##VIDEO ID:8qSEOLvPei8## e I call this meeting to order it's December 16th 2024 this is the council uh business session meeting roll call um divers uh here Mandel here Weiss here withfield here and council member uh Sonia ga gas is not able to be with us this evening have we been adequately noticed for this meeting yes we were adequately noticed on January 19th 2024 to the times in the Princeton packet filed with the municipal clerk posted on the Township Municipal Building and website please stand for the salute to the flag I also want to note that um resolution 2024-25 uh has been pulled by the administration so we will um not be voting on that this evening we have no ceremonial matters so before we enter to our first public comment period um Sharon lege who is a member of the recreation Commissioners uh has a special announcement uh on the Township's holiday house decorating contest so my name is Sharon lege uh 105 RAB Hill Road um I'm here on behalf of the Recreation Commission uh so this year we had our contest and as the um judges were going around the neighborhood they saw so many houses that weren weren't even a part of the contest so hopefully next year we'll have more people get involved um um we came with two categories the first was the most Whimsical and that was eight Channing Way and the second the most classical was three Columbia Place um so tomorrow I believe Ken Jacobs from the recreation department will be putting special yard signs in those yards so congratulations to everybody good very good congratulations to the winners and thanks to the uh Commissioners for all their work all year long and also on this too I'm sure it's a competitive contest so thanks for joining us tonight all right first uh public comment period if you'd like to make a public comment please come to the microphone state your name address and you'll have up to three minutes good evening everyone John Church 11 Princeton Place uh the final council meeting of the year after a very eventful year in many respects so maybe some of you are glad to see it come to an end this year and but all the best for this for the rest of this year and for the year to come I'm sure it'll be interesting okay council members I wanted to bring to your attention a publication that you probably some of you will know about I'm sure Mr Whitfield gets copies of this and the mayor gets copy of the very useful publication called the New Jersey planner now when we have meetings with the zoning board Mr ctis distributes copies of this to the zoning board members so this is the latest issue now I wanted to bring to your attention some very very important parts of this publication and by the way you can get copies of it from Mr cti's office um recently njde has proposed a new rule called the real rule proposal and it's published in the August 5th uh uh edition of the New Jersey register now this is talking about the projected rise in sea level by 20 uh 2100 and they're predicting it seems kind of outlandish to me and a little bit over the top of predicting a 5 foot rise in sea level by the end of this current century and because of that uh many changes will have to be made especially along the coast and it will affect all of New Jersey and you may be required if this rule gets actually adopted you may be required to revise quite a few ordinances local ordinances in terms of the uh what people can and cannot build in certain areas you might even have to uh raise uh certain Road levels because of possible floods so I just wanted you to be aware of that I think all of you should read this and then please feel free to get a copy from Mr cti's office I think it uh would be well worth your while to read this um um so uh it does specifically talk about ordinance updates municipalities will be required to update their ordinances within one year of the real rule adoption to match njds definitions and standards so it's a big deal and so uh assuming that the rule actually gets adopted and these rules usually do get adopted after a public comment period uh you should be aware that things coming down the road here may be rather difficult for us to do in terms of uh adjusting to these higher water projected higher water levels even raising roads and so forth so this is what may be coming down the pike so I would encourage all of you to keep up to date with this to get a car copy of this from Mr cti's office and read it and be prepared to act accordingly in the new year and so all the best to everyone for a nice holiday season uh it's been a long year and more to come next year and I think at the early meetings of next year I'll have some other comments about other issues so thank you for your attention thank you and um happy holidays and have a very happy and healthy New Year to you to Mr church and thanks for coming out on a regular basis we appreciate that and uh just so you know the hearings for the real rule are complete and D is looking at adoption probably mid to mid to late summer or maybe early fall thank you yeah the D and I believe New Jersey League of municipalities one of the others has had some um Zoom information uh sessions on that I think there were some concerns about going into 100e type of plan um there were a lot of concerns especially at the shore area being expressed so we'll see we'll see um once it's adopted all right um move on to Administration comments Carrie good evening um we have several updates today um the municipal offices will be closed on Tuesday December 24th and Wednesday December 25th in observance of the Christmas holiday and the offices will also be closed on Wednesday January 1st 2025 in observance of New Year's Day um during that time period for trash collection for the week of 12:23 Monday and Tuesday trash collection will occur as normally scheduled with um residents with a Wednesday trash collection will be collected on Thursday December 26th residents with a Thursday and Friday trash collection can expect trash to be collected on Friday December 27th with some carryover into Saturday December 28th for the week of 12:30 Monday and Tuesday trash collection will occur as normally scheduled residents with the Wednesday trash collection will be collected on Thursday January 2nd residents with a Thursday and Friday trash collection can expect trash collection on Friday January 3rd and some carry it over may happen on Saturday January 4th and this is all under news and notices and also on the Public Works site and with Public Works they are currently collecting in zone two today um and we'll be moving into zone three and four after zone two is finished and this is the final collection for brush and leaves until next year um they will be starting the Christmas tree pickup on December 26th uh for curbside collection of Christmas trees you do not need to call to schedule a pickup uh of a Christmas tree and artificial trees are not collected all lights ornaments garland tinsel Nails stands and plastic bags must be removed prior to placing your tree at the curb for collection the final day for tree collection will be Tuesday January 21st 2025 and trees must be placed out by 7:00 a.m. that day for Final collection you can also drop off Christmas trees during the same time period from um at the Public Works facility um bags must be removed from Christmas trees and all ornaments tinsil lights all that fun holiday stuff must be removed from the trees and you can drop it off during resident hours Monday to Friday 8: a.m. to 2 p.m. and Saturdays 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. excluding holidays during the 26th through January 25th um West Windsor parks and wreck is now accepting registration for the 2025 dad daughter dance which is going to be held on Friday February 21st 2025 from 6:30 p.m. to 930 p.m. at Mercer Oaks uh daughters must be age five or older prior to the date of the dance registration is $75 it includes music dancing and a dinner and a photo booth more information um is on the parks and rec page and you can register in person by or online