um public safety equipment and being reminded that the that the IT for the fire uh police department also covers a good amount of the infrastructure that the fire department operates under outside of the the fire
prevention which is on another page. So, I just want to put that back out there for your your your benefit so you you can make a a little bit more informed decision and just to let you know that that was what was the conversation that
we had. Thank you. >> Okay. Thank you, Mr. Strava. So, perhaps I can clarify at least in my own mind. So the number we're looking at is 385,995 and change,
>> right? >> Mhm. >> That represents a $67,000 cut in the original uh proposed amount for DD expenses. >> Right. >> So does that change this idea of a
$45,000 cushion? >> Now it's 20,000. >> Yes. >> Okay. So now it's a $20,000 cushion and it's a just to make sure I understand it's a $20,000 cushion which
represents less than 5% of the overall budget that we're talking about here right now. >> Correct. >> Okay. Now, Councilwoman Ruden, >> these are all fixed IT services. These
are not intended to cover emergencies. I'm sure that that emergency would be covered under a different area. These are literally paying for consulting fees, for subscriptions, for um monthly service costs, and these fees
are not going to change. So, this is a $20,000 cushion that does not have really any justification. We can't just have everything. there's going to be an emergency. If there's an emergency, it comes out of a different
area, not an IT area. If the whole s system collapses, that would go under repairs. That wouldn't go under subscriptions, which is basically what this is. >> Maybe
>> we we've covered different repairs that are needed in it when we come through the IT budget. So on the one hand, technically speaking, is that true that we have another
budget pot that we use for IT emergencies or to replace various equipment or is it embedded in the specific specific budgets uh that we're looking at now
because Councilwoman Councilwoman Ruden is saying you don't need a cushion in here for emergencies or or whatever else comes up during the year and I just want to make sure that we're all talking uh basically on the same page
>> from a non PD or from a non-uniform standpoint. point. I contract with MCG and I contract with MCG. Thank you. Sorry that and uh we have inscope and out of scope items. I rarely go into the
out of scope items. We're pretty solid with that. But there are out of scope items where it would be outside of their main scope of maintenance. So if something did go ary where we needed
their services, it would be outside of the monthly payments that that we pay them. To be honest, I don't know exactly where that budget where that is budgetarily. I'm new to this budget process because when John Gross was here, he managed budget top to bottom and I didn't really
have too much visibility in all of that. So I am I apologize for that. >> Yes. Nobody had visibility. No one else had visibility. It's part of the part of the change that Mr. Zinak is bringing. Okay. Councilwoman, >> I do see a line on page 43 for
miscellaneous repairs for equipment that is under um central IT. Would that be the pocket that we would pull from or are there other areas? >> That's more for the non-uniform for this
building that wouldn't cover um ED. So, I mean, you're correct in that in that these are fixed costs, but you know, like we did have a charge where we had to buy access cards um for for PD. Well,
I mean, it's they buy it for all of us. Um, you know, that was the access card. Uh, that was $1,100 almost to buy the security access cards for the buildings.
Um so you know there there could be different co um different unplanned expenses that would get charged here. Um now you know is he going to buy like a server rack? Is that a real thing? Am I making that up? Server rack
>> probably not going to buy it from there. Yeah, you're right. It's going to come from a capital request. We do still have some IT capital left over. Um but maybe smaller things or they mean realize they need a new firewall or something like that.
>> Yeah, it's going to be more services. So if we do have to purchase a firewall for >> you know one crashed or there was a uh cyber security something we would probably need to call Pasc to come in
and that would be an outside cost for that because that wouldn't be part of the scope. So, if it's if it's out of their general scope, I'm not that familiar with the Pasak uh scope. Um I'm I would think it's probably similar to the MCG scope, but if uh something did
get through and we would need their services, it would be out it would be out of scope. >> Okay. Do you even know if Pasc provides the hardware or just the services? >> Services. >> Okay. So, >> but we could purchase from them, but that would still come out of calf.
