The Ridgewood Blog Brings a Free Market Laissez-faire Point of View to Local, New Jersey State and National Issues.
We ALL know that there is ample parking. Even Sonenfeld says so. The problem is that PROMISES WERE MADE to certain key people that a garage would be built near their properties and businesses in the business district. What Aronsohn, Saraceno, Pucciarelli, Vaggianos, Sonenfeld, Hauck and company failed to consider is that the town if full of very smart people. And the people rose up and ran a petition drive and stopped the insanity. Bye Bye Garage.
Does anybody actually believe the kid had anything to do with that letter? A show of hands, please. Letter ends, “Let’s get it done”–has a teenage boy ever said or written that sentence, especially about a parking garage? Comical idea. But mostly, I feel sick about the endless pathetic attempts to manipulate and deceive us. Are Aronsohn’s minions being treated to the marketing programs of White Horse Strategies? They’re working so hard to fleece us. More important, could all these selfish, destructive, impossibly contemptuous people please shut up and go away or become honest? Either will do. Tired of identifying their ploys and rejecting them.
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, the ex mayor Paul Aronsohn and his cronies have flooded the membership of the Ridgewood League of Women Voters. According to their website the League of Women Voters is a non-partisan political organization encourages the active and informed participation of citizens in government and influences public policy through education and advocacy.
The League does not support or oppose any candidate or party. Operating on a non-profit, voluntary basis, its work is financed by dues and contributions from members and the general public. Membership is open to all citizens of voting age.
Readers claim, “This could be the LWV’s best-ever new member drive…or the worst, since nobody wants to be with those people. Newbies include Wyne, Winograd, Sonenfeld. All at once.” While other say ,”Aronsohn has now joined the league, and Rurik and Gwenn. Must miss.”
Most readers are quite skeptical over a group of clearly proven partisan hacks joining a supposed “non-partisan political organization” .Will attempts be made to manipulate the electorate and misrepresent information like past Aronsohn campaigns ie… “the Vote Yes” for the Hudson Street garage campaign ? Or will Aronsohn be shut down in dead end political never land ?
file photo by Boyd Loving
Clearly, this was an attempt on Ms. Winograd’s part to generate a newspaper headline that the current Council was seeking to limit public comment.
Siobhan Winograd is on the anti-Knudsen team.
Let’s list the mouthpieces for the former megalomaniacs so that we’ll know we can ignore everything they say. Sonenfeld, obviously. Willett and Weitz. Winograd. Halaby, Griffith.
Why would the former council members, who were defeated resoundingly, come to the meetings to attempt to advance their failed agendas?Are they just spiteful? Do they need to grow up?
Hot button issues bring a lot of people to public meetings. To limit their input would be wrong and would make them feel that their voices do not count.
There were a lot more residents speaking against the garage and high density housing than in favor of the projects. Maybe this attempt to limit public comment is an attempt to limit dissent.
Those with a financial interest in the projects, and their paid staff, will continue to go to the meetings. It will provide more time for them in front of the mic.
August 12,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Why would the former council members, who were defeated resoundingly, come to the meetings to attempt to advance their failed agendas? Are they just spiteful? Do they need to grow up?
Clearly, this was an attempt on Ms. Winograd’s part to generate a newspaper headline that the current Council was seeking to limit public comment.
According to the Ridgewood News which slept through the entire election Winograd was “compelled” to speak looking “to relieve the contentious energy that has been brewing for months”. The “contentious” energy was voted out of office and their agenda was resoundingly rejected . Perhaps if the Ridgewood News would have posted a few per election letters to the editor they would know that.
Ridgewood NJ, Siobhan Winograd, self-appointed Mistress of Niceness, went to the podium and started whining about why can’t everyone be nice and how people’s comments are not pleasant and then she suggested that people’s comments should be cut to three minutes from five. Said she had done a bunch of research about other towns and we have more time allowed than many towns. And then she went on past the buzzer for more than five minutes.
Mayor Knudsen stated that she was trying to think of how to accommodate MORE speakers, not fewer. She was considering one possibility of shortening each speaker’s time but lengthening the time slot to 40 minutes. Clearly the Mayor is an advocate for the people and wants to hear from all of us.
Aronson left us these problems and we need to deal with them now, ourselves. How much money is too much to unravel what was done? Besides, this is not a witch hunt – – this is a targeted effort to try and determine the truth of repeated allegations of improper favoritism in Village life. There is a reason there is a law on the books that allows the council to conduct this inquiry. This is exactly the situation where an investigation is required.