and the township just wants to wish everyone um a safe and happy holiday season thank you mayor thanks Linda as Mr chur said last uh meeting of the year every year I realize I'm getting older and older so um so um happy holidays to all merry Christmas happy Quanza happy holidays to all you celebrate and wishing everybody a very happy and prosperous and healthy New Year um a few comments I mean a few years ago uh the rec commission started a good uh contest house lightning contest and a couple of years I've gone out and I had exactly the same reaction there's so many houses that look as good as better than houses that won and you wonder why they didn't why they didn't enter the contest so I don't know if they knew and didn't want to enter or they just didn't know that there was a contest like that but people didn't do elaborate things to their houses and I'm very happy and I usually after the winners are announced I usually go around and see them and they're very nicely done so thanks for continuing that tradition um just one comment I mean krie mentioned leaf collection last for the year generally this time of the year people take it as a joke because January is around the corner it's not a joke next con connection will be in March so new next year means in three months time so if you're in zone one please please please don't put your leaves out nobody will come by till March and similarly Zone 2 three 4 just watch uh when your collection is over um the last comment I have is there's a lot of discussion about drones uh and both Pro for and a lot of theories going on as to what they are um the state did help hold a call today this afternoon I couldn't attend it but I did request Linda and Andrea as president vice president to attend and they will comment on what was discussed at the on the call but I do talk to our chief of police quite frequently about this issue and um he also wants everybody to know that even if you say drone those are perfectly legal they are um controlled by the federal government the state or the police have no jurisdiction over it so even if you see a drone if you call a police there's nothing much they can do about it um even if a drone falls down they are not allowed to touch it uh they have to treat it as a essentially a crime scene and wait for somebody at Federal level to come and do whatever they need to do so um we will continue to hear these stories and there are drones that are used uh for very valid and uh purpose just for example I think last week or week before Princeton flew a lot of Dron just to count number of deers at night so that's that's a legitimate use of drones and those drones were up at night and if somebody saw them they were doing something that was useful and that's done every year for last several years so um they will talk about what the state talked about but if you do see the drones just enjoy them like the Drone show and not much we can do thanks thanks thanks mayor yeah you had mentioned about that meeting um that Zoom meeting today um there were no PowerPoints to share and we were told um not to make any specific comments I guess about the the people essentially they said they we will tell you but you can't tell anybody yeah yeah right right so like don't take pictures of people's names and all this kind of stuff and one one of the Mayors asked for some statement that came out and they kind of said well we can we can give um a summary of what they're saying but they didn't want anything specific to trace back to anybody so right so no sharing of a tape of the meeting so okay fine that's their rules um so I guess what was said federal agencies are taking the Drone situation very seriously no na uh security public risks have been discovered no evidence of threat to Public Safety new legislation on drones would help Gap in authority of drones at state and local levels geospatial analysis is being done um was mentioned by a a d DHS U representative uh new concern seeing large numbers of Pilots being hit with lasers so someone on the ground and they had a laser and they're aiming it and the pilots are you know flying trying to land possibly so that seems to be um a newer problem that's starting again uh there will be postings on the FBI and State Police websites with information for people to know if they are seeing a manned aircraft because they're getting a lot of reports it might be a drone it could be a helicopter it could be a plane and all of that so um they they want try and uh FBI and State Police want to try and educate people to learn about these um machines Tech Technologies and drones FBI Newark um a large part of this office is looking into reviewing the Drone activity uh and then one of the members said the public is being asked not to fly um its drones uh they need to see if the uptake is due to people who own drones so there's these Dr drones we don't know exactly where they're coming from they're up there but then people who own drones are then flying their drones up there so there's more and more and it's it's I guess creating some um a lot of calls let's just put it that with a lot lot of calls coming in so um bottom line they're saying there's no um National Security public risk so we yeah stay tuned yes they they um said they've got a lot of U people calling on the tip line I think it was like close to 6,000 tip line calls and out of that there were really only couple hundred that were actionable for them to pursue further and out of what they've investigated um they said that nothing has been out of the ordinary so um they they also said that there's no Coast Guard saying that they've seen anything coming over um so it it sounds like they are taking this seriously and they have been putting Manpower into it and at this point they're not um seeing anything dangerous um you can take that however you want but um you know there were still you know some of the Mayors were asking questions like well why are we suddenly seeing so much and and I think people still were looking for more reassurance but everything so far that has been done has not come back with anything that was either a foreign actor or even anything that was considered um illegal uh drones that it's been um there's been a lot of sightings and some of the sightings have been uh airplanes some of them have been Stars some of them have been um other things uh obviously they have no way of going back and figuring out what each person saw but from everything that they've been able to do they haven't nothing's jumped out that this is something that's um that's bad and as Linder mentioned people were do using things like the laser pens that have always caused a problem with um uh with airplanes and with the blinding a pilot and now there's some anecdotal that there's more uh of that because people may be shining their laser light up and that's a definite no no because you don't know what you're going to hit and of course they did ask that people not consider taking the Law into their own hands and trying to attack shoot or use whatever other methods might be out there um to go after the drones because that would probably create a more dangerous situation that was probably about I think we probably all heard TV radio um on online you know articles so that I didn't find any breaking news tonight no I think it was pretty much nothing new mayor elected officials that type of thing so well so stay tuned okay that's all I can say some someday in a hundred years we may know the truth but I won't be here so okay all right uh council member comments um Dan thank you um don't they have any specific comments other than later this evening we will be talking about a variety of um ideas that are all the council members um put together in regards to uh our 2025 budget I was you know happy to see everybody contributed uh you know a significant amount of ideas and there was a lot of overlap in theme so um looking forward to that discussion later today good uh Martin sure I just want to pray that everyone has a safe amazing and blessed