>> So, if you're if you're running a system, who knows what >> and the hardware fails. >> Yes. >> In general, you're saying that the services contract with Pascac is just for services because obviously you can just hit a button and restart the
services, but you can't do that for hardware. >> Correct. So, I just want to make sure we're clear on >> when I mean service, I mean like human like a person coming in to reconfigure. They may need to reconfigure the firewall or Okay. >> or do an analysis to figure out where where the attack came in. There's
there's a lot that goes on. >> Okay. Now, I understand what you're saying. >> And, you know, from my perspective, I do a good portion of that and then it gets beyond me and I'll need a I'll need an engineer. So, I go to MCG. they bring in their security engineer and depending if
it's maintenance versus something that happened. It may or may not be in scope and I'll fight with them and say I believe it's in scope or whatnot. Um MCG's been fantastic uh with us. I believe my understanding has passed
that's been very good also but there are times it's you know we're an insurance policy you know we we we have so many pieces in line but you know you can put on a seat belt have a you know have an airbag and all this and people still get
hurt. So like it there are times that we still need those extra people and manh hours to do it on top of what uh the maintenance is. So that's that that's that's a that's a gamble for you guys to to you know to make if you want to keep
that or not or go in after. So that's a decision you guys can make. >> Okay. I sort of took the floor away from Councilwoman Ruden. Uh you still have the floor if you have anything else and otherwise Counciloman Castelino has wants to weigh in.
>> I see to to >> Okay. Counciloman Castelino. >> Thank you. And I'm back on the computer. So sorry about my technical difficulties. Um so just a quick question because I had asked it at the last meeting. Uh
dynamic traffic um we were looking to implement that hopefully sooner than later. Is any of those IT costs included anywhere in in this budget or you know is that something we're just going to push out to 2026? Um I I was hoping
somebody would have an answer to that question. So that that's going to be a 2026 project and that's going to involve capital because um we're going to be buying kiosks and uh um that that's a pretty big project that's just not going
to be included in the regular IT service. Now maybe going forward um if there's an annual software um fee to to utilize you know whatever we're going to move to in terms of like
a parking um management software we would we would put that into the 2026 operating budget and we may keep it in PD expenses or we may choose to actually break this out and have a separate parking um not necessarily a parking
utility, we could do that. But if we just keep it in the current front, a parking sub account, um, line item, uh, where we would put that. But, you know, we're going to have to buy kiosks. So, it's going to have to be a capital project. I think they've estimated around $100,000 in in sort of upfront
capital costs. Um, so we would do that within an ordinance. >> All right. Thank you. Yeah, because my recollection was that we were going to make it a separate parking department would be the more efficient way. Thank you, Mr. Tatinia.
>> Right. And that would be that either separate line item or if we cho chose to really go for it like a separate parking utility. Um but probably just a line item, you know, because we're not going to build a
garage or anything. So, >> thank you. Sorry, I I usually don't speak, but I would like to just Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead, Mr. Bobby. >> Thank you. Um, would it be possible to give us a total year-to- date spend, and
then since this a lot of this is fixed, um, how much you expect to get build between now and the end of the year, we can add those two numbers. See what that looks like. >> Yeah, I Let me see. Um, let me pull up
my spend so far. Well, if they're annual contracts, you're not going to get much deviation if at all on this. Yeah. Unless you've got a pay as you go. One of these or one or more of these is a pay as you go. Yeah.
