Reader says it only fair that the Sports Groups step up and contribute to maintenance and depreciation of the turf fields
If the sports clubs have gotten so much value out of the fields, I would think it only fair that they step up and contribute to maintenance and depreciation. It shouldn’t always be the VC or BOE (the rest of us). Given that maintenance seems to be running about $100K year and depreciation another $200K for $1.5M to replace the carpets after a flood-shortened 7 year life, the sports clubs should be contributing on the order of $100K.
Raise dues if you have to — it’s part of the true cost of doing business.
And did they ever contribute everything they had promised for the lights?
Maple Park flooded over into Meadowbrook on Aug. 1.
Police had to direct traffic. I was part of the directed traffic on my way home from the library. It was scary and dangerous driving through the flooded street. That’s why the police had to be called out.
I was coming home from the library where my shoes and socks and pants had gotten soaking wet as I had to wade to my car, in leg deep water. Note: Not ankle deep; leg deep, above the ankles.
Before Maple Field was turned artificial, REAC had done a report stating that artificial turf is safe for Maple field and good for the environment.
If the rains had continued the new village hall and new library would have been flooded.
Flooding was not supposed to occur there. Supposedly Ridgewood engineering experts had designed the buildings to prevent flooding.
You know what, the members of REAC should pay to have the artificial truf (grass) removed from Maple Field and real, mother nature’s grass replanted.
Trust me as they say: The kids will profit by playing on real grass.
Readers Question the wisdom of reducing traffic lanes at Garber Square
Would be interested in knowing how much additional funds were needed to make Wilsey and Garber Squares into one lanes vs. repaving existing setup. Not completely sure what they are trying to achieve at this location with the narrow roadways — is speeding/pedestrian safety a major issue around that stretch?
Starting Wednesday, May 7th, paving construction work will begin on the West Side at Wilsey and Garber Squares from Godwin Avenue to under the train trestle on Franklin Avenue. Expect traffic congestion in this area for the next 3 months during construction. To avoid delays, we suggest the use of alternate streets to get across the train tracks – Ackerman Avenue or W. Glen Avenue.
Ridgewood police seek man in assault on TD Bank employee
April 6 2014
Ridgewood NJ , On April 6 2014 at 3:05 PM patrol responded to TD Bank on Franklin Avenue on a report of an assault in progress. A bank employee had been assaulted by a Heavy Set black male that had attempted to pass a fraudulent check.
The employee had locked the door at closing time and when the accused person attempted to flee and found the door locked he punched the employee and took her keys to unlock the door.
The accused fled in a grey Volkswagen with possible Georgia license plates. The matter is under investigation by the Ridgewood Detective Bureau. Anyone with information please call the Ridgewood Police Detective Bureau 201-251-4537.
Below is a picture of the suspect.
Village Council Public 2014 Budget Hearings – April 7, 10
The Village Council has scheduled several Public Budget Hearings to take place in Village Hall, 131 N. Maple Avenue, Ridgewood.
Financial Advisory Committee Meeting – April 7
Notice: The Financial Advisory Committee (FAC) will meet on Monday, April 7 instead of their standard of the 2nd Monday of the month. The meeting will take place at 7:30PM in the Garden Room, Village Hall.
Wednesday, March 19 from 5 – 7PM in the Court Room;
Friday, March 21 from 5 – 7PM in the Court Room;
Thursday, March 27 from 5 – 9:30PM in the Senior Center;
Monday, April 7 from 5 – 7PM in the Court Room;
Thursday, April 10 from 5 to 10PM in the Senior Center
Departments Hearings:
March 19 – Overview of Budget, Community Services – Building Dept; Zoining, Health Dept, Tax Assessor.
March 21 – 5PM Police Department; 5:45PM Fire Department; 6:30PM MIS
March 27 – 5PM Village Council, 5:15 PM Insurance & Debt Service, 5:45PM Engineering, 7:30PM Traffic & Signal, W.P.C.F., Property Maintenance, Parking, Utilities, 7:30PM Municipal Clerk & Elections, 8PM NWBCD
April 7 – 5PM Municipal Court & Public Defender, 5:30PM Emergency Services, 5:45PM Emergency Management, 6PM Library, 6:45PM Village Manager
April 10 – 5PM Parks & Recreation, Project Pride, Graydon Pool, 6PM Streets, Fleet Services, Recycling, Yard Waste Recycling, Solid Waste, 7PM Water Dept., 7:45PM Finance, Tax Collection, Village Attorney
Lexus plows through fence onto railroad right-of-way
April 7th 2014
Boyd A. Loving
3:06 PM
Ridgewood NJ, The driver of a Lexus sedan wound up on the wrong side of a chain link fence on Monday afternoon while attempting to pull into a parking space in the rear of a medical office building located at 505 Goffle Road, Ridgewood. Ridgewood Police Department officers removed both uninjured occupants of the vehicle and safely escorted them away from an active railroad line. Ridgewood Fire Department personnel assisted in the removal of a portion of the fence to facilitate recovery of the Lexus. It is believed the driver may have mistaken the accelerator pedal for the brake pedal. A flatbed tow truck removed the car from the scene.