Christmas Hanukkah and New Year uh 2024 has given us many blessings good and fun times without a doubt obviously so many have been attentive to the national election of course our local recent no verse yes election as we head into 2025 with so much national news based around the inauguration of a new president increases in Goods service and products uh the recent before mentioned drone situation and or societal cultural news let us right here and our local community stay true to our principles our beliefs and our core fundamental values that have continued to make West Winds an incredibly desirable place to live I ask our residents to take some time to reflect on the good in our community to speak to your neighbors or even to speak to us as a council uh we are always willing to speak to you regarding concerns issues or hear from you on thoughts you may have for the future of West Windsor uh this is what democracy is really about and this is what a community is and should be about so as we reflect on 2024 and move into 2025 I always say united we stand divided we fall let's stand together for what is right our families our community our health and safety our police fire departments our jobs our careers our school district and many other things that are so very important to you at this time as a community will will be better when we truly commit ourselves and direct our undivided attention to being on one Accord with each other that will keep us headed in the right direction as a Township once again I pray that everyone has a wonderful and incredible Christmas Hanukkah and holiday season may your 2025 be a safe prosperous enlightening empowering and blessed year and prayerfully filled with joy Unity togetherness and love uh let us be thankful and grateful for the incredible blessings of 2024 and those that will come in 2025 thank you thank you a it's always hard to come after Martin um uh tonight's the last scheduled council meeting for 2024 so I want to do a little bit of reflection uh I want to TK thank everybody who took the time to come to Council meetings this year I want to thank everyone who contacted me about Township issues by email phone or at many activities around town I'm always happy to discuss issues and I always remember I represent everybody no matter where in town they live and if or how they vote I'd like to thank our hardworking staff for all they do DPW for not only being out there in the heat and cold but for the many outreaches and special collections during the year our police and emergency services including our volunteers who do it all for free for protecting us 247 our health department Senior Services Recreation engineering community services finance and all of administration that keeps us going and especially the clerk's office that takes care of council and keeps everyone out of trouble thank you to retired CL clerk gay Yuber and to Allison shean who is now our terrific new Clerk and to our new Deputy clerk Joey Gordon and our secretary Donal comp thank you to our volunteer boards and committees they do valuable work for the environment our trees our relationships as residents recreational opportunities our land use our farms and even how we can park our cars at the train station most people don't realize that the master plan for our Township is the responsibility of a volunteer group of residents we've accomplished a lot but there's always more to do I've enjoyed working with Council president Linda Jers mayam Marathi and the rest of council as Council vice president this year and I look forward to a good 2025 and the challenges and opportunities of the new year and want to wish everybody a terrific holiday season and New Year thank you thank you Andrea in case you're at home you hear a lot of uh fire trucks a lot of fire engine noise around town this week uh the West Winds are Volunteer Fire Company number one is undertaking operation Santa 2024 uh starting Wednesday December 18th which is this week uh through Friday December 20th uh the volunteer fir company will be escorting Santa around uh to every street within its District rain dates are set for December 21st and 22nd uh should they be needed and more specific information on the dates times um and the trucks in Santa will be around 6:00 p.m. to 900 p.m. and the streets um are listed on the West Windsor Volunteer Fire company's number one Facebook page so so enjoy but don't get alarmed if you hear a lot of those trucks going around you see flashing lights and all because um Santa's coming to town here so enjoy that with the especially with the kids um else here I want to wish everyone um including our staff all of our all of our volunteers every every committee and board um all the all the council members here and also um you know Sonia who's not with us tonight uh a very merry Christmas happy Hanukkah uh Happy K Quanza and happy holidays so may all of you have a a joyous season with family and friends and a happy and healthy New Year um and peace throughout the world for next year um Council will meet let's see Wednesday January Ary 15th that'll be our next meeting at noon for our annual reorganization meeting um so we cannot meet sooner by law which is following the law with the date and uh following the reorganization meeting uh there will be a business meeting so we'll we have several weeks in between so we'll have plenty of um some business to to catch up on so um again thank you to all of our staff members that are up here constantly for all of our meetings thank you to the council members um it's it's been great and my my my wingman this year is Andrea as vice president and uh we did we got a lot accomplished it was interesting year um so we're we're looking forward to uh you know getting a lot of the work done next year too with all with all your help everybody together talking to one another working through the issues so um I'm looking forward to a a good 2025 and everyone who comes to our meetings thank you for coming out too on on a regular basis we appreciate uh you know your comments or or even your presence so good to see you okay uh clerk any comments uh no I I don't have any other comments okay saving up for reading all these resolutions yes right saving my voice we have no public hearing so we'll move on to the consent agenda consent agenda okay minutes uh September 23rd 2024 business session as amended October 15 2024 business session as amended bills and claims anyone need anything pulled no seeing none can I have a motion to approve the consent agenda so move second roll call vote okay man down yes wi yes Whitfield yes Jers yes uh motion approved all right recommendations from Administration and Council clerk okay 2014- r243 cancelling 2022 fourth quarter taxes on block five lot 78 purchased by Amtrak National Railroad passenger corporation on September 7th 2022 202 24- r244 cancelling 2023 taxes on block 28 lot 15.03 conade to West Windsor Township on September 29th 2022 from Brookfield Holdings Windsor LLC subdivision intended for open space 202 24- r245 authorizing the business administrator to purchase bodyw warn cameras for the police department from axon Enterprises Inc under New Jersey state contract t106 sl7 fleet-- 00738 for 338,000 7376 2024 r246 authorizing the business administrator to purchase 6 2025 Ford police interceptor utility vehicles and selected options for the police department from Charles S winner Inc doing business as winter Ford under New Jersey state contract 20- Fleet d189 for $26,250 and4 cents 2024 r247 authorizing the business administrator to purchase Emergency Equipment for Police Department vehicles from emergency accessories and installations eai under New Jersey state contract 17- fleet-- 00761 17- Fleet 00719 and 17 Fleet d768 for $ 56,2 n42 in equipment not understate contract for $443 1292 for a total not to exceed $1,669 202 24- r248 approval to submit a six-month extension request through the pmrs system for the grant project La 2023 SST Alexander Road pedestrian safety improvements 2024-25 approval to submit