commuter garage - THE RIDGEWOOD BLOG.

February 25,2016

the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood Nj, The fact is a BCIA garage is a county owned and operated parking garage , that is paid for by Village of Ridgewood taxpayers .The Village gives up all control of the garage and Village residents have no priority.

From the Bergen Record October 13th, 2014 , “The village has been in talks with the Bergen County Improvement Authority (BCIA) for more than a year about a partnership that would ideally result in the county building a 450-space parking garage at the site of the Hudson Street lot, where there are currently only a couple dozen 12-hour metered parking spots.

The county would own and operate the garage, which the village would pay for over the course of 20-30 years from the revenue from the garage.

To put the plan into motion, the freeholders and the county executive both need to sign off on the transferring of funds from the county’s planning department to the BCIA through the approval of the resolution.” https://www.northjersey.com/news/freeholders-set-vote-on-funding-study-for-ridgewood-1.1108474?page=1

photo by Boyd Loving

Sad day for the Village – but only a day.

We should neither despair nor capitulate. We can prevent the council from handing the Village over to failed developers and downtown businesses. The May 10th election really isn’t that far away, and these things can still be derailed and prevented. Thankfully there are people working on doing just that. We need to all join in. Aronsohn knows his plans can be undone – – that is why he acts like he does when you try and nail him down on specifics. What scares him beyond belief is that if he doesn’t deliver, his developer friends will drop him like a hot potato. He’s not loved in either the local or state level democratic organizations or other groups. He knows the developers are his last hope to ever winning a real election. And yes, our current debates about Village life are all about one man’s political future (or lack thereof) – – that is what makes the sell-out so despicable.

Let’s keep the pressure up. And let’s see what happens in the May election. If those of us opposed to the overdevelopment are truly in the majority, as I suspect we are, then the council votes will reveal just that. In the meantime, lets not have this fellow undo over a hundred years of village life just so he can try and advance his own failed political career.