I am very concerned that newly formed committees/boards/councils etc. (arts, access, more) will consider part of their mandate to come up with countless expensive projects to propose to the council, who should bravely but firmly deflect like mad and say NO to all of them. We do NOT need a performing arts center, etc.–like many things, that was another Aronsohn plan to get his picture in the paper. It didn’t happen in time for that, so let’s scrap it. Even if partial grants can be applied for, such things always involve big bucks from property taxes. We have to stop working so hard to attract more people to visit and move here, because that just creates more problems. We cannot absorb more traffic, for one thing.
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Josh Gottheimer will outline his “comprehensive plan” to spur economic growth and create jobs in New Jersey’s 5th Congressional District Wednesday.
Gottheimer another PR person like Ridgewood Mayor Paul Aronsohn .Not sure many residents will share any enthusiasm given the bad taste the Jim Mac Greevey mouth piece has left in Ridgewood .Gottheimer donor list is a who’s who of Big Government ,Unions, pro Wall Street bailouts, pro-corporate welfare , pro-crony types looking to remove the last impediment to getting their hands on more tax payer money.
According to his press release ,Gottheimer will be joined by local business leaders at Ridgewood Cycle Shop at 11 a.m in Ridgewood on Wednesday to present his “comprehensive plan” to spur economic growth and create good-paying jobs for 5th District families. The local business leaders seem to be a laundry list of the same people who brought you “Garagezilla ” and other crony related projects the soon to be former mayor Paul Aronsohn tried to jam down residents throats in Ridgewood .
For his part Rep. Scott Garrett (NJ-05) will be in Wyckoff at the Blue Moon Mexican Café at 2pm on Thursday to discuss issues facing small businesses, like restaurants, in New Jersey including taxes and health care.
file photo by Boyd Loving
“Borg and Aronsohn are very close politically, with Borg regularly providing political support for or cover to the Mayor (like during the never ending jihad against “incivility”), and bending and shaping news coverage of local events to portray Aronsohn in the best possible light. Plus giving him a recurring column in The Ridgewood News. One wonders if our new mayor will be provided the same platform to expound his or her views and priorities.”
“The Recorg is a rag and I have enjoyed watching it die a slow painful death.
I hope the Borg family lost money on the sale. They damaged my familie’s business back in the early nineties with a politically biased false narrative published in The Record based on the Borg family’s liberal progressive anti business bias. Good ridence…”
“Borg’s sold the Record property, sold the Record, sold out NJ news integrity because of a traffic jam. But they love Ma Weinberg and her crew of Southeast Bergen and Hudson County Democrats. It’s a great day in America.”
“Maybe we can count on some un-biased news coverage under new ownership? It really couldn’t get any worse. The Ridgewood News used to be a decent community newspaper that covered all of the school plays and neighborhood happenings. Recently it’s been a megaphone for union bozos and local political hacks.”
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, we have to laugh at this one , NJ.COM is reporting that State Sen. Kevin O’Toole (R-Essex) claims that a threat was made in 2005 by Paul DiGaetano, then a leading Republican assemblyman dreaming about a long-shot bid for governor against him. In the article O’Tool claimed that he was threatened by Paul DiGaetano in a meeting over his endorsement of DiGaetano for Governor.
Wow is this a case of the pot calling the Kettle black !
The funny thing is that State Sen. Kevin O’Toole is a well know political bully who has threatened his opponents in the past and gone as far as calling their bosses at work claiming they were campaigning on company time and trying to get them fired.
O’Tool has also threatened the Ridgewood blog and it founder , in that instance he made threats from his car on Route 17 north near the Bendex Diner and only backed off when a blog staff member pulled out a camera.
O’Tool is also rumored to be plotting with with Democrat soon to be Former Ridgewood Mayor Paul Aronsohn to make a run for the current seat held by Rep.Scott Garrett (R).
June 9,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood with a little help from our friends
Ridgewood NJ ,According to Ridgewood resident Derek Schnure this Another Aronsohn propaganda piece — you’ll see if you drill into the info on the website. VOTE NO!