a six month extension request through the pmrs system for the grant project La 2023 ma West Windsor Township new Edinburg Road resurfacing project 2024-25 approval to submit a six-month extension request to the PMR system for the grant project Conover Road connection to South Post Road Bike Grant project 2024-25 granting the reduction of performance guarantees associated with public improvements within the public RightWay for the project known as Regency at West Windsor PB 21-02 C 2024 r252 granting the reduction of performance guarantees associated with private on-site improvements for the project known as Regency at West Windsor pb21 d2s 2024 r253 authorizing the mayor and clerk to execute a Professional Services agreement with geot Trek environmental and surveying LLC for professional land surveying services for the next phase of digital map tax map creation $250,000 2024-25 4 authorizing the mayor and clerk to execute a Professional Services agreement with geot Trek environmental and surveying LLC for professional land surveying services to complete the second portion of the creation of the storm drainage and sanitary sewer system Maps 62830 2024-25 authorizing the business administrator to execute change order number three with Montana Construction Corporation Inc for the Emergency generator for the project known as Duck Pond Interceptor Phase 2 for an increase of $ 32,7 70 for a total not to exceed 4,452 63 2024 r256 authorizing the mayor and clerk to execute a developers agreement between West Windsor Township and wood Woodstone commercial West Windor LLC PB 20-01 block 86 lot 58.2 pursuant to the planning board condition of approval dated July 17th 2024 2024-25 7 authorizing the mayor and clerk to execute a shared services agreement with East Windsor Township for animal control services for the period January 1 2025 through December 31 2026 and resolution 2024 r258 is being pulled 2024 r259 authorizing the award of a 5-year contract for the provision of solid waste collection services for the township of West wisor to waste management of New Jersey Inc for the period February 1 2025 through January 31230 all right that was a long one uh does anyone need any resolution pulled seeing none uh can I have a motion to approve 2024 r243 through 2024 R 257 and 2024 R 259 so moov second roll call vote Mandel yes voice yes Whitfield yes chers yes motion approved we have no introduction of ordinances so we have our our second public comment period right now if You' like to make a public comment please come to to the microphone and state your name address and you'll have up to three minutes uh good evening again John Church I live in Princeton Place I listened to the discussion about the drones the drones are really top of mine for everyone these days I have noticed on the news reports on television that uh they think that some of these drones are actually man now that would be very interesting a man is drone would be almost like a helicopter and I believe that helicopters need to file flight plans and they got to be specially licensed uh and all that so I don't know whether the any of these are manned or not but apparently some of them are very large so this is obviously great interest to everyone in New Jersey I noticed that none seem to have been reported over merca County I looked at the map at least the if if there are any they're not very many most of them are in the north Jersey and South Jersey so I don't know if whether anybody seen one here and I I'll look at the guys and see if I see any but if any of them if any of them are man that's a different kettle of fish Together Al together so I don't know what's going to happen with that I hope none of them are man because that's that's that's something else so anyway let's all keep our eyes on the skies and all the best for the rest of the year and and for uh next year in particular uh just to clar thanks just to clarify um when they were referring to Mann vehicle icle they were saying that it wasn't a drone that people were seeing a man vehicle and whether it's a fixed Wing aircraft or they were seeing sometimes a commercial airplane or a Cessna uh or they were seeing a helicopter and that you know nobody can really tell what size something is if you don't know how distance it is so that so people were thinking that these may have been drones and in reality they were normal type of aircraft that were you really think I don't know if anybody really knew that these were manned or not if so they were referring to manned drone drone means yeah and it's just the same UNM so fixed wi aircraft can be drones that's another misnomer that's going around um most of the military aircra drones are fixed Wing um but so so what they're basically saying is that people are mistaking uh regular aircraft for grown aircraft regular aircraft right and there are uh more recently so it depends on when you saw your Maps there have been a number of reports even in people in the neighborhood I don't know how how many of them are reporting them to FBI but a number of local people have seen what they thought might have been drown so everybody keep your eyes open Watch the skies for UFOs and Little Green Men and all the rest okay thank you very much well we fought them off in 38 so I'm sure we can do that now okay anyone else seeing seeing none we'll end the additional public comment uh move on to council reports discussion new business uh we have a discussion on Council priorities for the 2025 Municipal budget so this this time of year the uh the mayor Administration is is working on developing a a budget an operating budget the municipal budget and the capital budget um and so uh I thought it would be good to um and we do this each year actually past several years um to have council members um say or deliver to us three to five priorities for the upcoming year and it's just an exercise uh to give the administration um you know chance to to hear what we're thinking um there's you know it's you're going to find with each of us to make some comments on that there there is probably a lot of overlap but I thought at this point um it would be a good communication to the administration we will not get our budget books for 2025 uh until traditionally the end of February um so then we really uh we set up the public meetings and deliberate and the department heads um they all come in public meetings so you come in in person and you can make a public comment or they're um they're Live on YouTube or you can watch the tape of that too so it's very um open process uh but for now while it's being formed we just wanted to give um you know some feedback um and some thoughts uh to the administration so um I guess I'll start us off um on on some of some of the priorities and this isn't a total list of everything but it's just uh sort of a start um you know we're in a growth situation in this Township we have been for decades uh and we will continue that way too especially with the new affordable housing um obligations um that's something that'll be a big big topic for for next year especially we'll start in January with some thoughts on what our numbers um should be for the fourth round so anyway so police fire ambulance Emergency Services the gr the growth is continuing to come in and that Staffing levels need to be um thoroughly reviewed in order to keep up with the uh increased calls the township is experiencing I know just from being a volunteer member at the um West Winds Volunteer Fire Company number one and last year I believe we had around 650 calls but there is a possibility by the end of December that will be up to 800 so um there's a lot of calls a lot of growth going on and um whether it's you know the paid professionals and working with the with the volunteers it's it's we got to smooth things out and we got a we got a plan for for What's um going on now and a lot of a lot of developments are coming online everywhere from the train station to Old Trenton roads a route one um even heading towards Princeton but that's that's