Category: Uncategorized

photo www.ridgewoodymca.org

Ridgewood YMCA Backyard Pool Program to Offer Swim Lessons in Your Own Backyard

This summer, pool owners can take advantage of nationally-renowned YMCA swim lessons in their own backyard. From June 25th to August 4th, the Ridgewood YMCA’s Backyard Pool program is offering two-week sessions of eight half-hour classes. A special one-week session of four half-hour classes is also available from August 20th to 24th.

Says Job Pama, Associate Aquatics Director at the Ridgewood YMCA, “Our Backyard Pool program combines high-quality swim instruction with ultimate convenience. Participants also have a choice between private or semi-private lessons, which can include friends, family and neighbors.”

The Ridgewood YMCA’s Backyard Pool program is the largest in northern New Jersey. All instructors are highly qualified, trained and lifeguard certified.

Early registration for Backyard Pool is recommended, as sessions fill up fast. For session availability and fees according to group size, contact Job Pama at (201) 444-5600 x392 or e-mail jpama@ridgewoodymca.org. The site www.ridgewoodymca.org/backyard_pools contains additional information.

The Ridgewood YMCA is located at 112 Oak Street in Ridgewood.

The Y is one of the nation’s leading nonprofits, strengthening communities through youth development, healthy living and social responsibility. Across the U.S., 2,687 Ys engage 21 million men, women and children — regardless of age, income and background — to nuture the potential of children and teens, improve the nation’s health and well-being, and provide opportunities to give back and support neighbors. Anchored in more than 10,000 communities, the Y has the long-standing relationships and physical presence not just to promise, but to deliver lasting personal and social change.

www.ridgewoodymca.org and www.campbernieymca.org

Euro zone agrees to lend Spain up to 100 billion euros
By Jan Strupczewski and Julien Toyer
BRUSSELS/MADRID | Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:38pm EDT

(Reuters) – Euro zone finance ministers agreed on Saturday to lend Spain up to 100 billion euros ($125 billion) to shore up its teetering banks and Madrid said it would specify precisely how much it needs once independent audits report in just over a week.

After a 2 1/2-hour conference call of the 17 finance ministers, which several sources described as heated, the Eurogroup and Madrid said the amount of the bailout would be sufficiently large to banish any doubts.

“The loan amount must cover estimated capital requirements with an additional safety margin, estimated as summing up to 100 billion euros in total,” a Eurogroup statement said.

https://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/10/us-eurozone-idUSBRE8530RL20120610

photo from www.Labottegaridgewoodnj.com

Grand Opening LaBottega

Ridgewood’s newest restaurant La Bottega held its grand opening Friday June 8th .We will be doming a secret tasting sometime in the next couple of days .

La Bottega, which means “the store or shop” in Italian, is a romantic Italian trattoria that embraces the gourmet tastes of Italy.

The “Home of the Perfect Panini,” La Bottega is a full-service dining venue that focuses on panini. The word panino [pa’ni•no] is Italian for “small bread roll”; its plural form is panini. The menu includes appetizers, soups, salads, pastas, entrees and the best desserts and gelato you’ve ever tasted.

La Bottega Ridgewood, NJ is a cozy, intimate setting for family and friends with a warm, welcoming atmosphere that makes each and every guest feel right at home. You will be guaranteed personal attention and only the freshest food. It’s like dining among family! Who said you had to go to Italy for enjoyable and affordable Italian cuisine!

Owner Frank and his partners decided to bring these big, bold, mouth-watering flavors to NJ. Originally from NY, and with experience from various backgrounds but with “food” as the common passion, they decided it was time to share this unique culinary experience with NJ. Searching for a concept that would surpass the flavors of a traditional “pizza shop,” they wanted to showcase this authentic taste of Italy.

14 Oak Street
Ridgewood, NJ 07450
201-445-7222
www.Labottegaridgewoodnj.com

Fix Health Care Policy – A weekly Update from the Health Care Initiative at The Heritage Foundation

Obamacare’s Five Most Damaging Effects on Seniors

In anticipation of the Supreme Court’s Obamacare decision, it is important to remember that the constitutionality of the individual mandate isn’t the only problem with the law. Here’s a list of Obamacare’s five most destructive impacts on America’s seniors.