The word is the video was produced by a company that the son of the Hillman lighting company owns or works for. So there may have been no cost. However, was it filmed when Roberta, Chris, Bob, etc were working? Meaning that they were making this film and reading our mayor’s script when they were supposed to be actually working? Now there’s a cost
Dear Nattering Nobs of Negativity,
Earlier this week, I sent an e-notice reminder to vote in this week’s primary election. I also indicated that on June 21st there would be another election to determine whether or not to finance a parking deck at Hudson Street. There is background information on the website that you may want to consider while making your decision. Here is the link: www.ridgewoodnj.net
Best,
Roberta Sonenfeld
Village Manager
201-670-5500, ext. 203
Ridgewood NJ, readers continue to takes issue with Gwenn “drunken tiriad” at village hall after the humiliating defeat of the Aronsohn slate .Many residents can’t get over the fact that Gwenn lost it the night everyone met at the Community Center to hear the election results. She certainly had been drinking but that really is a non issue( Many drunks are nice!) .
Gwenn literally went into the face of a resident screaming and cursing and saying, ” Are you fucking gloating” and other curses. Her extremely rude husband who,is known for his rudeness, grabbed her to take her away all the while smiling and saying, ” we have freedom of speech, she can say anything she wants!” A classy act .
All three of the outgoing council members have demonstrated serious narcissistic rage issues. So many have witnessed these rants or have been the victim of them.
They have held these anti free speech civility meetings for two years basically attacking everything and everyone but themselves.
If the new council is only better in this department, we are most definitely in a better place. The behavior has affected so many areas of village government including not allowing for real conversation about problems in the departments.
Add that to the fact that the village manager acted as a 6th council member and was encouraged to do so made it impossible for Susan and Mike to have the impact they tried so hard for.
Fortunately, for residents a perfect storm developed: so many citizen groups with a variety of issues speaking out at once. There was no way they were going to beat that and that it is why they tried to push everything through in such an aggressive manner so quickly.
march 24,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, the no2BCIA petition was certified by the village clerk at the village council open public meeting tonight. (certified means she confirmed that we needed 814 signatures and we had at least 814 valid signatures).
The petition provided two options -the council could either withdraw the ordinance 3519 (bond for garage through BCIA), or put that as a referendum question to the voters of Ridgewood.
The mayor tonight at the council meeting, promised that he will be introducing an ordinance to repeal ordinance 3519 (BCIA funding) at the next meeting, and he decided not to proceed with the referendum question on the May ballot.
According to the petitioners , based on understanding of the law, the BCIA option for garage funding, as it was passed in ordinance 3519 appears to be dead for now.
Ridgewood will get a garage that’s funded by a local bond where Ridgewood will be in complete control. (The size of the garage is still an open question, and if you would like to be a part of petition, which will request the council to consider a smaller sized garage that’s right for that specific lot, please reach out to us at its2big.com
file photo by Boyd Loving
March 24,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ,last night It was a very predictable, 3-2 votes on anything meaningful and the majority stating all the reasons they were voting yes except representing the people. The leaving council majority aka the 3 amigos are enacting a “scorched earth policy” as they will be gone. Turn out was lower than expected because so many saw the vote as a for gone conclusion.
Zoning vote 3-2
Garage vote 5-0
All 5 voted for the Village to bond the garage not the county., Susan and Mike had no other choice but to vote that way because the council majority aka the 3 Amigos would have just gone to the BCPA. This way Ridgewood may retain control of the size, commuter parking and rates. Mike said something about researching a surcharge for businesses owner that are close to the garage to defray cost of maintenance.
The traffic study spokesman talked about increased traffic in several locations( 2 on Broad) and that is without the consideration of the garage. He mentioned some additional policing. No one in the garage discussion talked about the need for policing there or the need of an attendant. I believe I could live with the garage if it was one deck shorter, remained completely on the foot print and the street parking spaces would remain on Broad and Hudson Streets. Local business in those locations will take a hit without them.
Residents again questioned how is it that the council majority refuses to listen to the public? Could it be that they truly are in their own heads and are immune to incoming sounds,like the voices of the residents?
One nuclear physicist spoke wondering how they could be so emphatically certain that the were correct and that the developers could see no cause for concern? He said nothing is that certain and his world is one of exactness.
Mike and Susan seemed on there game and nobody clapped for Rurik and Jim when pontificated .
For most residents it is just too much development/ construction at once ,Yes these developments will bring traffic. The Hudson garage will not be enough. and the business owners must be salivating but most central business district businesses will not survive the construction phase.
Lastly Former Mayor Kieth Killion gets the last laugh , so many voted for this trio ,now buyers remorse .