photos by Boyd Loving
April 30,2015
Boyd LovingDoes anyone know if the Village of Ridgewood (VOR) is exempt from NJ State Department of Motor Vehicle regulations as they pertain to motor vehicle inspection?
On Thursday, 04/30, two (2) VOR owned vehicles were observed with expired inspection stickers (Parks Department pickup truck and marked police car) and another VOR vehicle without an inspection sticker (looked like a fleet maintenance truck).
Considering that the inspection stickers are expired (or non-existent), it is possible that the vehicle registrations may be expired as well.
So are we above the law/exempt from the law, or is it just gross incompetence on the part of whomever is supposed to keep track of these things?
Inquiring minds would like to know . .
Boyd,
perhaps if repairs are done by a “certified repair” service I believe they can then be OK.
yeah boyd , do you know that fleet service just lost three more fleet workers. and the last three are going this year. the village is only hiring part time workers, and do you think they are going to care . in six months they will be laid off, just like the yard waste workers.they are sending out car,s and trucks to paramus d p w and it,s not working out. talk to joe cap at fleet service and he will give you the reel scoop. because when you talk to the top all you are going to get is a b s story.
if thats a cop car that is the best.
“Boyd,
perhaps if repairs are done by a “certified repair” service I believe they can then be OK”
The law requires vehicles to pass NJ State inspection and display stickers indicating same. VOR is not exempt, trust me.
It is just gross incompetence on the part of whomever is supposed to keep track of those things as well as incompetence on the part of any Department Heads who would permit an employee to operate a vehicle with an expired inspection sticker. Get the vehicles registered and inspected as REQUIRED BY LAW.
the town fleet dep’t used to be. but now they are not hiring certified repair service crew. they are all part time helpers. talk about being in a danger. this is not good. the manager likes part time help. little pay, = little brains.this will not work.all these part time workers don’t give a hoot because it’s a deed end job .in 24 weeks they will be laid off. yes thats the reel truth.
O WELL the manager likes to say OUT SOURCE well this is what you get. we the tax people of this village will not get what we are paying for. big taxes and less service. they are trying to fool us with cheep labor , part time help and day labors. look around and open up your eyes it’s your tax money.
I used to have a problem with all the ” Boyd Loving Photo ” but you are so on the money Boyd. The town is not exempt from the state regulations. You will see now, all the vehicles will have up to date inspections !!!
What a joke Ridgewood has become. Feel real bad for the long time mechanics. All pride is gone
COP CAR
Sounds like a bunch of complainers (and retired Village employees) about outsourcing fleet repair to Paramus. Shared services are in my friends, welcome to the world where taxes cannot just forever go up to pay for duplication of services across Ridgewood, Paramus, Glenrock, Midland Park, Waldwick and Ho Ho Kus. As for Boyd’s concern, I agree with 7:16pm, this is nothing more than incompetence on the part of any Department Heads who would permit an employee to operate a vehicle with an expired inspection sticker.
Any Village owned vehicle with an expired inspection sticker or no instpection stiicker should be taken off the road immediately. Further, any Village owned vehicles with expired registations should be pulled from service. This is simply a disgrace. NJ State Police should be called in to inspect our fleet for compliance.
Hey Boyd – Suggest you send this photo to Dave Grubb at the Joint Insurance Fund. They’d be interested to know that we are not complying with State laws. If one of the uninspected and/or unregistered vehicles gets into an accident, plaintiff’s attorney will have a field day. Huge payouts possible if jury is convinced we were negligent in maintaining the vehicle as proven by fact that we knowingly ignored laws. Roberta is certainly asleep at the controls on this one.
It’s funny, the people to blame for the loss of our own mechanics is Police & Fire. Look at how much of the Village budget they eat up now, it’s right there on page 17 and 19 of our Village budget here https://mods.ridgewoodnj.net/pdf/manager/2015BudgetPresentation.pdf. 60% of our budget is now contractual obligations including wages, pensions, healthcare and accumulated leave. We have to pay out $715,000 in accumulated leave payouts just between 2015 – 2017 just for 9 retirees, ie $80,000 per retiree. And you wonder why we can no longer afford mechanics? Next time you see a cop sitting in their car watching PSE&G workers for us, thank them for the loss of our fleet mechanics. Public safety officials have pigged out so much, soon they’re going to be all we can afford anymore.
$715,000 in Village accumulated leave retirement payouts for nine retirees is what we’d rsther pay for than have six of our own fleet mechanics !