Less choice. Obamacare puts 15 unelected bureaucrats in charge of meeting a budget target in Medicare with its newly created Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB). IPAB may be statutorily prohibited from directly rationing care, but that doesn’t mean it can’t ration indirectly by reducing provider payments for certain medical procedures, which can compromise physician autonomy in the delivery of care.

Fewer options. Obamacare delivers a strong blow to Medicare Advantage (MA), which allows seniors to receive Medicare benefits from a private health plan of their choosing. Obamacare cuts the program by $145 billion, which, according to the Medicare Actuary, will decrease enrollment by 50 percent by 2017.

Higher taxes. In 2013, two new Obamacare taxes go into effect that will likely impact seniors: the 2.3 percent excise tax on medical devices and the 3.8 percent tax on unearned of investment income. Not only do seniors rely heavily on medical devices, but, as Heritage expert Bob Moffit points out, “older people have larger investments than younger people, and thus high income older persons will be more heavily impacted by the new 3.8 percent Medicare tax imposed on unearned or investment income (effective 2013).”

Fewer doctors. As Moffit explains, “With the retirement of 77 million baby boomers beginning in 2011, the Medicare program will have to absorb an unprecedented demand for medical services.” Obamacare exacerbates the issue for seniors by leaving the physician payment reduction schedule on the books and introducing more cuts to provider payments, which will make it even more difficult for Medicare doctors and other providers to serve the growing Medicare population.

Less access to care. Obamacare’s irresponsible cuts to provider payments will cause 15 percent of Medicare Part A providers to become unprofitable within the next 10 years, according to the Medicare Actuary. As Medicare providers begin to operate at a loss, they will be unable to stay afloat, leaving seniors with less access to care.

https://www.heritage.org/initiatives/health-care?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email;utm_campaign=FHCP

photo by Michael Shetler https://buyinginbergen.com/

CORRECTION – Opening June 7th – 2012 Kasschau Shell Schedule – Free Concerts Under the Stars!

All concerts begin at 8:30PM at the Kasschau Band Shell (behing the Ridgewood Public Library). All programs are free. Please bring a chair or blanket. Please do NOT cross over the baseball field if a game is in progress.

Click Here for 2012 Season Schedule: https://mods.ridgewoodnj.net/pdf/manager/2012KasschauShell.pdf

EPA Using Drones to Spy on Cattle Ranchers in Nebraska and Iowa
Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
June 4, 2012

Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency is using aerial drones to spy on farmers in Nebraska and Iowa. The surveillance came under scrutiny last week when Nebraska’s congressional delegation sent a joint letter to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson.
On Friday, EPA officialdom in “Region 7” responded to the letter.

“Courts, including the Supreme Court, have found similar types of flights to be legal (for example to take aerial photographs of a chemical manufacturing facility) and EPA would use such flights in appropriate instances to protect people and the environment from violations of the Clean Water Act,” the agency said in response to the letter.

https://www.infowars.com/epa-using-drones-to-spy-on-cattle-ranchers-in-nebraska-and-iowa/

Opening Night – Tuesday, June 5th – 2012 Kasschau Shell Schedule – Free Concerts Under the Stars!

Concerts begin at 8:30PM at the Kasschau Band Shell (behing the Ridgewood Public Library). All programs are free. Please bring a chair or blanket. Please do NOT cross over the baseball field if a game is in progress.

Click Here for 2012 Season Schedule : https://mods.ridgewoodnj.net/pdf/manager/2012KasschauShell.pdf

New Car Photo by Boyd Loving

If you think the New Ridgewood Police Cars are Ugly you are not alone
June 4,2012
the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, It seems like its was only a short while ago when tax payers were asked to fork over $650.00 per car for a new paint job for Ridgewood Police Vehicles. At the time the paint job was justified because we were told it gave the cars a so called “higher visibility” and a state wide uniform look .