more University needs there so so it's a lot um the public Department of Public Works I think you know that's that's also um right for increased Staffing levels to be considered the workloads have increased for such things as a athletic fields um tree pruning and new tree maintenance around town um needs to be taken care of and the shade tree commission um has met with the department head uh to review tree needs around town um that commission shade tree uh commission is also requesting a formal line item budget for required training that's statutory and for basic costs for events they run and or participate in and I know that sort of dub tales with the human relations Council I believe they were asking for some more formal funding last year but perhaps you'll get it this year for basic expenses um at events because some the the um uh council members for you know depends commission council members um have been using their own money you know for refreshments and flyers and things of that nature so um I guess they're they are looking for that I would look for that to you know full consideration of that in the 2025 budget bcle and pedestrian needs um yep there's there's always um a need for additional flashing beacons crosswalk improvements bicycle Lanes uh sidewalk connections and increased lighting um around town and we we've heard um throughout the year about um you know different um priorities for that with bicycle and pedestrian Alliance or just individual um members of the community coming to us and and um letting us know that they would like to see some improvements um regarding bicycle pestan needs Township operations um I know you look into how AI can help with efficiencies and Communications uh review how complaints come into the township and how responses are handled um because a lot of times we'll we'll get an email from residents and then we have to send it to the clerk's office and you have to send it to the appropriate department head um and sometimes we hear back on on the conclusion of what's being done or not and sometimes we don't and and so it's just just want to make sure that um you know there's there's a way of documenting this because there is for potholes you can go in our Township website for potholes and and I guess describe where they are and stuff but what about just other types of complaints um that come in so take a look at that an open space uh review the open space tax to see if current levels are sufficient for future purchases and for the maintenance and development of open space and Parks the recreational needs increase uh as our population increases too um all right let me just do Sonia so um woman Sonia gas was not able to be with us but she did um send in some comments uh one road safety pedestrian crosswalks flat flashing beacons install or connect bike Lanes any measures uh we can take to calm the traffic down and make the roads safer for all sidewalks fix or repave sidewalks install or connect sidewalks to make it safer for pedestrians three upgrade and update the township website what can we do to make the website more user friendly uh for fire safety we need to work better with the volunteer companies um it is a big tax saver for our Township so that that that is um one of my my concerns too there there's certain things that need to be um uh worked out better because the growth is coming in so that better um coordination there now um Andrea next okay um keep in mind that there's a whole bunch of things maybe a huge let's say most of the budget is already allocated um and so we only have freedom to change a certain amount that's in there um you know there's so many police the police get paid there's so many things the police need for instance that's we we can't take from that and give somewhere else so when it comes to how much money there is there isn't too much wiggle room so we have so we're basically talking about some of the wiggle room and some of where things can be moved around um pedestrian bicycle safety I think that's pretty consistent everybody would like to see more I would like to see the capital uh improvements the maintenance everything laid out as to where we're planning to do it over say the next year and over a fiveyear capital so we could get a good look at what the um what the town's going to look like as far as as circulation there is there is a master plan for circulation um that's sort of the basis for for our town but as far as some of these improvements making the roads safer um seeing where there's contiguous safe sidewalks safe roads safe places for be both bicycle pedestrian i' I'd like to see that um looked upon as we're planning where it's not just let's pick a street here or there but how is that all going to look and are we going to actually be able to get around the town um in addition I would like to see a um small group like an ad hoc committee put together say with a small budget unless we could get a grant and that would be um a just a short campaign uh over a few month period of time to um spread awareness for motorists pedestrians bicyclists about uh safety and the safe way to walk the safe way to drive safe way to bike um that's something I know bicycle and pedestrian does a lot and does constantly um but if we could have it as a Township uh committee then they could be brought in other groups could be brought in and we could make it as an official uh group that would have a lot more multiplier effect on what any one group could do so that's that's one thing I think I'd like to be done early it would be inexpensive uh it would just it would take uh a little bit of um desire to do so and members of council could be part of it too um storm water and flooding we're already spending money if you saw some tonight um on ms4 permit requirements including the new real rules that are coming up that's going to be not the next expense because we're probably going to have to make um ordinance changes for that and one of the things that we're doing uh is um looking at where our inflow and our outflow areas are around town is part of this um ms4 permit requirement so while we're doing that um we should probably be looking a little bit more to the next level on if we're seeing a problem in inflow are there places that perhaps were built too small or are there places that need to be maintained a different way um this would be a good time to um to look at all of those places that we're now uh essentially recording as far as how many there are and looking at at where the problem areas are and where we could make improvements over time to avoid some of the flooding conditions that we tend to have uh in certain areas in the town um I also would like us to look at um we've talked to the D about the millstone Basin issue is there something uh the D is saying they don't really have the capability of running something like that is this something that we could look at doing perhaps with some other towns and uh and still make it happen um third one I have is Road improvements and maintenance uh there's a lot of roads that we we do do a study every so often we come up with a um we just did a new one where all the roads are raided and which ones um have to be improved and are we looking at that are we falling behind are we getting ahead and I think between all the New Roads that we have added in town we're going to need some more money there to keep these roads in in decent shape before they fall apart to where they become major major Investments uh some smaller projects I still get people talk to me about permitting anytime some little new business opens up that becomes an issue again um is there something more we could be doing uh I hear complaints I feel a lot of both the complaints and the responses are very anecdotal and I'd like to find out whether or not um these complaints um are you know what the numbers show about them how could they be addressed and is there something we could be doing to help people uh that are putting in these permits before they get rejected uh more to support them