Ha ha. If we weren’t paying a bunch of 50 and 60 year olds to play golf in Florida, maybe we could afford a garage. We already have our top 12 Village retirees each making over $100,000 a year pensions, and that $100K group will include more than 20 members by 2017. That’s equal to over $2 million a year right there that could have paid for some mechanics and a garage… that’s in addition to the six months of accumulated leave at retirement.
Cops too busy talking on their cell phones and booking OT to get their registration renewed
$850,000 in missing quarters could have paid for a few vehicle registrations instead of being pissed away on beer money
7:54pm, your tax money is at work… paying retirees not to work and get discounts on their Viagra
Interesting….I wonder why some of these posts that are critical of village employees are from an IP address located overseas?
WHAT ABOUT PAID FULL TIME FIRE DEP’T, and all other dept’s in the village are down to lowest amount of workers ever . this new group of council members mayors, and top managers are making this town go down the tubes. these other services are going down, but it’s ok we have a paid fire dept in 2015, wow great. people don’t move into town because of a paid fire dept. it’s schools and services.Im in town for 45 years,
All these posters complaining about the paid Fire Department I have a question for you. Where is your application to become a volunteer Firefighter? What, you can’t be a volunteer. Why not? Oh huh I understand you want someone else to volunteer so you can benefit in the savings without having to sacrifice yourself. Now I understand.
I wonder what percentage of the Village’s fleet is “non compliant.” Anyone want to hazard a guess?
most don’t give a hoot about a savings from having a paid fire dept. because what we are saving in fire inc under home owners we all pay in tax ‘s so one way or another you pay.
11’38 needs to get the right info.
to 5;41 well the fleet manager is in charge right. oh he was moved out of that dep’t back in nov for some kind of a problem. who is in charge of fleet now ?
the village manager is. she is OUT SOURCING IT ALL TO SAVE MONEY , but it;s not working out is it. we the village is giving up power not a good thing. out sourcing is just a bull shit story for not rehiring workers. sounds real good, but to all the tax payers it;s not. why you ask well when you send things out of the village to get done, they need to make money. think about it. if this was such a good thing it would of bin done by every town.
what happen’ed to the DOCTOR,?????????. he was in charge.
is it true that mr john spano is in charge of the fleet garage, if so what does he know about fleet service . my god is the manager in the clouds or she just don’t give a shit. witch is it. can the mayor or big al tell us. oh I forgot they are in the same ship. what a mess.whats next
Like I said people, obscene $80,000 per Village retiree in accumulated leave payouts over the next three years to nine retirees and 60% of the Village budget locked up on contractual obligations means we’d rather pay a bunch of retirees than have our own garage and fleet service… ask yourself who is getting the bulk of those payouts, wages and benefits (hint: it’s not the mechanics).
no it’s the police dep’t, the state needs to go after that group. the rest are going home with that
to 9,30 ( are not)
This is hilarious. No one in this town should get pulled over for an expired inspection sticker until our own fleet gets up to speed. How great would it be if one of our Village Council members or the Village Manager has an expired sticker. Well, if they do, I am sure they are getting right on that Monday morning.
THE DOCTOR,
who is the doctor. and who is the boss of the truck service dep’t. maybe we need to call in the state d o t.
The Doctor is now working for the municipality of West Milford.
ok so who is in charge of the fleet service, who is the manager .some one must be the boss of that dep’t, right or is all the work just sent out.
some seen ridgewood police cars going back and forth to the paramus d p w garage for repair work. is this happening or not. if so why is it. this should be done in house.
Home rule is gone, we can’t afford it anymore because of public safety wages, pensions & benefits, and accumulated leave. That eats up too much of the budget now, can’t afford our own fleet mechanics.
So the root cause of this problem isn’t that we have incompetent managers, it’s that we pay our public safety workers too much? How screwed up is that thinking! Nice try Amigos!
Well 8:29 am this is Typical of the low information voter who is intellectually lazy…..they just attack Police and Firefightes and blame them for everything. It’s not at all possible that the people who they voted for are responsible for anything like piss poor management of funds or resources. That could never happen.
Nice try 9:05am to distort the facts which are right there on page 17 and 19 of our Village budget (https://mods.ridgewoodnj.net/pdf/manager/2015BudgetPresentation.pdf ). 60% of our budget is now contractual obligations including wages, pensions, healthcare and accumulated leave. We have to pay out $715,000 in accumulated leave payouts just between 2015 – 2017 just for 9 retirees, ie $80,000 per retiree. And you wonder why we can no longer afford mechanics?
9:05, Village taxes are basically unchanged since 2012, so contractual obligations are squeezing our ability to pay for other items. You may remember when Village taxes used to rise 4-5% every year, but that wasn’t going to pay mechanics. All of those increases were for public safety wages and benefits, which is why the contracts eat up so much of the budget today. Clearly you’re just trying to defend bad contracts that rip off taxpayers and force us to cut fleet services, without any effort to explain why.