Those who pointed out the cars looked fine as they were ,noted that the the cars were changed from from black and whites years before and the uniformity struck as a threat to home rule. These critics were quickly shouted down as being anti police .

So much to every one’s surprise in an age of doing more with less is a new more stylish update once again of Ridgewood Police Vehicles. To many it seems to run contrary to “zero based budget initiatives” we heard so much about during the recent campaign .

We are also still unclear as to how the color of the Police Vehicles effects the quality of service ? As for now we have seen the new patrol cars out and about and we are forced to agree with many of our readers ,they are just plain ugly .

 

Old car photo by Boyd Loving

Doggy Seatbelts: Time to really get serious about pedestrian safety
June 4, 2012
the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ , According to a 2011 survey by AAA and Kurgo, a manufacturer of pet travel products, 56% of pet owners drive with their dog in the car at least once a month. For many one of the pleasures of having “mans best friend” as a companion is the ability to take the dog along for outings.

But according to experts many dog owners do not consider that driving with a dog unrestrained in a vehicle carries inherent risks for the dog and for the driver as well as other passengers.

To make matters worse, the survey found that large numbers of dog owners exacerbate the risk by engaging in activities with the dog in the car that can best be classified as distracted driving. Making driving with an unrestrained dog another threat to pedestrian safety

The AAA and Kurgo Survey Methodology :The online study was conducted among a sample of 1,000 dog owners who have driven with their dog in past 12 months. The study results have an average statistical error of +/- 3.1 percent at the 95 percent confidence level.

According to the AAA and Kurgo survey:

52% of respondents admit they pet their dogs while driving
23% have used their hands or arms to hold their dog in place while applying brakes
19% have used their hands or arms to prevent their dog from climbing into the front seat
18% allow their dog to sit in their lap
13% give treats to their dog while driving
The AAA/Kurgo survey also revealed that 83% of respondents acknowledge that an unrestrained dog in a car can be dangerous, but only 16% use a pet restraint.

Currently no U.S. state mandates dog car seat belts, and while several states have laws that require pets to be restrained while traveling in open areas of the vehicle, such as the bed of a pick-up truck, no U.S. state has successfully enacted legislation mandating that pets be restrained inside the passenger area of a moving vehicle.

But NJ Police and animal control officers are authorized to cite drivers with unrestrained animals in the car. Yes, that includes the back of a pickup truck too. Violators can be fined $250 to $1,000 per offense.

So the question remains should there be doggy seatbelt laws? The dangers involved in having an unrestrained dog in a moving vehicle are clear. It is a safety hazard for the driver, the passengers, the pet, and potentially for first reponders such as law enforcement and EMTs as well as pedestrians .

Top Italy banker says risk of euro breakup growing
TRENTO, Italy | Fri Jun 1, 2012 5:07pm EDT

(Reuters) – A top Italian banker said on Friday that the European single currency was “on the edge of the abyss”, and indicated that national regulators were helping to cripple interbank lending across the euro zone by urging banks to lend domestically.

“The Greeks will decide on their own whether to stay in the euro or leave it, but if they leave and we haven’t decided what to do to keep the others in, everything will fall apart,” Alessandro Profumo, chairman of Italy’s third-largest lender Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena (BMPS.MI), told an economic conference in Trento, Italy.

“We are on the edge of the abyss … The risk that (the single currency) may fall apart rises every day.”

https://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/01/us-italy-banker-crisis-idUSBRE8501DT20120601

Homes Prices Drop 2% to Post-Crisis Lows: Case-Shiller
Published: Tuesday, 29 May 2012 | 9:11 AM ET

Home prices fell in the first quarter to new post-crisis lows, but prices were up in March from February for the first time in seven months.

The increase is the latest evidence of a slow recovery taking shape in the troubled housing market.

The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller home price index showed that prices increased in 12 of the 20 cities it tracks.

Still, the major indexes ended the first quarter at new post-crisis lows, the report said. For the first quarter, prices were down 2 percent, compared to a 3.9 percent decline in the last three months of 2011.