>> These all fixed. >> Okay. >> Yes. So, we're at >> Yeah. Right now, we're at $336,43.99. >> So, you correct? >> Anyway, >> um it's hard to determine. I I know that
that I do have these fixed costs put into place. So, it's probably because we just don't have the full budget that they didn't put everything in for the encumbered, but I mean, these are it. The only the only thing I didn't account for was the
was the the cards that we bought the cards for $1,84. So, that's really the only thing that's not in my detail. So, I think just so I'll just finish what I was was going to say, which is
that uh as I pointed out, the the uh the cushion is uh $20,000, which is uh uh just a little bit more than 5% of the overall budget. And uh we've already spent something from that already. And
uh I just get very concerned when we talk about police department cutting anything out of the police department. I I'm not opposed to it, but again, if the if the cushion, as explained, it's already been hit once
this year as as far as we know, and it's for roughly 5% of the overall budget, I am uh I'm not opposed to I I'm not opposed to perhaps cutting a little bit of that, but not, you know,
not 50%. Um given that it's now September. So, just want to throw that out. So, Councilwoman Rude, did you want to make a motion? >> Yes, I would like to make a motion. I think these are fixed costs and we have to be realistic about what is actually
being um expended in this department and what is just being held because of a a maybe. And frankly, I really appreciate that Mr. Garcia is here. the person who should be representing this budget is not here and
not making a good case about why this needs to be here. And I would like to stick to my original motion, which is to reduce this by the cushion, which is $20,000. >> So, we have a motion. Do we have a
second? It looks like the motion fails for lack of a second. Would you like to make a >> I'll take another stab at it. >> Thank you. >> I'm I'm I'm in the game. >> A cushion is about $5,000 if there's an
emergency. Is that correct, Mr. Duteniac? I mean, >> I don't think you could define a cushion as is as any one number. it has to be proportional to >> we don't we don't know what what this is but we have padded basically every single every single
um page and every single budget has a little bit of a cushion. So again I really would like to go back to the fact that the person who was supposed to be representing this budget is not present to justify it even though he has apparently spoken on the phone with Mr.
Smearaldo. um this is where he should be to justify this this cushion. So I will make a motion to to cut this by 15,000 and leave a cushion of five.
>> So while your motion is pending, we have a u Councilwoman Castelino has her hand up. Is it okay to >> Yes. >> Councilwoman? >> Yes. Thank Thank you, Council President. Um I am fully confident with the person
that is not here. That person um uh kept us all alive during COVID and and the crisis we had there. Councilwoman, with all due respect, you have you know this is your first year. You'll see I'm in year 10 years on the school board. There
are emergency situations that do come up. I hear you. Uh, I'm willing to reduce this down to 30,000 and let's move on. So, that's going to be my recommendation. If you'd like to make the motion, I'll second it at 30,000. Thank you.
Okay, Councilwoman Castle, before we move forward, it may have been part of our communication issues over the last half hour, but uh 30,000 would actually increase the cushion by 50%. So, I don't think that's what you
>> unless maybe perhaps you did. But in any event, to add to a budget item, we would require four votes and we don't have that. So, >> excuse me, council president. Are we talking about the 45,000
uh cushion, the 45? I thought I thought we were on the 45,629. >> No, Mr. Diniac, this is all his fault. Let let me explain. >> Listen to us. He didn't take a vote and he increased the reduction in the
overall budget. So he >> Yeah, let me explain. Yeah, I'm sorry. Uh, Councilman Castelino. So, at some point in one of the budget hearings when we were going through the
detail, um, we cut an additional $25,000 and I updated the budget document on the website. I didn't I didn't update my supplemental document. So instead of the cushion being 45,000, it's 20,000.
Um because the recommend the introduced budget was 385,5 9855, not 410. Um >> and that represented a a reduction of $67,000 to get us here today. So we were looking
at old numbers. We got it clarified and now the cushion that was allegedly well it was 45,000 originally is now down to 20,000. So that's what uh Councilwoman Ruden was talking about. She uh suggest
she made a a motion to reduce the cushion entirely by $20,000. It failed for lack of a second. And now uh uh she has another motion. You raised your issue. So you you raised your hand. So
that's sort of where we stand now. If you want you continue to have the floor if you wanted to respond uh respond to what's on the floor now. >> Okay. Uh I uh see you already brought it down from 45
to to 20. I was willing to keep it at 30. So I I'm good here. I'm good at the 20. >> Okay. So, we have a motion pending on the floor requiring a second uh to reduce this by uh I'm sorry, what
was the number? >> 15,000 >> 15,000 >> leaving a cushion of five, >> right? And it looks like this motion fails for lack of a second. Would you like to? >> Yes, I will take another stab at it.