Our current crop of public officials have stooped to classic middle school bullying tactics to squash any opposition
Mr. Sedon decided to run for Council and look what that got him. The original post represents how more and more people feel. Look at how Mrs. Price and Valley’s attorney have treated taxpayers attempting to speak their mind. Look at how the Council majority treated Mrs. Walsh, Mr Richie and Mr Gabbert. Our current crop of public officials have stooped to classic middle school bullying tactics to squash anyone with a point of view that opposes their own.
Why would anyone with a point of view that threatens either Valley or our Council majority ever want to volunteer for anything in this town?
Reader says It’s simple math. The financial condition of the Village is such that new hires are completely out of the question
It’s simple math. The financial condition of the Village is such that new hires are completely out of the question. Unlike the Federal Government that can print money, the Village of Ridgewood can’t. We can all play the blame game of how we got here. Incompetence. Stolen quarters. Nepotism. Unsustainable pension schemes. We can also talk about raising extra revenue. The problem with raising taxes is that Ridgewood competes with other similar jurisdictions, and if you raise taxes here, that raises the incentive to move elsewhere.
Bottom line, guys. Just like the rest of us who work in the real world. You do more with less. I think I speak for many of us when I say that we all are doing jobs that were not very long ago, being done by more people. It sucks, and we go into work each day with an element of worry wondering if it’s our day to get called into HR
Photo credit: Boyd A. Loving Ridgewood bank teller assaulted by man attempting to cash bad check
April 6 2014
Boyd A. Loving
4:37 PM (15 minutes ago)
Ridgewood NJ, A teller at the TD Bank branch located at 133 Franklin Avenue, Ridgewood was assaulted on Sunday afternoon at approximately 3:15 by a man attempting to cash a fraudulent check. Witnesses to the incident described the alleged perpetrator as being an obese African American male who fled the scene driving a grey sedan with out of state license plates. An investigation is currently underway by Ridgewood PD detectives. The bank branch was closed for the day shortly following the incident. The female bank teller, who sustained minor injuries after being struck in the face, was treated at the scene by members of Ridgewood EMS.
Catholic Church and faithful see confession in a new light
APRIL 6, 2014 LAST UPDATED: SUNDAY, APRIL 6, 2014, 12:26 AM
BY HANNAN ADELY
STAFF WRITER
THE RECORD
One of loneliest places in church these days is the confession line. The act of confessing one’s sins, a requirement for Catholics, has sharply fallen over several decades with evolving views on sin, penance and the stature of the priesthood.
But now Pope Francis and church leaders, in a push to draw people back to confession, are highlighting what clergy say are the healing, uplifting aspects of the sacrament and focusing less on themes like punishment and condemnation..
The Paterson Diocese and Newark Archdiocese are using websites, newspaper ads and highway billboards to get the message out. Under diocesan guidance, local churches have also added one extra day a week to hear confession during Lent, the period before Easter when penance is considered a Catholic duty. And the pope, in an image seen and talked about around the world, confessed to a priest last week in public view.
But will these efforts change attitudes among Catholics, many of whom believe confession no longer is a necessary part of the faith?
Reader asks ” are you willing to allow some expansion or just against all expansion? “
and another answers, 7 years ago, I probably would have said yes. But no longer. NO WAY!
They have squandered all their good will. They have played dirty politics and have cost the taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars. They have forced residents to spend their own money trying to protect their interests and have sucked time away from friendships, family and worthy civic involvement. They tried to stop other towns from having access to quality healthcare for one reason alone….greed. They pretend to be philanthropic when actually they are simply buying good will. They are greedy, deceitful bullies and I would not give them a single square foot any more!
Readers says ” This whole process has been at best a joke at worst a fraud.”
If Valley had made anything approaching a reasonable modernization plan when they first pushed for their “Renewal” (remember way back when it was called a “Renewal”? That was like 3 PR campaigns ago) construction would be finished by now. Instead, they continue to push for this monstrosity of a project that’s no good for anyone but Valley and their plants on the Planning Board and Village Council.
The court asked for a compromise and the compromise is the addition of a 5 story parking garage along Linwood and the elimination of some underground space. Residents have not been engaged in the revised plan. This whole process has been at best a joke at worst a fraud. Residents should take to the streets . Village officials and Valley have been stringing us along.
” This whole process has been at best a joke at worst a fraud.” Of all the statements made above, this one really hits the nail on the head ! How embarrassing to the residents of this town.
Reader says The town desperately needs alternative legal advice–YESTERDAY
In My Humble (Honest) Opinion, The town desperately needs alternative legal advice–YESTERDAY.
In particular, the planning board must have an accurate assessment of their range of options in providing a final response to Valley Hospital’s expansion plan.