Prices increased in Tampa and Miami — two of the hardest hit markets.

https://www.cnbc.com/id/47597053

New Yorkers Leave Like East Germans Fled Communism
Posted 05/30/2012 06:42 PM ET

Big Government: New York thinks of itself as the place to be, but its high taxes have made it a place to flee. Those who have escaped the Empire State tax man could fill a major city.

From 1949 to 1961, more than 2.6 million of East Germany’s 17 million population escaped to West Berlin or West Germany, a hemorrhage of humanity that led the Communists to construct the infamous Berlin Wall in 1961.

The state of New York, with about 19.5 million people, has no known plans to erect concrete barriers or barbed wire fences. But from 2000 to 2010 it suffered an exodus of some 3.4 million New Yorkers — nearly a million more people than in Germany’s post-war experience and more than that of any other state.

And the outflow hasn’t stopped. The income loss for the state is $45.6 billion, the Tax Foundation says.

https://news.investors.com/article/613163/201205301842/new-yorks-taxation-outweighs-its-attractions.htm

Barack Obama has insulted 38 million Poles with his crass and ignorant ‘Polish death camp’ remark
By Nile Gardiner World Last updated: May 30th, 2012

President Obama has a long track record of insulting the Poles. In 2010 he chose to play golf on the day of the funeral of the Polish President Lech Kaczynski, the Polish First Lady, and 94 senior officials who perished in the Smolensk air disaster.

Eight months earlier he humiliated Warsaw by pulling out of the agreement over Third Site missile defence installations in Poland and the Czech Republic. And last night Barack Obama caused huge offence in Poland by referring to a Nazi death camp in Poland as “a Polish death camp” while awarding the Presidential Medal of Freedom to a Polish resistance fighter. As ABC’s Jake Tapper reported:

https://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/nilegardiner/100161347/barack-obama-has-insulted-38-million-poles-with-his-crass-and-ignorant-polish-death-camp-remark/

Oy Vey…’Obama … Stressed He Probably Knows About Judaism More than Any Other President’
“[A]ll his friends in Chicago were Jewish.”
12:36 PM, May 30, 2012 • By DANIEL HALPER

President Obama met yesterday with “about 20 Conservative Jewish community leaders, thanking them for the work they do to improve communities around the country and discussed their shared commitment to rebuilding the U.S. economy,” Haaretz reports.
Obama in Cairo

In the meeting, Obama reportedly boasted about his knowledge of Judaism, telling the leaders that he thinks he knows more “about Judaism” than all past presidents. He said he gained this knowledge of Judaism from reading.

“Obama … stressed he probably knows about Judaism more than any other president, because he read about it,” Haaretz reports. “[He] wondered how come no one asks Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner or Senate minority leader Mitch McConnel [sic] about their support to Israel.”

Similarly, he said to the group, “I [am] not going to tell you again how I even feel about Israel, but why [are] we still talking about it?”

https://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-stressed-he-probably-knows-about-judaism-more-any-other-president_646293.html

National Senior Health and Fitness Day Today at the Ridgewood YMCA
Wed, May 30, 2012
Time: 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
Ridgewood YMCA, 112 Oak St. Ridgewood, NJ

The Ridgewood YMCA will join an estimated 1,000 local events to celebrate the 18th Annual National Senior Health & Fitness Day (NSHFD) on May 30, 2012. As an official host site, the Ridgewood YMCA will offer a free day of healthy lifestyle activities for seniors.

An estimated 100,000 seniors across the country will join the YMCA to help promote active, healthy lifestyles through physical fitness, good nutrition and preventive care.

National Senior Health and Fitness Day is a wonderful opportunity for seniors to make, renew, and revitalize their commitment to live healthier lives through better health and fitness.

The event will run from 10:00am to 2:00pm at the Ridgewood YMCA, 112 Oak Street in Ridgewood, and will include free senior fitness classes, guess speakers, door prizes, senior games, and more.

For more information, please contact Carol Livingstone at 201-444-5600 or email clivingstone@ridgewoodymca.org