in some way especially the smaller businesses and the individual homes uh is there more we could be doing to help them before permit requests are put in so that they'll be more successful on a timely basis uh Communications I know that's been talked about we're I know we're redoing the website I I've been asking for some improvements and of sending on little little uh things that I've got for for a while on some of this but I think with us doing the website impr um fixing at this point there's uh we can do some major changes for not that much more money um I just sent down a separate um couple pages of suggestions and and different um software that's out there that could be an improvement and I think we should look at doing an app so that when somebody uh two things one is make it easy for where somebody doesn't have to go look through a website and figure out what department and how to send and then it's a diff so if I'm doing something for a pothole it's something totally different when I'm doing it for um a sewer grate which is totally different than if I'm requesting something from uh from a different department if that we could have some unified approach so that somebody could go wouldn't have to do a whole research project um could it could just put in one place we we decide where it has to go we we um we acknowledge that we got the complaint and then all the parties get an answer when the complaint's satisfied I think uh that would also help us track some of the complaints so I think there's there's several systems out there and we should probably look at something that is both um more friendly to Residents businesses and to um and then to our uh internal capabilities to track things and that would be a you know much more efficient for um you know for everybody I don't want to do another layer which is the danger of a system like that sort of like a menu system for phones but but something that makes it easier for people and lastly uh 250th anniversar is coming up for the United States and that's something that I know Historical Society is starting to work on but I would like to make sure that the town takes a um active role and probably has a um U maybe maybe a Community Day in 2026 or whatever would be a major event so that the town itself would run some major event for the um 250th anniversary of the United States thank you Dan thank you Linda um I think what's interesting is all the the themes the common theme that all of us have pointed out and they all come from a a perspective of the growth that our Township has seen and will continue to see and how that growth impacts a variety of um services that the township delivers so whether that's infrastructure Services um for road maintenance um for maintenance of our Parks and Recreation areas um these probably tie back to DPW Staffing and should we be looking at an increase in Staffing to be able to continue to support um the growth of the township um at minimally the same level and be prepared for additional you know additional work as we get bigger um same thing goes say the same thing about growth for police and safety do we need to take a a closer look at are we correctly staffed to be able to provide adequate Services um considering our growth um bicycle and pedestrian safety there sort of the same model that the town has grown traumatically um lots of new spots where um we should be paying attention to whether additional um safety mechanisms whether it's striping beacons signage um road cing again in the context of growth every single one of us all pointed this out um so specifically I think at at the minimum we should maintain the same budget level that we had in 2024 for 2025 I think that would be S of the Baseline for that um you could say the same thing about growth in the context of Public Health Services um our community is expanding it's getting more and more diverse um it's great that we've seen um all the vaccination clinics are there other types of clinics that we could be running for members of the community that might be more vulnerable especially considering the context of what might be happening um in our political circles in 2025 members of our community that might need um some extra help and services because of that um as Andrew pointed out um permitting um and inspections all are driven by workload again growth do we have the right Staffing to to support that adequately and are there options to mod iiz and make our environment more more efficient so um from a software perspective Linda mentioned AI Andrea mentioned software apps um I know specifically of a an app that's called um click C fix which is a mobile app and a backend CRM app that allows residents to report stuff from their mobile phone so if they're driving along or walking around and they see a poth hole they can take a picture of it click a button that goes into you know a you know a problem system and can be tracked and managed and monitored um I think I know Princeton uses it um it's it's it's used by numerous towns across the state U I think at the very least we should consider if not that one but we should consider a a pilot program or at least an evaluation of those tools um to start because that's probably the first step into moving into that direction um same thing about communication so more people we we I think have admitted that it's been difficult getting the word out to folks even just today we're talking about the you know house decorating issue like so many houses that could have could have um participated in that but didn't that's a communication issue how do we get the word out um and that then ties back to our website because if our website was sort of more U modern use that word um perhaps that would be a way to get more engagement with our community uh do we need um a specific program within our Township that focuses on how do we communicate going forward um communication in the 21st century has lots of different angles to it whether it's online whether it's in social media whether it's in print um I think there's a need to look at how the township um manages that communication and if that requires additional staff or maybe a reprioritization of what staff responsibilities are uh these are all things that I think we need to to look at and ensure that there's appropriate funding in our budget to accomplish those tasks um a couple of specific things that I wanted to point out uh Linda you mentioned um align item budget for the HRC um I'm not sure if there's any other committee that might be you know that benefit you know a small item and that's mostly just for efficiency um makes it easier for them to get stuff done a lot of the expenses are getting reimbursed for anyway but it's sort of a convoluted process so it' be nice to just be able to have a line item in there um HRC ,000 total for the year which is you know a rounding error in our budget which make life a lot easier for them um there is um and this might already be covered for and uh mayor you might be able to to help me out with some of the specifics here I know we were responsible for um the site groundwater remediation investigation both for the um the landfill lot and also for the um the former bus lot and it's not clear to me where those budget items are in the current um whether they've been acred for but just want to keep an eye on to ensure that we um have the appropriate funding to do those activities Martin sounds good uh thank you I don't want to end the inter of time don't want to be so repetitive there's so many commonalities and priorities that each Council colleague has already mentioned uh so I just uh definitely will touch on the bicycle and pedestrian safety uh we've talked about the increase not only in our residents but the increase of joggers and mainly walkers in the community and bicyclist so that's something I think is very important we all totally agree on um in addition to dep Department of Public Works Staffing and as well as the township continues to grow police and fire because more services will be