Interesting new union tactics, blaming “low information voters who are intellectually lazy”… How screwed up is that thinking? We can all read the budget. Nice try amigos !
yea at the top they are so full of shit. we need to out source the mayor two of the council and manager. and who ever rides the same bus as them. because they are sending this town down the hill with no brakes.
wake up people.
Ok 12:34 and 12:45 PM it’s obvious you never ran a business or have any experience in business accounting.
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According to the Society for Human Resource Management – (https://www.shrm.org/pages/default.aspx)
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The percentage of your budget allotted for labor, which includes employee salaries, also takes into consideration payroll and unemployment insurance taxes, benefits, reimbursements, overtime, workers compensation, leave time and holiday pay.
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Depending on the sector of your business, you may spend between 40 to 80 percent of gross revenues on employee salaries and benefits combined. Salaries alone can account for 18 to 52 percent of your operating budget, according to the Society for Human Resource Management.
(https://www.shrm.org/pages/default.aspx)
Considering that the Village is NOT a for profit enterprise the labor costs for Police and Firefighters, by percentage in the Village budget, is well within accepted guidelines for government accounting. Particularly for a business in the service industry, which exactly describes the Village end product, a service, not a product. In this case, payroll will make up at least 50 percent or more of the gross revenue. In the service industry, your employees are your merchandise; instead of buying goods, you pay for your employees’ labor.
Gee 12:34 PM , I wonder why you didn’t mention the information on Page 16 of the Village Budget Document you cited as a reference
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https://mods.ridgewoodnj.net/pdf/manager/2015BudgetPresentation.pdf
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You know the page that says……
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Expense Decreases:
◦ Decrease in Fire salaries & wages – $350K.
◦ Decrease in Gasoline – $200K.
◦ Significantly sized departments are within 1% of last year’s budget or
actual.
DPW (5.2 million) including higher dumping & lower gas is – 3%
versus 2014 budget, 0% vs 2014 actual.
Recreation is 5% less than budget & actual.
Parks is 1% over budget & actual.
Fire is 9% less than prior year’s budget & 7% less than actual.
Graydon Pool is 4% less than prior year’s budget & 5% less than
actual.
◦ Maintaining overall staffing levels across the board except for
investment spending.
◦ Decrease in labor attorney fees (decrease of $46K) due to
establishment of an HR capability.
◦ Formulation of a realistic Parking Utility Budget.
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So much for your FALSE statement that ”
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You may remember when Village taxes used to rise 4-5% every year, but that wasn’t going to pay mechanics. All of those increases were for public safety wages and benefits, which is why the contracts eat up so much of the budget today.” Clearly you chose to cherry pick your information Charlie!
Uh, oil prices are down from $100 per barrel to $60 per barrel since last summer, so our Village gasoline and heating bill should be down. Guess you don’t read the news. Newsflash: our Village taxes are rising this year in spite of any savings, and despite letting six mechanics from fleet services go. Why? To pay for pensions, healthcare and accumulated leave. You’re clearly part of the status quo, and nothing in the status quo can continue.
Who’s Xarlie?
Ah 3;48 PM the taxes are going up because of the incompetence of the management with our on the job training village manager who has made so many elementary blunders costing taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars. We should have never hired someone to fill the managers position who needed on the job training. We should have hired a proven and experienced municipal manager.
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And NEWS FLASH the biggest increase in the property taxes are through the BOE. You are clearly part of the failed leadership in the Village or one of their supporters you can’t see the forest through the trees. Sorry Charlie you can’t support your ridicules claims with any facts so you just make stupid statements and claims and hope someone believes you. Sorry Charlie, no one believes what you say anymore.
Looks like our delusional Fire Captain is back. He wants the Village to be run like a business, but then cannot understand when a professional manager needs to outsource fleet services because over 60% of the Village budget is already tied up in contractual obligations ? I think the last Village manager cost us millions on his failure to promote at least two people within the paid fire dept. one in a $500k (originally $3.5mn) judgement against the Village on a whistle blower case against the dept. and another failure to promote someone with military service to Captain, so taxpayers ended up paying for two captains salaries and pensions instead of one. Are you claiming that the Vilkage Manager has something to do with expired vehicle registrations?
Guess 4:47 pm is another failed applicant for the Village Manager’s role. She’s doing a great job. The last two supposed “experienced” managers cost us millions. Remember the “golden toilet”? The heads of each department are at fault if they’re allowing any of their staff to drive in vehicles with expired registrations, and they should be fired if they knew given the legal risk to the Village that creates.