We simply can’t accept an after-the-fact justification of rubber-stamping Valley’s expansion plan that goes something like this: “We had no choice. If we had said no, Valley would have sued the town and won.” We’ve been down that road before. Thankfully, it led to a last-minute (miraculous?) vindication of the village’s interests by the Village Council in November 2011. (Read the related newspaper article at: https://www.northjersey.com/news/ridgewood-council-opposes-valley-hospital-renewal-plan-1.243368 )
“We had no choice, we had to say yes” is a lame excuse. Fortunately, as a legal theory, it also doesn’t actually hold water.
I sometimes wonder about attorneys who advise municipal governing bodies (Rogers) and planning boards (Price). On the one hand, none of the individual councilmembers, board members, or the mayor can lay claim to having that attorney as their personal lawyer, because strictly speaking, the latter’s client is the municipality. This means no elected or appointed official can legitimately bend the town attorney’s efforts toward their own personal gain or aggrandizement. This is a good thing, of course!
On the other hand, though, non-citizen third party entities like Valley seem to be quite willing and able to spend enormous sums to employ brash mouthpieces to twist municipal law, articulate one-sided theories of liability, and put whatever village attorney is in front of them into some kind of a deer-in-the-headlights trance. The goal, of course, is to get him or her to lose focus his client’s best interests and unwittingly begin promoting those of the third party. Ms. Price’s unnecessarily accommodative behavior in response to the condescending approach of Valley’s lawyer in abruptly and rudely interrupting concerned village residents trying to speak at many recent public planning board meetings this past winter is evidence to show that Valley Hospital’s strategy of relentless pressure and shameless and unapologetic advocacy can eventually bear fruit, particularly when the targeted municipality regularly fails to stick up for itself.
New Jersey municipalities are not just in the business of avoiding lawsuits! They should be about exercising firm but appropriate control on development in the interests of residents and the municipal entity, riding herd on their hired attorneys to ensure they are accurately apprised of the full range of acceptable action in response to third party petitions/applications, and actively discouraging the latter from developing and acting upon one-sided legal theories that bully elected and appointed officials by magnifying out of all proportion the true risk of litigation. Town attorneys who fail to paint a full and appropriately nuanced legal picture for their client risk looking like patsies when sophisticated, deep-pocket entities like Valley Hospital are inexplicably allowed to win major battles, and even entire wars over the course of months or years of wrangling over proposed changes to Ridgewood’s master plan and municipal law without having to fire a single ‘litigation’ shot.
FLOOD WATCH IN EFFECT LATE THIS EVENING AND TOMORROW AM
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE NEW YORK NY
406 AM EDT SAT MAR 29 2014
…HEAVY RAIN AND FLOODING ARE POSSIBLE LATE TONIGHT INTO
SUNDAY…
…FLOOD WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT FROM LATE TONIGHT THROUGH SUNDAY
EVENING…
THE FLOOD WATCH CONTINUES FOR
* PORTIONS OF SOUTHERN CONNECTICUT…NORTHEAST NEW JERSEY AND
SOUTHEAST NEW YORK…INCLUDING THE FOLLOWING AREAS…IN SOUTHERN
CONNECTICUT…NORTHERN FAIRFIELD…NORTHERN MIDDLESEX…NORTHERN
NEW HAVEN…NORTHERN NEW LONDON… SOUTHERN FAIRFIELD…SOUTHERN
MIDDLESEX…SOUTHERN NEW HAVEN AND SOUTHERN NEW LONDON. IN
NORTHEAST NEW JERSEY…EASTERN BERGEN…EASTERN ESSEX…EASTERN
PASSAIC…EASTERN UNION… WESTERN BERGEN…WESTERN
ESSEX…WESTERN PASSAIC AND WESTERN UNION. IN SOUTHEAST NEW
YORK…NORTHERN WESTCHESTER…ORANGE… PUTNAM…ROCKLAND AND
SOUTHERN WESTCHESTER.
* FROM LATE TONIGHT THROUGH SUNDAY EVENING
* AS LOW PRESSURE TRACKS FROM THE TENNESSEE VALLEY TODAY AND INTO
THE MID ATLANTIC STATES BY THIS EVENING…STEADY RAIN WILL
DEVELOP BY THIS AFTERNOON. THE RAIN SHOULD THEN BECOME HEAVY AT
TIMES TONIGHT INTO SUNDAY MORNING.
* RAINFALL AMOUNTS OF 2 TO 3 INCHES AND LOCALLY UP TO 4 INCHES
COULD CA– USE FLOODING OF SMALL STREAMS…AS WELL AS SIGNIFICANT
URBAN AND POOR DRAINAGE FLOODING.
PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS…
A FLOOD WATCH MEANS THERE IS A POTENTIAL FOR FLOODING BASED ON
CURRENT FORECASTS. YOU SHOULD MONITOR LATER FORECASTS AND BE
ALERT FOR POSSIBLE FLOOD WARNINGS. THOSE LIVING IN AREAS PRONE TO
FLOODING SHOULD BE PREPARED TO TAKE ACTION SHOULD FLOODING
DEVELOP.