needed uh I do uh totally agree with my other Council colleagues in terms of communication and or marketing I don't know the wording how we would do it but the residents on small and large initiatives and projects um the methods can be discussed at a later date uh but I think we should find way to engage our residents um but create a contemporary more advanced method of communication between the township and Community I think there's a lot of times that some people in this community do not know things that are going on although many of us are out and about throughout uh this Township and uh either and or on the website or social media uh I think we just need to find ways that we can not only communicate to our Township of everything that's going on but also engage our Township uh nights like this where there's not anything contentious or a subject that is um not of serious concern we have three people uh nights where there's a contentious or concerning subject you know there's a line down the street and there's 60 people here so I just want to see how we can uh improve those measures uh throughout this community and 2025 and Beyond uh also I know I talk about it a little bit and often but in our recreation department has done a great job I just look at other townships throughout the state um and I've had kids who are athletic you know in athletics and myself being a former athlete myself um I just just want to see that there's ways that and some of this is School District oriented so it's not just uh Township or recreation department but there's ways that we can also try to engage our community um to understand health and fitness and the wellness of health and fitness and the benefits of health and fitness and I don't know if that's a specific campaign that we do um as a Township uh is that a for that we do as a Township I just think the importance of Athletics especially uh kindergarten through high school is very important for many of our residents because we all know we live in a very very strong academic and um educational Community I just think there's some things that need to be improved on the Athletics side of things so I'd like to see that and lastly um I've said this before we we do an incredible job I think at Community Day um in a fall at the beginning of the school year I'd like to see if we can possibly do two Community Days um I know a lot of people in this community um either are in educational uh activities and programs or they're in sporting activities but a lot of of our residents don't get to often get together speak with each other meet with each other and I think that's a great way also to un unify the community so if we can see if we can do uh an extra Community Day throughout the year I think that would be very helpful uh that is it thank you all thank you may or Carrie any questions comments anything yeah yeah I do have comments time for question is much later once I give you the budget but I did read all of these and uh pretty similarity uh there's no doubt I hope neither uh Tim Lynch or GF is listening because if you ask more do we have enough people they will tell you we don't have enough people they probably need a lot of people every year so um there's always a struggle between what we want to do and what we can possibly do uh one thing people don't uh realize appreciated that we are capped at 2% uh we can only increase our expenditure 2% over uh what we spent last year even if we willing to uh tax ourselves and spend more money um the second uh challenge also comes in they just voted on Garbage Contract those of you who heard the last council meeting it's going up by roughly 70 plus% 300 some thousand so when every item is capped at 2% when one item goes up 70% Your to make up that difference from it has to come from some other item uh most likely or hopefully the state will allow us to put it outside the cap so the Cap won't matter but still that's another $300,000 of I mean I don't want to call it unproductive it's productive because it keeps the township clean but it's uh it's an operational expense that could be used somewhere else much better so there are challenges challenges like that that we have to uh decide to come up with a budget that's presented to the township uh to the counil and then it becomes uh their budget and then uh they do whatever uh they can with the budget um um bicycle pedestrian safety I mean if you saw we have been doing it for last six years since I've been mayor last year we specifically listed a lot of things that were included in the budget one of the things that um is not uh I at least I didn't see her but that's always asked is lighting I mean just somebody in our development last night was uh asking for more lighting and I told them they way down the list if you ever go to it because we already spend close to over $400,000 on lighting and we can easily put 1,00 to, 1500 more lights where people want more lighting um so that's something that's not in the list but that's something definitely we are working on um every year slowly increasing but that's an operational operational expense that means some May 5 10 years down the line is going to curse me and others who put more liks in there because they will have to they will have to fund it so these are all um these are all good ideas I don't have any objection to any of them and as we prepare the budget um we will definitely keep these in mind and try to come up with something that addresses I can't promise I'll address every one of these items but as many of those items as possibly can um going through this one quick thing uh Mr Weiss that number three has been already taken care of we have um we have looked at our own budget and come to an agreement with the parking authority and that project is uh proceeding we are hoping that uh parking lot will be ready by sometime uh next summer that's our that's our hope um so those are my general comments if you have any specific questions I'll be happy to I'll be happy to answer those good right thank you so we'll be getting the budget towards the end of February or whenever you're ready we're ready yeah yeah yeah no I mean we usually whenever it's ready we give you I mean we don't hold it to the last day for the sake of holding it to the last day yeah sometimes we get on the 27th instead of 28th so okay by the way on the lighting we had been looking at solar lights and I know we have a few is that still on the we did put one solar lights we have some in that park that's uh behind where the wall grains and but they're not they're not not good enough for actual Road oh not for a big road but like last week people who were on a culdesac were complaining their culdesac could use lights I mean that there would be on the bottom of the list but something like a solar light might be useful within a neighborhood or something yeah but I mean just see the list of I mean there was a lady last week here talking about uh lights off of cornov road right there's so many so many requests I mean Linda is on our WhatsApp group she saw a request from lady yesterday on our outside our street because there've been two three accidents within last three months um right at that intersection um you you talked about um educating the uh public and that's my petp it's not a one-time committee it's an ongoing thing and the best solution is every person being more responsible in how they drive and paying attention um the township will do whatever we can do but at the end of the day it comes to an individual I mean there's going to be some people who drive like crazy they drive like crazy um that's the sad reality so if we can have a permanent campaign to keep educating people and putting some kind of uh moral commitment from them to you can go outside the township and speed as much as you want but at least within Town um Drive within budget like mean your uh your kids live here you live here um you go on Harris Road towards train station they have all these signs in all the um y still people still people drive fast so um it