Cushions are only I mean you can have a cushion on every single page and we obviously my council colleagues want to leave a cushion on this page but leaving a $20,000 cushion is really exorbitant when we are talking about a page that only deals with fixed
costs. So I would make a motion to reduce this to to reduce it by $10,000. Is there a second? >> Uh, I will second it to see if we can get a vote. >> Okay. Thank you. >> But as far as the discussion, I I just
want to ask how is the administration, how is the CFO, what do you think about a $10,000 cushion as opposed to a 15 or $20,000 cushion? >> I don't I don't support any further
cuts. I think we came in with a pretty sizable cut in the first round and then the council, I don't remember who on the council wanted more and we gave another $25,000.
We've laid out, you know, everything that we need to charge to it. There's a small amount of room for something to go wrong, which typically happens. I don't recommend any more cuts. >> Okay. Thank you. Is there any other discussion?
>> No, I'm I'm fine. >> Uh >> yeah, I'm fine. >> So >> I'm not an IT person, but it seems to me that all of these contracts um include services including firewall,
cyber security. If something breaks down, we have contracted with um many many companies on this list who are supposed to provide services and that's I don't understand really what is this
cushion for? Is it cushion for hardware for other I mean the firewall already exists? We have a a large contract to protect the firewall. I don't understand what this cushion is for. It's not really being explained to
me why we need to have a $20,000 cushion in this particular line item. >> As much as I fully appreciate where you're going with this, 100% my job is to make sure that when something
happens, we're prepared. And I get about six to 15 emails, maybe about six emails a day from Homeland Security, sieges from just
dozens of different places talking about all the uh potential attacks going on. And I, you know, my job is to make sure that it happens. And when something does
occur that's catastrophic, we're there to protect it and we can just do it instantly. Every minute that we're not addressing something can be days or weeks of down of downtime. Uh
so for me, I sleep better having these numbers in there. And that's that's really all it is. and and if it's not there, you know, we'll we'll make do and we'll do what we can. We do what what with what we have. So, if we don't have it, we'll we'll make do. Um but I would definitely sleep better with it there.
That's really all I can >> Okay. >> I mean, I can't say that we're going to need it. I I absolutely don't know and I hope that we don't need it, but if we do, it's it it makes my life and MCG's
life and Pasc and and uh PDIT uh makes our lives just that much easier knowing that uh there there is a cushion there that that we can't fall to. >> Okay. So, I would just like to ask my colleagues if you are supportive of any cuts to this cushion. Are you
supportive? >> Uh I'm not supportive. Okay. And um council council member Castelino, are you supportive of any cuts? >> So So councilwoman, I was supportive that they went from 45 to 20. And again,
I'm going to put this under, you know, we're doing things differently and next year I'm going to ask the directors whether, you know, they need to put it in a different category. Um you know, that that's it. I mean, we got to move
on. So I I I no right now I'm down 20 is fine with me. I'd like to consent and we got to get this budget done. So let's move on. >> Thank you. >> Have a motion on the floor. It's >> I withdraw my motion. >> I don't have support. So I I I see when
I'm don't have support. >> Yes. >> Okay. So uh Councilman Ruden has withdrawn her motion. I've withdrawn my second. >> Thank you. Anything else on this uh budget this page?
>> Consent. >> Consent. >> Consent. >> Okay. Uh right. The last one for today is central IT non-uniform expense. We did not consent to this one, I believe. >> Oh, page 47. Sorry.
[Music] How much has been spent year to date? We do not have a consent on that. >> A consent on uh non-uniform expenses. >> Yeah. On page 47. I'm looking here. >> Do you need a page fourth?
Do you have a further breakdown than this one number? >> Did you This is the one we actually took out >> the small difference that was left over. >> Um, so
>> the 967. >> Yeah, that was that was the difference. Yeah, we took that out in another budget hearing. So, this one was Fauvionics, Arbor Pro, Municity, Munidex, and the batteries. >> And how much has been spent to date?
>> Um, Good thing it's been all of them. More than all of it. Oops. Yeah. Everything has been spent for >> Okay. So, we're we're removing the difference. >> You already did. Yeah.
>> We When did we do that? >> At at whatever previous budget hearing because we introduced with the difference the 967. So, Okay. And we consented on that already. >> We didn't consent on this one. Um,
>> are you sure? >> I don't have any of it. >> I'm looking now, but >> this page 47. I I know we didn't consent. >> Yeah. No, I don't have a record of it on on my notes for Venus.
