By the staff of The Ridgewood Blog
Ridgewood NJ, Late last summer a reporter employed by The Record newspaper, submitted an Open Public Records Act (OPRA) request to the Village Clerk’s office that asked for some information from all five elected Council members. Four of the five complied in a timely fashion, as required BY LAW. Councilman Jeffrey Voigt, however, delayed his response. When he finally did respond, he included a fictitious narrative that was not what the reporter had requested. Actually, even if his narrative had been factual, this would not have been in compliance with OPRA, as you are not supposed to CREATE DOCUMENTS when supplying information via the OPRA process. The fact that Councilman Voigt’s response was full of untruths just compounded the violation.
Thankfully, a detailed and FACTUAL retraction was sent by the Village attorney to The Record; this itemized and corrected point-by-point each of Councilman Voigt’s “falsehoods.” Certainly in this day and age of “fake news,” it is good to know that the record (no pun intended) could be set straight.
Subsequently, Councilman Voigt then sent not one but TWO letters to local newspapers (The Record and The Ridgewood News, both owned by the same parent company – Gannett). Unbelievably, these letters contained more falsehoods. Moreover, The Ridgewood Blog obtained, via OPRA, a memorandum from Councilman Voigt to the Village Clerk asking that another OPRA not be fulfilled, because he did not want the information made public on The Ridgewood Blog.
The staff of The Ridgewood Blog has identified several problems here:
1. We have an elected official who repeatedly provides FAKE NEWS directly to the press.
2. We have an elected official who attempts to suppress the flow of information to the public.
3. The Ridgewood Village Council has not taken any kind of official and/or public stand against the behavior of this one rogue councilman. In fact, The Ridgewood Blog has been told that Mayor Ramon Hache reportedly said there would be “no political gain” in publicly reprimanding Councilman Voigt for his actions. So the elected body seems to be protecting itself and its badly behaved member from the public embarrassment of an official rebuke. The staff of The Ridgewood Blog is left wondering if the Council will only take action when “political gain” is involved.
4. The Village Clerk’s office should NEVER have sent the false narrative out in response to the reporter’s OPRA request. Ms. Heather Mailander, who serves the Village in dual roles as Village Manager and Village Clerk, knows better. We have heard reports (unconfirmed) that Councilman Voigt was very vocal in insisting that his fiction be forwarded to the reporter, but – if this is true – why did the Clerk’s Office comply? Were they intimidated by his supposed ranting?
5. Neither Gannett owned newspaper, The Record nor The Ridgewood News, appears to have a policy in place of fact checking letters from a public official who they know has provided fake news to them in the past. Wow!
It is indeed a sad state of affairs.
Once a douche bag, always a douche bag.
Wake up and smell the coffee Ridgewood voters. If it isn’t going to benefit Ramon politically, it isn’t going to happen.
If you think our local newspapers are for shit now, just wait; it’s going to get much worse.
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2019/11/18/how-the-gannett-gatehouse-merger-could-deepen-americas-local-news-crisis/
From our experience the village is very slow in retrieving information when the public needs it. It’s a request at times for documents. The village does not like giving out their information, unless it has been edited .
Hache doesn’t want the publicity…. CLM
at lest voigt is consistent
All of them are disgraceful, Voigt at the top of that list
I am saddened that the council is not doing something about this. Fake news going out to the press? Seriously. Voigt should be called on the carpet for this. No question about it. Ramon? Susan? Mike? Bernie? You are sitting there silently while this happens?
Come on did anyone expect Ramon to jump into a conroversty and mess up his pocket handkerchief?
Jeff will be gone soon, thank god. But wait and see who he supports.
The Ridgewood newspaper and all those other old town and rags are all bullshit. Talk about control by the top. No one is running anymore to pick up newspapers in the morning. Unless you are Up in old age .Everything is online now and you don’t even know what’s true and what’s not.
Jeff Voigt trying to keep things off the Blog. It will never happen Jeffie boy. The Blog RULES. Long live the Blog!
So…do we have a list of the lies ??
Followed up with the truth.
To whoever asked, here is the info on the lies and corrections:
https://theridgewoodblog.net/ridgewood-councilman-jeff-voigt-provided-inaccurate-information-about-one-of-his-facebook-accounts-in-response-to-a-public-records-request-ridgewood-nj/
This town gets worse every day.
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It was done about 15-20 years ago.
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It’s only taken this long to be plainly visible because momentum allowed it to maintain the illusion.
But as everyone knows (at least the graduates of Ridgewood from 30 years ago), momentum cannot be maintained indefinitely…
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The mayor and council and management can’t stand the blog.Why because they cannot control the blog. And I used to this to use to control the Ridgewood news in local newspapers. Dirty politics.
Jerry ,,you are absolutely correct..
they truly can’t stand the blog because it represents what
a majority of overtaxed towns people think and for a decade we have
protested the ongoing fleecing of long term taxpayers..
what is it now ..105 M or more not shocking enough just for the schools under Union Rule.New condos will pour kids by the 50s to 0ver 100 new kids that need top tier funding for the life of the school..numbers rarely do not go up each year in enrollment ..for renters it’s a win win..loose loose for overburdened property taxpayers .we let them build these new kid mills
photo : refer to Bogart in the Cain Mutiny..case closed