has to come from Individual and whatever we can do to change that human behavior would go a long way in uh in Long Way in improving our safety but if we had a kickart we could possibly change some of the culture a little bit so it that is that is what is needed I mean that thinking that's what I'm thinking thinking having a ad hoc something that and then we would possibly come up with some materials that would be easy to send out once a year or something or we could do Refreshers but the idea of changing the culture to make it cool to be safe might might uh yeah but that's why I reached out to bike pestry and asked them if they want to take a lead I mean um one of the things you and Lind have been presidents of Council and you know how many times I tell you time is many cases more important than money because we have limited staff and they have limited time I mean everybody works X number of hours per week and time is sometimes more important than money money we can come up with time we can come up with so um as a council and as a mayor we have to be uh cognizant of the fact that there are 5,000 things that are worthwhile to be done but we can only do five because of the time we have and we have to choose what five we want to do and that's that's just the reality I think we have the uh the benefit that we have a couple of very um engaged and willing organizations like the bicycle and pedestrian Alliance like the Buran City that's why I reached out to that's why leverage that energy their time because we don't have to pay them yeah that's why they want to help so I think that's a great way to to sort of bring these two pieces together yeah I mean that's why I reached out to them they have this uh Drive 4 feet away from car um Fly uh poster and we have moved it various places around town uh DPW puts it on but they came up with that so that kind of partnership we can certainly do but again I mean I always keep reminding people time is limited I mean people want DPW to cut every um playing field and line ride pick up leaves I mean just picking up leaves is a big challenge even after the new truck because the number of leaves have increased and in spite of saying again and again uh Zone one is over I bet you will find leaves on Zone one and that's why I was ties back to growth because even doing everything that we're doing we just keeping our head above water and just keeping up yeah keeping up yeah some some of those trees just dropped their own leaves so it's not uh yeah no no that that's a different I mean that the leaves they don't they don't collect nicely together I can tell like about three inches of thick in this road but what I'm thinking of is taking these different groups like bicycle pedestrian who has been doing a really good job and is already doing that but has a limited audience and now taking um and making it an official program where they could be part I mean we would probably need maybe one staff member and then after because it's just an awareness it's not we're not rebuilding the road we're not redesigning the road we're basically making it a campaign program and getting everybody out there at once and trying to trying to work and backing up and maybe putting some money in to help out and places and stuff yeah I mean we can work out the details we are not going to work out the details here but I'm just throwing that out there that's why I as them to come up with the proposal what works and um the more we can do with volunteers the better it is since our um time is very limited yeah and especially with uh engineering if uh the affordable housing stuff moves as fast as the state wants it to move we will have lot of ordinances and stuff coming to the council um by next year and the same people work on that as they work on roads and and a whole bunch of new people moving in that should be taught how to cross the street all right well I think that was a good discussion and um all these points will be um picked up during during budget season that thank you one day give you some communication on what we're thinking so thank thank you all for your your thoughts all right um one uh update with the um engine braking update engineering and police have ordered signs and are looking at the proper placement together for that from the um engine braking ordinance that just was passed at the last council meeting good thank you you're welcome good that's good to hear all right um any Council reports Mark I do not uh planning board meeting is uh this Wednesday uh at 6:30 here um discussions around Varian ins sign waivers for Chick-fil-A Market Fair lighting waivers senior living at Bear Creek a minute sight plan princ University amendment of their General development plan in their baseball stadium so that'll be this Wednesday uh 6:30 Dan uh the west parking authority met last week um two projects I'll comment on the fence project which is targeted to be done the last weekend of the year um the typ the the model is to start on Friday Friday and Monday um that's the target possibly might be might be in January but they they they feel good about it happening um that last weekend and the Station Drive repaving project is pretty much done they finally got trees in there was a delay in getting the trees in because of the drought they didn't want to plant trees and then not be able to water them um so the trees have been planted and all the lighting has been complete and there's a few minor buch items but that's pretty much done and came in under budget that's what we' like to hear yes okay good thanks Andrea um yep the environmental commission met um they had a couple of presentations on adopted Rin there's a Girl Scout Troop uh from Plainsboro that had been doing an adop the drain project and the robotics team from Plainsboro uh that had been working there for adopt the drain uh we talked about uh doing that in West Windsor I believe the mayor had been interested in that also um but we would need to have some sort of a program uh to to keep a something like this going what Plainsboro did is their um public works department essentially took a map of the uh current uh mostly residential drains um and put together some forms where people can actually sign on with the town to adopt a drain so in order to get a program doing where we going where we have um Volunteers in any organized way we need to have some way of keeping track uh from the township as to um who who is adopting it and what they're going to be doing so uh ball is B is in that court right now we can probably get all kinds of volunteers but um we need some sort of system for them to work with and um that fits in with our ms4 also since we're out there counting drains now um and the other big thing that we're working on is sustainable Jersey recertification for 2025 I attended includ and so did several others a webinar from sustainable Jersey the first application deadline is February 23d uh and then the 2nd May 16th and the final for this year uh would be July 31st in order to be recertified this year so that's going to require a lot of that very precious time um dandel bramski used to do a lot of the um the uh work on putting those uh putting it together what's goes on the form and uh so we're going to need some uh some um staff type of time or Dan if uh we can contact with him to help with that and uh then that can be divvied up amongst the Commissioners uh who can work on different projects and getting all the background information to get the get the points and uh the other thing there was a discussion on the U gasoline leaf blowers and alternatives to that and what's what other towns are doing for um to uh eliminate the pollution and the noise from the gasoline leaf blowers thank you uh shade tree commission is not meeting in December and its next meeting is Wednesday January 22nd 2025 any further administr updates none we is there any need for a closed session no so can I have a motion to adjourn this meeting moved all in favor say I I I okay this meeting is adjourned happy New Year everyone