>> Okay, I move to consent. >> Consent. >> Consent. >> Thank you. >> That's everything for today. >> Okay. Uh, so I need to raise my hand.
>> Are we are we? >> Let's get Councilwoman Castle on, please. >> Thank you, Council President. Um before we close out, um I I have a a question
on uh page 53 54 going back to the planner. Um because we had two two two questions and uh hear me out before. The first one is and just
let me finish my statement and then administration can answer. The first one is for the code um the open position the council um put in to do the uh professional planner the full-time professional planner but we wanted it at
the higher code. So when are we doing that salary ordinance? I I we had asked to do that before we finalize the budget because right now the code is for a lower lower level entry person and um I'm only going to you know otherwise we
might as well just take out the money if we're not going to hire uh a qual a highly qualified planner which I I thought the administration was commit to but we need to change that code and get that salary ordinance drawn up. And then the second question is on Tuesday
night's uh Monday night's agenda. Sorry, I keep forgetting we're meeting Monday. There's a request in uh for additional monies to pay the uh the consultant $75,000. So my question is uh where's that money
coming from in in this budget? Is where where's the administration pulling? Uh if the council chooses to uh uh approve that, where in this budget is that money coming from? I'm done. Thank you.
Is the vendor What vendor are we talking about? >> Nish. Oh, Nishuain. >> Yeah. So I just curious to see raised his hand. >> This is going to be escrow money. Nishuain. >> Yeah. It's Do do you want to let Mr. Smaldo.
>> Oh yeah, sorry Mr. Smaldo. >> So yeah, Mr. Diniac, as far as inituing, that is a that's an escrow. Um, so that's going to be a resolution and I believe we had some explanation provided for it. If not, we will. Um, I did receive questions from both uh the
council president and councilwoman Ruden said if everybody could try and get their answers in by today. I just sent out multiple emails u because we did have a short week this week and we have a shortened week next week to get to the u um to the questions for the for the council and I know that some of our
directors have already responded so hopefully we'll have all the answers for you but um directly to the nitain that is going to be based on escrow that is for the planning that is for the two boards the planning and the zoning board to make sure that they have the representation that they have asked for
and other than and and I don't have the exact figure. Mr. Datinia, I could back me up on this when provided. I believe to date this year, we spent I know it's less than 2,000 or if not even less than that of township money with Nishuain.
So, it's below uh most of this money is escrow. So, that's that's that one question. And with regards to the salary ordinance, we what I had said to you back in July was that we would move forward with this, but the mayor and and and I made that commitment with you with
the mayor about the planner and that this money has to go into the the budget and we didn't know where the budget was going to be and if it was going to be approved. We thought it was going to be done by now. Um and and I said if we have everything taken care of, we would we would move to put the salary
ordinance on for the September 28th. and that was to the chagrin of the of the members of the council, but I said I would try to get it on for the 28th, which is this month. Um or and if if we had other agreements in place, we would try to get it sooner. But um you know, that's where we're at. The mayor is
still committed to by hiring a full-time planner as stated in the past. Um and we will advertise, but we have our budgetary process and that's where we're at. So if you remove that money, then she cannot advertise. But um I I've told
you this u uh privately and I've said this publicly. Um the mayor is convinced is is convinced to to move forward with this um or I should say committed to this and I have my marching orders as well. So as soon as we get all this stuff done, we'll we'll move forward. So
that's about as best explanation I can give you. Councilwoman >> Castelina, please go ahead if if Mr. Swaldo is finished. Yes, sir. I am >> sorry. Um, okay. So then what I expect
to see then is then a revised page on 53 to include the new code. Uh so when we approve the budget, that code is inserted under position code and then uh
we could also approve on first reading on the same evening and that will satisfy me. if that's possible. >> Thank you. >> We will we will address that and um and we could also have um you know offline
discussions about the particulars of Sure. >> All right. >> Yes. Thank you. >> Thank you. I'm I'm done council president if you unless you have other questions. >> Okay. Thank you. Uh I I just want to clarify something. There's a the line item here that we are talking about is
for $92,535 $530. So do I don't know who to ask this, but do I correctly assume that is only part of an anticipated annual salary? >> Correct. Prrated. Yes.
