December 9,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, at Wednesday night’s Council meeting Mayor Knudsen suggested that the missions and bylaws of boards and committees need to be reviewed. Some have cumbersome bylaws some have none, while others overstep beyond the original intent. Some, most notably the Financial Advisory Committee, border on performing management functions.
While the volunteer efforts of committee and board members is greatly appreciated and was duly acknowledged, the fact remains that these hard-working individuals need guidelines under which to function.
Interesting this obvious point resulted in an angry, nasty, vituperative outburst from Councilman Voigt, who made wild accusations about Mayor Knudsen. Were we back in the days of the 3 amigos and their consorts? One could close one’s eyes and think, for a horrifying moment, that the angry quartet of Aronsohn-Pucciarelli-Hauck-Sonenfeld had returned to the dais.
Desperately defending the worthless Financial Advisory Committee, just going on and on about it. The committee that adds nothing to the Village ,has no minutes and no defined responsibilities .The FAC was set up and used by the Aronsohn and Co. to oust former Mayor Kieth Killion and discredit Village Manager Ken Gabbert.
Paraphrasing Shakespeare…….methinks thou dost protest too much. Who is pulling your strings to protect the FAC with such venom??? (and the Jeopardy answer to that question is……).
The other four elected officials (you know, the four that are level headed and do not have people behind the scenes telling them what to do) agreed that Mayor Knudsen’s suggestion is valid and that the review of committee and board bylaws will be worthwhile…..all while Councilman Voigt continued to spew his objections. A template for committee bylaws will be developed, thus providing a framework for each group.
Well that is just not good enough, New council members were well warned about ceding power to nameless special interest run committees. It was a huge mistake not disbanding this “fake” finance committee right from the get go. FAC which only exists to push and justify special interest politics on Village Taxpayers. There is nothing they have to offer about running the Village that could not be found in the comment section of the Ridgewood blog over the last 10 years . FAC is no less of a joke than that ridiculous”civility “committee set up to squash free speech and stifle dissent .