>> Okay. Okay. Uh here's here's my issue that I have with this and I'm not sure it's been addressed by Mr. comments or his efforts and I applaud his efforts, but we had two very large
issues that we as a council have previously expressed that we want this to move forward, but we want it to move forward in a collaborative fashion. We asked and the uh that the
mayor allow us to have input on the job description and we also asked that we have input on the organization structure including this person. Now as
far as I know there has been no agreement on either of these two issues. I don't want to negotiate it now. I don't I really don't want to be talking about it except that it's in the context of the budget. But uh I have not seen
movement at all on either of these two I guess for lack of a for lack of a description conditions that the council has asked the mayor to con to consider because this is the mayor's prerogative
and we acknowledge that and you know our budget process is something that we do have influence over. So, I I don't know where that stands, but I would feel much better if we could get in writing that these two issues that we have are are
accepted so that we we can move forward on this. And if not, I think uh uh Councilwoman makes a very good point. We should take the money out. So, Mr. Maybe we should talk about this offline,
but >> I I I would I would prefer we talk about this offline, council president, but I what I I will say here again, as I said previously, the the mayor is committed to this. Um and I I have listened to you about the job specs and I can I could I
could tell you that um once the job specs come out, I would be more than willing to share and show that and everything else. But, you know, like I said, we, you know, we're we're all we're walk we're all walking gingerly these days. So, um, so, and I'm just
going to leave it at that and and we can we can, uh, I I would definitely welcome a offline conversation with you. >> Okay, sounds good. And then if something changes, we we'll just have to amend the contract. I mean, amend the budget. So
if it doesn't go the way we hope it does go, is that fair to say our other my colleagues? Is that good or do you want to >> think Todd had his hand? >> Okay. Sorry, I didn't didn't see that. Please go ahead, Mr. Boie. >> Um kind of looking at this sort of
pragmatically. Let's assume we hire somebody at 175 a year. Um, and they start on October 1st, which is probably uh not going to happen, but whatever. That's $43,750
for the year. Um, I mean, maybe cutting all of it may not make sense, but bring it down to give us the cush the amount of money that would be needed to pay that person for the rest of this year. >> So, that's a good point, Mr.
because at the time we were talking about these numbers it was multiple months ago. So uh uh so I understand where you're coming from. Do do my colleagues want to uh reflect that? >> Yes, I think I I agree with um Mr.
that we should at least prorate this and I also agree with council president that we need in writing what what what position where this position is going to be within this administration. Is it its
own department? Is it under another department? We need to have those answers. And so I I think that we can very very safely at least half this budget >> because we're only talking about if
somebody gets on sal, you know, on staff, it probably is not going to be until November and we're only really talking about two months. >> And I don't know if we would be hiring at 175. It seems to me like 150 would be
more of a would would be a a fair starting salary for a planner in our in our township. >> Councilwoman Casalino. >> Uh, >> thank you. Um, so question. Yeah, we definitely have to prorrate it.
The reason why I didn't bring that up sooner is because I want to get a a handle on where we're at with the affordable housing planning consultant uh hire gr and um you know where what line item is that coming out of uh Mr.
Datiniac and do you have money budgeted there and whatnot? So it's they come out of operating expense and we can charge 20% to our affordable housing trust. Um
so that that's how they get split up. >> Okay. So we're good. So if we were to reduce this now because you know realistically which is unfortunate because it would have been great to have somebody somebody in place already with all this
affordable housing plan going on. um to have somebody in place. But realistically, by the time you advertise uh plan, like we're talking you're lucky if you have somebody in here by November 1st. So, I mean, I'm willing to take
this down to like 30 uh for the end of the year even to split it in half. But I just wanted to make sure that um you know, the consultant, we had money in there for the consultant. >> That's all. Thank you,
>> Councilwoman. I see that on page 54 there is another line item for township planner under 070 with another 30,000. Actually it's the request was almost 31. So what is that took out? We took it
out. Yeah. You voted >> was taken out completely to take that fully out. >> Yes. >> Okay. So then if we're looking at a $15,000 a month salary, that's only 30 that's $30,000 for two months. And
that's wishful thinking that we get it get somebody in place by November 1st. So I think we should cut the difference and leave it at $30,000 >> just like Okay. So then I'm going to make a motion to cut that down to
$30,000 >> and a second. Thank you. And reduce it by 60 uh 62,000. >> 62,530. Right. So the new number would be
uh 30,000. I'm sorry. 30,000. Yes. >> Correct. >> This is on uh >> on the open position on page 53. We have a motion and we have a second. Is there any further discussion?
Madame Clerk, >> Councilwoman Castelino, >> yes. >> Councilwoman Ruden, >> yes. >> Council President Koviaak, >> yes. >> The motion carries. >> Super. Mr. Mr. Datiniac, before you send us off
into the weekend, is there anything you want to say or can say at this point about the timing of uh the potential adoption of the budget? >> So, we're going to have our hearing. We still have to have our hearing on the
30th because we advertised we we do have to have the hearing. Um but with the amendments that we have, we're going to end up having to advertise the amendments. Um, so I'll alert DGS that it's going to have to be what's our first meeting in October? >> I think the 8th. Okay. If >> I'm not mistaken.
>> So October 8th would be final adoption because again, >> Madam Clerk, that's on regular Tuesday, correct? >> No, it's not the 8th. It's the Or maybe it is. I I have to look at my calendar. >> Can anybody look at the calendar on the
homepage of the website? Seventh. It >> It is the seventh. Tuesday, October 7th. Okay. Yet another great reason why we have the Citizens Budget Advisory Board.
>> Council President, the next uh meeting in October is October 12th. >> The 16th and the 28th. >> I'm sorry. That's I'm in the wrong month. I'm sorry. Wrong month. >> Wait, what? >> Even later. >> October 30th. >> 16th. Okay. October. So the 16th. Yeah. >> When do when do we have to pass this? We
have to pass it by the 30th. >> Yeah, but we're going to have amendments, so we're not going to be able to pass it on the 30th. >> Are we going to be fined? >> I'll tell GL DLGS. I don't I don't think they're going to find >> Just tell them if they don't agree, we're going to sink Councilman Ruden
after them. >> That's right. >> To take away all of their phones and their MFIs >> and their cars. So we'll still we'll still hold a public hearing on the 30th because we have to we advertise that and
then uh yeah final adoption would be the 16th >> post [Music] also that affects me but >> not sure you want >> we don't want to do >> and we also have council connection is
it virtual >> yes it is >> well this takes uh can't think residents. >> Thank you. Yes. Over. So, um,
>> so the zoning board is still all >> Zoom, right? >> Yes. >> Okay. So, you don't need this room for this. Okay. >> Yeah. >> Right. You're going to have to have split screen. >> Do we do a consent on 53, by the way?
>> Probably not yet. >> No. No. Okay. Did we vote or Yeah, we put on the reducing it. >> Councilman Castalino. >> Yeah. Uh yeah. So I I just Well, one or
two things. First, um in regards to the the fine and the dates, thank you, Mr. Diniac, uh for for mentioning to make that phone call. I do appreciate a lot of people reaching out uh to me worried about us because of that letter that was
sent. I'm disappointed that that was posted and and shared like, you know, we're doing something wrong here by not having our budget done. I think we've been doing great work and trying to accommodate our taxpayers. We have not
hurt our staff or any of our departments. So, and I'm really disappointed that people are thinking that's the case because it is not. And again, the word disappointed, I I can't express enough. Um, however, um, you
know, this has been great work and, um, learning on all our parts and staff, I know you may be stressed, but you're also realizing we've done, you know, things antiquated for many years and and we're just trying to be more
businessminded, which is not a bad thing. and I I think all of you will appreciate it uh as we move forward with future budgets. With that being said, just to wrap this up um and if anybody should be stressed, you know, the council and and and and this and I want
to thank everybody in the rooms for coming to all these meeting because they they have been tedious and very time consuming. You know, our staff today lost you know whole whole day's work but it was good to get it done. So I appreciate them uh for staying today u
because I know you have a lot of other work to be doing. So thank you. So just to wrap up u Mr. uh council president Mr. Diniac what what has left what is left to be consented on? So, just I just
want to keep a running list here so we know we're all good to go on the on the 30th and I assume the the the um the um administration will have their budget presentation as well. So, ready? So,
what what what what other pages do we need to consent on? I had here 31 42 50 we have the 53 consent. Uh any anything else? Um >> was 31. Correct. 31. Um
um >> 3142. >> 42. Correct. And what was the buildings one that we have to come back to? Uh got um >> 79
>> 79 and 80. Yeah. 79 >> 53 >> I think. Did I say no? 53 we just did. >> No. Well, you said not to do consent. I asked if the do consent. You said no. >> Oh, no. I said they didn't do consent. Oh, I
thought you were saying no. >> No, they they can do consent. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This that was the one. I'm sorry. That the one you cut the uh cut down to 30. Yeah. >> Okay. So, is there a consent on page 53? >> Sorry. >> Consent. >> Consent. >> Consent.
>> Thank you. Okay. And then what was the other two, John? I'm sorry. >> Was 79 and 80 because they're the same. U >> Thank you. Okay. >> And then I think 31 31 >> 31 427980. >> Yes, I I think that's it.
>> And when are we going to address those? >> See? >> Well, the the two you have to have your executive session or >> we have to schedule a time just to wrap up these things and also have four people in the room. >> Yeah.
>> Or you could do it on Zoom. >> Well, yeah, you have to have four people available. >> Yeah, that's Yeah. Yeah. Huh? >> Friday. >> Are we good? >> Well, do you want to set a date for >> need to set a date >> for It has to be after after our next
council um meeting which will have the executive meeting >> Friday at 12. >> Um Friday. That's that works for me. >> Okay. So, >> Councilwoman Scarp is only available for an hour. Are we going to be able to wrap
up whatever is the needed for a super majority? Um, probably not. But that won't work. >> Well, we could frontload whatever needs a supermajority. >> Yeah, >> true. >> Is an hour good?
>> God, I hope so. >> Can ask her to take off an extra hour >> if we all promise. pinky promise to keep our conversations to an absolute minimum so we can move through this. >> Considering that two of them are SNW,
you probably don't want to have too much of a conversation anyway about them. >> Good point. >> So, >> I think that'll work. >> All right. So, that's Friday the 12th at noon. >> I am not available. >> Uh oh.
>> You can have the meeting. I'm just not available, that's all. >> We can't do without you. >> Sure, you could. >> Okay. When are you available? Well, is there someone else available for >> Yes, Miss Brill. >> I'm sorry. >> I can do the new >> Okay. Yes. All right. Awesome. Okay.
You've been replaced, Joe. >> No. >> Shield could do it, but he's not he's seen how the sausage is made out. He's not allowed back in council chambers. He's going to have you on speed dial. Going to have that little red phone.
Okay. Next meeting, Friday, September 12th at noon. I move to adjourn. >> Uh, second. >> I beg your pardon. I didn't know that.
>> No, I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. >> Okay. >> Okay. >> Good work today, everybody. >> Thank you. Great work today. >> So that you know, we saved $140,74140. >> And what's our commission? >> And between between this workshop and
the last workshop, we saved more than a4 million. >> Okay. So, >> Councilwoman Pasino did re raise her hand. >> Just Mr. Tiniac for Tuesday. Can you can you have the new updated uh number of of
the savings to the tax offline? >> Yeah, for Friday. I will. >> Yeah, that'd be great. >> Monday? I'm not here Monday. >> Is she talking about the >> on Monday? Yeah, >> she's talking about the council meeting. Michelle, the council meetings on Monday. >> Yeah, I know. I keep saying Tuesday. Sorry. >> I'll I'll send Pete uh an email and he
can share it. >> Yeah, I'm just curious to see what we're down to. >> Okay. >> Okay. There's a motion pending. >> Is there a second? >> Thank you everybody. >> Oh, can we stay longer? Come on. It's Friday. Come on. >> All those opposed. >> Have a good weekend
>> meeting. Thank you. Um, why are